Downed in seven

The ball was flying around Runkle-Miller Field.

For one inning, it was when the Rockets made contact. But it wast mostly the Jackers who hit around the park. The Rocket defense certainly didn’t help the cause, either.

The Portland Rockets surrendered 15 hits — eight were for extra bases and three were solo homers — and committed five errors while managing just three hits themselves in a 13-2 setback in seven innings to the Fort Wayne Jackers on Thursday.

“Obviously we were shorthanded,” said Rocket manager Randy Miller, whose team dipped to 9-8 on the season before a doubleheader against the Jackers on Saturday at Carrington Field in Fort Wayne. “New guys got opportunities. I just hope we are healthy and of a good mindset to come back.

“You tip your cap and go on. Strive to get better.”

The Rockets must tip their cap to Jacker starting pitcher Keegan Long, an Edon, Ohio, native and former professional.

Long, who went to St. Joseph’s College in Rensselaer and was drafted by the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2015, reached as high as Triple-A with the Reno (Nevada) Aces in the Pacific Coast League. But in 2018, he was released by the Diamondbacks as a member of the Midwest League’s Kane County Cougars. He spent the remainder of that season and 2019 pitching for the Joilet (Illinois) Slammers of the Frontier League, an independent organization.

On his Twitter account, Long posted a video July 1 of him firing fastballs with a radar gun reading 95 and 96 miles per hour.

He threw every bit of that fast when he took the mound Thursday night.

With Fort Wayne leading 1-0 heading into the bottom of the first inning, Rocket leadoff man Justin Greene watched two humming heaters from Long go for called strikes.

Greene then worked an eight-pitch walk.

Following a flyout to right field, Rocket newcomer Peyton Smith wasted no time attacking the former pro. Smith ripped a ground ball foul down the right field line. Long’s next pitch didn’t hit grass until it was well beyond the left field fence.

“If they’re throwing it over the plate you can hit it even if it’s thrown 105 (MPH),” said Smith, 19, a 2019 Daleville graduate. “I was just sitting dead red. Guys with big fastballs want to show it off.

“I was way behind (the first pitch) so I thought he was going to try to blow one by me. I was just going to try to get the (front) foot down, get out in front of it, hit it out front. I elevated it and hit it out. It felt great. Kind of knew it off the bat. It was a good piece of hitting on a guy that’s throwing hard.”

Long settled down from there, only allowing one more hit for the remainder of his four innings. He finished with two earned runs on two hits with a walk and four strikeouts.

Just as Long was getting his arm warmed up, Fort Wayne’s bats heated up as well.

Three hits — with a pair of errors — helped the Jackers plate four runs off Portland pitcher Chandler Jacks during the second inning.

Things got worse in the third. Will Coursen-Carr hit a 2-0 Jacks pitch to left for a solo home run, then Isaac Bair jumped on the an 0-1 offering to go back-to-back with Coursen-Carr. Jacks induced a strikeout, but then James Weber went deep as well to give the Jackers three round-trippers in the inning.

Jacks, a 2016 JCHS graduate, said after his night was over that all three homers were on pitches high in the strike zone the Jacker batters simply made good connection on.

“They hit three bombs in one inning,” Miller said. “That’s impressive.”

Fort Wayne scored a total of five runs that frame to go ahead 9-2 and added one run in each of the fourth, sixth and seventh innings to complete the run-rule victory.

Portland’s only other hits came from a Chase Ruiz single in the fourth inning and an RBI triple from Kasey Henderson in the sixth.

Following Saturday’s twin bill with the rival Jackers, Portland will host the Summit City Sluggers at 7 p.m. Tuesday in the first pool play game of the first of two postseason tournaments. The final pool play game will be against the Fort Wayne Blues at 8 p.m. July 31 at Carrington Field. The top two teams in each of the three-team pools will advance to a single-elimination tournament, with semifinal games slated for 1 and 4 p.m. Aug. 1 and the championship at 1 p.m. Aug. 2. The semifinal and championship games will be played at Carrington Field.

The Rockets will then play in a tournament at Kokomo the following weekend. The schedule has not yet been announced.