The Frisco RoughRiders had just enough pitching to keep Friday night within reach for most of the game, but not nearly enough traffic to make Arkansas pay for it.
Frisco managed only two hits at Riders Field, both in the middle innings and both erased or stranded before they could become anything larger, in a 4-0 loss to the Travelers on June 19. Arkansas did not break the game open so much as keep adding distance, scoring in the second, fifth, sixth and eighth while Kade Anderson and two relievers turned the RoughRiders’ lineup quiet.
Anderson was the central problem. The Arkansas left-hander improved to 7-0 by throwing six scoreless innings, striking out eight and walking one. Frisco struck out 11 times overall, with Anderson setting the tone early by getting Arturo Disla and Rafe Perich swinging in the first and never letting the RoughRiders stack pressure.
The first run came in a way that could have felt like an escape for Frisco. Dalton Pence walked Lazaro Montes, Caleb Cali and Connor Charping to open the second, loading the bases with nobody out. Nick Raposo followed with a ground ball that Perich turned into a 5-4-3 double play, but Montes scored from third for a 1-0 Arkansas lead. Pence then got J.T. Arruda to pop out in foul territory, limiting the damage to one run after the inning had tilted toward something worse.
For a while, that mattered. Pence retired Arkansas in order in the third and fourth, and Disla finally gave Frisco its first hit in the bottom of the fourth with a sharp line-drive double to center. The rally stopped there. Perich flew out to right and Ian Moller struck out, leaving Disla at second and keeping Anderson in control.
Arkansas gave him more room in the fifth, when Charping led off with his second homer of the season, a fly ball to left-center that made it 2-0. Raposo doubled later in the inning, but Pence worked through that, too, getting Arruda on a flyout before striking out Jared Sundstrom and Bill Knight.
Frisco’s best chance to make the game feel different came in the bottom half, and it lasted only a few batters. Julian Brock singled on a grounder to left that was deflected by shortstop J.T. Arruda, giving the RoughRiders their second hit. Keith Jones II struck out, and Corey Joyce followed by lining into a double play to third, with Brock caught off first.
That sequence captured most of the night for Frisco: a rare runner, then a fast exit.
Pence’s line closed in the sixth after Hunter Fitz-Gerald singled and Montes walked with one out. Austin Roberts entered and got Cali on a fly ball, but he walked Charping to load the bases and then walked Raposo to force in Fitz-Gerald. The run was charged to Pence, who took the loss after allowing three earned runs over 5 1/3 innings with four strikeouts and four walks.
Roberts kept the deficit at three by striking out Arruda on a foul tip, then worked around a two-out walk in the seventh. But with Frisco still searching for any kind of answer, Montes added the final run in the eighth, homering to center off Janser Lara for his 21st of the season.
Montes finished 1-for-2 with two walks, an RBI and two runs scored. Charping went 1-for-2 with his homer, two walks, an RBI and a run. Arkansas scored four runs on four hits and committed no errors, turning limited offense into enough support because Frisco never forced the Travelers to answer back.
Disla finished 1-for-4 with his double and two strikeouts. Brock had the RoughRiders’ other hit, going 1-for-3 with a strikeout. After Anderson left, Jimmy Kingsbury covered two scoreless innings with three strikeouts and two walks, and Charlie Beilenson finished the shutout with a clean ninth.
By the end, the game had become less about one swing than the absence of a counterpunch. Frisco had two hits, three walks and no inning with more than one baserunner. Arkansas had a ground-ball run, two solo homers and a bases-loaded walk, and on a night when Anderson gave the RoughRiders almost nothing to string together, that was more than enough.