EVERETT — Collin Cowgill arrived in Everett amidst a certain amount of buzz.
Thursday night, the Yakima Bears center fielder gave a sample of what all the commotion is about as he continued his one-man assault on the Northwest League.
Cowgill extended his early-season homer binge, hitting a tiebreaking solo shot in the top of the eighth inning, and Yakima defeated the Everett AquaSox 5-4 at Everett Memorial Stadium.
Cowgill’s homer came one day after he slugged three in the Bears’ 9-8 victory over Spokane, and it was his 11th in just 16 games, continuing the dream start to his professional career.
“No way,” Cowgill responded when asked whether he expected a start like this. “At the beginning you want to get off to a good start, you want to get some hits, but I never thought it would start like this. It’s pretty amazing experiencing this at the beginning of my career, and I’m just having a lot of fun with it right now.”
Cowgill’s homer made a winner out of Yakima starting pitcher Houston Summers. Summers, a converted catcher turned knuckleball pitcher, was functionally effective. He gave up seven hits and five walks, but threw enough useful 65 mph flutterballs and sneaky 80 mph fastballs to last eight innings, inducing Everett’s batters into repeated lazy flyouts.
“I’d only seen one (knuckleball pitcher) in my career,” said Everett’s Kevin Reyonlds, the only AquaSox batter to manage more than one hit against Summers. “It’s a little bit different facing a pitcher who doesn’t throw any harder than 80 mph.
“We heard they had a knuckleballer throwing tonight, so we were a little heads up on it,” Reynolds added. “I was trying to share my experience with the guys on the knuckleballer I faced and I think we did OK tonight, we just didn’t get the win.”
Summers keeping the Sox bats at bay gave Cowgill the chance to play hero. The first batter up against Everett reliever Doug Salinas in the eighth, Cowgill, a fifth-round pick by the Arizona Diamondbacks in this year’s draft out of the University of Kentucky, thought he had walked on a 3-1 pitch, trotting 15 feet toward first before strike two was called.
However, the 5-foot-9 mighty mite returned to the plate and on the next pitch skied a shot the opposite way that cleared the fence in right-center, snapping a 4-4 deadlock.
“I was looking for a ball away, he ended up throwing it away, and I kind used the park,” Cowgill said. “I didn’t really get a lot of it, but I hit it to the right spot, and the wind was blowing out a little bit so that helped. I just got a little luck right there.”
Cowgill’s homer pace is historic. The league record for home runs in a short season is 25 set by Southern Oregon’s William Darkis in 1980.
Anthony Smith also homered for Yakima (8-9). Summers’ victory improved his record to 3-0, and Jason Durst tossed a perfect ninth to pick up his first save.
Reynolds finished 2-for-5 with two RBI to lead Everett (6-11). Salinas suffered the loss to fall to 0-2.
Everett starting pitcher Walter Suriel was every bit as effective as Summers, if not more so. The right-hander went seven innings, giving up just four hits and striking out seven. However, the Bears made the most of their opportunities, pushing four runs across against Suriel, leaving Suriel with a no decision.
Everett’s batters had varying success against Summers’ knuckler in the early innings, but finally put something together in the third to take a 1-0 lead. With two out Nate Tenbrink walked, stole second, then scored when Manelik Pimentel smacked a knuckler into left-center for a single.
Suriel faced the minimum through the first four innings, but the Bears found the range in the fifth. On the first delivery of the inning Smith turned on pitch and blasted it over the wall in right-center for his second homer of the season. Then later in the inning Gerardo Bustemante ripped a double down the left-field line, scoring Brendan Duffy from first to give Yakima a 2-1 lead.
The Sox surged ahead in the sixth. The tying run scored when Travis Howell scored on a wild pitch. Then with two out Reynolds lined a triple into the right-field corner. Two runs scored as Everett went ahead 4-2.
But Yakima tied it up in the seventh, Duffy tripling in one run and scoring on a groundout.
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