Birds Win Rubber Match at Kansas City, Climb Back to .500
Kansas City, KS – Spencer Sarringar drove in three runs and Neil Lang struck out five as the Canaries climbed back to the .500 mark with an 8-4 win at Kansas City on Thursday.
The Birds scored twice in the second inning without the benefit of a hit. Ozzie Martinez drew a bases loaded walk before a wild pitch put Sioux Falls ahead 2-0.
Kansas City answered with a pair of runs in the bottom half but Sarringar ripped a two-run double in the top of the third to put the Canaries in front for good.
Jabari Henry crushed a solo homerun in the fourth inning and Sioux Falls added two more runs in the fifth. Sarringar scored Logan Eickhoff via sacrifice fly and Martinez followed with an RBI single.
A solo homerun got the Monarchs within 7-3 in the bottom of the seventh but Darnell Sweeney got the run back with an RBI single in the eighth. Kansas City scored once in the ninth inning but it was too little, too late as the Birds (42-42) get back to the .500 mark for the first time since May 17.
Sarringar, Henry, Martinez and Eickhoff all finished with two hits while Lang allowed two runs on four hits over five innings to earn the win. The Canaries are alone in third place in the West Division standings, two and a half games behind Sioux City, who the Birds open a three-game series at the Bird Cage with Friday at 7:05pm.
Notable Milestones
- Jabari Henry’s fourth inning homerun was the team’s 100th in the 2023 season. The Canaries have now hit 100 homeruns in consecutive seasons for the first time since 2001-2002.
- The Canaries stole three bases on Thursday and have set a new franchise single-season record with 135. The previous mark (132) was set by the 2017 squad.
- The Canaries also broke the league single-season hit by pitch record on Thursday. Jabari Henry was plunked in the second inning to tie the mark and Mike Hart, who set the league individual single-season record on August 8, was struck in the eighth. The previous record (83) was also set by the Canaries in 2021.
