SPOKANE — The Everett AquaSox opened their regular season-ending series against the Spokane Indians with a much-needed 9-4 victory Tuesday.
With both teams battling for a place in the Northwest League playoffs, Everett (20-14 second half, 36-36 overall) moved into a tie for the second-half W
est Division lead with Eugene. The AquaSox trail Vancover by two games for the overall second-best record in the division with four games to play. The Frogs must either finish first in the second half or finish with a better overall record than Vancouver to advance to the playoffs.
Spokane trails Boise by one game for the second-best overall record in the East Division. The team with the second-best overall record will advance to the playoffs if first-half champion Tri-City also wins the second-half championship. Tri-City leads Yakima by a game for the second-half title.
While starting pitcher Stephen Landazuri, who allowed just four hits and struck out seven batters, pitched seven shutout innings, Everett zoomed to a 5-0 lead.
The AquaSox scored two runs in the first inning. Marcus Littlewood and Jorge Agudelo led off with walks and Mario Yepez reached on an error to load the bases. Littlewood scored on a wild pitch. Jabari Blash walked to reload the bases and Agudelo scored on a passed ball.
Yepez singled to lead off the third. An out later, Jharmidy De Jesus and Ramon Morla stroked back-to-back RBI doubles.
And Agudelo doubled, took third on a ground out and scored on a sacrifice fly by Blash in the fifth.
Spokane gave the Frogs a scare, scoring four runs in the eighth to make it a one-run game. But the AquaSox bounced back with four of their own in the ninth.
In the eighth, Hanser Alberto notched a one-out single. Rougned Odor reached second and Alberto took third on a two-base error by Blash in left field. Alberto was thrown out at home on Jimmy Swift’s grounder to Ethan Paquette at first. Trever Adams walked to load the bases. Brett Nicholas walked to force in Odor. Yefry Castillo followed with a three-run double.
Paquette led off the ninth with a single, moved to second on a balk and took third on an errant pickoff attempt by pitcher Tim Stanford. Larry Gonzalez followed with an RBI double. Gonzalez scored on a two-run home run by Agudelo, who batted 2-for-4. De Jesus, who batted 3-for-5, drove in another run with a single.
Tim Griffin got the Frogs out of the eighth-inning jam and pitched a 1-2-3 ninth to record his sixth save.
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