Two swings of his bat were all it took to confirm that suspicion.

Labron hit his first two homers of the South Atlantic League season Monday night in a doubleheader split for Kannapolis. Labron’s solo shot against Charleston,W. Va., wasn’t enough in the opening 3-2 defeat, but his grand slam in the nightcap sealed an 8-2 victory.

“It’s always fun to play the game of baseball,”said the 6-foot-6, 230-pounder who was playing in an independent league before the White Sox signed him last week. “A bunch of the guys have treated me very nicely since I’ve been here.”

Labron treated the 1,211 fans to an offensive outburst not often seen at Fieldcrest CannonStadium. And there might just be more to come from the massive right-hander, who played first base and designated hitter Monday.

“I’ve been big all my life,”Labron said with a big grin before adding with a hearty laugh, “I can’t run — I haven’t been encouraged to bunt much.”

Charleston reliever Ben Quick inherited a 4-0 deficit when he came on in the third inning. He kept the Alley Cats (15-20) in it until the sixth, when Juan Santamarina reached on a wild pitch third strike and Michael Spidale and John Lackaff were hit by pitches.

Charleston called on Alexis Guzman to escape the two-out jam. He fell behind in the count 3-1 on Labron before the Intimidator fouled off a pair of off-speed pitches. The next delivery was a fastball that arched high and long to left-center, bouncing off the scoreboard.

“In that situation you’ve got an idea that the pitcher doesn’t want to walk you,”Labron said.“I was 0-for-2 in the second game and striking out with the bases loaded is pretty bad. I was just trying to put good wood on it. With home runs, you can’t look for them. They just come.”

The shot was especially gratifying since Labron had worked with hitting coach KenDominguez on staying back and waiting for the right pitch earlier Monday.

“We worked on some things he wanted me to correct,”Labron said. “We tinkered with a couple things. I owe everything to Kenny Dominguez.”

Kannapolis manager Razor Shines was pleased with Labron’s performance, but also that of the players around him in the batting order. Lackaff collected two hits and drove in three runs in Game 2. Joey Gillikin had a pair of hits, a run scored and an RBI in the two seven-inning games.

“Hopefully what Francisco Labron will do is take pressure off some of the younger kids,”Shines said. “So they don’t feel like they’ve got to be the guy all the time.

Starting pitcher Wyatt Allen benefitted from the offensive outburst in the nightcap. He threw a complete-game five-hitter, walking one and striking out five. The only runs he allowed, in the fourth and seventh innings, came after errors.

“Wyatt was outstanding,”Shines said. “He really dominated the hitters at times, especially when he was ahead.”

Jim Bullard, the Game 1 starter for Kannapolis (16-19), didn’t fare as well in the run support column.

Labron gave the Intimidators a 1-0 lead when he led off the second inning with a line drive homer to left field. Charleston tied it in the top of the fifth on Bullard’s one big mistake — a hanging curve that RaulTablado deposited onto and over the clubhouse roof beyond the wall in left.

Kannapolis scratched for a 2-1 lead with an unearned run in the fifth inning, but back-to-back doubles in the sixth tied it and Charleston led off the seventh with a single against reliever JulioCastro. A sac bunt and stolen base later, Alexis Rios drove home the game-winner with a sacrifice fly.

“The only time I’m satisfied with a split is when we don’t win the first one,”Shines said. “We have to settle.”

n

NOTES:Intimidators general manager Todd Parnell, sitting in the press box at the time, called Labron’s grand slam two pitches before he hit it. … Nilson Teilon drove in the second run of the opening game with a triple — to medium, straightaway centerfield. But Rios was shaded over some 20 paces to right-center and couldn’t come over in time to make the catch. … Kannapolis and Charleston square off again tonight at 6:35. Intimidator Dan Mozingo, with 90 Ks in 77 innings and a 2.34 ERA, will try to improve his record to 8-3.

n