Astros Farm Report: 9-7

Not a good night down on the farm with a rainout, an elimination and a playoff loss ...

Tri-City's schedule shrank by yet another game as bad weather caused their penultimate game with Connecticut to be cancelled. They will try again one final time tonight with Alex House scheduled to start for the ValleyCats at 5:30 CST.

After winning the first game at home against Elizabethton, Greeneville only needed to win one of two games on the road to advance to the finals. They didn't. Roman Garcia's triple in the first was one of only four hits that the Appy Astros could muster. Carlos Machado contributed two hits to the effort, including a double in the seventh. But they struck out 13 times and were never able to get anything going offensively. Greeneville starter Cole Watts (2.1IP 3H 3R 2BB 2SO) took the loss. Yhoan Acosta took over with two outs in the third and was dominant through the next two innings, not allowing a baserunner until he issued two walks in the sixth and was pulled; he finished the night with six strikeouts over three innings. Dariel Aquino followed with 1.2 scoreless frames. But the same cannot be said of Jhyeson Caraballo, whose three additional runs allowed firmly sealed Greeneville's fate. The final score was 6-0.

In the first game of the Midwest League Division Quarterfinal, Quad Cities fell 4-3 to Peoria on the road on a walk-off. A rehabbing Michael Feliz pitched a perfect first for the Bandits and was then replaced by Kit Sheetz who allowed a small-ball run in the second and another run in the sixth off two one-out hits and a sac fly at which point he got the hook. His replacement, Jesus Balaguer, proceeded to walk the next three batters, allowing one more run to score, before recording the final out of the inning. Devon Carr held the line through the seventh and eighth and was pulled in the ninth after issuing a lead-off walk. Carr was charged with the final run and the loss, a fate he didn't deserve, as Robert Corniel allowed that walk to blossom into the winning run with his less than stellar outing. The Bandits did their scoring in the fourth (Josh Rojas sac fly and Kristian Trompiz RBI single) and the seventh (Chas McCormick RBI triple). McCormick went 2-for-3 with the triple and two walks. Abraham Toro and a rehabbing Colin Moran each doubled in the game.

Quad Cities must win tonight at home to keep their season going. They will take the field at 6:35 CST behind starter Cristian Javier who is 2-0 with a 2.39 ERA in his eight outings for the Bandits this season. He will face Austin Warner, 2-4 with a 3.00 ERA in nine starts in the Midwest League in 2017.

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The gang over at the Lima Time Time podcast with help from Timothy de Block of Crawfish Boxes fame will be putting on a 24-hour podcast/livecast to raise money for Hurricane Harvey relief. They already have a ton of announced guests lined up and some unannounced ones as well (as in yours truly). They will be broadcasting from 7 pm CST Friday the 8th until 7 pm CST Saturday the 9th. (Personally, I'd tune in around 4:00 am when James and Patrick start getting delirious.) The details can be found here. And you can start the donations rolling ahead of time by clicking on the link below.