TinCaps Fall 12-4

FORT WAYNE — After taking both games of a doubleheader on Friday, the TinCaps came back down to earth on Saturday as the Cedar Rapids Kernels took advantage of 12 walks and a pair of Fort Wayne errors to top the home club 12-4.

“My philosophy around baseball is as simple as it gets; you throw the ball, hit it, and catch it, and we didn’t do that tonight,” said TinCaps manager Lukas Ray.

“When you give 90 feet away as often as we did, you aren’t going to win many games when you are beating yourself.”

As he has often this year, starter Isaiah Lowe labored through the first inning, allowing the first two batters to reach base. But the righty, who had allowed 12 first-inning runs in his first seven starts, was able to come back and get the next three without allowing a run.

In the second, he once again loaded the bases, but again escaped the inning without allowing a run before finally setting down the Kernels in order in the third.

Fort Wayne got the scoring started in the bottom of the frame when Leo De Vries doubled to open the fame before Brandon Butterworth hit an 0-2 flare to right field to bring him home. Brendan Durfee followed with an RBI double to put the TinCaps up 2-0.

However, the club didn’t score any more, and then things began to unravel in the fourth inning, as Butterworth committed two errors at second base helped the Kernels plate a pair of runs.

Sitting at 84 pitches with one out and the go-ahead runs on base, Lowe was removed for Luis German, who allowed a sacrifice fly to put Cedar Rapids ahead 3-2.

In the fifth, the Kernels sent 11 batters to the plate to plate seven runs and put the game out of reach.

With the game out of hand in the eighth inning, Ethan Long hit a 106 mph blast over the left field wall for his second homer of the season.

“It was nice to hit the home run, but as a competitor at the end of the day, I would have rather come out with the win,” said Long, who is still working to balance the ups-and-downs of a long season.

“That is still a work in progress. I like to play hard, and losses are going to happen, tonight, take a little anger out on MLB the Show and then flush it tomorrow.”

Even in the one-sided contest, there were a few bright spots on the night. De Vries, who had been 1-for-12 in the series, reached base four times with a pair of doubles and a walk. He hadn’t collected more than two hits in a game this month.

Left-hander Bodi Rascon, whose numbers for the game weren’t great because he joined in the struggles of the fifth inning, came back to work clean innings in the sixth and seventh.

“It’s always good to end the outing on a positive, and this is a momentum sport,” said Ray. “Hopefully, he will build on this and carry it to the next outing.”

After reliever Nick Wissman struggled with his command, Ray brought in catcher/first baseman Addison Kopack to get the last out of the game. After he hit the first batter, Kopack gave up a line drive which Butterworth made a leaping grab on to leave him with a perfect ERA.

Kopack pitched six games at the University of Rhode Island in his collegiate career, along with every other position on the field except for center field.

Notes:  After reaching base six times in his first nine plate appearances with the TinCaps, Kai Roberts is now 0-for-8 with five strikeouts in the next two games. The 6-foot-5 center fielder from the University of Utah hit .533 in five rehab games in the Arizona Complex League. … Infielder Rosman Verdugo, who got hit by a pitch on the left shoulder in the first, was pinch-hit for in the third. We’ll have updates when they are available.