By Stephen Ur –
The Worcester Red Sox opened a new series against the Columbus Clippers, the Triple-A affiliate of the Cleveland Guardians, at Polar Park in Worcester, MA on Tuesday night. The WooSox were coming off a series split on the road against the Buffalo Bison. Justin Hagenman was on the mound for Worcester to start this game.
Columbus struck first with Angel Martinez knocking a solo home run to right field with two outs in the top of the first inning. On a 3-2 count with one out in the bottom of the second, Eddy Alverez hit a solo shot to center field to tie the game at 1.
Columbus would knock back-to-back-to-back homers in the top of the third inning as Jose Tena went deep to center field, giving the Clippers a 2-1 lead. Juan Brito then went deep to right center field on the very next pitch to extend their lead to 3-1. The third consecutive at-bat with a home run came by way of Martinez, his second of the night. The score now read 4-1 in favor of Columbus.
Hagenman’s night was done after four innings in which he gave up four runs, all homers. Naoyuki Uwasawa came in in relief for him. Alverez would score for the second time in this game, this time on a sac fly from Hernandez, making it a 5-1 game after 4.5 innings.
With a 6-1 lead, Jhonkensy Noel hit the Clippers’ fifth home run of the game, a three-run homer into right field, to increase Columbus’ lead to 9-1 in the top of the seventh. The Woosox weren’t done yet as a double off the center field wall from Mark Contreras and another double off the wall from Chase Meidroth scored two runs, making it 9-3 in the bottom of the seventh. Worcester would another before Columbus would end the inning.
The Clippers would blow the game open, including their sixth home run of the game, a three-run homer, and their seventh, a grand slam in the ninth, and win by a final score of 16-4. Game 2 of this series will be played tomorrow night at Polar Park in Worcester, MA. First pitch is scheduled for 6:45 p.m. ET.
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