This baseball season, Chapelboro.com is following the Durham Bulls and sharing recaps of each series played. Check in each Monday for details on how the Triple-A team fared against its opponents, either on the road or in downtown Durham!
The Durham Bulls have won back-to-back Triple-A National Championships over the last two years, and the 2023 season — along with the chase for another championship — kicked off this past weekend with a three-game series against the Norfolk Tides.
No place like it 💙🧡 pic.twitter.com/7i8uy2L7V8
— Durham Bulls (@DurhamBulls) April 2, 2023
Unfortunately, the Bulls took three tough losses in their first outing at home. Read the descriptions below, as they were shared on the Durham Bulls website and MiLB.com.
The Opening Day game on March 31 saw a hard-fought final score of 6-4.
Bulls catcher Rene Pinto clubbed three hits, including a home run, while second baseman Osleivis Basabe tallied two knocks in his Triple-A debut, however Tides second baseman Connor Norby crushed a three-run blast in Norfolk’s 6-4 win over Durham on Friday evening in front of a paid attendance of 8,733 at Durham Bulls Athletic Park.
Pinto got the Bulls on the board in the opening frame with his two-run blast to right, however Norfolk countered with a three-spot in the second. Durham evened the contest when Basabe slashed an RBI single to left, yet the Tides would strike again in the subsequent inning with another trio of tallies to go ahead 6-3. DH Jonathan Aranda would narrow the margin to two courtesy of an RBI double down the right field line in the sixth, however the Bulls were not able to further erase the deficit.
The second game of the series was a little tougher for the Bulls, with the Tides concluding the game 13-4.
Durham left fielder Ruben Cardenas crushed two home runs and catcher Nick Dini collected three hits, however Norfolk first baseman Josh Lester mashed three longballs of his own in the Tides’ 13-4 win over the Bulls on Saturday afternoon at Durham Bulls Athletic Park.
Lester left the yard for the first time with a two-run blast in the third as part of a four-run frame. His second longball, another two-run shot, would come two frames later to make it a 6-0 contest. Cardenas would then go deep to narrow Durham’s deficit to four in the last of the fifth, however Lester’s third roundtripper of the day, a solo shot extended the margin to five to the seventh before SS Cadyn Grenier’s RBI single made it 8-2.
Cardenas later smashed his second two-run homer of the afternoon in the last of the seventh to make once again make it a four-run contest. Norfolk would add five insurance runs over the final two innings to increase their advantage to nine.
The third and final game of the series, played on April 2, saw a final score of 7-4 with the Norfolk Tides once again taking the victory while Bulls players gave them a run for their money across each inning.
Bulls shortstop Osleivis Basabe bashed a game-high three hits and first baseman Kyle Manzardo mashed his first Triple-A homer, however Tides second baseman Connor Norby, shortstop Jordan Westburg and left fielder Ryan O’Hearn all went deep in Norfolk’s 7-4 win over Durham on Sunday evening at Durham Bulls Athletic Park.
Westburg went deep in the opening frame, giving the Tides an early 2-0 advantage. Bulls 2B Jonathan Aranda cut the deficit in half with a sacrifice fly in the last of the first, yet O’Hearn left the yard with a two-run blast to extend the Tides’ advantage to 4-1. Basabe’s RBI triple to center in the fifth would narrow the margin to two with an RBI groundout from Manzardo making it a one-run contest.
Norby would then club the third Norfolk longball of the evening with a two-run shot in the sixth to make it a 6-3 Tides lead. Manzardo, rated by Baseball America as the 60th-best overall prospect before the season, would then smashed a solo blast to right in the seventh to cut the Tides lead to 6-4, before 1B Josh Lester’s run-scoring single in the ninth capped Norfolk’s scoring.
The bulls are on the road for the next set of games against the Jacksonville Jumbo Shrimp, a six-game series starting on Tuesday, April 4. The next home series at DBAP kicks off on Tuesday, April 11, against the Lehigh Valley IronPigs. Click here to view the Bulls’ full 2023 schedule!
It's good to be back
We'll see y'all again in 8 days! pic.twitter.com/1QaXqPh8mH
— Durham Bulls (@DurhamBulls) April 3, 2023
You can follow the Bulls on Twitter and Instagram for updates and news directly from the team, and tickets for all 2023 Durham Bulls home games can be purchased at DurhamBulls.com, or by calling 919.956.BULL
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