The Tucson Sidewinders, plenty rested after three straight off days, used one big inning to blast the Salt Lake Bees on a chilly Monday night at Franklin Covey Field.
Tucson, the defending Pacific Coast League champions, sent 13 batters to the plate and scored nine runs in the fourth inning and coasted from there to a 10-2 victory.
"We had that one bad inning," said Bees manager Brian Harper. "We just couldn't get that third out."
Salt Lake actually had a golden opportunity to take the early lead in the bottom of the third inning when Adam Pavkovich led off with a double and shortstop Gary Patchett reached on an infield single. That put runners at the corners with no outs. But a strikeout and a groundout double-play later and the Bees remained scoreless.
"If we could have put some pressure on them and gotten a couple of runs there when we had first and third with no outs before their big inning, it could have been a different ballgame," said Harper.
Instead, Tucson blew the game wide open in the fourth. A big play to keep the rally going came when the fifth batter of the inning — Matt Morgan — reached on an throwing error by Bees second baseman Matt Brown.
"As teammates you have to pick each other up — everybody is going to make mistakes," said Harper. "Plus they just had a couple of big hits on good pitches."
In all, the Sidewinders had seven hits — including two doubles and a triple — and two walks in the fourth off of Bees pitchers Phil Seibel and Chris Resop.
The Bees were there own worst enemies on several occasions. They had 11 hits for the game and walked five times, but managed just two late runs — thanks in part to hitting into four double plays.
"We had opportunities and base runners and couldn't cash in," said Harper. "It hurt hitting into four double plays."
One bright spot for the Bees was a solo homer by Terry Evans in the eighth inning.
Tucson is now 2-0 after having three straight games postponed in their opening series at Colorado Springs. The Bees, after starter 3-0 for the year, are now 3-2.
The same two teams will play today at 6:30 p.m. Salt Lake is scheduled to start Kasey Olenberger (0-0, 1.50 ERA) against Tucson's Yusmeiro Petit, who will be making his first appearance of the year.
BEELINES: Bees third baseman Jason Wood, the No. 1 prospect for the Los Angeles Angels, entered the game hitting just .105. His 2-for-4 game, however, raised his batting average to .174 ... Wednesday's game is a matinee, scheduled to begin at 1 p.m. ... The announced crowd was 3,848, but only a few hearty souls lasted through the heavy rain and even hail in the final innings.
E-mail: lojo@desnews.com