Days off help Dragons’ Hudson find bat in victory

Today’s Game

Lansing at Dayton, 7 p.m.

980-AM

What Dayton Dragons catcher Joe Hudson needed to put some bounce in his step and some pop in his bat was a couple days off.

Dragons manager Jose Nieves sat him for back-to-back games over the weekend, and the former University of Notre Dame standout looked better for it. During Dayton’s 7-3 win over Lansing on Monday, he had one of his best games of the year, going 3-for-3 with a double and an RBI.

“Me and Tony (Fossas, Dragons pitching coach) noticed before the game started he had better energy,” Nieves said. “Something, for whatever reason, clicked — maybe something changed. Whatever it was, it was good to see.”

Hudson came into Monday hitting .222 with 12 RBIs. In 2012 he came out of college into minicamp last year, and took the first pitch he saw off his wrist, breaking it. The result was a missed season. He’s picked up in Dayton this year, where he’s catching a talented young staff that features prospects like Robert Stephenson, Nick Travieso, Drew Cisco and Sal Romano.

“Up to this point of the season, I’ve been struggling,” Hudson said. “I had one of those nights where I looked into the mirror and said ‘Let’s get this thing going, be the player you want to be’ and have a little confidence in myself.”

Cisco made his first start of the second half. He threw six innings, allowing six hits and two earned runs while striking out three and walking one. Cisco was selected to the Midwest League All-Star game, held in Dayton last week, but didn’t play due to a blister on his pitching hand.

Sammy Diaz and Junior Arias were both 2-for-4 with an RBI. Seth Mejias-Brean was 2-for-3 with an RBI.

Joel Bender pitched a scoreless seventh, while Sean Lucas pitched a perfect eighth and ninth, getting his 11th save while striking out two.

After a bad first half, Dayton was looking forward to the second, but lost three of its first four. The team had a lengthy meeting after Friday’s game. Dayton has won two of three since, but the fate of the season rests in its pitching — especially at home, where the staff ERA is over 5.00.

“Honestly, it will boil down to pitching,” Hudson said. “We can swing the bat, we will put up some runs. If we can get some consistent pitching, this team will win a lot of ball games.”