SACRAMENTO, Calif. (KTSM) – In his first official game since October of 2021, Fernando Tatis Jr. helped the El Paso Chihuahuas to a 10-8 win over the Sacramento River Cats on Tuesday night.
Tatis Jr. went 1-2 with an RBI single and a pair of walks in the first game of what will be a 15-day rehab stint with the Chihuahuas. Tatis Jr. is still serving the remainder of his 80-game suspension from Major League Baseball for performance-enhancing drugs. He’s eligible to return to the Big Leagues on April 20.
The game was also Tatis Jr.’s first game in Triple-A. On his way to the Big Leagues, he skipped over the Chihuahuas entirely, going straight from Double-A to the San Diego Padres in 2019.
Tatis Jr. batted lead-off and played in right field on Tuesday night. He walked in his first two at-bats, before scoring a run by grounding into a double play in the fourth inning. He gave El Paso its first lead of the game in the sixth inning with an RBI single.
El Paso trailed for much of the game and was down 8-5 after six innings. However, five unanswered runs in the final three frames gave the Chihuahuas the win. Taylor Kohlwey put El Paso in front for good in the eighth inning with a two-RBI single.
The Chihuahuas and River Cats will play again on Wednesday at 7:45 p.m. Tatis Jr. is expected to be in the lineup once again.
After the six-game road series in Sacramento, the Chihuahuas will return to Southwest University Park in El Paso, Texas to play a six-game series against Albuquerque April 11-16. The conventional wisdom is that Tatis Jr. will return to El Paso with the Chihuahuas for that series as well.
