Roth’s slam in eight-run 8th helps Mavs to lopsided W

By MEDICINE HAT NEWS on June 14, 2025.

newsdesk@medicinehatnews.com

Carter Roth launched an eighth-inning grand slam and had six RBIs as the Medicine Hat Mavericks got back to form at the plate in a 17-8 drubbing of the 57s in Swift Current on Thursday night.

The Mavs’ third-baseman finished the game with three hits, raising his league-leading batting average to a humble .517 through his 12 games played.

His extra-base totals aren’t enormous just yet – his home run and a double Thursday were his first since opening day – but he’s sat above .500 since a 5-for-5 game in Regina on June 3, and his OPS is now at 1.151, good for eighth in the Western Canadian Baseball League behind a list of the league’s top sluggers.

The Mavericks were coming off a pair of losses in Saskatoon where the bats were uncharacteristically cold and a blown lead had cost the club a would-be win on Wednesday.

After going three-up-three-down in the first on Thursday, Aaron Vulcano got things going for Medicine Hat in the second with a solo blast off Swift Current starter Max Noto. A 1-0 deficit isn’t often the undoing of a pitcher, but Noto threw just two more strikes during a stretch where a walk, an error and a hit batter loaded the bases, and two more walks on nine pitches pushed a pair of runs home.

That brought the hook for Noto, replaced in relief by Hunter Mark, who got out of the inning despite another run-scoring walk. The Mavs led 4-0 going to the bottom half of the second and had just one hit along the way.

The 57s got one back in their half, working a leadoff walk around to score thanks to a couple of short singles, but by the time the home team sent another man home it was five innings later and they were down 9-1.

The Mavs picked up singles in the third and fourth, with RBIs from Jamel Chabot and Roth, respectively. They added three more in the sixth, with Roth’s double cashing in Yusei Ozawa, a throwing error after an Aaron Vulcano single scoring Roth and a pinch-hit RBI single from Jaden Babiuk sending Vulcano home.

Mavs’ starter Max Hudlow was asked to throw just two innings Thursday before Diego Centella came in to pitch the next four, needing just 59 pitches to do so. Centella gave up just one earned one – a solo home run in the seventh – and earned the W on the night.

Swift got one more in the seventh to make it a 9-3 game before the Mavs went off in the eighth.

Not yet knowing he’d soon clear the bases with a grand slam, Roth actually led off the inning and promptly worked a walk. It looked to be a tame situation for a few hitters thereafter, as Roth had only advanced to third by the time the second out had been recorded.

But the next five Mavericks reached base without recording a hit – error, walk, error, walk, walk – and all of a sudden, Roth, who scored the first and four runs in the inning so far, was back at the dish in a bat-around eighth where they’d only had one single. But he made the 57s pay for their wildness on the first pitch he saw, launching a David Jinks offering over the fence to cap off a two-hit, eight-run inning.

Swift added five runs in proverbial garbage time to soften the embarrassment, but the 17-8 win was just what the Mavericks needed to put their performance in Saskatoon behind them.

The Mavs were back home on Friday for one game against the Okotoks Dawgs (the game was not complete by press time) before heading to Regina for a pair of weekend road games. No games are scheduled fir Monday, but Medicine Hat will be back home for a game Tuesday against the Brooks Bombers.

First pitch is scheduled for 7:05 p.m. at Athletic Park.

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