Lombard Jr. homers twice, RailRiders drop both games to Lehigh Valley
George Lombard Jr. homered twice, but Lehigh Valley erased both leads and left Scranton/Wilkes-Barre empty-handed in a rain-split doubleheader.
Twice Scranton/Wilkes-Barre found a spark, and twice Lehigh Valley snuffed it out. The RailRiders watched a winnable night turn into a draining sweep at PNC Field in Moosic, Pennsylvania, losing 7-4 in the resumed suspended game and then falling 6-3 in the seven-inning nightcap.
The first game resumed Friday with one out in the top of the fourth inning after a 56-minute rain delay had sent the clubs off the field with the score still 0-0 on Thursday. Brendan Beck gave the RailRiders the kind of start that had been building his profile all week, working three scoreless innings with five strikeouts before play was stopped. Beck entered the game at 5-2 with a 3.55 ERA after his seven hitless innings in the RailRiders’ combined no-hitter against Syracuse, a performance that earned him International League Pitcher of the Week honors on June 8.
When the game restarted, Scranton/Wilkes-Barre got more help from its most recognizable bats. George Lombard Jr., the Yankees’ No. 1 prospect who was promoted to Triple-A on April 29 after beginning the season with Double-A Somerset, homered to give the RailRiders life. Jasson Domínguez, still on a rehab assignment, also went deep during the series. But Lehigh Valley answered Oswaldo Cabrera’s homer with a four-run inning, then kept pouring on pressure until Keaton Anthony’s two-run blast widened the margin beyond reach.
The frustration only deepened in the nightcap. Lombard opened the game by going deep again, handing Scranton/Wilkes-Barre an immediate lead, but the RailRiders could not hold it through the shortened contest. Lehigh Valley waited out the middle innings, then broke it open behind Carter Kieboom’s decisive power swing.
Tempers finally boiled over in the fifth inning after Felix Reyes was hit by a pitch, triggering a benches-and-bullpens-clearing incident that produced four ejections, two from each club. It fit the tone of the night: high leverage, high emotion and no payoff for a RailRiders team that kept creating moments only to lose control of the game’s next turn.
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