More Than 5,000 See Grand Prairie Drop Series Finale
While the 5,014 fans at QuikTrip Park on Wednesday – many of them children on Education Day – may have had an unforgettable day, the Grand Prairie AirHogs had one they would rather not think about, as six errors and tough Lincoln Saltdogs pitching doomed them to an 8-1 defeat, snapping a four-game winning streak and preventing an AirHogs series sweep.
Grand Prairie (4-3) did get the first run of the game, as David Espinosa came in on Greg Porter’s groundout in the first. But the AirHogs only got one more hit off Saltdogs starter Alessandro Maestri (1-1), who walked one and struck out five in six innings of work.
Scot Drucker (0-1), who impressed in his first start, allowed an unearned run in the second inning to tie the game, and then the wheels came off for the AirHogs in the fourth. Lincoln (3-4) only collected three hits, but the Saltdogs sent nine men to the plate and scored five runs, helped by four Grand Prairie errors and two wild pitches in the frame.
Curt Smith added to Lincoln’s lead in the fifth on a solo home run that just hooked around the left-field foul pole, the only earned run Drucker allowed of the seven he was charged with in five innings of work. The Saltdogs got one more unearned run in the eighth, but it hardly mattered as Maestri and relievers Garrett Sherrill, Paul Koss and P.J. Zocchi held the AirHogs at bay for the rest of the day. Grand Prairie mustered only five hits – two by Espinosa, and did not have two men on in an inning after the first frame until two outs in the ninth.
The AirHogs have Thursday off before heading to Kansas City to start a three-game series, their first ever meeting with the T-Bones. The series opener is Friday, May 20, at 7:05 p.m. The next home game at QuikTrip Park is Friday, May 27, against the defending champion Shreveport-Bossier Captains at 7:05 p.m.
