Justin Bour connected on his second home run of the season, but the Tennessee Smokies fell to the Jackson Generals, 7-2, on Thursday night at Pringles Park in the second contest of a five-game series.
The Smokies (10-12) have now dropped four of their last five contests, including the first two of the series at Jackson (15-7).
With Nick Struck on the mound for Tennessee, the Generals wasted no time getting on the scoreboard. With two outs in the bottom of the first, Joe Dunigan doubled and scored on an RBI single by Rich Poythress to make it 1-0. Denny Almonte, who finished 3-for-3 with three RBIs and three runs scored, followed with his first of two homers on the night to give Jackson a 3-0 advantage.
The Smokies took advantage of a Jackson miscue to plate their first run of the night in the top of the second when Nate Samson drew a two-out free pass and scored two batters later thanks to an error by Jackson second baseman Eric Campbell to cut Tennessee's deficit to 3-1.
But the Generals retaliated with three runs in the third to put the game out of reach as Johermyn Chavez laced a three-run double to make it a 6-1 contest.
Almonte tacked on his second homer of the night in the fifth and Bour homered in the seventh to cap the scoring.
Jackson starter James Paxton (2-0) fanned nine batters and yielded just one unearned run in six innings of work to notch the victory. Struck (2-2) suffered the loss, allowing seven runs on nine hits in 5.1 innings. Steven Hensley pitched the final three innings for the Generals to pick up his first save of the season.
The Smokies and Generals continue their five-game series on Friday night at 8:05 ET at Pringles Park. Jackson will send right-hander Taijuan Walker (2-0, 2.25 ERA), the top prospect in the Seattle Mariners organization according to Baseball America, to the mound while Tennessee has yet to announce a starter.
Tennessee Smokies