SAL1 Kannapolis Cannon Ballers

Game Notes: Kannapolis Intimidators (White Sox) vs. Hickory Crawdads (Rangers) - August 6, 2014

Published on August 6, 2014 under South Atlantic League (SAL1)
Kannapolis Cannon Ballers News Release


KANNAPOLIS INTIMIDATORS vs. HICKORY CRAWDADS

53-59, 24-21 (Chicago White Sox) 66-48, 25-20 (Texas Rangers)

Wednesday, August 6, 2014 - 7:05 p.m.

CMC-Northeast Stadium - Kannapolis, N.C.

2nd Half Game #46 (113 of 137)

RH Robinson Leyer (5-7, 3.45) vs. RH Tyler Smith (5-3, 3.80)

Today's Preview: The Intimidators (A, White Sox) wrap up this 24-game season-series against the Crawdads (A, Rangers) with the third and final game of this series at CMC-NorthEast Stadium. Hickory leads the season-series, 12-11, so Kannapolis can split the 2014 season-series with a win today. A loss will give the season-series to the Crawdads for the fifth straight year. The Intimidators and Crawdads split the first two games of this 3-game set with both contests going into extra innings. Today Adam Engel looks to extend his 10-game hitting streak and 23-game on-base streak while RHP Robinson Leyer toes the rubber in his team-leading 22nd start for Kannapolis. Hickory is countering with Tyler Smith.

Sally League Standings: Kannapolis (24-21) fell to 4.5 games out of first place in the SAL Northern Division 2nd Half standings, fourth in the 7-team division. Hickory (25-20) currently ranks third in the division.

Intimidating Starter: Robinson Leyer, 21, makes his fifth start against Hickory and team-leading 22nd start of the season. In four starts against the Crawdads, he is 1-1 with a 1.74 ERA but has not faced them since June 23. Leyer is coming off consecutive quality starts, including a loss in his last outing on Aug. 1 against Augusta. The Intimidators team-leader in ERA (3.45) and innings pitched (114.2) excelled in May and June (going 3-2 with a 1.53 ERA (10 ER/58.2 IP) in 10 starts), but July and August have been less kind as he is 1-3 with a 4.97 ERA (16 ER/29 IP) in five starts. Leyer struck out a career-high nine batters over 7.0 scoreless innings against eventual Southern Division First Half champion Savannah. He tossed his first career complete game July 8 at Greensboro in a rain-shortened 7-inning contest. The younger brother of former Intimidator Euclides Leyer, Robinson spent 2013 with Advanced Rookie Bristol, going 2-7 with a 6.35 ERA in 13 starts.

Hickory Hurler: Tyler Smith, 22, makes his eighth start of the season and second against the Intimidators. He has earned wins in three of his last four starts, including 5.0 shut out innings at Rome on June 19 in his most recent outing. Smith's lone loss of the season came against Kannapolis on May 27 in Hickory, allowing a run over 5.1 innings. He is 0-1 with a 0.66 ERA (1 ER/13.2 IP) in four games (one start) against the Intimidators, who are batting .180 against him. Smith is in his second season with the 'Dads after going 4-5 with a 5.49 ERA in 26 games (11 starts) in 2013 with Hickory. He made four relief appearances last season for High-A Myrtle Beach. Texas drafted him in the 19th round in June 2012 out of the University of South Carolina-Sumter. Smith graduated from Sumter (S.C.) High School.

About Last Night: Kannapolis failed to hold a 3-0 lead in the eighth as the Crawdads came back to beat the Intimidators, 6-3, in 11 innings on Tuesday. With the bases loaded and one out in the 11th, Zach Cone broke a 3-3 tie by crossing the plate on a wild pitch. Michael De Leon added a run on a sacrifice-fly, and Evan Van Hoosier followed with an RBI-double to cap the inning. Andrew Mitchell (3-3), the fifth Intimidators pitcher of the night, took the loss. Felix Carvallo (4-2) spun 3.0 scoreless frames to secure the win. The Crawdads rallied for three runs off Jose Brito in the eighth inning to tie the game, 3-3. Luis Marte, Michael De Leon and Evan Van Hoosier strung together three 1-out singles off Brito to chase him from the game and put the Crawdads on the board. David Putman surrendered run-scoring singles to Ryan Cordell and Kellin Deglan. Kannapolis broke a scoreless tie in the fifth. Christian Stringer 2-out RBI-single to right field provided a 1-0 lead, chasing Hickory starter Akeem Bostick. Stringer reached base safely five times on the night, going 3-4 with a walk and a hit-by-pitch. In the sixth, the Intimidators added two more runs thanks to a Zach Fisher RBI-single and a Carl Thomore sac-fly to plate Danny Hayes and Jacob Morris, respectively, for a 3-0 lead. Andre Wheeler shutout the Crawdads over 5.0 innings of work, striking out five while limiting Hickory to a pair of hits and a pairs of walks. Jordan Guerrero tossed 2.0 perfect relief innings, striking out the side in the seventh.

Extra! Extra!: Kannapolis went to extra innings for the second straight game on Tuesday, the second time the Intimidators have played consecutive extra-inning games this season. The Intimidators went to back-to-back extra inning games against Hagerstown on May 11-12, going 10 innings in the second game of a May 11 twin bill then playing 11 innings the following day. The Intimidators are now 4-9 in extra innings in 2014, including 3-1 against the Crawdads. Kannapolis had a chance to win consecutive games via walk-off on Tuesday for the first time since Aug. 16-17, 2012, when Courtney Hawkins - that summer's White Sox first round draft pick - came through with extra-inning walk-off hits in back-to-back games against the West Virginia Power.

Atta-boy, Adam: Adam Engel went 2-6 Tuesday to run his on-base streak to a career-best 23 straight games since July 11, tied for the ninth-longest streak in the SAL in 2014. He is now one game shy of the longest streak by an Intimidators player this season (Danny Hayes had a 24-game on-base streak April 11 to May 8). Engel is batting .320 (32-100) with 4 doubles, 3 triples, 3 home runs, and 13 RBI while posting an on-base percentage of .387. Engel has hit safely in 22 of these 23 games, and he is now on his second hitting streak of 10 games. He went on a career-long 12-game hitting streak from July 11-25, and after an 0-4 game on July 26, he started his most recent hitting streak, which he ran to 10 games with Tuesday's game. This is the fifth 10-game hitting streak by an Intimidators player this season (Engel is the only Intimidator with two 10-game hitting steaks).

Wild Thing: Reliever Andrew Mitchell continued to strikeout batters at a high rate, adding two more whiffs in 1.0 inning of work Tuesday. He has struck out 73 batters in 54.1 IP. The former TCU Horned Frog also walked two batters Tuesday, giving him a SAL-leading 60 base on balls this season. Mitchell is also tied for the league lead with 21 wild pitches after two stray tosses, one of which brought home the go-ahead run in the 11th.

Game Broadcasts: This season all 70 home games and select road games will be broadcast on the Kannapolis Intimidators Baseball Network available at IntimidatorsBaseball.com & on the TuneIn Radio App with Josh Feldman, now in his fourth season as the Voice of the Intimidators.

Check out the Kannapolis Cannon Ballers Statistics

Share: Facebook | Twitter/X | LinkedIn | Reddit | Email



South Atlantic League Stories from August 6, 2014


The opinions expressed in this release are those of the organization issuing it, and do not necessarily reflect the thoughts or opinions of OurSports Central or its staff.

OurSports Central