Sonoma Stompers clinch first place with 13-2 blowout over San Rafael

Playing at the end of a 100-degree day, the Sonoma Stompers turned up the heat on the San Rafael Pacifics and cooked up a decisive 13-2 victory at Palooza Park. The win confirmed the Stompers as first-place finishers in the Pacific Association’s 2019 season – and number one seed in the post-season playoffs.

The result put the Stompers 10 games ahead of the two tied second-place teams, the Pacifics and the Vallejo Admirals, an insurmountable lead with only 9 games left to play.

Starting pitcher Vijay Patel ran his record to a league-leading 7-1 with seven strong innings, giving up four hits and striking out nine. He did lag in the eighth inning, however, as Yeiler Peguero slugged a home run for the Pacifics’ first score and Patel was pulled for reliever Jacob Cox.

Cox gave up another run before the inning was over, but that frame was the only time the Pacifics scored. Ryan Richardson came in to pitch a flawless top of the ninth and the game, and the season, went in the Stompers win column.

But the game was won on offense, and the run-happy Stompers crossed the plate three times in both the third and fifth innings, and six times in a wild eighth that punctured any hopes of a Pacifics upset. The first run came on a bases-loaded wild pitch following a swinging strike out by Nick Gotta. As Rob DeAngelis raced home, Pacifics catcher Ermindo Escobar dove for the plate but missed the tag, a call he angrily argued but which stood nonetheless.

No matter: the Stompers scored twice more on a Chris Kwitzer single to give the home team a 3-0 lead.

Two innings later, Brent Gillespie unloaded on a Johnny Morell pitch with two men on, and the score doubled to 6-0. That was it for Morell, and he got the loss to run his record to 2-3.

The decisive inning came late in the game, with Axel Johnson now pitching for the Pacifics. Nick Gotta led off with a single and, after Jacob Barfield struck out, Gotta advanced to second on a wild pitch. Then Kwitzer flew out, and it looked like Gotta would be stranded as Johnson ran the count full on Nick Kern.

But Kern got the walk, then Pedro Barrios got another, and suddenly the bases were loaded. With the count full and the runners going, Miles Williams hit a bouncy grounder to shortstop Zane Gelphman who let it slip under his glove and it rolled into left. Williams was safe, and Gotta and Kern both galloped home.

That prompted Pacifics manager Derrick Pyles to bring in Jimmy Lunardelli as the team’s fifth pitcher of the night, but it didn’t prove a wise move: A wild pitch scored Barrios from third, and following a walk to DeAngelis, catcher Bronson Butcher hammered his fourth home run of the year, bringing home Williams and DeAngelis and ending the scoring at 13-2, the Stompers 40th win of the season against only 15 losses.

As the champagne flowed and the Gatorade spilled, manager Zack Pace said, “Our guys work to get better everyday and it shows on the field.”

But he added, “We still have some work to do to achieve the main goal,” that being bringing home the league championship following the playoffs, which start Aug. 30 for the top-seeded Stompers.

Team president Brett Creamer agreed. “Our goal is to keep this positive momentum rolling into the playoffs and bring home a championship,” he said.

The Stompers visited Vallejo on Thursday night for a too-late-to-report game against the Admirals, then open a two-game series at home on Friday and Saturday against the Napa Silverados. Both games start at 6:05 p.m. at Palooza Park, Arnold Field.