It doesn’t seem to matter where the Amarillo Sod Poodles are these days, they’re just leaving every series with a win.

Sunday afternoon, they clinched their sixth straight series victory by winning on the road in San Antonio, keeping them solidly atop the Texas League South Division standings. The Sod Poodles had one big inning and their pitching did the rest as they beat the San Antonio Missions 5-4 to leave town with a 4-2 series victory.

With the win, the Sod Poodles (32-19) are running away from the pack in the second half of the Texas League season. They’re now eight games ahead of second place Frisco with only 18 to go in the regular season, with the magic number to win the division down to 11.

The Soddies will try to reduce that even further starting this Tuesday evening at 6:35 p.m. at Hodgetown, when they open a six-game series at home against Northwest Arkansas.

Every series it seems as if the Sod Poodles find a new way to win and Sunday added another twist. San Antonio (19-32) took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the third before the Sod Poodles came up with a big fourth inning and never trailed again.

Jean Walters put the Soddies up 3-1 with a two-run single. Ryan Waldschmidt and Gavin Conticello then had consecutive RBI singles to increase the cushion to 5-1.

The Sod Poodles didn’t get anything else at the plate the rest of the game, but that was all they needed. Jonatan Bernal, who’s bounced back and forth between the starting rotation and the bullpen this season, went 1 1/3 innings in relief to earn the win and improve to 4-2 on the season.

With the Soddies leading 5-3 and nobody out in the bottom of the eighth, Zane Russell releived Eli Saul with the tying run on base. Russell gave up an RBI groundout which cut the lead to 5-4, but retired all six batters he faced to earn his fourth save of the season.

That game ended a four-game stretch of superb pitching in which the Sod Poodles gave up only 29 runs in two innings. Friday and Saturday they may have had their best back-to-back starting outings of the season, but ironically, neither starter earned a decision.

Friday, right-hander Daniel Eagen was called up from the Soddies major league parent club Arizona Diamondbacks Class A affiliate in Hillsboro. Eagen quickly showed he was worth the hype.

After going 7-5 with a 2.49 ERA and 132 strikeouts in 97.2 innings in Hillsboro, Eagen showed he was ready for Double-A ball. In his Sod Poodles debut, Eagen went 7 2/3 innings, giving up only two hits with eight strikelouts and walking only one while giving up no runs. Unfortunately, the Sod Poodles didn’t support Eagen, as they were scoreless for the full 10 innings, as the Missions won 1-0 with a run in the bottom of the 10th.

Saturday, left-hander Avery Short had his best outing since returning from injury, going six innings and allowing only two hits with no runs before leaving in a scoreless game. The Sod Poodles broke their scoreless drought on Gavin Conticello’s two-run double in the top of the ninth for a 2-0 victory.

The series actually got compacted into five days because Tuesday’s scheduled series opener was rained out, forcing a Wednesday doubleheader. San Antonio won the first game 5-4 with a run in the bottom of the sixth, but the Soddies bounced back with a 4-2 win in the second game, as Jose Cabrera went six solid innings to improve his record to 8-5 on the season.

Thursday was the only lopsided game of the series, as the Sod Poodles won 10-1. Conticello and Ben McLaughlin provided half the scoring with home runs.

There was some tough news for the Sod Poodles before the weekend got started, though. Catcher Christian Cerda, who leads the team with 18 homers, was placed on the seven-day injured list Friday, meaning he will miss at least the first three games of the series against Northwest Arkansas. J.J. D’Orazio was activated from the developmental list after five days and made an impact in his return Sunday, going 2-for-4 and driving in the first run of the game for the Sod Poodles and later scoring the go-ahead run.

Waldschmidt honored

Before the series in San Antonio, Sod Poodles outfielder Ryan Waldschmidt was honored as the Texas League’s Player of the Week for his big series at home against the Corpus Christi Hooks a week earlier. Waldschmidt, the No. 3 prospect in the Diamondbacks and No. 69 prospect in major league baseball, hit .524 in six games with five homers and 11 RBIs against the Hooks, scoring 10 runs and having two multi-homer games.