Final from Friday night at First National Bank Field:
Greensboro Grasshoppers 17, Winston-Dash 3
WP:Steven Jennings(1-0)
LP:Johan Dominguez(2-3)
Hoppers(13-15)/Dash(15-13)
Hoppers' line:17-11-0 Dash' line: 3- 3-0
Attendance:5,593
Time of Game/TOG-3:20
The Greensboro Grasshoppers scored two runs in the second inning, one run in the third inning, two runs in the fourth inning, one run in the fifth inning, four runs in the seventh inning, and then they closed out their scoring with seven big runs in the eighth inning, to claim their first win of the season, and their first win of the series, over the Winston-Salem Dash…The Dash runs came few and far in-between, and it was a loud Grasshoppers’ victory, 17-3, over the Dash on Friday night, at FNB Field…
The Hoppers called on four different pitchers to carry their load on Friday evening, with starter Tahnaj Thomas going three and a third innings, then Will Kobos came in from the bullpen, and Kobos put in two-thirds of an inning of work….One run and just one hit for the WS Dash off of starter Thomas, and the Dash got no runs and no hits off of reliever Kobos…Thomas walked two Dash batters and struck out three, while Kobos walked one, and struck out two…
Steven Jennings, a Hopper pitcher back in 2019, when the Hoppers were at the Class A Level, Jennings came on to get the win, in his first appearance at the High A Level for the Pittsburgh Pirates….Jennings worked two innings, giving up two runs, on two hits, while walking two WS Dash batters, and striking out one…Jennings left the game with an ERA of 4.50….Turned out to be a nice return to First National Bank Field, for Steven Jennings, on Friday night…Austin Roberts took the mound for the Hoppers in the final frame of the game(9th inning), and the righty Roberts gave up no runs, on no hits, he walked two, and struck out two Dash batters…
The pitching was far more than efficient/effective on Friday night, and then you had the Hoppers at the plate….
How do you begin to put a bow on this phase of the Grasshoppers’ baseball game on Friday night???
Some say ‘Bang the Drum Slowly’, but the Greensboro Grasshoppers were “Banging the Drum Loudly”, on Friday night….
Let’s just start at the Top of the Batting Order, and go right through the batting lineup, and see how everybody did…
Matt Frazier 1-4/2 BB’s/2 Runs…Frazier leaves the game batting a team-leading .298….Liover Peguero 2-4/BB/HBP/Run/RBI/SB…Aaron Shackleford 1-3/HR/3 BB’s/3 Runs…LoLo Sanchez 0-2/3 BB’s/2 Runs/2 RBI…Fabricio Macias 2-5/2 Runs/2 RBI…Jared Triolo 2-4/BB/3 Runs/RBI…Grant Koch 2-4/4 RBI…Will Matthiessen 1-4/BB/HR/2 Runs/3 RBI…Claudio Finol 0-4/BB/Run…
Aaron Shackleford blasted his ninth home run of the season on Friday night, while Will Matthiessen connected for his first Hopper homer of the season…Shackleford now with 19 RBI for the year, plus you now have Jared Triolo and Fabricio Macias, each with 17 RBI…
The Hoppers’ offense was plenty potent on Friday night….As we look back at the game, one of the wilder runs scored during the Friday night affair, came when the WS Dash catcher Daniel Millwee was at the plate in the third inning…Millwee got hit by a pitch from the Hoppers’ Tahnaj Thomas, so Millwee jogged on down to first base…Millwee got to second base, when he stole the second base bag, but he was just safe, on a much/highly contested safe call…Then Millwee takes third base on a passed ball, that got past the Hoppers’ catcher Grant Koch..Millwee now at third base and he is awarded home, due to a balk on the pitcher Thomas, and Millwee scores the WS Dash first run of the game…Hit by a Pitch, a Stolen Base, a Passed Ball, and then a Balk….You never know how a baseball player might score a run…
Another interesting time of the game in the bottom of the eighth inning, when the WS Dash turned to their first baseman from Thursday night’s game, Lazaro Leal and put him on the mound to finish out the last two-thirds of the game…Leal, the first baseman now pitching, gave up two runs on one hit, he walked three Hopper batters, struck out none, and left the game with his ERA at 27.00…..
We saw quite a bit of baseball on Friday night, and the good thing is, the Hoppers left out with a win/victory over Winston-Salem…
So, with the victory/win on Friday night, the Dash now lead the series, 3-1/Three-Games-to-One….Both teams back at on Saturday night at 6:30pm, with LHP Omar Cruz going for the Hoppers, and RHP Isaiah Carranza ready to go for the Dash…Be sure to click on and listen to some of the game from GSOHoppers.com….Pregame around 6:10, and you can get a direct LIVE feed broadcast signal of the game, when you CLICK HERE…..