HARTFORD, CT. – The Reading Fightin Phils (Philadelphia Phillies, Double-A) took down the Hartford Yard Goats (Colorado Rockies, Double-A) by a score of 5-4 to win the Eastern League Divisional Series two games to none. This pushes the Fightin Phils to the Eastern League Championship Series for the first time since Sept. 12, 2015.<\/p>\n
Reading scratched across its first run in the second inning, Carson DeMartini (Phillies No. 24 prospect) made his way to third after a leadoff single against Hartford starter Jackson Cox (Rockies No 8 prospect), and Pedro Le\u00f3n drew a walk on a wild pitch to score DeMartini. This gave the Fightins an early 1-0 advantage.<\/p>\n
Bryan Rincon (Phillies No. 4 prospect) led off with a no-doubt blast into the second deck of the right-center field bleachers. Rincon has surged up prospect rankings, entering the Eastern League playoffs as MLB Pipeline\u2019s No. 100 overall farmhand.<\/p>\n
Back-to-back walks by Dante Nori (Phillies No. 7 prospect) and Aidan Miller (Phillies No. 2 prospect) applied more pressure before a DeMartini single loaded the bases with only one out. This forced Cox out of the game to get into the bullpen. Yard Goats starters have gone a combined 3.1 innings over the last two games. Nori, the lead baserunner, came around to score on another wild pitch to build the R-Phils lead to 3-0.<\/p>\n
The Rockies\u2019 Double-A affiliate retaliated in the bottom of the third frame, as Braylen Wimmer roped a two-run double to right center field, sending both Jared Thomas and Dyan Jorge to the plate. This cut Reading\u2019s lead to 3-2.<\/p>\n
The Fightins extended their lead in the fourth when Aidan Miller (Phillies No. 2 prospect) roped a line drive through the right side of the infield to score Rincon. It was Miller\u2019s third straight plate appearance where he reached base safely, this time extending Reading\u2019s nod to 4-2.<\/p>\n
The R-Phils tacked on another run, in the seventh when Le\u00f3n roped a single through the left field, scoring DeMartini. Escobar tried to score from second, but Jared Thomas (Rockies No. 10 prospect) threw him out to hold the Fightins\u2019 lead to 5-2.<\/p>\n
Thomas followed his impressive throw with a lead-off solo homer in the eighth, ejecting the ball into the second-deck right field bleachers. His round-tripper cut the lead to 5-3 against Fightin Phils reliever Christian McGowan. McGowan then walked Dyan Jorge before getting Andy Perez (Rockies No. 15 prospect) to ground out.<\/p>\n
That would be all for McGowan, as Estibenzon Jimenez induced a pair of flyouts to get out of the eighth stanza.<\/p>\n
Jimenez continued through the ninth, retiring the first two hitters before Cole Messina blasted a solo shot over the right field wall. Zach Kokoska then stepped in as a pinch-hitter, representing the tying run. Jimenez struck him out swinging on a breaking ball, sending Reading to its first Eastern League Championship series since Sept. 12, 2015.<\/p>\n
Graves (1-0) got the win, firing an inning and a third of scoreless baseball to hold down the fort for the Fightins.<\/p>\n
Cox (0-1) took the loss, allowing three runs on three hits with four walks and four strikeouts over 2.1 innings of work.<\/p>\n
DeMartini accounted for three of the team\u2019s six hits, scoring two runs with a double on the night.<\/p>\n
Reading returns to the field on Sunday at the Erie SeaWolves at 5:05 p.m. for game one of the Eastern League Championship Series. Pregame radio coverage is underway at 4:45 p.m. on the Reading Fightin Phils Radio Network. A video stream is available via MiLB TV or the Bally Live App.<\/p>\n
The Fightin Phils return home on Tuesday and Wednesday, (if necessary) against the Erie SeaWolves.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"HARTFORD, CT. – The Reading Fightin Phils (Philadelphia Phillies, Double-A) took down the Hartford Yard Goats (Colorado Rockies,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":288986,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[4773,2496,51245,128,130,129,44158,726],"class_list":["post-288985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-reading","tag-_sports_top_stories","tag-local_sports","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\/288985","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=288985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/288985\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/288986"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=288985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=288985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-pa\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=288985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}