Frisco had spent most of Saturday night climbing out of a six-run hole, one inning at a time, and by the sixth the whole thing had become believable.
Theo Hardy walked. Dylan Dreiling beat out a soft grounder. Arturo Disla then lined a ball into right field, hard enough to bring Hardy home and send Dreiling behind him, and suddenly what had been a 6-0 game was a two-run game with Riders Field back in it.
That was as close as the RoughRiders got in a 7-5 loss to Wichita on August 22 at Riders Field, a game that started with too much damage, turned into a real comeback bid and ended with Frisco still a swing short.
The RoughRiders outhit Wichita 10-7, scored in four straight innings from the third through the sixth and got three scoreless innings from Josh Trentadue at the back of the bullpen. They also committed three errors and spent the rest of the night trying to outrun the first two innings.
Aidan Curry’s start never settled. Jake Rucker and Caden Kendle opened the game with walks before Brandon Winokur ripped a line drive down the left-field line, a 110 mph double that scored Rucker and pushed Kendle to third. Garrett Spain and Kyle DeBarge followed with sacrifice flies, giving Wichita three runs before the RoughRiders had come to bat.
Frisco had an immediate chance to answer against Chris Vallimont in the bottom of the first, when Disla singled and Malcolm Moore doubled with two outs. Vallimont stranded both, and Wichita made that miss hurt in the second.
Bryan Magdaleno took over with two outs in the first and got the inning closed, but the Wind Surge put the next inning in motion with a Jay Thomason single and a Graham Brown double. After Luis Hernandez struck out, Rucker lifted a fly ball to right-center that kept carrying. Yeison Morrobel went back toward the wall, and the ball left the yard for Rucker’s three-run homer, stretching the lead to 6-0.
Magdaleno did strike out five over 2.1 innings, including all three hitters he faced in the third, but the early line was already heavy: three earned runs allowed by Curry in two-thirds of an inning with three walks, and three more earned runs charged to Magdaleno.
Moore started Frisco’s climb in the third. He got a 1-2 pitch from Vallimont and drove it high and deep to right, his seventh homer of the season and second at Riders Field, to get the RoughRiders on the board. Moore finished 2-for-4 with the homer, a double and a hit-by-pitch, a night that kept Frisco’s offense from disappearing after the early hole.
The RoughRiders added another run in the fourth after Keith Jones II doubled to right. Hardy followed with a line-drive double to right, sliding in safely as Jones scored, and Frisco had runs in back-to-back innings.
Wichita’s one answer after the second proved important. In the fifth, Kendle jumped a pitch from Jonathan Brand and sent it out to left-center for his eighth homer, making it 7-2. Brand otherwise covered three innings and allowed one earned run, giving Frisco the first stretch of stability it needed.
The Riders kept coming anyway. After Max Wagner struck out, Disla reached on an error in the fifth against Darren Bowen, Moore was hit by a pitch and Morrobel bounced a single through the right side. Disla scored when the throw home was off line, trimming the margin to 7-3.
An inning later, Hardy walked and Dreiling singled with one out. After Max Wagner struck out, Wichita went to Jacob Webb for Disla, and Disla won the matchup. His sharp single to right scored both runners and made it 7-5. Disla went 3-for-5 with two RBIs and a run, the best night in a Frisco lineup that gave itself chances until the end.
The bullpen gave the offense room to keep pressing. Trentadue worked the final three innings without allowing a run, struck out four and did not walk a batter. He pitched around his own throwing error in the seventh, retired the side in order in the eighth and worked through a Luis Hernandez single in the ninth.
But after Disla’s sixth-inning single, Wichita’s bullpen closed the door. Webb retired the next four RoughRiders he faced after Disla’s hit, and Mitch Mueller handled the final two innings for the win, striking out three without allowing a run. Disla singled again with one out in the ninth, bringing Moore up as the tying run, but Mueller struck him out before Morrobel flew out to left to end it.
For Frisco, the shape of the night was clear enough: the RoughRiders spent six innings making the opening two innings matter less. They just never made them disappear.