Soddies by Morning: Starters Shine, but the Sod Poodles Fall, Dropping Both Series on the Road Trip
- Austin Hartsfield
- 5 days ago
- 5 min read
Happy Memorial Day to everyone, with special gratitude to the men and women who have served our country, allowing us to enjoy things like America's pastime. With that in mind, let's delve into the eventful weekend for your Amarillo Sod Poodles!
Friday: Sod Poodles 1 Hooks 0
May has looked good on Amarillo pitching and Avery Short has been no exception. Short tossed the first five innings of Amarillo’s second shutout of 2025, striking out five Hooks and walking two. Short gave up six hits on the night with four of them coming off of infield singles and extending innings. Another good outing from Short has given him a 2.11 ERA in the month of May and a 64% strike rate that resulted in 22/5 strikeout to walk ratio despite only getting 9% of swinging strikes.
The Sod Poodles offensive explosion from the night before didn’t quite carry over to Friday night. The Sod Poodles were shut out themselves for the first 5.2 innings of the contest by Hooks starter Joey Mancini before Amarillo finally broke through when LuJames Groover picked up one of his three singles on the night, giving him back to back three-hit nights for the fist time in his career. Folllowing the Soddies third basemens lead Caleb Roberts cracked a double off of Mancini for the only run of the entire game and chase the starter from the game.
After struggling most of the roadtrip the bullpen put together a great evening outside of one particular thing. Zach Barnes after loading the bases following a double and a pair of walks, saw a 1-2 pitch get away from catcher Christian Cerda, and the throw to home plate was accidentally headbutted by the current hitter and center fielder Logan Cerny. He would be called for batter interference and Willits who would have scored was called out. The problem for Amarillo came when Willits slide into home and made contact with the covering Barnes who looked like he got spiked. Barnes would have to leave the game and replaced by Alfred Morillo who would get out of that wild sixth inning.
The Hooks would have baserunners in the final innings but the combination of Morillo, Abner, and Sims would all work their way through it and shut the door on Amarillo’s rare 9 hit shut out.
Saturday: Sod Poodles 2 Hooks 3
One thing the Sod Poodles have been able to count on in 2025 is Spencer Giesting to do his part. Giesting looked like himself again dueling Hooks starter Trey Dombroski and tossing 6 innings of just two run baseball, and tying season high 8 strike outs for the fourth time this season. That marked the ninth time in 9 starts that the DIamondbacks #20 prospect went at least 5 innings, and the sixth time that he had worked into the sixth inning.
Amarillo has averaged 2.2 runs per game in the last five Giesting starts including Saturday. Even then the lefty didn’t get a run of support until he had thrown his last pitch of the night in the sixth, and in the top of the seventh his battery mate Drake Osborn belted a 2-run shot to tie the game and relieve Giesting of a potential loss.
It wouldn’t be long after that Corpus Christi would snatch the lead back.
Gerardo Gutierrez made one mistake in his two innings of work, but it was a big one in a night where offense was hard to come by. After just being promoted from High-A Ashville on friday Luis Encarnacion lead off the Hooks seventh and took a 2-1 pitch on the inside part of the plate from Gutierrez for a ride, hitting it deep to left field. That gave the Corpus a 3-2 lead where the games would finish despite the Amarillo right hander sitting down six straight Hooks after the home run.
Outside of the Osborn blast the bats were pretty quiet for the second consecutive night. Kristian Robinson would lead off the game with a double and steal his 12th base of base of the year later after a walk, and Manuel Pena launched a triple in the second but like every runner in scoring position all night, they would be stranded on the basepaths, going 0-10.
Sunday: Sod Poodles 5 Hooks 6 /10
Roman Angelo saved the best start of the week for last. Angelo shoved against the Hooks on Sunday, pitching 7 shut out innings, and recording a team season high 9 strikeouts. The Amarillo right hander only gave up 2 hits against the 26 hitters that the Hooks sent to the plate, and only walked 2 despite only thowing 55% (53/96) of strikes on the night. The Diamondbacks #26 prospect retired 10 of his last 11, and put an exclamation point on the outing when he struck out the side to close out his start in the 7th inning.
Amarillo built Angelo a lead with Christian Cerda mashing his second homer of the series in the 3rd inning, and singles from Robinson and Conticello pushed the lead to 3-0 before a wild pitch added one more in the 7th.
Much like most of the road trip (with the bullpen recording a 4.75 ERA over the two weeks), the Hooks took advantage once the starters left the game. Amarillo's only left-handed bullpen pitcher, Philip Abner, saw a 4-0 lead disappear, giving up 4 unearned runs after two outs were recorded, due to a fielding error that extended the inning. The 7th inning ended in a 4-4 tie after Luis Encarnacion delivered an RBI single for Corpus for the second consecutive night, preventing Roman Angelo from securing his first win of 2025 despite his impressive performance.
In the top of the 9th Tommy Troy made up for his fielding mistake when he sent an opposite field triple to the right field corner, and LuJames Groover drove him in with a 68.7 MPH check swing that found a hole in the Hooks infield drove him in to take the lead 5-4
Following Landon Sims finishing the 8th for Abner, acting manager Jordan Procyshen brought in Zane Russell to close out the game in the 9th. Like the entire series, Hooks shortstop Edwin Diaz delilvered. He took Zane Russell deep on a 0-1 pitch for his third home run of the series snatching a lead away from Amarillo for a second straight inning and send it into extras.
After Amarillo went 1-2-3 in the road half, Corpus made it quick in extra innings. The first pitch of the home 10th Zane Russell fielded a Rowdey Jordan bunt and over threw Manuel Pena at first base to score the automatic runner from second base, and seal the series for the Hooks. That was the second walk off for the Corpus Christi this series.
Road Trip Recap
4-8 (2-4 in Springfield - 2-4 in Corpus Christi)
The roadtrip from hell is finally over. After travelling over 2000+ miles for their last two series, the Sod Poodles will finally play baseball in Amarillo again tomorrow night. Amarillo struggled mightily with runners in scoring position the entire trip, hitting just .117 in those spots over the two weeks. They managed just 3.66 runs per game in that stretch, scoring more than 5 runs just once in the 12 games, a 10-3 win against the Hooks that was responsible for 22% of the road trip runs in one outing.
Good news for panhandle Ranger fans, the Sod Poodles will welcome the highest ranked prospect in the Texas League Sebastian Walcott (#1 in the Rangers system and #8 overall on MLB Pipeline) and his team the Frisco Roughriders for 6 games starting on Tuesday. For more on Frisco and their potential superstar, tune into Soddies by Morning tomorrow for your series preview with a spotlight on Walcott.
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