SONOMA, Calif. — The Walnut Creek Crawdads started the 2025 season with moxie. The offense scored 10 runs or more in five of the team’s first six games, propelling the Crawdads to early success. Since then, the offense only managed double digits one time. Until Wednesday evening, that is. After three straight four-run performances, the offense exploded on the road against the Sonoma Stompers for double digits. 

The scoring started inconspicuously enough with catcher Brandon Clizbe knocking in shortstop Jared Mettam on a groundout to second base in the first inning. But by the time Joey Donnelly doubled up against the left field wall in the eighth inning to score Walnut Creek’s 10th and final run of the game, the outburst was undeniable. 

Walnut Creek (10-5) rode the offensive wave to victory, marching into Arnold Field and silencing one of the loudest crowds in the CCL on a perfect day in wine country. The pitching staff kept Sonoma (11-9) from making the fixture a close one, winning the rubber match 10-1 and flashing some of the team’s best all-around baseball of the season. 

“They’re getting a little better,” Crawdads head coach Brant Cummings said. “The pitching side of it, the ability to throw strikes and put hitters in play and collect outs, that’s encouraging. I think we can hit. I think eventually, we will start to swing the bat even better.” 

A Crawdads offense that can generate more than 10 hits and 10 runs would be a frightening sight for the rest of the league. It’s hard to imagine, but it’s possible. 

Some Crawdads are still fighting their way out of slumps. Designated hitter Kam Taylor broke through with a 2-5 performance, and if a couple more of his teammates could do similar things in the coming days, the 1-9 spots in the lineup could be perilous at-bats for opposing pitchers. 

One spot in the lineup that’s been an especially perilous at-bat for opposing pitchers as of late has been wherever Cummings pencils in utilityman Joey Donnelly. Recently, Donnelly has been batting either third or fourth and playing either right field or first base. On Wednesday, it was a combination of the former, but it doesn’t matter; Donnelly — who leads the CCL in batting average (.490) and RBIs (17) — has brought “MLB: The Show” production to real life. 

Donnelly seems to always be at the heart of Walnut Creek’s run-scoring efforts. His eighth-inning double was his biggest hit of the day, but he also had two RBI singles earlier in the game. In total, the prospective graduate student drove in half of the Crawdads’ total runs and scored once himself. He isn’t flashy and doesn’t do too much, but he keeps a level head and gets results. 

“(I’m) honestly just trying to see it well and be on time,” Donnelly said. “That’s really all it is.

“It’s baseball, you’ve got to ride the wave. There’s going to be highs, there’s going to be lows, so I think just sticking with that and knowing that even if some days aren’t your best, you go out and go through your routine the next day, you’ll be in a good spot.” 

While Donnelly and the rest of the offense did put up a confidence-boosting 10 runs on the board, they would’ve only needed two to walk out of Sonoma with the win. The pitching staff allowed five hits, four free passes, and — for the second game in a row — zero earned runs. 

Left-handed starting pitcher Aiden White set the pace by going five strong innings, striking out six and allowing just five base runners. White, a rising sophomore, only appeared in one game for Nebraska in 2025 — pitching one inning out of the bullpen — but has experience starting in high school and last summer. He looked like a veteran on Wednesday and gave the bullpen a good example to follow. 

“(White’s performance) gave us a chance to keep (the Stompers) off the board, or limit their opportunities,” Cummings said. “… And then (the bullpen’s performance) increased the lead even more by limiting. (Sonoma) scored one run tonight on five hits. They were really good, top to bottom.”

Right-handed relievers Raymond Olivas and Edward Said followed White out of the bullpen, pitching four innings of two-hit ball and only dishing out two walks. Commanding the zone has been one of the biggest points that the coaching staff has tried to instill in their young arms. Wednesday was the first time all summer it felt like the Crawdads had finally done that.

“Coach Cummings has really preached throwing it down the middle and trusting the defense, not walking guys, limiting free bases,” White said. “We really focused on that.” 

The execution of the game plan and the offensive explosion handed the Crawdads the series win. The victory was important for a multitude of reasons, but chief among them was timing. The Crawdads will head back to Arnold Field on Saturday, intersecting a three-game stretch against the San Francisco Seagulls. 

The Seagulls are a team that the Crawdads should beat, and facing them with momentum and vibes on the rise should equate to a good stretch of baseball for the Crawdads.

“It’s very important,” Cummings said. “It gives us another win, and we move up in the standings in front of (Sonoma), they fall down one, but overall it feels good after the first game of the series was ugly for us … My moniker is, it feels better to win than to lose, so it feels good to win tonight.”