The Wisconsin Timber Rattlers were held to four hits as the Quad Cities River Bandits beat them 5-0 Friday night at Neuroscience Group Field. Felix Arronde pitched seven scoreless innings, allowed two hits, and was supported by four two-out runs from his offense to pick up the victory.
The River Bandits (69-55 overall, 30-28 second half) got on the board with a two-out rally in the top of the first. Wisconsin starting pitcher Bishop Letson retired the first two batters before giving up a single to Daniel Vazquez, who stole second and scored on an RBI double by Chris Brito.
Quad Cities followed a similar pattern to take a 2-0 lead in the top of the second. Carter Frederick walked with one out and stole second with two out. Erick Torres singled to drive in Frederick for a 2-0 lead.
Austin Charles made it 3-0 with a one-out, solo home run off Jefferson Figueroa in the fourth inning.
Torres struck again in the sixth against Sam Garcia. Charles drew a lead-off walk and moved to second on a passed ball. Garcia had two outs on back-to-back strikeouts. Then, Torres doubled just inside the first base bag to drive in Charles.
Brito made it a 5-0 lead with a two-out, solo home run in the seventh.
Wisconsin (53-69, 19-38) could do almost nothing against Arronde. The right-hander walked none and struck out three over seven scoreless innings. The only hits for the Rattlers were a one-out double by Blayberg Diaz in the third and a lead-off single by Marco Dinges in the fifth.
The Rattlers got a pair of two-out singles in the eighth from Diaz and Daniel Guilarte against reliever Max Martin, but they could not find the big two-out hit to get on the scoreboard. Juan Martinez closed out the fourteenth shutout of the season for the River Bandits with a perfect ninth inning.
Garcia struck out nine in his four innings of relief for the Rattlers to set a new single-game high as a pro.
Friday night marked the fifth time Wisconsin has been shut out this month.
The pitching matchup on Saturday night is Travis Smith (1-1, 2.55) on the mound for the Rattlers against Drew Beam (6-10, 3.87) for the Bandits. Game time is 6:40pm.
