Luigi Rodriguez homered in his first at-bat upon returning to the Hillcats and proceeded to tie a career high with five RBIs on a 3-5 day at the plate. Yu-Cheng Chang and Alex Monsalve added home runs, and Bobby Bradley had a pair of RBIs to also fuel the offense in a 12-3 victory at Frawley Stadium Monday night.
After Greg Allen singled to begin the game, Luigi Rodriguez drilled a two-run homer over the center-field fence in his first bat with the Hillcats after joining the team from Akron. Rodriguez added a sacrifice fly in the fourth inning, an RBI double in the sixth, and an RBI single in the seventh. He tied his career high of five RBIs, which he also set at Wilmington last year on May 8. Additionally, Rodriguezscored three runs in the contest.
Also returning to Lynchburg after spending time in Akron was Alex Monsalve. The catcher played 26 games for Lynchburg in 2015 before an injury cut his season short. Monsalve had a multi-hit game with a solo home run in the seventh.
Lynchburg had four different multi-run innings to build its 12-3 final margin. After the two-run first, Yu-Cheng Chang led off the fourth inning with a solo homer. Tyler Krieger, making his Hillcats debut, was hit by a pitch. Monsalve and Mark Mathias followed with singles to bring in a run, and Rodriguez’s sacrifice fly pushed it to 5-1. Wilmington plated a run in the home half of the frame to cut it to 5-2.
Lynchburg broke the game open with a two-run sixth and a five-run seventh. Bobby Bradley had an RBI single in each of those stanzas, and Allen walked and scored a run in each inning. Monsalve’s home run and a pair of run-producing hits by Rodriguez highlighted the scoring barrage.
Justus Sheffield (5-4) earned his first victory in a calendar month by going 5 2/3 innings, holding Wilmington to two runs on six hits. The lefty tied a season high with seven strikeouts and only walked a pair. Luke Eubank’s only run allowed in 1 1/3 innings was unearned, and Matt Whitehouse tossed two scoreless innings to close out the contest.
Lynchburg is 28-15 when a Hillcat hits a home run…Luigi Rodriguez hit 12 home runs and had a slugging percentage of .492 in 92 games with Lynchburg last season…Lynchburg’s 16 hits fell one shy of a season high.
Lynchburg will send Sean Brady (5-3, 5.43) to the mound Tuesday against righty Zach Lovvorn (0-8, 3.61). First pitch at Frawley Stadium is scheduled for 6:35 p.m. Fans can listen to the action on 93.3 FM and 1320 AM as well as www.lynchburg-hillcats.com, beginning with the Hillcats On-Deck Show at 6:15 p.m.
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