Pair of Portland All-Stars Shine in 7-5 Victory
Published on July 9, 2010 under Eastern League (EL1)
Portland Sea Dogs News Release
Portland, Maine- Nate Spears provided the offense, and Stephen Fife provided the pitching to help lead the Portland Sea Dogs (43-44) to a 7-5 victory over the New Britain Rock Cats (24-64) Friday night at Hadlock Field before a crowd of 5,648.
With two out and a run already scored in the second, Spears launched a Grand Slam into the U.S. Cellular Pavilion in right field. The Grand Slam by Spears was the first for Portland since August 14th in 2008, when Lars Anderson homered with the bags full of âDogs against Altoona. It was also Spears' team-leading ninth homer of the year.
Aside from a small hiccup from the Portland defense in the second inning, Fife was perfect in his other five innings of work. Fife (5-2), who relinquished just the two hits and two unearned runs while striking out five in six innings of work to collect the win.
Portland entered the bottom of the second down 2-0 after New Britain coupled two hits and two errors to take the early lead off of Portland starter Fife. Erik Lis led off the inning and worked his way home after consecutive miscues from Spears and Anthony Rizzo. Mark Dolenc added a single and an RBI.
Matt Sheely remained hot at the plate, with a 2-for-4 effort. After tripling in the fourth, Sheely scored the sixth Portland run by bluffing a tag up to home on a Luis Segovia fly ball to center. The bluff drew an errant throw from Ben Revere, to score Sheely with the eventual game winning run.
Portland would add another insurance run in the sixth to take a 7-2 lead and close the book on New Britain starter Tyler Robertson (1-8). Robertson would toss 5.1 innings in the loss, allowing seven runs on ten hits with two strikeouts.
New Britain would make things interesting late, slugging three solo homeruns off reliever Ryne Miller. Joe Benson hit two, one in the seventh and eighth, and Chris Parmalee got to Miller for one homer in the eighth to make it a 7-5 game.
Bryce Cox would put out the fire for Portland, tossing 1.1 hitless innings in relief of Miller with one strikeout to secure the win and pick up his team-leading 11th save of the season.
The Sea Dogs and Rock Cats will continue their four-game series with a second tilt at 6 p.m. Saturday night at Hadlock Field. Right-hander Kyle Weiland (4-5, 3.99) will take the ball for Portland opposite New Britain's righty Mike McCardell (0-10, 5.79).
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