Elly De La Cruz homers in rehab, Louisville splits doubleheader at Gwinnett
Elly De La Cruz homered 441 feet in his rehab start, but Louisville split the doubleheader at Gwinnett after a 9-8 walk-off loss and a 2-0 shutout.
Elly De La Cruz gave Louisville exactly the jolt the Bats hoped for in his rehab assignment. The 24-year-old switch-hitting shortstop singled in his first at-bat, then crushed a 441-foot homer in the second inning as Louisville and Gwinnett played a makeup doubleheader at Gwinnett Field in Lawrenceville, Georgia.
That blast was more than a loud swing in a Triple-A box score. It came after a rainout pushed the teams into two seven-inning games that started at 5:05 p.m. Friday, and it immediately showed how De La Cruz can tilt a lineup. Louisville needed the offense, too, because the opener turned into a shootout before the Stripers grabbed a 9-8 walk-off win.
The Bats surged early behind back-to-back first-inning homers from Hector Rodriguez and Michael Toglia, then added two more long balls from De La Cruz and TJ Friedl in a game that featured four Louisville home runs. Louisville built a 3-0 lead and later carried a 5-2 advantage, but Gwinnett kept chipping away. Cal Conley’s two-run triple in the seventh tied it, and Jose Azocar finished the comeback with a walk-off three-run single for the Stripers.
Louisville answered in the nightcap and showed why a split still counted as a useful day. Jose Franco threw 5.0 scoreless innings with five strikeouts, and the Bats blanked Gwinnett 2-0. Hector Rodriguez supplied the first run with an RBI single in the fourth, then came around to score on a Gwinnett error as Louisville erased the sting of the opener.
For De La Cruz, the night was a clean reminder of what his presence means at this level. The former Reds international free agent, signed for $65,000 on July 2, 2018, is already one of the most recognizable names in the minors, and his rehab assignment instantly raised the stakes for Louisville’s lineup. For the Bats, the split mattered just as much: after a walk-off defeat, they steadied themselves, protected the shutout, and left Gwinnett with a result that reflected both resilience and depth.
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