For a while Wednesday night, Amarillo had enough offense to keep answering. Danny Serretti hit one off the wall in right-center. Cristofer Torin found the gap. Even after Frisco kept nudging ahead, the Sod Poodles had the shape of a team that could drag the game back into reach.
The problem was the fourth inning, which got too big too quickly and left too much road behind.
Frisco scored eight times in the fourth, the last four on Gleider Figuereo’s grand slam, and held off Amarillo’s late push for a 12-9 win at Riders Field. The Sod Poodles trailed by 10 after five innings, then made the RoughRiders sweat with five runs in the eighth and Druw Jones’ 490-foot homer in the ninth.
It did not erase the inning that decided the game. It did keep the night from becoming empty.
Amarillo hitting coach Ty Wright had described the offense before the game as having “a killer instinct right now.” The line fit better after the game had gotten sideways.
“I think what we’ve seen from an offense, especially the last 10 games, is just a relentless nine inning effort from the guys to where it doesn’t matter what the other offense, We come back, we put a run on the board or two or three or whatever it may happen, and you do that for nine innings, you’re going to wear the other team down,” Wright said.
Amarillo did that part. It just could not completely climb out of the hole Frisco dug.
The Sod Poodles answered Sebastian Walcott’s leadoff homer in the first with Serretti’s two-out double in the second, a ball driven deep to right-center that brought Ben McLaughlin around from first. After Max Wagner put Frisco back in front in the bottom half, Trent Youngblood walked in the third and Torin lashed another double into the gap to tie it at 2.
Torin finished 3-for-5 with two doubles and three RBIs, continuing the late-season stretch Wright had pointed to before the game.
“I think the confidence is building in him. He’s been putting in a lot of hard work this year on some of the things that we as a hitting department have asked him to do,” Wright said.
The game turned in the bottom of the third and broke open in the fourth. Mason Marriott, making his Double-A debut, nearly escaped a two-out spot in the third before Marcus Lee Sang chopped a ball back toward the mound. Marriott barehanded it, had no play at first, then threw into center field as Frisco took a 3-2 lead. Marriott took the loss, allowing two earned runs over 2.2 innings with two strikeouts and one walk.
Dawson Brown entered and got the final out of the third, but Frisco loaded the fourth with a single, a walk, a sacrifice bunt and another walk. Dylan Dreiling drove in two with a hard single past a diving Youngblood and into right field. Yeison Morrobel followed with another run-scoring single, and Lee Sang’s bases-loaded walk made it 7-2.
Alec Baker came in and struck out Wagner, but Figuereo made the inning unmistakable. On a full count with the bases loaded, he drove a ball to right that carried all the way toward the Lazy River for his first Double-A homer, a grand slam in his Double-A debut. Figuereo finished 3-for-4 with a walk and four RBIs.
Frisco added one more in the fifth on Rafe Perich’s double, pushing the lead to 12-2. Baker wound up covering 2.2 innings with five strikeouts while allowing two earned runs, and Billy Corcoran later gave Amarillo two scoreless innings.
That gave the bats space to make the final third of the game interesting.
Torin singled home Junior Franco in the seventh before the Sod Poodles put together their real push in the eighth. Angel Ortiz opened the inning with his ninth homer with Amarillo. Jones doubled and scored on Serretti’s single. Alberto Barriga singled, Franco moved both runners over, and Youngblood pulled a grounder through the right side that skipped under Morrobel’s glove in right, scoring Serretti and Barriga.
Youngblood, who went 1-for-2 with two walks, a hit by pitch and two RBIs, has been one of the lineup’s quieter constants. Wright’s pregame description held up when the inning found him.
“He can hit, and I think that’s underrated,” Wright said.
Torin followed Youngblood with his second double of the night, scoring him and cutting the deficit to 12-8. The tying run reached the on-deck circle before Austin Roberts struck out Ortiz to end the inning.
Jones gave Amarillo one more jolt in the ninth, jumping on the first pitch from Roberts and sending it out to left-center. He finished 3-for-5 with a homer, double and strikeout.
The Sod Poodles finished with nine runs, 12 hits and one error. Frisco had 12 runs, 16 hits and one error. That was enough to make the fourth inning stand up, even after Amarillo spent the final innings trying to make it wobble.