Tulsa stumbles late after John Rooney pitches into the eighth inning

Wednesday around the Dodgers minors saw two comeback wins, a former third-round pick have a career-best performance and a shutout loss at the lowest level.

Player of the day

John Rooney turned in the best start of his career, pitching into the eighth inning with a 2-0 lead. It was only the second time since being drafted 104th overall in 2018 that Rooney had completed seven innings and he had never pitched to a batter in the eighth inning of a start prior to Wednesday.

The left-hander had struck out six and allowed just one hit and one walk on 69 pitches through the first seven innings. But Rooney gave up a single on the first pitch of the eighth and hit the next batter to give the Travelers life with no outs. After an errant pickoff attempt moved the runners up to second and third, Rooney got the next batter on a line drive out.

That was the end of the line for the 25-year-old and unfortunately for him, the first batter a Tulsa reliever faced, singled in both runners to tie the game.

Triple-A Oklahoma City

Oklahoma City scored four times in their last three innings on offense to regain the lead for good, defeating Sugar Land (Astros) 6-3 in front of the home crowd.

Down 1-0 in the second on a Yainer Diaz homer, OKC rallied for two in the bottom half on a James Outman RBI-double and Hunter Feduccia single to bring Outman home for a 2-1 lead. The advantage would hold until the sixth when the Space Cowboys scored two to take the lead back.

Outman launched a solo shot in the sixth on his way to a 2-for-3 night and Miguel Vargas followed in the seventh with one of his own to break the tie. Ryan Noda later singled in the second run of the seventh and Drew Avans provided another insurance run in the bottom of the eighth.

Vargas now has 14 home runs and leads the Pacific Coast League with 105 hits and 78 runs scored.

Andre Jackson made the start for OKC and allowed just one run through five innings on one hit and three walks while striking out six. Pedro Báez immediately gave up the lead when he allowed the two runs in the sixth on three hits and two walks, striking out none and only getting two outs.

Double-A Tulsa

With a two-run lead heading into the eighth behind Rooney’s gem, the wheels fell off and Arkansas (Mariners) scored six runs over the final two innings to send the Drillers to a 6-2 loss.

Gus Varland was first out of the bullpen for Tulsa to protect the 2-0 lead and eventually induced an inning-ending double play. But the right-hander first gave up a two-run single to tie the game. Both runs were charged to Rooney, though only one was earned.

Varland would give up three singles to the first four batters of the ninth to give up the lead and leave a mess for Austin Drury to cleanup. Drury retired the first batter on a force out but walked the next four to put the game out of reach as the Travelers scored four in the inning.

High-A Great Lakes

Great Lakes fell behind in the top of the first but when the dust settled on the first two innings, the Loons had the lead and held on to beat Lansing (Athletics) 8-6.

Starter Kendall Williams didn’t make it out of the first inning and was removed after recording two outs in the first seven batters. A leadoff homer for Max Muncy and two one-out doubles made it 2-0. Three batters later after an out and a walk, a fielding error by third baseman Alex De Jesus allowed the third run to score.

Great Lakes came back with four runs in the home half of the first when five of the first six hitters reached safely, including a leadoff homer for Eddys Leonard. Two of the next three hitters walked with a single in between to load the bases, followed by a sacrifice fly and two-run single for Imanol Vargas.

After the Lugnuts tied it in the top of the second, the Loons pulled away with three more runs in the bottom of the second to take the lead for good.

Jared McDonald hit a two-run homer in the ninth and the tying run came to the plate for Lansing with nobody out, but reliever Ben Harris came in and got the next three hitters to slam the door.

Low-A Rancho Cucamonga

It was a wild night up north for Rancho but not for the bats as they were shutout 6-0 on the road against San Jose (Giants).

Outside of not scoring, it was a four-run third inning that did the Quakes in. After Maddux Bruns kept the Giants off the scoreboard for two innings, reliever Gabe Emmett had a tough time finding the strike zone. San Jose sent eight men to the plate and scored four runs with only one hit the entire inning.

Emmett hit the first batter and walked the next two to lad the bases with nobody out. After a strikeout, Carter Williams banged a single into left field to plate two runs. The right-hander allowed a double steal, another run on a wild pitch, hit a second batter and allowed a fourth run on his third wild pitch of the inning.

The only real chance of the night for the Quakes came in the fourth inning when they strung together three straight one-out walks. But Kenneth Betancourt hit into an inning-ending double play to end the threat.

An RBI-single for Hayden Cantrelle in the fourth and yet another run-scoring wild pitch stretched the deficit to the final score of 6-0.

Transactions

Triple-A: Oklahoma City Dodgers activated pitcher Garrett Cleavinger, released pitcher Dakota Chalmers, transferred outfielder Ty Kelly to the development list, activated pitcher Pedro Báez from the 7-day injured list. The Los Angeles Dodgers recalled Jake Reed and optioned Mitch White to Oklahoma City.

Wednesday scores

• Oklahoma City 6, Sugar Land 3
• Arkansas 6, Tulsa 2
• Great Lakes 8, Lansing 6
• San Jose 6, Rancho Cucamonga 0

Thursday schedule

• 4:05 p.m. PT: Great Lakes (Emmet Sheehan) vs. Lansing (Joey Estes)
• 5:05 p.m.: Oklahoma City (Dustin May) vs. Sugar Land (Jonathan Bermudez)
• 5:05 p.m.: Tulsa (Bobby Miller) vs. Arkansas (Emerson Hancock)
• 6:30 p.m. PT: Rancho Cucamonga (Edgardo Henriquez) at San Jose (Trevor McDonald)