Franklin Labor leads three home runs, Eugene Emeralds beat Spokane Indians | Spokane Indians

The Eugene Emeralds were one of the two best teams in the High-A West all season, battling the Everett AquaSox at the top of the league standings.

The two teams faced each other last week, however, and the Emeralds took it to the point – they lost the last five of the six-game series – to fall 5 1/2 games behind the Frogs.

On Tuesday they let out their frustration.

Franklin Labor went 3 to 4 with a 2-run homer and a 2-run single, and the Spokane Indians defeated the Spokane Indians 12-4 in the first of a series of six games at Avista Stadium.

Heath Quinn and Brett Auerbach added homers for Eugene (35-25).

Niko Decolati went low for Spokane (28-33).

Indian starter Helcris Olivarez made it through five innings for the fifth time in a row. The Lefty allowed four runs, three earned, four hits, five walks and a hit batter with six strikeouts. He threw 50 of his 94 pitches for strikes.

Olivarez (2-8) got off to a difficult start. Ismail Munguia hit the first field with a line drive single, finished second on a two-out walk against Sean Roby and scored a goal with a single from Tyler Fitzgerald.

Michael Toglia, back from the MLB Futures Game, cut off the throw and tried to catch Roby in third, but his throw went on the line so Roby could score.

Decolati halved the deficit in the bottom half with a solo shot, his eighth of the season.

The Emeralds extended their lead in the third to Labor’s single of two games and two runs.

Again the Indians answered. AJ Lewis hit an infield single with a down and scored a double to Isaac Collins’s left center gap.

Spokane loaded the bases for the fourth straight singles and a walk, then Lewis laced one in the middle for an RBI single to make it 4-3. Collins put one in the middle that Munguia could catch with a shoe upper and Hunter Stovall appeared to have scored on the day, but after the broadcast the umpires decided he left early.

It became a moot point.

Reliever Jake Sommers came up for sixth place and after an initial strikeout he gave up a single, walk and home run – to No. 9 hitter Quinn – and the gap grew to 7-3.

Stovall eventually scored a goal. In the sixth, he hit a one-out double, stole the third, and hit on a wild pitch.

Labor strengthened the Emeralds lead with a triple homer in the seventh and Auerbach made it 11-4 with a double shot in the eighth – both ahead of reliever Boby Johnson.