The Tacoma Rainiers have plenty of power, league-leading type of power to be certain. They rank near the top of the Pacific Coast League with 52 home runs, including 22 in 17 games at Cheney Stadium.

But sometimes, a bloop or some other seeing-eye base hit will do just as much damage as a long home run.

Rainiers’ manager Daren Brown would have gladly settled for any sort of base hit – no matter the distance – in a pivotal sixth inning in what ended up being a 6-4 loss to the Memphis Redbirds on Friday at Cheney Stadium.

Memphis grabbed a 3-1 lead in the top of the sixth inning on Casey Rowlett’s run-scoring, two-out single off Rainiers starter Gaby Hernandez.

But the Rainiers had a chance to answer and take control in the bottom half of the inning after loading the bases with one out on Redbirds starter Clayton Mortensen, who had pretty stingy for the first five innings.

Mike Morse coaxed a walk out of Mortensen to score one run, and the Rainiers seemed poised for a big inning. But Memphis manager Chris Maloney went to veteran left-hander Royce Ring, and the former big-leaguer did the job by getting Brad Nelson to ground into an inning-ending double play.

“We had a chance there in the sixth to really get something going,” Brown admitted. “We just couldn’t come up with the big hit.”

Yet the Rainiers managed to keep things interesting. Memphis scored two runs in the eighth off reliever Jesus Delgado, but Tacoma answered with RBI singles from Morse and Jerry Owens in the bottom of the inning to keep the deficit at one run.

But Memphis added an insurance run in the ninth, and the Rainiers simply ran out of chances.

Hernandez took the loss (3-3), allowing three runs in seven innings – unfortunately all of those runs came on two-out hits.

“I thought he made some pretty good pitches,” Brown said. “The thing with two-out hits is that he’s really close to getting out of there with nothing.”

Mortensen, a Gonzaga product and first-round draft choice in 2007 (36th pick), was solid, allowing two hits and one earned run in five innings, while striking out four and walking three.

“He’s got a good sinker and he keeps the ball down and gets a lot of ground balls” Brown said.

Rated as the No. 6 prospect in the Cardinals’ organization by Baseball America, Mortensen had a solid outing last season against the Rainiers.

Short hops

Center fielder Prentice Redman continues to hit well in Cheney stadium, going 1-for-5 and extending his home hitting streak to 21 games. ... Jeff Clement also has a hitting streak of his own. His single up the middle extended his hit streak to 10 games.

On tap

Left-hander Ryan Rowland-Smith will be making a rehab start for the Rainiers. He will be on a limited pitch-count. Rowland-Smith went on the disabled list on April 15th with pain discomfort in his throwing elbow. Right-hander P.J. Walters (2-1, 3.18 ERA) will get the start for Memphis. First pitch is set for 7 p.m. The game will be broadcast on FSN.

Ryan Divish: 253-597-8483

ryan.divish@thenewstribune.com