MARILLO, TX (June 20, 2026) -- The Amarillo Sod Poodles (36-31) defeated the Midland RockHounds (31-36), 4-3, on Saturday night at HODGETOWN. In front of a sellout crowd on Harry Potter night, the home squad used the long ball backed by another excellent performance by the Amarillo starter to match a franchise-long winning streak.
Entering play on a 12.0 scoreless inning streak was Amarillo starter Avery Short. The lefty twirled a perfect inning in the first, capped by a strikeout of Brennan Milone to get the Soddies back in the dugout to start swinging the sticks.
Each of the first three Amarillo hitters reached base with Cristofer Torin and Jansel Luis smacking back-to-back doubles, scratching the first run of the night on the latter of the two-baggers.
The lead would not hold long as Colby Halter went deep to right field with a two-run shot, putting Midland in front. Amarillo responded quickly however thanks to a two-out solo blast off the bat of Gavin Logan that evened the score in the bottom of the second.
Amarillo would make it a third straight inning with a notch in the run column when the switch-hitting Luis drove an 0-1 pitch on the outer half of the plate the other way to give the Soddies the advantage in the third.
Short had settled in on the mound following the lone blemish from the second inning, retiring five batters in a row going into sixth inning. He worked another three-up, three-down frame in the sixth to bring his night on the bump to a close. He retired the final six batters he faced on just 10 pitches to cap his quality start. Jesus Valdez then torched a 1-2 pitch with an exit velocity reaching 108 miles per hour off his bat to add Amarillo’s third solo homer of the night to the line score in the sixth.
A stretch of Sod Poodles pitching retiring 11 RockHounds hitters ended in the top of the eighth when the first three batters reached base safely to threaten with the tying and go-ahead runs on the basepaths with no outs. Dawson Brown worked out of the jam by only surrendering one run by inducing a run-scoring double play and forcing Milone to line out to left field two batters later.
Down one run in their next turn to bat, Midland’s Devin Taylor led off the top of the ninth with a single off Logan Mercado. The right-hander sat Bobby Boser down on strikes for the first out and got Halter to lineout to Torin at shortstop, who doubled off Taylor retreating back to first base to end the game.
POSTGAME NOTES
LUIS YOURSELF: Slugging his eighth home run of the year this evening was Jansel Luis...over his most recent nine games, he has scored 10 runs and five of his starts have been multi-hit efforts.
SHORT STACK: Three of Avery Short’s most recent five outings have been quality starts...over that span (5/28-c), he is posting a 0.98 ERA (3 ER/28.0 IP) with a 0.93 WHIP and 23 strikeouts...his season-ERA sits now at 2.76 which ranks 2nd in the Texas League.