51s fall behind early in loss to Salt Lake
The 51s have spent much of their series against Salt Lake playing from behind. Wednesday, for the second time in three days, their starting pitcher put them in a deep hole that they couldn’t recover from.
Las Vegas lost 11-5 to Salt Lake for the third straight night on Wednesday at Smith’s Ballpark, falling into a six-run deficit in the second inning.
Starter Nabil Crismatt, who tossed six scoreless innings in his last outing, was ambushed by the Bees (51-46) in the frame.
Crismatt gave up six hits in that inning, including three doubles and a triple.
He got in trouble again in the next inning, earning himself an early exit after just 2⅔ frames in his third Triple-A start.
“His changeup’s probably his best pitch. He just couldn’t get it over the plate. When he did, he left it up,” manager Tony DeFrancesco said. “Breaking ball was inconsistent (and) 2⅔ innings is not a long outing for him. He’s going to have to learn to execute pitches in this league. If he’s going to be an offspeed pitcher, he’s going to have to learn how to throw it for strikes.”
The Bees tacked on three more runs off reliever Ian Krol and one each off Gerson Bautista and Chris Beck.
Outfielder Eric Young Jr. led the Bees offensively with four hits, including a double and a triple. In three games this series, Young has seven hits along with three walks.
Second baseman Luis Rengifo, who has also given the 51s fits in the past three games, homered and tripled for Salt Lake. Like Young, Rengifo has seven hits in the past three games.
With the Bees beating up on Las Vegas pitching, the 51s (45-52) were looking up all night.
“They’re swinging the bat well as a team, 14 hits. Six walks isn’t helping either. We’ve got to do a better job when we get ahead in the count to put them away,” DeFrancesco said. “We need to minimize their walks. We’ve got to pound the zone a little bit better. … We’ve got to continue to teach these guys how to pound the zone. Walks are going to kill you in this league for sure.”
Las Vegas scored a pair of runs in the third inning on a Kevin Kaczmarski RBI double and a Zach Borenstein run-scoring single.
Borenstein’s sacrifice fly in the fifth inning gave the 51s their third run of the night and the Las Vegas added two more in the ninth on a Phillip Evans sacrifice fly and Luis Guillorme RBI single to center.
Christian Colon had four hits for the 51s and Kevin Kaczmarski had three.
The 51s had 13 hits on the night to Salt Lake’s 14 but weren’t able to convert on them as effectively in the loss.
“We were out of the game early, 9-2 and then before you know it we battled back late again. It was good to see the guys didn’t give up,” DeFrancesco said. “Thirteen hits on the day. We had a couple big games. Colon had four singles, Zach Borenstein had a couple hits today and Kaczmarski, so the guys swung the bats. We made the plays, we just couldn’t put anything together. A lot of scattered hits.”
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