Hot Streak Continues with Another Win in Orem
August 24, 2015 - Pioneer League (PL)
Ogden Raptors News Release
OREM - After a winless 0-for-4 first half at the Home of the Owlz, the Ogden Raptors (14-8, 33-27) have taken the first two games of the series at Orem in the second half after a 10-6 win on Sunday afternoon.
Matt Jones hit his third home run in two games and is 6-for-10 with six RBI in the series so far.
"When a hitter is hitting well, he's says 'I'm seeing the ball well', and I know Matt is seeing the ball well," said Raptors manager John Shoemaker.
Sunday saw a combined 12 pitchers, six for each team, and a combined 16 runs. Ogden jumped out to a 3-0 lead after three innings with Jones' RBI double scoring Scott De Jong in the first and consecutive RBI groundouts from Gersel Pitre and Jordan Paroubeck in the third scoring Deion Ulmer and Gage Green.
Orem scored the next four runs to briefly take the lead in the fifth inning, 4-3, on Jordan Serena's RBI triple and Brendan Sanger's RBI single. Sanger finished the game 3-for-3 and is 6-for-7 in the series so far with three extra-base hits and three runs batted in.
Ogden regained the lead for good in the top half of the sixth inning on two, two-run home runs from Jimy Perez and Green. It was Perez' first home run for the Raptors, and Green's second.
The Owlz made it a one-run game in the bottom of the seventh inning when the first four batters led off with base hits. Clint Freeman then retired the next three batters to limit the damage.
The Raptors added insurance runs in the final two frames with Alex Santana's leadoff home run in the eighth inning, and Jones' two-out, two-run blast off the top of the right-centerfield scoreboard in the ninth.
"I give credit to Brink. He's put a lot of effort towards me, giving me a lot of time out of his day to help me with mine," Jones said. "Just little things - slowing the game down, seeing the ball, trying not to do too much." (see Matt Jones' postgame interview above)
"Jones just needed to make sure he is ready to crush every pitch away - every pitch away," said hitting coach Darryl Brinkley. "I give him a little leeway of being a little bit long on the pitch away, but he has to be short in and he has to keep his head on the ball."
Marcus Crescentini walked two batters and struck out two in a hitless, scoreless ninth to close out the game.
In just his second start, Chris Powell went 3 2/3 innings, striking out five while allowing just one, unearned run. Rob McDonnell and Freeman ran into some trouble in relief, but Andrew Istler and Bernardo Reyes did not allow a run, although Istler (2-1) did walk two batters in picking up his second win of the year.
"We didn't play well tonight, luckily we outscored them," Shoemaker said. "A lot of things happened today that shouldn't happen to a good team - a lot of base-running mistakes, a lot of physical errors, mental mistakes, too many walks, but its going to happen to every team in the league and we just have to try to see if we can minimize those mistakes."
Ogden's Ivan Vieitez will face Orem's Jose Rodriguez in the third game of the series on Monday night in Orem. First pitch is scheduled for 7:15pm MT.
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