Wings Doubled Up By Hens

The Toledo Mud Hens (28-37) defeated the Rochester Red Wings (24-36) 6-3 Sunday night. Will Rhymes paced the offense by going 2-4, with a home run, two RBI, and two runs scored. The Hens busted out to an early lead in the first inning. Leadoff hitter Will Rhymes got the action started with a single. Timo Perez followed up with a double down the left field line. The Red Wings pitched around cleanup batter Ryan Strieby to load the bases. With two outs and the bases juiced, Bryan Pounds stroked a two-run single to center. Then with Clete Thomas batting a wild play broke out. With runners on the corners, the Hens attempted a double steal. When the catcher threw the ball to the Rochester shortstop, Tsuyoshi Nishioka, he noticed that Pounds was retreating back to first. Nishioka at first ran toward Pounds. However, Nishioka then realized that Strieby was breaking toward home. Nishioka fired toward home but Strieby made a hook slide to score the third and final run of the inning.

Rochester answered back in the second. The Wings connected on back to back doubles to score their first run of the game. Starter RHP L.J. Gagnier pitched his way out of a jam when the bases were loaded with two outs and 2010 Nippon Professional Baseball Hitting Champion Nishioka came to bat. Gagnier forced Nishioka to groundout to the second baseman.

Rhymes belted a solo home run down the right field line in the fourth to extend Toledo's lead to 4-1.

The Red Wings battled back in the fourth. Following a leadoff walk, Jeff Baily roped a double to left. Chase Lambin hit a sacrifice fly to score the Wings second run of the game. However, five-time NPB all-star Nishioka got the best of Gagnier in the fourth when he smoked a RBI double to deep right center that closed Toledo's lead to 4-3.

The 4-3 score did not last long. The Hens tacked on two more runs in their half of the fourth on a Rhymes RBI groundout and a Argenis Diaz RBI single which gave Toledo another three-run lead.

LHP Matt Hoffman provided two shutout innings of relief in the sixth and the seventh to keep the Wings at bay. Ryan Perry also pitched two shutout innings to earn the save.