AirHogs Walk Over Diablos to Take Series
Sometimes in baseball it is better to take what the opponent gives, and the Grand Prairie AirHogs did that on Sunday night, taking advantage of 15 walks, six hit batters, four wild pitches and two errors to beat the El Paso Diablos 14-7 in front of a crowd of 1,282 at QuikTrip Park.
The AirHogs (29-13) jumped out to an early 5-0 lead against first-time professional starter Jose Sanchez, but Jason Jennings could not hold it, after facing the minimum nine batters in the first three innings. El Paso (11-31) scored four in the fourth in a nine-batter inning and after the AirHogs got a run on wild pitch in the fourth, the Diablos tied it with two in a seven-batter fifth.
Grand Prairie got a run on a John Alonso single in the bottom of that inning to re-take the lead, but Jon Fulton (2-0) allowed an unearned run in the top of the sixth as El Paso tied the game 7-7. But Fulton, Dustin Cameron and Jon Hunton held the Diablos off the scoreboard the rest of the way and the AirHogs re-built their lead from there.
Rigoberto Almonte (0-1) walked Zane Chavez to start the sixth and Jake Taylor tripled in pinch-runner Guillermo Martinez to give Grand Prairie the lead for good. A walk and a single gave the AirHogs another run, and after a sacrifice bunt, intentional walk and strikeout, John Alonso was walked to force in a run to make it 10-7.
Chris McMurray hit a sacrifice fly in the seventh for the 11th run, and a bases-loaded walk, Danny Figueroa sac fly and David Espinosa single in the eighth finished off the scoring.
The AirHogs continue their homestand with a four-game series against the Shreveport-Bossier Captains, starting at 7:05 p.m. on Monday with Military Night, where all military, police and fire department personnel can get the best seats in the house for $5.
