FL Lake Erie Crushers

Bullpen Strong in Loss at Washington

Published on July 28, 2010 under Frontier League (FL)
Lake Erie Crushers News Release


WASHINGTON, Penn. - The Lake Erie Crushers dropped the opener of a three game series to the Washington Wild Things, falling 6-2 Wednesday night at CONSOL Energy Park.

The Wild Things opened the scoring in the bottom of the second with a Jon Kourie single that scored Eric Stephens with two outs to give Washington a 1-0 lead.

Lake Erie evened the score in the top half of the fourth. With one out, Drew Saylor lined his second hit in as many tries to get aboard before Joel Collins struck with a double to left center, plating Saylor and tying the game at one.

But the Wild Things exploded in the ensuing half-inning, scoring five times on Crushers starter Esmelvin Jimenez in the process of chasing him from the contest. With two and two out, Wilson Matos worked a walk from Jimenez to load the bases for Billy O'Conner. O'Conner drew the count full before walking himself to plate Stephens for the first run of the frame. Michael Parker came up next and ripped a double down the left field line that scored Jon Kourie and Matos. After Parker's hit, Jimenez was lifted in favor of Cristobal Mata, who was greeted by a Luis Rivera single that brought in Parker and O'Conner to put the Wild Things up 6-1.

Dom Duggan hit his second long ball of the season in the fifth, a solo homerun to left with one out, to bring the Crushers within 6-2.

But that was all that Lake Erie would muster against Zach Groh, who tossed seven innings allowing the two runs on five hits while striking out six and walking a batter on his way to his third win of the season.

The Crushers bullpen kept it close, tossing 4.1 innings of shutout baseball between Mata's three frames, Ronnie Morales's single inning and Phil Rummel, who appeared out of the bullpen for the second time in 2010 to record the final out in the eighth.

The Crushers and Wild Things meet Thursday night in game two of the three-game set. RHP Josh Roberts (6-1, 1.96) is scheduled to face Wild Things RHP Jeff Sonnenberg (2-6, 3.68)

EXTRA SWINGS:

>The loss marked the second time the Crushers have lost four times in a row in 2010.

>The Crushers fall to .500 for the first time since June 18, when they were 18-18.

>Cristobal Mata's three innings marked the longest outing of 2010 for the right-hander.

Check out the Lake Erie Crushers Statistics

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