Aug 21, 2024 By Chris Dugan 3 min read

It took Caleb McNeely one pitch – the first thrown by Joliet starter Brett Sanchez – to set the tone for the Wild Things in their game against the Slammers.

McNeely, Washington’s center fielder, smacked a leadoff blast over the wall in left field and the home run derby was on.

McNeely’s was one of five home runs hit by the Wild Things – each off Sanchez, the Slammers’ sidearming rookie – in Washington’s 8-2 victory Wednesday night.

The five home runs give the Wild Things a league-leading total of 97 on the season.

“That’s kinda cool,” McNeely said about the statistic. “We hit the ball hard. We have a lot of guys with enough power to leave the yard, but we don’t go up there trying to hit home runs. We try to take a good approach and stay with it.”

There were plenty of good approaches at the plate and good swings on this night. Designated hitter Tyreque Reed led the barrage as he belted a pair of solo home runs, left fielder Wagner Lagrange gave Washington back-to-back home runs when he followed a Reed shot with one of his own in the third inning. Reed and right fielder Brandon McIlwain each homered in the fifth. McIlwain also had a triple.

Shortstop Cole Roberts, who is the son of Los Angeles Dodgers manager Dave Roberts, tied the score at 2-2 in the second inning with an RBI single.

The five home runs was a season high for Washington and one shy of the franchise record for most in a single game.

“There’s power there,” Washington manager Tom Vaeth said of his lineup. “Nobody expected the numbers McNeely has put up, and maybe Tommy (Caufield) is up, but Jalen Miller has been a double-digit home run guy in his career, Tyreque has put up high home run numbers, we know what Andrew Czech has done, McIlwain is the same type of hitter and Wagner was a 20-homer guy last year.”

The power surge enabled Washington to trim its magic number for clinching the West Division title to 5 with 10 games remaining in the regular season. Second-place Gateway’s game against Florence was not completed at press time.

Washington starter Malik Barrington (6-4) benefitted from all the home runs. Barrington, whose season had had its ups and downs, was very good against Joliet. He allowed two runs over seven innings, allowing four hits and one walk. Barrington struck out nine, one shy of his season high.

“Over the last three or four starts, he’s been pretty good,” Vaeth said. “He made some adjustments we asked him to make and has been good since then.”

Sanchez gave up 10 hits and eight runs over five innings. The righthander has given up 13 home runs over 90 innings with eight of those long balls being hit by the Wild Things over three starts.

The Slammers’ Jeissy De La Cruz had two hits, including a triple, one RBI and scored a run.

Joliet was limited to one hit over the final five innings by Barrington and reliever Marlon Perez.

“We’ll try to come out and win another ballgame (Thursday),” Vaeth said. “We’ll try to take care of our business and come out with the same intensity and energy level. I think our energy level was down the last couple of games, which happens after clinching a playoff berth. We talked about that prior to the game and the boys responded well.”