51s snap 5-game losing streak with win over Albuquerque
The 51s halted their five-game losing streak Thursday, putting together quite possibly their most complete game of the young season.
Las Vegas used a solid start from Chris Flexen and a pair of runs in five different innings to overmatch Albuquerque 10-3 on Thursday afternoon at Isotopes Park.
The game started, like the two before it, with the 51s striking first.
Tuesday, Las Vegas (2-6) scored three in the first inning and Wednesday, they scored four.
They couldn’t hold onto either of those leads, though.
Thursday, a two-run blast from Zach Borenstein — his third home run in as many games — in the first inning put Las Vegas atop for good.
“(It) seems we’ve been scoring early, we just can’t shut them down,” manager Tony DeFrancesco said. “Today we finally shut them down. Borenstein had a big home run to right field and that kind of got us going. It was a much-needed win.”
The 51s capitalized on a pair of Albuquerque (5-3) errors in the third inning to extend their lead to 4-1 and piled on with two more runs in each the fifth, sixth and eighth innings.
Ty Kelly, who went 4-for-5 on Wednesday with a double, triple and two home runs, followed that up by going 3-for-5 with a home run and two triples. He drove in three and scored three times.
“Very impressive. Very low-key kid. He just comes to work every day. Very professional,” DeFrancesco said. “Had as good a series as I can remember in a long time driving balls all over the ballpark, triples, doubles, homers. I’m very impressed with him.”
Borenstein, Gavin Cecchini and Brandon Nimmo each and two hits of their own in the game, with Borenstein driving in three.
Nimmo, who was atop the 51s’ lineup after being sent down by the Mets earlier this week, along with Kelly and Borenstein, the top three hitters in the 51s lineup went 7-for-14 with six runs and seven RBIs.
That was more than enough offense for Flexen, who turned in a better start his second turn through the rotation.
Flexen, the team’s No. 9 prospect per MLBPipeline, gave up seven hits but was mostly able to minimize the damage against him.
He gave up just two runs — one in the second and one in the sixth — in his six-inning outing while striking out five and picking up his first Triple-A victory.
“(He was) more aggressive in the zone. He was able to control his breaking ball today, his fastball command. I did watch him pitch in spring training. This was the guy that I was expecting the first outing. He really did a nice job today.”
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Contact Betsy Helfand at bhelfand@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BetsyHelfand on Twitter.
