Lots of excitement during Fish’s loss to RedHawks

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This article was published 01/07/2019 (2525 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Strong pitching, late-inning home runs and some questionable calls by the home-plate umpire helped the Fargo-Moorhead RedHawks to a 9-7 win over the Winnipeg Goldeyes on Monday.

But it wasn’t all bad news for the Goldeyes — Tyler Hill, one of the team’s newest additions, showed some good stuff in his first appearance at Shaw Park — even if it wasn’t enough to give his team the win.

Hill walked once, hit a two-run double and absolutely crushed a two-run homer to left. In his first week with the team, the outfielder has notched two home runs, six RBI and is batting. 423.

“First game here being Canada Day, it was pretty electric. The city is nice, got to walk around and check it out this morning. It’s awesome. The stadium is great, you feel at home,” he said.

Goldeyes starter Mitchell Lambson had an unusually rocky beginning. He has already thrown two complete games this season and pitched seven or more innings in each of his past five starts.

Monday, Lambson allowed four runs on four hits in the first inning. After that, he went into absolute lockdown mode. The lefty pitched six shutdown innings with nine strikeouts and allowed just one more run, in the eighth. Lambson took the loss, dropping to a 5-2 with 3.03 ERA.

RedHawks starter Sebastian Kessay was credited with the win. Kessay is one of the few American Association starters yet to be charged with a loss this season. He improved to a 6-0, striking out nine and allowing two runs on four hits.

But Kessay and the RedHawks definitely got some help from home-plate umpire Nick Webb. Webb was holding a tight but consistent strike zone in the early innings. However, shenanigans began when Goldeyes outfielder Willy Garcia was at bat in the fifth. With a runner in scoring position, Kessay threw a pitch that nearly skimmed the dirt in front of home plate. Remarkably, Webb called it strike three to end the inning.

In the eighth, RedHawks infielder T.J. Bennett drove home teammates Correlle Prime and Devan Ahart to give the ’Hawks a 6-2 lead. Prior to Bennett’s at-bat, Prime drew a seven-pitch walk from Goldeyes reliever Marcus Crescentini. Two of those pitches appeared to look a lot more like strikes than balls.

Goldeyes manager Rick Forney thought so, too. The usually level-headed Forney walked out to Webb at the end of the half-inning and gave the umpire a piece of his mind. Fans were cheering and on their feet, witnessing Forney defend Crescentini and his pitches. Forney eventually got tossed, but it gave the Fish the fire they needed to come back and rally for five runs in the last two innings — not quite enough.

“We just started to put together our at-bats. It’s not that we weren’t hitting throughout the whole game, it was just different timing and where we were hitting, it wasn’t (working),” Hill said.

“Then, we just started putting things together toward the end of the game and it gave us a chance to get back in the game. Didn’t come away with the victory, but you know, that’s baseball.”

Fargo-Moorhead hit two ninth-inning home runs to seal the deal. The RedHawks improve to 28-15, while the Goldeyes drop to 24-17. Game 2 of the three-game series gets underway tonight at Shaw Park at 7:05 p.m.

devon.shewchuk@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @devonshewchuk