Springfield Pitching Woes Lift Drillers To Win

NewsOn6.com

TULSA, Oklahoma -- Tulsa led by three runs Monday, but after a rain delay stopped the game for more than an hour the Springfield pitching staff fell apart and gave up eight runs in the sixth to give Tulsa a 12-4 win to close the series.

Springfield (53-61) replaced Michael Blazek (10-6), who had already given up four earned runs to receive a loss for the day, with Francisco Samuel, who didn't even manage to record an out in his service.

Samuel gave up back-to-back singles and then back-to-back walks to score Bronson Sardinha and give Tulsa a 5-3 advantage. During the following at-bat he threw a wild pitch to bring Matt McBride home and eventually walked batter Stephen Dodson to load the bases yet again. Samuel was then pulled in favor of Samuel Freeman, who didn't fare much better.

Freeman walked the first batter he faced, Hector Gomez, bringing Michael Mitchell home and then two batters later forced Ben Paulsen to ground out, which allowed Erik Wetzel to score. Wilin Rosario reached on a fielding error in the next at-bat to bring Stephen Dodson and Paulsen home to put Tulsa up 11-3.

McBride, who had already scored in the inning, capped the scoring off with an RBI single to center field, scoring Sardhina and making it 12-3 in favor of Tulsa.

Josh Sullivan (3-7) was credited with a win for Tulsa, allowing just one hit and one earned run in 1.1 innings of service.

The Drillers will now take a day off before traveling to Midland for a three-game series with the RockHounds, the first of a six-game road trip.