Tribe Goes With The Flow Brown’s Clutch Single Stops Volcanoes

Dermal Brown started to grab his glove and prepare for extra innings. “Wait, ‘D,”’ said batting coach Greg Smith. “There are only two outs.”

So instead of taking his place in left field, Brown snatched a bat and saw to it that the Spokane Indians wouldn’t need extra innings.

Brown singled to right field with the bases loaded in the ninth inning Wednesday, rallying Spokane to a 5-4 Northwest League win over Salem-Keizer at Seafirst Stadium.

“You love to see your players come through when they’re put in that position,” said Tribe manager Jeff Garber. Spokane (2-0) trailed 4-2 heading into its ninth, but opened with a strikeout/wild pitch, then drew four walks to set up Brown’s winning single.

Brown also homered to left-center in the fifth off starter Jeff Pohl to cut into the Volcanoes’ 3-1 lead.

“(Pohl) had struck me out (in the first) and got me to ground out (in the third) on changeups, so I looked for another,” said Brown, Kansas City’s No. 1 selection in last year’s amateur draft. “He left a changeup high and I jumped on it.

“I had messed up in the first with runners in scoring position (first and third with one out).”

Brown, just 1 for 20 at rookie league last year before injuring his hamstring, is 4 for 9 with five RBIs for Spokane.

“There’s nothing like playing before fans,” Brown said after autographing several balls for youngsters. “I get pumped up. Florida (rookie league) is not like baseball. It’s like boot camp.”

Salem-Keizer (0-2) scored three unearned runs off Spokane starter Todd Meady. Each run came after a walk.

Two Spokane errors in the first allowed the Volcanoes to score twice without a hit. Spokane outhit Salem-Keizer 6-2 through five, but trailed 3-1.

Spokane started its rally against Jason Verdugo (0-1) with pinch-hitter Cade Griffis reaching first on a strikeout/wild pitch. Pinch-hitter Dave Ullery walked, as did Merrell Ligons.

Goefrey Tomlinson’s groundout to first scored Griffis. Joe Caruso drew an intentional walk, then reliever William Malerich walked pinch-hitter Doug Blosser on a 3-2 pitch for a tie game, with pinch-runner Francisco Bautista scoring.

Mike Brambilla struck out on three pitches.

“Actually, I wasn’t even ready,” Brown said of the winning at-bat. “I was thinking that was the third out, then someone said, ‘Get ready.”’

“Things work out in funny ways,” Garber said. “But the bottom line is we had to have baserunners in the inning (to rally) and we got them on.”

Notes

Spokane dropped pitcher Jason Wright from its roster. “He wasn’t ready to pitch at this level,” Garber said… . Salem-Keizer lefty Michael Riley starts against righty Eric Yanz tonight. Yanz completed his Kansas State career as the all-time leader in innings pitched (290 1-3) and was No. 2 in strikeouts (219)… . Garber said the rest of the five-man rotation will be lefty Jason Gooding on Friday and righty Kris Wilson on Saturday. … Tonight’s promotion is The Blues Brothers, annual visitors to Seafirst who mimic songs made famous by Dan Ackroyd and the late John Belushi.

See box score on Stat Sheet/C5

, DataTimes