Baseball Game Preview: Fremont Firebirds vs. Santa Clara Bruins

The Fremont Firebirds will head out on the road to square off against the Santa Clara Bruins at 4:00 p.m. on Thursday. Both squads will be entering this one on the heels of a big victory.

Santa Clara will be up against a hot Fremont team: the squad just extended their winning streak to five. The Firebirds were the clear victors by an 11-4 margin over Saratoga on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, winning is always nice, but doing so behind a season-high score is even better (just ask Santa Clara). They blew past MacDonald 24-1 on Tuesday. Perhaps unsurprisingly given the team's high-flying offense, the game also marked the team's biggest victory of the season.

Nathaniel Sanchez made a splash while hitting and pitching. On the mound, he tossed one inning while giving up no earned runs or hits. Sanchez was also solid in the batter's box, scoring three runs while getting on base in all three of his plate appearances. Those three runs gave him a new career-high.

In other batting news, Santa Clara got a massive performance out of Jaxton Chao, who got on base in all six of his plate appearances with four runs, two triples, and three RBI. Chao is on a roll when it comes to triples, as he's now hit at least one in each of the last three games he's played. The team also got some help courtesy of Andrew Traffas, who went 3-for-5 with one home run, six RBI, and three runs.

Santa Clara always had someone on base and finished the game having posted an OBP of .646. That's the best OBP they've posted all season.

Santa Clara has been performing incredibly well recently as they've won six of their last seven contests. That's provided a nice bump to their 12-3 record this season. Those wins came thanks in part to their pitching effort, having only surrendered 3.4 runs on average over those games. As for Fremont, their victory was their fourth straight at home, which pushed their record up to 11-3.

Fremont beat Santa Clara 6-2 in their previous matchup back in March. The rematch might be a little tougher for the Firebirds since the squad won't have the home-field advantage this time around. We'll see if the change in venue makes a difference.