Baseball Game Preview: Mercedes Tigers vs. Rivera Raiders

For the second straight game, Mercedes will face off against Rivera. The Tigers are taking a road trip to challenge the Raiders at 7:00 p.m. on Friday. Mercedes has a tough task ahead: they'll enter the contest with seven straight defeats, while Rivera will come in with seven straight victories.

Mercedes came up short against Rivera on Tuesday, falling 10-2.

For Rivera's part, Andres Rocha made a splash while hitting and pitching. He struck out 14 batters over six innings while giving up just one earned run off three hits. Rocha has been nothing but reliable on the mound: he hasn't tossed less than six strikeouts in five consecutive appearances. He was also stellar in the batter's box, getting on base in three of his four plate appearances with one home run and three RBI. That home run marked the first that he launched this season.

In other batting news, Rivera let Enrique Rey and Marcos Guerrero run wild. Rey scored three runs and stole a base while going 2-for-2, while Guerrero scored two runs and stole two bases while getting on base in four of his five plate appearances. The dominant performance also gave Rey a new career-high in doubles (two). Jesus Sanchez was another key player, going 2-for-4 with one triple, one run, and one RBI.

Rivera was getting hits left and right and finished the game having posted a batting average of .375. That was just more of the same: they've now posted a batting average of .310 or higher in three consecutive matchups.

Rivera pushed their record up to 15-4 with the win, which was their fourth straight on the road. Those road victories came thanks in part to their pitching effort, having only surrendered 0.5 runs on average over those games. As for Mercedes, their loss dropped their record down to 6-13.