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B a s e b a l l
M e x i c o
October 07, 2 0 1 7
Mexican
Baseball Road Trip: Tucson, Arizona
Mexican Baseball Fiesta
Day 1 - October 6, 2017
Tucson
Mexican Baseball Fiesta: Day Two Report
Day Two of the
2017 Mexican Baseball Fiesta in Tucson’s Kino
Stadium on Friday saw a reasonably close first game in which the
defending
Mexican Pacific League champion Mexicali Aguilas held off a Cincinnati
Reds
Arizona Instructional League team, 4-3, as Yuniesky Betancourt singled,
doubled
and drove in two runs. The
much-anticipated nightcap between Hermosillo and Obregon, two longtime
LMP
rivals, ended up being an 8-1 Naranjeros romp as starting pitcher Cesar
Vargas
tossed three innings of one-hit scoreless ball while veterans Jason
Bourgeois,
Carlos Gastelum and Jose Amador evenly split six hits and scored four
runs
between them. Throughout the evening,
however, a festive mood prevailed in the ballpark as live bands played
on the
concourse, mascots took parts in between-innings skits and fans from
Arizona
and Mexico got to enjoy an evening of baseball, Mexican-style.
In the opener,
Cincinnati opened the scoring in the top of
the second inning when Morgan Lofstrom redirected a Javier Solano
offering off and
over the top of the wall in right-center for a leadoff homer. Solano then bore down and struck out the next
three Reds batters. Mexicali came back
in the bottom of the frame with a pair of runs.
C.J. Retherford led off with a single and came around to score
on Ricky
Alvarez' double against the center field wall to tie the game. After Josh Romanosky struck out, Ramon Rios
punched a single to left to bring Alvarez in with the go-ahead run.
The defending
MexPac champion Aguilas added to their advantage
in the bottom of the third with two more runs.
With one out, Yordanys Linares and Walter Ibarra hit
back-to-back soft
singles, bringing up Yuniesky Betancourt.
After Linares and Ibarra successfully pulled off a double steal,
Betancourt smoked a Luis Alecis pitch down the third-base line into
left field,
scoring both baserunners and bringing about Alecis' exit.
Reds reliever Tanner Rainey struck out both
Retherford and Alvarez to end the inning, but Mexicali had themselves a
4-1
lead after three.
Cincinnati got
two runs back in the top of the fourth, both
after the first two batsmen were retired by Solano. Lofstrom rapped a
single to
right and then scored when Mark Kolozsvary doubled into the gap in
right-center. Leandro Santana then singled up the middle to bring in
Kolozsvary, but was gunned down trying to take second on Linares' throw
to the
plate after catcher Francisco Cordoba's subsequent throw barely beat
Santana to
the bag on a close call. That ended both
the inning and the night for Solano, who finished his four entradas
of work after allowing three runs on four hits with six
strikeouts.
From that point
on, it was up to Mexicali’s bullpen to hold
the Reds scoreless over the last three frames of the seven-inning
contest. After Marco Quevedo retired the
side in order
in the fifth, newcomer Nolan Becker, who led the independent Can-Am
League with
24 saves for champion Quebec this summer, ran into some trouble in the
top of
the sixth by walking the first two Cincy batsmen he faced (Jeter Downs
and Taylor
Trammell) before getting the next two hitters out, although Montrell
Marshall
sacrificed both runners to third and second, respectively.
Aguilas manager Roberto Vizcarra then brought
in another fresh face, Victor Capellan, to strike out Kolozsvary and
end the
inning.
Capellan, who
went 4-4 with a 1.25 ERA for Winnipeg in the
indy American Association, went on to post a 1-2-3 seventh for the save
as the
Aguilas mound staff combined to hold the Reds to three hits on the
night. Solano earned the win for Mexicali
while
Alecis took the loss for Cincinnati after giving up four runs on six
hits in
2.1 innings. Betancourt had two of Mexicali's seven hits with two RBIs
while
Linares and Rios both reached base twice.
Lofstrom singled, homered and scored two runs for the Reds.
In the second
game, Hermosillo and Obregon swapped zeros
through the first two innings before the Naranjeros put three runs on
the board
in the top of the third. Carlos Gastelum
led off with a single, then came around from first base on a Domonic
Brown
double. Obregon manager Miguel Ojeda took out starting pitcher Irwin
Delgado
and brought in Martin Sotelo to pitch to veteran slugger Luis Alfonso
Garcia. The move paid immediate
dividends as Sotelo got Garcia looking for a strikeout.
Things looked even brighter after Brown was
caught stealing third while Jose Amador was batting on a terrific throw
by
Yaquis catcher Jose Felix for the second out of the inning, and it
didn't seem
to matter much at the time when Amador singled.
Ojeda then brought in Adrian Ramirez to pitch to Fernando Perez,
who
promptly doubled and moved Amador to third.
Jose Cardona came up and rapped a single that scored both Amador
and
Perez to give the Naranjeros a 3-0 lead before Ramirez got Arturo
Rodriguez to
fly out to right to end the inning.
The Naranjeros
broke the game wide open with three more runs
in the top of the fourth. After Jorge
Flores popped out to the catcher to open the inning, the next five
Hermosillo
batters either singled or walked, with Roberto Ramos' bases-loaded walk
pushing
Jason Bourgeois across with one counter and a sharp Amador single
bringing in
both Gastelum and Brown to make it a 6-0 Hermosillo lead over their
bitter
rivals (a Naranjeros-Yaquis matchup is the MexPac's version of the
Yankees and
Red Sox in terms of intensity).
The Yaquis
finally broke their scoreless spell after
Hermosillo starter Cesar Vargas was taken out after three innings. Reliever Sergio Alvarado struggled in the
fourth, starting with Carlos Valencia’s leadoff double into the left
field
corner. Valencia advance to third on an
infield single by Paul Leon and scored on Jonathan Aranda's flyout to
left,
breaking up Hermosillo's shutout bid.
Jose Felix added a single to put Leon in scoring position but
Felix Pie's
groundout to second ended the threat.
Not that it
really mattered, as Hermosillo plated two more
runs in the top of the fifth when Flores singled in pinch-runner Ciro
Norzagaray and Flores scored on Irving Lopez' groundout to second,
bringing the
rout to its final 8-1 count as neither team scored the rest of the way..
Bourgeois,
Gastelum and Amador each had two singles, combined
to score four runs and drive in four more for the victorious
Naranjeros, who
outhit Obregon, 11-6. Nobody had more
than one safety for the Yaquis, with Valencia and Irving Falu
contributing
doubles on a night that clearly belonged to Hermosillo.
Vargas' three innings of work earned him the
win, but it almost seems unfair that the loss should be hung on
Delgado, whose
two-plus innings (in which he gave up one run on three hits and as many
walks)
was probably the Yaquis’ pitching highlight, which sort of says it all
right
there.
Saturday's Day Three schedule at the Mexican Baseball Fiesta will begin with a 5:30PM PDT contest between Mexicali and Los Mochis, with the Caneros making their 2017 Tucson debut by taking CIncinnati’s place in the foursome. That game will be followed by an Hermosillo-Obregon rematch.
FOR MORE BASEBALL NEWS FROM MEXICO, VISIT www.BaseballMexico.com