A game that Frisco had pulled back with two loud swings ended on a pitch that nobody had to swing at.
The RoughRiders erased an early three-run deficit Saturday night at Arvest Ballpark, built a two-run lead on fourth-inning homers by Marcus Lee Sang and Max Wagner, and still walked off the field with an 8-7 loss to Northwest Arkansas after Janser Lara’s wild pitch brought home Angel Acosta in the bottom of the ninth.
The ending was especially cruel because Frisco had just tied the game the same way. Down a run in the top of the ninth, Frainyer Chavez reached second on a fielding error by right fielder Alberto Rodriguez and moved to third on Rafe Perich’s deep fly to center. With Yeison Morrobel at the plate, a passed ball skipped away from catcher Hyungchan Um, and Chavez came home to make it 7-7.
Northwest Arkansas answered without putting a ball past the infield after Acosta’s leadoff single. Rodriguez’s sacrifice bunt turned into a throwing error by Perich, Um moved both runners up with another bunt, and Lara intentionally walked Luke Pelzer to set up a force at every base. Lara’s next pitch sailed to the backstop. Acosta scored standing, and the Naturals had the final run in a game full of late mistakes and late chances.
Frisco had spent most of the night trying to outrun the first inning. Aidan Curry opened with trouble immediately: Pelzer singled, Javier Vaz doubled, and Sam Kulasingam shot a ground ball through the left side with the infield pulled in to score Vaz for a 2-0 Northwest Arkansas lead. Spencer Nivens followed with a single, and the Naturals pushed the inning to 3-0 before Curry steadied it.
For a while, he did more than that. Curry allowed three earned runs over 5.2 innings, struck out seven and walked two, giving the RoughRiders time to flip the game in one concentrated fourth-inning burst.
Morrobel started it with a single, Arturo Disla followed with one of his own, and Lee Sang changed the inning with one swing. Grant Gambrell left a cutter in the middle of the plate, and Lee Sang drove it out to right-center, a three-run homer that tied the game and turned a sluggish night into something else entirely.
Two batters later, Ian Moller singled, and Wagner followed by driving his 20th home run to left-center. The second homer of the inning gave Frisco a 5-3 lead and turned the fourth into the kind of inning that usually becomes the shorthand for a win: five runs, two homers, the early deficit gone.
It did not hold.
Jonathan Brand entered with two outs in the sixth after Curry struck out Kulasingam and Nivens. Connor Scott greeted him by sending a line drive over the wall in center, cutting Frisco’s lead to 5-4. In the seventh, the Naturals built the inning with Acosta’s single, Um’s single and Pelzer’s hit by pitch before Vaz delivered the swing that changed the game again.
Vaz lined a ball to center that cleared the bases. Acosta scored, Um followed, and Pelzer came in behind him before Vaz was thrown out trying for third on the relay from Dylan Dreiling to Chavez to Perich. The out ended the play, but not the damage. Northwest Arkansas had turned a 5-4 deficit into a 7-5 lead.
Brand was charged with a blown save after allowing four earned runs in 2.1 innings. Lara took the loss after allowing the ninth-inning run in one-third of an inning.
Frisco still nearly dragged the game back. Lee Sang singled and Moller walked in the eighth, and Lee Sang scored before Corey Joyce’s groundout to cut the deficit to one. The RoughRiders then manufactured the tying run in the ninth without a hit, only to lose it in the bottom half on Lara’s wild pitch.
Lee Sang finished 2-for-3 with his 15th homer, a walk and two runs scored. Wagner drove in two with his 20th homer. Dreiling went 2-for-4 with a walk, and Moller reached four times, going 2-for-2 with two walks.
Vaz led Northwest Arkansas, going 2-for-4 with two doubles and three RBIs. The Naturals finished with eight runs, 11 hits and one error. Frisco had seven runs, nine hits and one error, and a game that swung from early trouble to a fourth-inning rescue to one final pitch at the backstop.