AA Winnipeg Goldeyes

Fish Cap 5-1 Home Stand with Thriller over Gary

Published on June 3, 2012 under American Association (AA)
Winnipeg Goldeyes News Release


For awhile it appeared as if Yurendell de Caster's grand slam home run would stand up.

But that was before the shenanigans in the ninth inning.

Sunday afternoon in front of 6,149 fans at Shaw Park, the Winnipeg Goldeyes beat the Gary SouthShore RailCats 6-5 in a thriller.

It wasn't a thriller until the RailCats do what they often do late in a ball game - they scored three runs in the ninth without a ball out of the infield.

It's called "Getting RailCatted," and the Goldeyes almost had it happen to them again.

For 7 1/2 innings it was a pretty standard Winnipeg-Gary game. The RailCats scraped across a run the fourth to take a 1-0 lead; the Goldeyes scored four in the fifth on an infield single by David Narodowski, a walk to Chris Roberson, a walk to Jon Weber and a grand slam home run by Yurendell de Caster; and then Gary made it 4-2 in the seventh with back-to-back doubles.

But the Fish scored two in the bottom of the eighth as Luis Alen singled, Amos Ramon sacrificed Alen to second, Josh Mazzola singled to score Alen and Ridge Carpenter doubled to score Mazzola, who had taken second on a bad throw.

That made it 6-2 heading into the ninth and it looked like the Fish had it locked up.

But that's when the Railcatting started.

With closer Nick Carr throwing 90-95-mile-per-hour heaters, the RailCats never hit a ball out of the infield, but they scored three runs. David Cooper grounded to third to open the inning, but with one out, Adam Klein walked and stole second. Mike Massaro then beat out an infield single to put runners on the corners. Brian Kolb then hit a ground ball to third base that looked foul. It looked foul to Goldeyes third baseman Amos Ramon, too, who eventually threw to first base, over the head of de Caster, and that scored Klein to make the score 6-3.

Massaro, who had gone to third, then scored on an infield hit by Rico Washington. That made it 6-4. Carr then struck out Sean Smith for the second out, but the drama was only starting.

Kyle Haines then walked to load the bases and Mike Rohde delivered another infield hit that scored Kolb from third to make it 6-5.

However, with the bases loaded and two out, Carr struck out Craig Maddox for the final out and the Goldeyes had locked down the win for Ace Walker who threw six solid innings and deserved his second victory of the season.

Walker also struck out three RailCats to tie Rick Forney for the Goldeyes all-time career strikeout lead with 314.

However, the game had ended with the bases loaded while the RailCats scored three runs on two walks, three infield hits and an error. They did not hit the ball past the infield dirt.

"We were never nervous in the ninth inning because we trusted our pitcher," said de Caster on the Shaw TV post-game show. "Nick is a good pitcher and we have a lot of confidence in him. We were never worried."

As for his grand slam, de Caster got a pitch that sluggers only dream about - a thigh high, 78-mile-per-hour ball that looked like a batting practice pitch from reliever Chuck Lukanen.

"I saw the pitch and didn't try to do too much with it," de Caster said. "It was a good pitch for me to hit and I just wanted to put a good swing on it."

With the win, the Goldeyes improved to 11-4 on the season, won five of six on the home stand and won the series with Gary. Walker (2-0, 3.32 ERA) got the win while Carr got the save (4). Reliever Nolan Nicholson (1-1, 2.63 ERA), who was responsible for the runners on base when de Caster hit it out, suffered the loss.

As soon as the game ended, the Goldeyes hopped on the bus and headed off to Lincoln for a four-game series with the Saltdogs beginning on Monday night. They'll play three in Fargo next weekend before returning to Winnipeg next Monday for a three-game series with the Saltdogs.

All of the road games can be heard live, with Paul Edmonds, on TSN 1290 Sports Radio.

Check out the Winnipeg Goldeyes Statistics

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American Association Stories from June 3, 2012


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