Naturals Slip Past Travs to Take Series
Published on July 24, 2014 under Texas League (TL1)
Arkansas Travelers News Release
SPRINGDALE, ARK. - A home run by Micah Gibbs (2) broke a tie game in the sixth inning to send the Northwest Arkansas Naturals to a 5-3 victory over the Arkansas Travelers on Wednesday night at Arvest Ballpark. The Travs dropped two-of-three games to the Naturals and now return home after a 3-4 road trip.
Gibbs sent a 1-0 pitch from Kramer Sneed over the left field wall with two outs driving in Cheslor Cuthbert ahead of him. Sneed dropped to 6-8 with the loss and allowed five runs on six hits in 5.2 innings.
Sneed was sharp early on retiring eight of the first nine batters while the Travs built a lead in the second inning against Matt Murray.
Matt Long and Anderson De La Rosa hit singles off Murray to begin the second inning. A one-out single to center by Adam Melker brought Long to the plate. Then Murray fielded a comeback grounder by Eric Stamets and threw to second baseman Cheslor Cuthbert attempting for a double play. However Cuthbert, playing his first career game at second base, threw wildly past first base for an error that scored De La Rosa for a 2-0 Travs lead.
Sneed only allowed one batter to reach base in the first three innings on a single by Edinson Rincon in the third. He got the next batter, Justin Trapp, to ground to second baseman Alex Yarbrough for a double play.
Angel Franco began the Naturals fourth inning with a single to left on an 0-2 pitch and stole second base. Sneed issued his first of three walks to put Mitch Maier on base. Hunter Dozier followed with a hard liner right at Yarbrough, who caught the ball and flipped to Stamets at second base with Franco off the bag. However Stamets came off the base before he had the ball allowing Franco to slip back to second base. A two-out walk put Jorge Bonifacio on to load the bases for Max Ramirez, who Sneed got ahead 1-2 before allowing a hard single to center scoring two runs to tie the game.
Sneed's third walk came in the fifth inning with one out to Justin Trapp. Franco, who was 4-for-41 against the Travs before Wednesday, doubled to left field knocking Trapp home from first base giving the Naturals a 3-2 lead.
Murray left the game after five innings with the lead and outs from eight of the last nine batters he faced. Angel Baez pitched the sixth inning and allowed a one-out walk to Long, who stole his way to third base and scored on De La Rosa's broken-bat grounder to shortstop, tying the game at 3-3.
With the Travs short on pitchers after an 11-inning game the night before, Sneed came back for the sixth inning and gave up Cuthbert's leadoff single. A line drive by Bonifacio was caught by Stamets, who dove near second base for a fantastic play in the field. Sneed struck out his fifth batter getting Ramirez swinging, but Gibbs followed with the home run to put Northwest Arkansas on top 5-3.
Michael Brady relieved Sneed after the home run and pitched 2.1 innings with just one hit allowed.
Baez (1-4) left two runners on base when Michael Bianucci fouled out to end the seventh inning. Andrew Triggs (15) pitched two innings and allowed just one hit then set down the last six batters for the save.
The Travs fell to 17-16 with the loss, still in first place by one game in the North Division over Northwest Arkansas who improved to 16-17.
Time of game was 2:51 and the paid crowd was 3,035.
A seven-game home stand begins at Dickey-Stephens Park on Thursday night with a four-game series against the Tulsa Drillers. The first game pits two lefties on the mound when Nate Smith (5-3, 2.30) and Tyler Anderson (3-4, 2.40) are scheduled to pitch. The game is set to begin at 7:10 p.m. while gates open at 6:10 p.m.
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- Naturals Slip Past Travs to Take Series - Arkansas Travelers
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