Tacoma sweeps Sacramento in doubleheader to take series lead

Tacoma spent Thursday night turning a doubleheader into a pitching showcase, beating Sacramento 3-1 and 8-1 at Cheney Stadium to move to 8-10 and take the series lead from the 10-6 River Cats. The Rainiers did not need a barrage to do it. Their arms controlled both seven-inning games, held Sacramento to two runs and struck out nine hitters while keeping the River Cats out of rhythm from the start.

The opener set the tone. Victor Labrada started Tacoma’s first push with a single after he advanced on a steal and an error, then Johnny Pereda brought him home. Sacramento answered on a Jesús Rodríguez sacrifice fly, but Brock Rodden flipped the game with his first Triple-A home run, and Colt Emerson added an RBI double in the fifth. Dane Dunning made that support stand up, throwing 6.0 innings of one-run ball on one hit and two walks with two strikeouts. Troy Taylor finished the job with a hitless seventh for his second save of the season.

Game two followed a similar script, with Tacoma striking first again when Will Wilson launched a ground-rule double and the Rainiers kept building from there. Rodden kept the pressure on, Emerson added two more hits across the twin bill, and Tacoma separated enough to cruise to an 8-1 finish. Sacramento never found the kind of sustained inning that can flip a shortened game, and the Rainiers never let the contest get back to even.

Rodden was the offensive headliner across the two games, going 4-for-7 with a home run, a double, four RBI and a run scored. The 25-year-old switch-hitting shortstop from Durant, Oklahoma, drafted by Seattle in the fifth round in 2023 out of Wichita State, entered the day already hot. Tacoma’s game notes said he had three hits and three RBI in the rain-shortened loss on April 15, was hitting .455 over his previous seven games and led the Pacific Coast League with eight doubles. His first Triple-A homer only sharpened the case that his bat is forcing attention.

The sweep carried more weight because it came from run prevention and staff depth, not a one-night burst. Tacoma’s game notes said the bullpen had a 2.78 ERA, best in Triple-A at the time, and had allowed only one home run through 16 games, tied for the fewest by a PCL bullpen through that span in the last 21 years. That kind of pitching profile matters for a Seattle system that could need reinforcements if injuries or call-ups hit.

It also mattered because Tacoma had already been through the disappointment of a rain-shortened 7-6 loss the night before, and because the club had gone 1-2-7 in its previous 10 doubleheaders before this sweep. After getting swept in its first doubleheader of the season on April 4 against El Paso, Tacoma answered with the kind of twin-bill response that can reset a series, a homestand and a staff’s reputation in one long night.