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SAL1 Charleston RiverDogs

2010 Charleston RiverDogs Season Recap

September 7, 2010 - South Atlantic League (SAL1)
Charleston RiverDogs News Release


Success results from several items: hard work, a never-say-die attitude and perhaps the most overlooked aspect - consistency. The Charleston RiverDogs have staked their claim as the most consistent team in the South Atlantic League having posted seven consecutive winning seasons since 2002. Even though the parent club New York Yankees provided the Holy City with 17 players from the New York-Penn League Champion Staten Island Yankees, that consistency and that resolve were mightily tested during the 2010 campaign.

Opening Night on April 8 at Joseph P. Riley, Jr. Park saw Charleston come from behind in the seventh inning for a 5-2 win over the Lexington Legends in front of 7,587 fans, the third-largest crowd in the history of The Joe, to give first-year manager Greg Colbrunn his initial win.

That season-opening series against Lexington ended in dramatic fashion, as the RiverDogs erased a 6-1 deficit to win, 7-6, in 12 innings on Taylor Grote's RBI double.

Charleston enjoyed another walkoff win two nights later against the West Virginia Power, courtesy of Luke Murton's RBI single for a 3-2 triumph.

After a 4-4 homestand, the RiverDogs experienced early road troubles with a 2-6 mark against Augusta and Hickory, with three of those defeats being walkoff losses.

A five-game losing skid was quickly swept under the rug through a four-game home sweep of the Rome Braves. The first of those wins -- on April 24 -- was the third walkoff win of the season, a 4-3 decision in 12 innings. Ray Kruml singled to lead off the inning, and then Murton doubled to deep left. While Kruml rounded second, he collided with Rome's shortstop and was awarded home on a defensive obstruction call.

Even though the good vibes were flowing in Charleston, the RiverDogs lost the next four games to Hickory to split that eight-game homestand and conclude the month of April.

Even though the roller-coaster was in full swing, Murton remained one of Charleston's rocks of consistency, registering a league-best 14-game hitting streak and a 29 game on-base streak.

Next on the slate was an eight-game road trip beginning in Lakewood, N.J. with another extra-inning affair. Kelvin Castro's two-out RBI double in the ninth tied Game One at 1-1 and it remained that way until the 14th inning, when former South Carolina Gamecock DeAngelo Mack hit a go-ahead RBI single to start the five-run frame. Murton capped off the scoring with a mesmerizing three-run home run and a 6-1 final.

Two days later, the RiverDogs and BlueClaws locked horns in a day affair at FirstEnergy Park. The events of that May 5 game not only yielded a 2-0 Charleston win, but featured a landmark performance by RiverDogs starter Graham Stoneburner. The former Clemson Tiger proceeded to toss two-hit ball over 7.0 innings with a career-high 11 strikeouts. The Virginia native fanned seven straight batters between the second and fourth innings and had 10 strikeouts after four. Charleston staked him to a 2-0 after the sixth, but in the eighth, it was the defense that stole the show. Lakewood put men at first and third with no one out, but reliever Ronny Marte induced a ground ball to the mound which he threw to second for one out, onto first for the second out, then the ball worked its way home to complete the team's first triple play since 2003 and preserve the masterpiece.

The RiverDogs ended up splitting with Lakewood and taking three of four from Delmarva in Salisbury, MD before returning home for a four-game set against Augusta. Charleston took the first two games of the series, but needed a pickoff at second base on a wild game-ending rundown to complete a 3-2 win.

When that final out was recorded, it set off a trying stretch that saw the RiverDogs lose seven straight games, the most since 2006.

Riley Park proved to be a temporary remedy for those ills, as Charleston took the next two games against Savannah. A five-run first inning led the team to a 9-6 win, but the next night, the RiverDogs fell behind, 6-2, heading to the ninth inning. But, the Never-Say-Die R'Dogs revved up the engine, getting a solo home run from Hector Rabago and a game-tying three-run home run with two outs from Zoilo Almonte to tie the game at 6-6 and send the contest to extra innings. Charleston took the reins in the 11 th on a Kruml sacrifice fly and a dramatic 7-6 win.

Even after a 1-0 walkoff loss to Greenville three days later that set the RiverDogs at 19-27 - a season-high eight games under .500 - Charleston bounced back less than 24 hours later when Sean Black hummed 7.0 shutout innings in a 5-0 victory over the Drive.

After the team sojourned back to the Lowcountry, adversity once again reared its ugly head on June 1, as the RiverDogs had 25 consecutive batters retired in a humbling 8-0 loss to Hickory in which the team collected only two base hits. The very next night, Charleston celebrated its fourth walkoff victory of the season as 2009 1st round selection Slade Heathcott hit a walkoff RBI single in the 10th inning in his SAL debut for a 5-4 win.

Alternating wins and losses occurred until a landmark game on June 16 against Augusta when the team pounded a franchise-record 22 base hits in a 15-6 thrashing of the GreenJackets, led by a 5-for-5, three RBI, four run, two stolen base performance from Emerson Landoni.

Even though the record books received a positive boost, the flip side surfaced in the final four games of the first half, when Charleston was swept at Rome for the second time in the half, giving the team a record of 31-38 to mark the first time since 2002 that the franchise experienced a losing half.

Three RiverDogs were named to the SAL Midseason All-Star team, as infielder Luke Murton, outfielder Zoilo Almonte and right-handed reliever Ryan Flannery were selected to represent the Southern Division at the 51st SAL All-Star Game at Fluor Field in Greenville, S.C.

When the second half began, the four-game skid that ended the half turned into a season-worst nine-game losing streak when the RiverDogs dropped five in a row to visiting Greenville, three of the losses coming by one run. The nine-game losing skein was the longest for the franchise since May 2006.

Almost immediately things improved mightily, largely facilitated by four straight victories in Augusta on the ensuing road trip for the first time under the Yankees umbrella, although the GreenJackets won the fifth and final game, 7-6, in 10 innings.

Independence Day 2010 ushered in 7,536 patrons for the second biggest crowd of the year, yet the RiverDogs fell to Asheville by a 6-4 final.

Charleston kept its hard charge going in the second half, flashing a league-best 20-12 record over the next 32 games following the five-game Greenville sweep. The RiverDogs got their revenge on the Drive by sweeping the Upstate rivals in four straight at The Joe from July 28-31, all part of a season-high six-game winning streak.

After the four-game whitewashing closed a 6.0 game deficit in the Southern Division standings down to just 2.0 games with over a month play, Charleston could not sustain that momentum over the rest of the half and finished 13-17 in the last 30 games, while never getting closer than 2.0 games.

Several bright spots came out of the late season mudslide, including a five-game series at Hickory from Aug. 12-16 in which the RiverDogs not only took the final four contests, but also posted 48 runs on 64 hits in the series; by far the best offensive showcase of 2010.

August 13 was particularly memorable as Charleston jumped to an 8-0 lead after four innings and cruised to an 18-4 victory. That production accounted for the most runs scored by the team since May 2008.

Six different players may have had multi-hit games and eight starters may have scored, but starting catcher J.R. Murphy stole the show, going 3-for-6 with two home runs and nine RBI. The former second round pick crushed a third-inning grand slam - the first for the franchise since June 2008 - a fourth-inning three-run homer for his first career multi-home run game, a RBI groundout in the sixth and a RBI single in the eighth for the most runs driven in by a RiverDog since becoming a Yankees affiliate. Murphy also missed the SAL single-game RBI record by one, which was a 10-RBI performance by Asheville's James Barbe on April 22, 1978.

From the pitching side of the ledger, right-hander Brett Marshall flirted with history on Aug. 25 against Savannah by retiring the first 16 batters he faced before allowing a one-out double in the sixth inning. The Texas native finished the inning scoreless in a game that was shortened to six frames by rain in an 8-0 RiverDogs triumph. Marshall, who underwent Tommy John surgery in 2009 after making his professional debut with the RiverDogs, did not walk a batter, struck out four and finished just one batter shy of the second perfect game in SAL history.

Savannah rebounded to take the final three games of the series and to guarantee Charleston's first losing season since 2002.

Playoffs would not be in the cards for the 2010 RiverDogs, but the last eight-game homestand of the year provided incredible bookend contests to close effectively the season's curtain.

Game One versus Greenville on Aug. 30 saw the Drive take a 1-0 in the second, which lasted all the way to the bottom of the ninth inning, when Taylor Grote stepped to the plate. Grote, who had missed 106 games earlier in the year due to injury and had not hit a home run at Riley Park since May 2009, crushed a 1-2 pitch from All-Star Dennis Neuman off the centerfield batter's eye to knot the game at 1-1 and move the festivities to extra innings. With a man on and two outs in the 12th, it was Heathcott who played hero when he launched his first career walkoff home run over the right-centerfield wall for a thrilling 3-1 victory.

Exactly one week later on Sept. 6 in the final game of the season, a 0-0 tie between Charleston and Greensboro navigated itself to the 10th inning, when the Grasshoppers seized a 1-0 lead. In the bottom half, the first two RiverDog batters were retired, catcher Hector Rabago walked and was lifted for a pinch-runner. Heathcott came calling again, this time with a game-tying RBI double, setting the two-out stage for Rob Lyerly.

Lyerly, who days before was the lone RiverDog named to the SAL Postseason All-Star Team, blooped a walkoff RBI single to right field for a dramatic 2-1 victory, the second season in a row that has ended with a walkoff victory.

A former standout at UNC Charlotte, Lyerly led the RiverDogs in six offensive categories and ranked third in the league with a .312 average, third with 157 base hits and tied for sixth with 36 doubles. Lyerly also staked his claim as one of the best RiverDogs in history with his double total ranking third in single-season team history, and his average and base hit count each finished in the top-10 in the single-season annals.

In 2010 the RiverDogs finished with a 65-74 overall record and a 35-35 mark at Riley Park, which was the 12th time in the 14-year history of the ballpark that the team ended .500 or better. The final attendance figure of 269,023 fans resulted in the third-best season mark in the history of Riley Park.

It might not have been the year of the winning season or the year of the playoffs, but the RiverDogs once again showed the best fans in Minor League Baseball a year-full of walkoffs and records being set, making 2010 a very successful season.

*THE RIVERDOGS: BY THE NUMBERS*

3,556,828 - Total attendance in the 14-year history of Riley Park.

269,023 - Total attendance for 2010. Ranks as the third-highest attendance figure in Riley Park history.

7,587 - Total attendance for Opening Night on April 8, marking the fifth largest crowd in the history of Riley Park.

1,166 - Number of victories in the history of the RiverDogs franchise dating back to 1994.

530 - Number of victories in 14-year history of Riley Park. The RiverDogs recorded their 500th win in the park's history in a thrilling 4-3, 12-inning triumph over the Rome Braves on April 24.

36 - Number of doubles hit by post-season All-Star Rob Lyerly, which tied him for sixth in the SAL and third in RiverDogs single-season history with Cliff Pastornicky, who smacked 36 doubles in 1982.

29 - On-base streak registered by Luke Murton from April 11-May 12, the fourth-longest skein in the SAL.

22 - Number of hits notched by the RiverDogs in a 15-6 victory over Augusta on June 16, the highest total by the team since becoming a Yankees affiliate in 2005.

20 - Number of batters retired consecutively by starter Graham Stoneburner on April 24 versus Rome. The former Clemson standout would take a no-decision in Charleston's 4-3, 12-inning victory.

18 - Season-high run total for the RiverDogs in an 18-4 drubbing of Hickory on August 13, the highest output for the team since a 20-2 win over Greenville on May 21, 2008.

17 - Number of batters retired in a row by the Charleston bullpen to end a 5-0 shutout of Hickory on August 16.

14 - Hitting streak posted by mid-season All-Star Luke Murton from April 13-April 27, tied for the ninth longest in the SAL in 2010.

12 - Number of shutouts posted by the RiverDogs, tied for third-most in the SAL.

11 - Number of batters fanned by Graham Stoneburner on May 5 at Lakewood, marking the first time a RiverDog starter struck out double-digit batters since Dellin Betances sunk 12 Lakewood batters in August 2008.

10 - Walkoff victories in 2010, capped off by a 2-1 comeback win over Greensboro in 10 innings in the final game of the season at The Joe on Sept. 6.

9 - J.R Murphy's RBI total on August 13 in the 18-4 victory over Augusta. The No. 8 prospect in the Yankees system according to *Baseball America *cracked a grand slam, a three-run home run, a RBI groundout and a RBI single to account for the most runs batted in by a RiverDog since becoming a Yankees affiliate in 2005.

7 - Number of batters fanned in succession by Graham Stoneburner on May 5 at Lakewood. The Virginia native struck out seven straight between the second and fourth innings in a 2-0 victory over the BlueClaws.

6 - Longest winning streak of the season for the RiverDogs spanning from July 27-August 2.

3 - Number of mid-season All-Stars for the RiverDogs. Outfielder Zoilo Almonte, reliever Ryan Flannery and infielder Luke Murton were all named to the Southern Division squad for the 51st SAL All-Star Game at Fluor Field in Greenville, S.C.

3 - Outs recorded in a triple play recorded on May 5 at Lakewood. It was the only triple play in the SAL in 2010 and the first for the RiverDogs since 2003.

2 - Number of grand slams hit by the RiverDogs: J.R. Murphy on August 13 at Hickory; and Emerson Landoni on September 4 versus Greensboro. Charleston had been without a grand slam since June 2008, when Taylor Holiday turned the trick against the now-defunct Columbus Catfish.

1 - Number of post-season All-Stars: infielder Rob Lyerly garnered those laurels ranking in the top five in the SAL in average and base hits and tied for sixth in doubles.

Check out the Charleston RiverDogs Statistics



South Atlantic League Stories from September 7, 2010


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