Thursday night was defined by late comebacks, with all four games having the winner decided by runs in the final half of their contests. Tate Southisene continues to make an impact for Rome and had a big triple off of the center field wall for his 31st extra base hit of the season. Unfortunately in this game Owen Carey left early for unknown reasons.
(43-45) Gwinnett Stripers 2, (54-36) Memphis Redbirds 1
- Brett Wisely, SS: 1-3, 2B, .286/.399/.427
- Carlos Santana, 1B: 1-3, BB, RBI, .100/.357/.100
- Anthony Molina, SP: 3 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 3 K, 3.88 ERA
- Rolddy Munoz, RP: 1 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 1 K, 2.97 ERA
Needing an end to their five game losing streak the Stripers found themselves in a corner late in this game, but thanks to great pitching
throughout the evening they remained close and were able to break through in the ninth. Anthony Molina had been shelved for a bit and had a long rest coming into this start for Gwinnett, and he looked fresh from the opening pitch. Molina didn’t allow a hit over his three innings of work and kept the Redbirds from even having a real chance at scoring. Austin Gomber came in to cover the middle innings and he did finally give up an inside-out double to end the no-hit bid in the top of the seventh inning, but he, too, looked nearly untouchable across four scoreless innings. Gomber didn’t even need 50 pitches to get through his four innings, throwing tons of strikes with all of his pitches and relying on his deep mix to keep Memphis off balance. Gwinnett’s pitching fortunes finally ran out in the eighth inning with Rolddy Munoz on the mound. Munoz has been on a rough stretch lately and hitters are starting to figure out how to handle his slider, and he didn’t get away with leaving pitches over the strike zone in this game. Memphis strung together three hits to score a run, and going into the bottom of the ninth inning the Stripers were trailing 1-0.
Offensively the Stripers seemed just as hopeless as Memphis throughout this game, as Cardinals’s number six prospect Quinn Mathews was fully in control for seven innings. The Stripers typically don’t hit the ball very hard but that was especially prevalent for them throughout this game, and the only hits they managed against Mathews were a couple of weakly hit balls that found the perfect place to get the runner on base. After finally chasing Mathews from the game the Stripers didn’t fair much better in the eighth inning, as although Adam Zebrowski had a 104 mph single the other three batters in the inning struck out. Gwinnett needed a whole lotta luck in the ninth inning to get this thing done, and fortunate was what they found. Brett Wisely came into this game without a hit in his past four, but led off in the ninth by stroking a double into the right field corner that immediately had Gwinnett on a path to tie the game. Then came luck, as Brewer Hicklen hit a shallow pop up into center field that the shortstop had all day to camp under, but misplayed allowing it to fall for a hit and put the tying run on third base and winning run at first. Carlos Santana chopped a ball that just snuck past the diving first baseman and into right field for the third straight Stripers hit, and with no one out the Stripers were just 90 feet from stealing this game from Memphis. On the first pitch of his at bat DaShawn Keirsey Jr. sliced one into right field, and though the left fielder made a diving attempt he couldn’t come up with the ball and Gwinnett won in exciting fashion.
Swing and Misses
Anthony Molina – 6
Austin Gomber – 5
Joel Payamps – 4
(38-41) Columbus Clingstones 7, (31-53) Birmingham Barons 1
- Patrick Clohisy, CF: 1-4, RBI, .264/.346/.448
- Dalton McIntyre, LF: 1-3, HR, BB, 2 RBI, .290/.450/.484
- Julio Robaina, SP: 4.2 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 2 K, 2.41 ERA
- Tyler LaPorte, RP: 1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 3 K, 1.91 ERA
With a 7-1 final score you might expect a loaded offensive game for Columbus, but they didn’t record their first hit until there was two outs in the fifth inning. To that point they had been shut down, but once they dipped into Birmingham’s bullpen they raced away with the game. This game was a tough one to get in in the first place. Rain pushed the start time of this game back, then in the second inning they also suffered a lengthy delay. Regardless of the delay both sides decided to leave in their starting pitchers, a decision which turned out well. Birmingham’s didn’t allow a hit and Julio Robaina was able to hold the Barons to only one run, though that came with a whole lot of heavy breathing. Robaina allowed eight baserunners but stranded most, with the Barons as a team going 0-7 with runners in scoring position in the game. The Columbus bullpen was fantastic and it started with Isaac Gallegos, who continued his great season with two scoreless innings and two strikeouts. Gallegos had a bit of a down year in 2025 where he wasn’t missing as many bats and wasn’t always as sharp with his slider, but so fa4r he has been lights out across two levels. In his short time in Double-A his slider is playing as well as it did in High-A and he is commanding the ball better this season, patterns which should they hold would give him a chance to fit in the major leagues as a solid multi-inning relief arm.
The Clingstones only managed to sneak a Luke Waddell single through the left side in the sixth inning before making two quick outs, and it seemed it could be another fruitless inning for a team struggling to get any offensive momentum. Down to his final strike Dalton McIntyre flipped the game in a flash, turning on a slider up in the zone and crushing his second home run of the series to put Rome up 2-1. In the next inning the Clingstones ran away with the game. Facing a new pitcher Logan Braunschweig started the inning off with a single, and Tyler Tolve wasted no time bringing him home with an RBI double. Patrick Clohisy made his first impact of the game by flipping a single into right field to score Tolve, and Jordan Groshans put the game away with a three run bomb off of the scoreboard. Five of their runs and four of their hits came off of one pitcher who recorded just one out, and for the close of the game Columbus was back to where they were at the start. Clohisy continues to be a force at the top of the lineup, though this game did break a streak of eight straight games with a walk for him. Clohisy is on a nine-game on base streak with a .310/.459/.552 line and as many walks as strikeouts so far in July.
Swing and Misses
Julio Robaina – 10
Isaac Gallegos – 6
(40-41) Rome Emperors 2, (40-42) Hudson Valley Renegades 9
- Tate Southisene, SS: 1-4, 3B, BB, .205/.340/.361
- John Gil, 2B: 1-5, .263/.357/.418
- Eric Hartman, LF: 1-5, .291/.361/.557
- Owen Carey, RF: 0-1, BB, .269/.336/.471
- Zach Royse, SP: 4.1 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 3 BB, 7 K, 5.66 ERA
It was an ugly loss for the Emperors, and is made even more so by the now unclear status of Owen Carey. Carey has been great for Rome this season, but was pulled from the game in the fifth inning for a pinch-hitter for reasons that aren’t especially apparent upon watching the game. In his prior at bat he dove into first base trying to beat out a chopper to the first baseman, but initially seemed fine after the play and didn’t have any sort of defensive play in the next inning. Hopefully Carey is okay as it would be extremely disappointing to have any sort of injury interrupt him yet again this season, though there isn’t any sort of information around at the moment. At the time he left the Emperors were actually winning this game 2-1, thanks to some good early work from Zach Royse. His slider was electric for the first three inning of this game and the Renegades had little answer for him, though he started to show some cracks in the fourth inning with his control failing him. He was able to hold Hudson Valley to only a single run, but that was not the case in the next inning. Royse was missing all over the place and either giving up hits on pitches over the plate or walking batters, and he ended up allowing three runs in the inning with a home run taking the biggest chunk out of him. With his heavy emphasis on his fastball/slider combination the jump to High-A has been a little challenging for him, though he seems to be getting more of his footing in the last two starts with his whiffs coming back to his baseline. Still he has to find a way to pitch deeper into game to stick as a starter, though the projection for him has always been a likely reliever role.
After Hudson Valley tied the game up in the fifth inning Tate Southisene made a huge impact, crushing a high sinker off of the base of the center field wall and motoring around for a triple. He had a couple of strikeouts in this game but overall there is nothing you can complain about from his so far in the jump to High-A. The strikeout rate is a tad high for a top prospect, but given how young he is and how aggressive the move was in the first place he’s handled it quite well. Not many 19 year olds show up with game-ready power to all fields like Southisene has done, and he has some of the best strike zone recognition you’ll see from a player this young. Eric Hartman has struggled a bit so far in this series, with his only hit so far being a flare single into right field in this game. He struck out three times in his five plate appearances, and this is probably his worst stretch of the season at the plate though it’s been a very brief fall off. You have to expect he is going to struggle at some point and this is just a small blip.
Swing and Misses
Zach Royse – 14
Jacob Kroeger – 5
Justin Long – 4
(48-36) Augusta GreenJackets 7, (46-36) Hickory Crawdads 5
- Luis Guanipa, CF: 0-5 .307/.366/.467
- Conor Essenburg, DH: 0-3, BB, .253/.386/.458
- Alex Lodise, SS: 1-4, 2B, .258/.341/.480
- Derek Vartanian, SP: 4.1 IP, 5 H, 5 R, 5 ER, 4 BB, 3 K, 3.81 ERA
Yet another game defined by a burst of runs later on, the GreenJackets were able to take the lead in the seventh inning of this game and hold on thanks to the bullpen’s fine work. It wasn’t really the big boys at the top of the lineup doing a ton of damage, but rather another monster game from Matt Scannell who has been the team’s best hitter since being picked up as a free agent at the end of June. Scannell got the scoring started with a solo home run in the second inning, but going into the sixth inning that was all the GreenJackets had recorded. With two outs in the sixth inning Alex Lodise managed to keep a line drive fair down the right field line for a double, and that set off the biggest rally of the game to get August back into it. Cody Miller ripped a sinking line drive into left field to make it 5-2, and then following a Scannell walk Michael Martinez made an appearance. Martinez launched a ball off of the top of the center field wall, scoring both runners, though he only got a single out of the play himself. It didn’t matter much, though, as he advanced to second on a walk and was able to score on a single from Cooper McMurray to tie the game.
The seventh inning had a similarly slow start to it. Conor Essenburg drew a one out walk, but with strikeouts from Luis Guanipa and Alex Lodise it was hard to foresee a big rally on the horizon. Yet it came, as Cody Miller drew a walk and brought up Scannell with a chance to give Augusta the lead for the second time in the game. Scannell responded, lining a ball that cleared the left fielder and rolled to the wall, plenty deep enough for both runners to score and give Augusta a multi-run lead. It has been a pretty wild season for Cristobal Abreu out of the Augusta bullpen. He gave the team two solid innings of relief in this game to lower his ERA to 2.93 and give himself 9 2/3 straight scoreless innings dating back over a month, yet he has walked 22 batters so far in 15 1/3 innings with Augusta. Derek Vartanian had his worst start of the season, breaking up a stretch of impressive play over the past month for him. Vartanian hadn’t had a single game this entire season to this point with more walks than strikeouts, but tied his season high with five earned runs allowed and set his season high with four walks.
Swing and Misses
Derek Vartanian – 8
Cristobal Abreu – 6
Kade Woods – 5
