READING, Pa. –\u00a0The Reading Fightin Phils (55-60, 25-21) lost to the Portland Sea Dogs (60-55, 25-22) by a score of 6-4 at Hadlock Field on Wednesday. The Fightin Phils have now lost four games in a row and the first two of this six-game set with the Sea Dogs.<\/p>\n
Portland found an early scoring surge again, piling on three runs to jump on Reading in the first frame. Justin Gonzalez (1) smacked his first Double-A home run in lead-off fashion. The 19-year-old hit an opposite field blast before Henry Godbout (2) crushed a two-run homer over the Maine Monster in left field, scoring Jack Winnay.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Reading answered in the third inning, first on a Raylin Heredia RBI single that scored Pedro Le\u00f3n. This was Heredia\u2019s 132nd hit of the season, a mark that keeps him atop the Eastern League and in second place among Double-A hitters (behind MLB No. 6 prospect Josue De Paula).\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Fightin Phils found more offense in the fifth stanza when Le\u00f3n lined a single to center field, sending Wuilfredo Antunez trotting home. This cut the deficit to 3-2.<\/p>\n
However, the Sea Dogs had an immediate response in the bottom half of the inning. Tyler McDonough (9) crushed a deep fly ball to left field, scoring both Max Ferguson and Nelly Taylor for a decisive three-run home run. This pushed the Red Sox Double-A affiliate\u2019s lead out to 6-2.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Fightins retaliated in the seventh inning on an Antunez (14) solo shot to right field that cut into the lead.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Bryan Rincon (Phillies No. 5 prospect) followed Antunez up with his 20th double of the season on a ball that pierced the left-center field gap. He is now only two home runs shy from having 20 long balls, 20 doubles and 20 stolen bases. Rincon advanced on a passed ball and scored on a wild pitch to bring the Fightin Phils to within a pair of runs.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The R-Phils aimed to put together another late-game rally in the ninth, and Al Pedrique\u2019s squad applied plenty of pressure. Bryson Ware swatted a lead-off single to center field before Antunez and Rincon were retired on a lineout and groundout. Le\u00f3n drew a walk, and Ware eventually took third base on a balk. Heredia stepped up with the tying run on base, and he flew out to the edge of the warning track to end the ball game.<\/p>\n
Joe Vogatsky (2-3) got the victory for Portland, firing 2.1 innings of one-run ball with three strikeouts in a bullpen game.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Adam Seminaris (11-8) took the loss for Reading, tossing 6.2 innings while allowing six runs on six hits with five strikeouts.<\/p>\n
Antunez led all Fightin Phils hitters out of the nine-spot, going 2-for-4 with a pair of runs scored and a solo shot. The former Guardians farmhand has now cleared the fence in two of his last four games.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Fightin Phils hold a narrow half game lead atop the Eastern League-Northeast standings, as Portland continues to surge closer in second place.<\/p>\n
Reading returns to the field on Thursday against the Portland Sea Dogs at 6 p.m. RHP Cody Bowker will start for Reading, and he will go opposite LHP Hayden Mullins for Portland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"READING, Pa. –\u00a0The Reading Fightin Phils (55-60, 25-21) lost to the Portland Sea Dogs (60-55, 25-22) by a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":174536,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[4773,51245,128,130,129,44158,726],"class_list":["post-269094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-_sports_top_stories","tag-milb","tag-reading-city","tag-reading-city-headlines","tag-reading-city-news","tag-reading-fightin-phils","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=269094"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/269094\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/174536"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=269094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=269094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=269094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}