Wenatchee AppleSox Stumble In 1st Loss in 8 Days

Joel Norman AppleSox Media

The Wenatchee AppleSox lost for the first time since July 6 as the Victoria HarbourCats defeated them, 8-4, on Friday night at Royal Athletic Park.

Mason Strong recorded his fourth consecutive multi-hit game while simultaneously extending his hitting streak to eight games. He went 3-for-5 with his second three-hit effort of the season. Strong is batting .359 overall and .485 (16-for-33) during his streak.

Wenatchee (25-9) scored the game’s first four runs but surrendered the next eight to drop the first game of a road series for the first time in seven instances. The loss snapped the AppleSox’ six-game winning streak and gave them their first defeat since July 6.

A four-run barrage in the fifth put the AppleSox up first. Marty Kaplan and Sebastian David opened up with a walk and a single, respectively, and were sacrificed up 90 feet. Strong singled down the third base line to drive in the first run and Josh Williams launched a long fly ball to right field that nearly was his fourth home run in the last three days but landed a couple feet short of leaving the park. His sacrifice fly made it 2-0, Wenatchee, and then Reeve Boyd singled in another run before Brandham Ponce scored from third on a throwing error.

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The HarbourCats scored five times in the bottom of the inning, all with two outs. The first two hitters reached base before Ryan Martinez struck out the next two. An RBI single got the HarbourCats on the board but then a ground ball to the left side with two outs and runners at the corners that seemed poised to end the inning led to four more runs scoring. Reeve Boyd’s throw to Sebastian David missed the glove as the glare prevented David from seeing the ball allowing everyone to be safe and a run to score. A three-run homer a batter later gave the HarbourCats the lead for good. Victoria tacked on a run in the seventh and two more in the eighth to add to the lead and cap the scoring.

The AppleSox look to even up the series on Saturday night when they face the HarbourCats in the second game of the three game series.  Wenatchee’s next home game is on Monday against the Bend Elks at 6:35pm.