Offense, Gorski solid in victory over Salt Lake
Darin Gorski turned in his longest — and quite possibly his best — performance of the season on Saturday.
And as it turned out, the 51s gave him way more run support than he needed as their offense erupted in a 12-3 victory over Salt Lake at Smith’s Ballpark.
“I thought Gorski threw a great game. It’s probably one of his best games,” Backman said. “He pitched ahead in the count today and was able to go deep in the game for us.”
Gorski gave up just two runs — one earned — on his way to striking out seven, a season high, in his 7 1/3-inning outing.
After Las Vegas scored a run each in the first two innings — first on Travis Taijeron sacrifice fly and then a Kyle Johnson homer — he gave up his first run of the game in the second.
But after that, it was all 51s as everyone in the starting lineup finished with at least a hit.
T.J. Rivera led the way with four while Eric Campbell finished with three.
Rivera’s four hits brought his batting average up to .349 while Brandon Nimmo, who currently leads the race for the Pacific Coast League batting title, added two of his own and currently sits at .354.
“The offense is always there,” Backman said. “They got big hits. Campbell had a big day. T.J. had a big day. Brandon continues to get at least a couple hits every night.”
Roger Bernadina and Johnson also had two each and all told, the 51s finished with 18 hits in the game.
Salt Lake starter Nate Smith left after two innings, and after that, Las Vegas (69-73) teed off on the Bees’ bullpen with four runs in the third and five in the fourth.
In the third, Gavin Cecchini got the scoring going with a solo home run before the 51s picked up runs on a Bernadina single, wild pitch and Matt Reynolds single.
An inning later, Campbell completely broke the game open with a bases-loaded double to deep center that plated two and gave Las Vegas an 8-1 lead. They added three more runs in the inning after that.
Backman pulled both Campbell and Reynolds, two players who are potential September call-ups, mid-game, but said the moves were just to rest them.
“We had a 10-run lead. If you can’t hold a 10-run lead, than we don’t deserve to win. They’ve been playing every day and those guys have been the guys that I’ve had in the past, the grinders,” Backman said. “I thought it was deserved. They’ve been playing hard.”
The 51s were just fine without them, running their record to 4-2 on their season-ending road trip and up to 11-3 against Salt Lake this year.
“It’s the offense that I’ve talked about from the start of the year and it’s been pretty consistent all year,” Backman said. “When we get pitching performances like we do today, we’re going to win a lot of games. We just ran out of time.”
Betsy Helfand can be reached at bhelfand@reviewjournal.com. Follow @BetsyHelfand on Twitter.
UP NEXT
Who: Las Vegas 51s at Salt Lake Bees
When: 6:05 p.m. PDT Sunday
Where: Smith’s Ballpark, Salt Lake City
Starters: Tyler Pill (1-1, 6.30 ERA) vs. Tim Lincecum (0-3, 4.31 ERA)
UPCOMING
Monday: Las Vegas at Salt Lake, 12:05 p.m.
UPDATE
The 51s faced Lincecum in his last start on Aug. 25. The two-time Cy Young winner gave up eight runs — five earned — on eight hits in a four-inning outing.
