Jones and Johnson join Gimenez dingerfest on perfect night for the farm

Finally, a Friday night without doubleheaders or rainouts. We are making progress!

Columbus Clippers 7, Toledo Mud Hens 5

Box Score · Clippers improve to 18-21

Nolan Jones did not waste any time handing Columbus a lead that it would never quite surrender.

Ah yes - the patient Nolan Jones jumping on a 0-0 fastball with a runner in scoring position. Tick tock.

Daniel Johnson and Andres Gimenez also homered. Gimenez has now homered in five consecutive games. I think he is angry, and he should be. It is fun to watch him work through that anger in exactly the way we had hoped.

Oscar Mercado got a double and scored; Conor Marabell did the same with a single.

On the mound, Logan Allen #2 (The Elder) allowed three in four, coughing up three hits and two walks against four strikeouts. Robert Broom earned the save and everyone else worked around walks capably enough to hang on.

Akron RubberDucks 5, Bowie Baysox 1 (F/12)

Box Score · Captains improve to 21-18

Some games are fantastic deadlocks until finally one team crumples. Last night, Josh Rolette provided the killing blow with a three-run bomb in the top of the twelfth. They added an insurance run on a groundout from there, but four phenomenal innings from Francisco Perez saved the day.

His numbers are getting goofy, you guys. Last night Perez struck out six in four, walking one and allowing a single hit. His ERA is now 0.67 and it is time to start paying serious attention to him as a prospect. 2019 was not a fluke, and he has been busy ever since it seems. He is 23, his strikeout to walk ratio is ludicrous, and I have seen this six times before now. Fifty spectacular innings across three seasons at four levels is enough for me to go, “Okay kid, let’s see what you got.”

Lynchburg Hillcats 4, Fredericksburg Nationals 3

Box Score · Hillcats improve to 21-17

Jordan Jones tossed 5 innings of one-run ball for the Hillcats, striking out five. His ERA dropped to 4.94 in the process. Again, relievers behind the starter struggled with walks (six in two and two-thirds of an inning) but they kept things tamped down enough to escape with a win.

The key moment: Brian Hemminger’s boy Micah Pries blasted a two-run shot to put Lynchburg up 4-1. While Fredericksburg did both Stuff and Things in an attempt to Win the Game, they did not do Enough and fell One Run Short.

Lake County Captains 9, West Michigan Whitecaps 4

Box Score · Hillcats improve to 22-18

Lake Country capped off a perfect night in the Tribe system. Tanner Burns tossed two and allowed as many. Kevin Coulter and Alec Wisely took the Captains the rest of the way, allowing a single run in seven innings of... shared piggyback duties? Dual Followers? I don’t know what to call it, I just wish they’d do it in the majors a little bit more often. If, you know, you have a lot of injured starters or something.

Anyway, I’m going to write about George Valera now. He went 3-5 with 3 RBI, 2 R, and nary a strikeout.

Nary.

He blasted another bomb, too. Justin Lada, who you may recall from being Justin Lada and writing about baseball, attended the game and got video of pretty much everything other than the dinger.