The Visalia Rawhide suffered a rare home loss on Friday night when the Modesto Nuts pushed across an eighth-inning run to eke out a hard-fought 5-4 victory in Cal League North division action. Nuts starter Ljay Newsome bounced back from two rough outings to throw six strong innings while SS Johnny Adams belted a homer and a triple to pace the offense.
Modesto built a 4-0 lead going to the bottom of the fifth inning, but the first-half champion Rawhide pecked away with single runs in the fifth and sixth before tying it up in the seventh.
The Nuts came up in the top of the eighth and took the lead back with a homer off the bat of CF Connor Kopach, his third of the season. It was a major breakthrough against Rawhide reliever Mack Lemieux, who had held opponents to a .156 batting average coming into his 12th relief appearance. Kopach touched him up for the deciding run as Lemieux (4-1) took the loss.
Newsome went six innings and allowed seven hits and a walk with five strikeouts and two earned runs. Reliever Kyle Wilcox (2-1) got the win despite a shaky inning where he surrendered the lead, in part because of two wild pitches.
Five of Visalia’s 11 hits came from the top two spots in the batting order where SS Jancarlos Cintron went 3-for-5 and 1B L.T. Tolbert was 2-for-5. Tolbert has batted .410 over his last 10 games (16-for-49) and clocks in at .358/.431/.453 on the year.
The five-game series continues tomorrow night
OTHER SCORES
LANCASTER – 0
LAKE ELSINORE – 5
RANCHO CUCAMONGA – 6
INLAND EMPIRE – 5
SAN JOSE – 3
STOCKTON – 8
