RUSSELLVILLE - Russellville’s Cody Greenhill continued his recent hot surge at the plate with another home run against Hamilton on Saturday night, and Rudy Fernandez allowed just one run in five innings as the Golden Tigers beat the Aggies 6-1 to extend their season-best win streak to five games.
Greenhill, who went 5-for-7 with eight RBIs in a three-game sweep of Lawrence County earlier in the week, kept it going with a two-run homer in Saturday’s first game, a 6-0 win over Westbrook Christian. He was at it again in the nightcap against Hamilton, capping off a run of four consecutive extra-base hits by the Golden Tigers (10-5) in the bottom of the fifth with his third home run of the season, a two-run shot that stretched the lead to 6-1.
“He hit a fastball out, and he hit a curveball out,” head coach Chris Heaps said on Saturday night. “It’s been huge, what Cody’s doing for us at the plate this year.”
Heading into Thursday’s game at Bob Jones, Greenhill has entrenched himself in the cleanup spot while batting .311 with three homers and a team-best 16 RBIs. Russellville finally played its first three home games of the season last week, and Greenhill went deep in each of them, but there’s much more to his recent offensive surge than merely playing at the friendly confines of Russellville Baseball Stadium.
Heaps credits that development at the plate to a better frame of mind and a swing adjustment that has Greenhill keeping the barrel of his bat level through the hitting zone for a longer period of time, thus enabling him to make more consistent contact and to do more damage when he does.
“He’s longer through the zone now, and that’s made a difference for him,” Heaps said of Greenhill, whose has struck out just twice all season and is now up to eight career home runs. “If you have that slight upper-cut to your swing, it keeps the bat on a level plane with the baseball for a longer period of time. When you’re trying to swing down through the ball, that doesn’t leave you with much margin for error.
“Plus, there’s just something that happens with a lot of guys between their junior and senior year. The confidence just gets so much higher.”
With Greenhill and fellow senior Skylar Holland (.349 average with seven doubles, 11 RBIs and a nine-game hit streak heading into Thursday) mashing in the middle of the lineup, Russellville’s offense started to find its stride last week. After totaling just eight extra-base hits and scoring only 32 runs during a 5-5 start, the Golden Tigers have pounded out 19 extra-base hits (including four homers) and scored 49 runs in their current five-game run.
Seven of those extra-base hits came in Saturday’s win over Hamilton, and four of those came in succession in the bottom of the fifth. Senior leadoff man Colin Garrison started the inning with a grounder inside the bag at first for a double, and Judd Ward followed with a deep drive to center for an RBI triple, the 14th three-bagger of his career.
Ward scored on Landon Ezzell’s second RBI double of the game, and then Greenhill smacked a curveball over the fence in left-center for his eighth career varsity home run.
Ward finished the game 2-for-3 with two runs scored and a stolen base, and Ezzell was 2-for-3 with two doubles and two RBIs. Holland and Jeff Lloyd each had a double as well.
The Golden Tigers’ pitching, meanwhile, continues to be terrific. Senior Chad Wray threw a second straight shutout last Thursday, holding Lawrence County to one hit over the final five innings of an 8-0 win and racking up a season-high nine strikeouts. During his current 14-inning scoreless streak, Wray has struck out 17 batters and walked only one while lowering his season ERA to 1.12.
Holland, another senior right-hander, was lights-out on Saturday, throwing a total of five shutout innings against Westbrook Christian and Hamilton. He yielded just four hits, struck out 10 and walked none, giving him 25 Ks and a microscopic 0.41 ERA in 17 innings on the year. Fernandez, a junior right-hander, has been almost as good in his 17 innings of work, going 3-0 with a 1.24 ERA, 21 strikeouts and only nine hits allowed.
Fernandez made his first start of the season against Hamilton on Saturday and struck out five in five innings, pitching out of trouble time and again and stranding a total of eight runners. He walked two batters, hit two and allowed five hits before giving way to Holland, who struck out five of the eight batters he faced over the final two innings.
The Golden Tigers will look for a sixth straight win when they play at Bob Jones on Thursday at 4:30 p.m. The game will be broadcast live on WGOL-AM 920 and 100.7 FM.
