Washington Sweeps Joliet as Early Lead Holds Up on Road
JOLIET, Il. (August 1) – The Washington Wild Things got big days from Wagner Lagrange and Andrew Czech to earn a 7-4 victory to complete the sweep over the Joliet Slammers.
Kobe Foster got the start for the Wild Things and worked seven innings giving up four earned runs while striking out seven. It was the first start in his last six that he failed to reach 10 strikeouts. The five in a row is a presumed team record. He earned his seventh win of the season in the finale.
The Wild Things struck first in the top of the first. Wagner Lagrange laced a bases-loaded RBI single to left field, scoring Caleb McNeely to make it 1-0. Later in the inning, Ethan Wilder hit a sacrifice fly scoring Tommy Caufield to extend the Wild Things lead to 2-0. Washington added on to its lead in the top of the second with a Caufield RBI double that scored Ricardo Sanchez to make it 3-0.
Washington continued to pile it on in the top of the fifth as it added two more runs on the board with two RBI singles: one by Lagrange and one by Andrew Czech.
Foster would run into a little bit of trouble in the bottom of the fifth as Joliet would match Washington with two RBI singles of their own by catcher Evan Orzech and right fielder Liam McArthur to make 5-2. Foster would get the next two batters out to escape any more damage.
Neither team scored again until the seventh inning as Andrew Czech hammered a long solo home run over the right-field fence to extend the Wild Things lead to 6-2 in the top half. Then, in the bottom half, Slammers Matthew Warkentin hit a two-run homer to left-center to cut the deficit to 6-4.
Brendan Nail would come into the game in the bottom of the eighth after Foster’s seven innings of work. He escaped another potential big inning for Joliet by getting a key fly out and strikeout to strand two runners on with one out.
Washington would capitalize and add an insurance run in the top of the ninth on another clutch RBI single by Ethan Wilder, scoring Jalen Miller to make it 7-4. In the bottom half, Gyeongju Kim once again slammed the door to earn his league-leading 18th save of the season and earn the team a sweep.
Czech’s solo homer marked 11-straight games for the Wild Things with a home run and was also his 57th as a Wild Thing (his entire pro career). That pulls him into a tie for second on Washington’s career home run charts with Jacob Dempsey (2008-10), a Frontier League Hall of Famer.
The Wild Things return home tomorrow night to start the first game of a six-game homestand against the Sussex County Miners at 7:05 p.m.
