Game Preview: Rochester Red Wings look to win their first series since June

Game preview as the Rochester Red Wings look to win their first series since June as they face the Lehigh Valley IronPigs.

by The Nats Report Newsroom

Updated September 16, 2022

Rochester, New York - Tonight, the Rochester Red Wings look to win their first series since June as they face the Lehigh Valley IronPigs. The Rochester Red Wings will send LHP MacKenzie Gore to the mound, who will make his second rehab appearance since joining the Nationals organization.

He is entering his 6th professional season, first with the Nationals after being acquired from San Diego for Juan Soto and Josh Bell LHP MacKenzie Gore was originally selected by San Diego third overall in the 2017 Draft out of Whiteville, NC. Gore was also named to the Sirius-XM Futures game in 2019…earned MLBPipeline.com Pitcher of the Year honors in 2019.

Last time out...

The Rochester Red Wings picked up their fourth consecutive win last night, topping Lehigh Valley 2-1 in 10 innings to guarantee at least a series split...starting pitcher RHP Franklyn Kilome delivered one of his best performances as a Red Wing, working five scoreless innings allowing just two hits while striking out seven...the Wings first run wouldn't come until the eighth, when 1B John Nogowski launched his second homer with Rochester to tie the game at one.

RHP Reed Garrett and southpaw Alberto Baldonado held the IronPigs hitless in the ninth and tenth, respectively, before 2B Jecksson Flores scored the winning run on a wild pitch to give the Wings their sixth walk-off win. The Rochester Red Wings pitching staff struck out 13 Lehigh Valley batters last night, marking their 1,269th punch out of the year, which now ranks second most in franchise history (1st - 1,285 in 2019).

Additionally, The Rochester Red Wings welcomed back Daniel Brito to Frontier Field last night for the first time since the 23-year-old was rushed into emergency surgery upon suffering a brain hemorrhage on July 31, 2021, in the bottom of the first inning of a Red Wings vs. Lehigh Valley game at Frontier Field.

The Venezuelan suffered a ruptured arteriovenous malformation which is the abnormal tangle of blood vessel connecting arteries and veins, disrupting normal blood flow and oxygen circulation.

Brito was taken off the field by ambulance and rushed to the University of Rochester’s Strong Memorial Hospital, where doctors, led by Dr. Thomas Mattingly, performed multiple life-saving surgeries. The IronPigs’ third baseman would spend 59 days in the Intensive Care Unit at Strong Memorial Hospital.