In minor league baseball, one game is all that’s needed to turn a season around.
That’s what Eugene Emeralds manager Jeff Gardner said after his team blew out Yakima 13-0 on July 2 at Civic Stadium.
He was right. That win preceded two more home victories over Yakima, including a 5-4 battle on July Fourth. The Ems opened up a five-game road trip with two losses at Spokane, then turned around for three straight victories by a combined total of 13 runs.
Monday night’s contest was a perfect example of the Ems’ recent turnaround. Eugene used power hitting and decent pitching to blow out Spokane 9-5 in Washington.
Spokane struck first with three runs in the bottom of the second inning, but the Ems answered with four runs in the top of the third. First baseman Greg Sain had a two-run home run — his league-lead-tying fifth shot of the year — to spur the Ems to a 4-3 lead.
After Spokane scored two runs in the bottom of the third inning, Eugene got another key home run from Jon Benick in the sixth inning, a three-run bomb to put the Ems up for good.
The Emeralds’ statistics for the weekend were mind-boggling, considering that Eugene averaged just over four runs per game before that 13-0 rout of Yakima. The Ems had five home runs in Sunday and Monday’s games, had back-to-back shots both nights, have two players with active hit streaks over five games and sent nine batters to the plate in an inning Monday.
Pitcher Jason Anderegg is part of a starting rotation for the Emeralds that had a 2.26 ERA over the last 10 games heading into Monday’s contest.
After Monday’s contest, the Ems have two hitters — Sain and shortstop Jason Bartlett — in the Northwest League’s top seven for hitting. Sain is seventh overall with a .333 average.
The Ems have also gotten good performances from their starting pitchers. Before ace Scott Kelly left in the fourth inning of Monday’s contest, Ems starters had gone 10 straight games of reaching the fifth. In that 10-game stretch, Ems starters had a combined 2.26 earned-run average.
Monday, it was Eugene’s relief pitchers who got the job done. Mike Hoyt came on in the third inning in relief of Kelly and pitched 2 2/3 innings of hitless baseball to pick up the win, his first decision of the season.
Leading up to Monday’s contest, the Ems had a successful week, spurred by their July 2 romp. Eugene took Tuesday’s contest with Yakima 6-2, then won the July Fourth game on the strength of Bartlett’s two-run home run in the bottom of the seventh inning. The Ems then lost back-to-back games to Spokane by a total of three runs. Eugene lost the two games 6-4 and 1-0, but turned around to beat Spokane 7-3 and 8-3 in the next two games Saturday and Sunday.
Bartlett has been the star for the Ems so far this season.
The Ems take an off day today before starting a five-game homestand against Spokane Wednesday night. That homestand will be followed by eight straight road games. The Emeralds return home from that road trip July 24.