By: Jackson Wright
The Joplin Outlaws continued their red-hot start to the season, finishing off with a run-rule sweep of the Piney Woods TimberHogs by a score of 15-5 in the series finale.
The Outlaws wasted no time setting the tone. In his season debut, lefty starter Ty Zahradnick struck out the first three batters he faced in the top of the first. The Outlaws then immediately gave Zahradnick some run support by drawing four straight walks and a Mark Ross sacrifice fly to make the score 2-0. The TimberHogs turned to their first reliever of the night, Remi Schaber. With bases loaded, she limited the damage and left the bases loaded with Outlaws.
Piney Woods briefly tied things up on the top of the second after a walk to Pedro Martinez Jr, an error to get Garrett Sheffield on base, followed by a two-run triple for Mason Grube. However, Joplin wasted no time reclaiming the lead. Luke Graham lined a triple to the wall, followed by RBI base hits from Landon Midgett and Tyler Brodrick. Outlaws lead 4-2 after two innings.
Outlaws manager Dean Green turned to Will Newberry out of the bullpen. Newberry tossed a scoreless third inning, keeping momentum in Joplin’s dugout. The Outlaws used this to send 13 batters to the plate, scoring six runs off of seven hits. Blake Wilson, Sam Slagle, Brodrick, Kaiyala, and Ross (twice) all added extra bae hits. Cy Darnell just missed a chance to clear the bases with a deep fly ball, that was caught on the warning track, but the damage was already done. The Outlaws led 10-2 after three innings.
The fourth inning was similar to before. Shutdown inning from Newberry, crooked numbers from the Joplin offense. Slagle got another base hit and Midgett got hit by a pitch. Both runners scored when Brodrick lined his third double of the game to the outfield fence to give the Outlaws a 12-2 lead.
The TimberHogs offense wasn’t completely done. They added a run in the fifth when Martinex Jr. got an infield single to score Drake Lee. The fifth inning was yet another multiple run frame for Joplin. Evan Aslaken and Darnell both reached on base hits, and were brought around to score when Graham’s fly ball was dropped by the centerfielder. Score was 14-3 after five innings.
Piney Woods added two more runs of their own in the sixth off of miscues by the Outlaws, but the comeback efforts were not enough. After Joplin went scoreless in the sixth, and turned around and shut down Piney Woods in the top of the seventh, the run-rule runner was at the plate.
Wilson walked, moved over on Darnell’s single, and both moved up on a passed ball. This got Graham back to plate where he delivered a walk-off RBI single, to make the final score 15-5 in seven innings.
Next up, the Outlaws head to Sherman, Texas for a pivotal early-season matchup with the first-place Shadowcats. Must watch baseball begins Tuesday, June 3rd at 7:05 pm
