A promotion called Bark in the Park encouraged local baseball fans to bring their dogs to Hadlock Field on Friday and 95 of the four-legged friends showed up with their people.
Bad night for dogs. Exhilarating night for the Sea Dogs, who staged a four-run rally in the ninth to extend the game, then came from behind in the 10th to beat the Harrisburg Senators 7-6.
Tanner Nishioka delivered the game-winner, a line single to left with the bases loaded and none out to score Jhonny Perada. By rule, each extra frame begins with a runner on second base, and Perada immediately moved him to third with a single, his third hit of the game.
Ryan Fitzgerald followed with a double that tied the score 6-6. An intentional walk set the stage for Nishioka, who was mobbed by his teammates in shallow right field after rounding first base.
“We talk about battling down to the last out, and we showed it,” said Sea Dogs Manager Corey Wimberly. “That’s the culture we’ve created. Don’t give up and continue to battle until the end.”
Friday’s victory marked the first time this season the Sea Dogs won a game at Hadlock when trailing after eight innings. The entire affair lasted five hours and six minutes, including a 98-minute weather delay after lightning, thunder and a heavy downpour forced a temporary halt after the first inning.
It seemed all but over when the Sea Dogs trailed 5-1 entering the bottom of the ninth, but the Dogs came through with four hits, none bigger than a two-out, two-run single by Tyreque Reed to tie. Reed’s opposite-field hit followed another two-out single by Devlin Granberg that loaded the bases.
“We had so many different big at-bats in there, I don’t know if I can point out one,” Wimberly said. “Every single guy who came up to the plate gave us a quality AB there.”
Only a few dozen of a crowd announced as 5,097 stuck around through the lengthy weather delay to see the late dramatics. The Senators had gone ahead 6-5 in their half of the 10th when Rhett Wiseman led off with a run-scoring double. He was erased, however, after trying to advance on a fly to left.
The Sea Dogs have won 16 of 17, having seen their franchise-record streak end at 15 Thursday night.
Harrisburg had taken a 2-0 lead off Sea Dogs starter Brayan Bellow with three hits before the skies opened and the tarp made the first of two appearances. Center fielder Jeisson Rosario snuffed out the rally with a tumbling catch after a long run to his right.
The Sea Dogs finally pushed across a run in the third, ending a string of 12 scoreless innings stretching back to Wednesday night’s 11-6 victory. A single by Nishioka and two walks loaded the bases with none out, but consecutive grounders from Granberg and Reed yielded just one run before a double play.
It marked the second of four consecutive innings that ended with a Sea Dogs runner stranded at third. The tying run seemed assured in the home fourth when the newly-arrived Nick Sogard was robbed of his first Double-A basehit (he finally got one in the ninth). Harrisburg second baseman Osvaldo Duarte made an over-the-shoulder catch in right field to prevent Perada from scoring and protect the 2-1 lead.
Sea Dogs reliever Rio Gomez (six strikeouts in four scoreless innings) kept the game close, as did Zach Schellenger (one run in two innings) and Jake Thompson (a hitless eighth).
Wimberly praised his bullpen for keeping the game close when the offense wasn’t producing.
“When the momentum really wasn’t on our side, we found a way to keep damage to a minimum and continue to compete out there,” he said. “That says a lot about our team as a whole.”
Harrisburg made it 3-1 on a solo home run by Jake Alu in the sixth and added two more in the ninth to take a 5-1 lead.
The Senators displayed another web gem to end the seventh. Shortstop Jackson Cluff went horizontal for a diving catch near the foul line in shallow left to steal a hit from Rosario.
Perada sparked the tying rally by opening the home half of the ninth with a walk. He reached base in all five plate appearances. Fitzgerald and Sogard followed with singles and the rally was on.
Before the season, Wimberly delivered the usual baseball caution about keeping an even keel. Never too high, never too low.
“I think the guys are doing a really good job of that,” he said.
Of course, lately, only the first half of that premise is being tested.
The Sea Dogs continue their homestand Saturday with a new uniform and different name, the Red Snappers, in a hot dog promotion.
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