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ApL Kingsport Axmen

K-Mets Down Astros 5-0 for Fourth Win in a Row

July 23, 2014 - Appalachian League (ApL)
Kingsport Axmen News Release


KINGSPORT, Tenn. (July 22, 2014) - Don't look now, but the hottest team in the Appalachian League is the Kingsport Mets.

Four pitchers combined on a two-hit shutout as the K-Mets beat the Greeneville Astros 5-0 on Tuesday night, in a rematch of last year's Appalachian League West Division playoff semifinals.

Kingsport now has won five in a row, with two of those victories shutouts. This latest win evens the K-Mets' record at 15-15, and in combination with some other results, pulls Kingsport into a tie for second place in the West with Johnson City, three games shy of division leader Elizabethton.

Blake Taylor (1-0) went six solid innings in the start for Kingsport, allowing a single hit and a pair of walks with one strikeout. Arriving with the Mets as the player to be named later in the Ike Davis trade with Pittsburgh, Taylor did a good job inducing contact from the Greeneville hitters, many of whom swung early in the count.

Offensively, the K-Mets struck early when Oswald Caraballo's left-field double plated Leon Canelon in the first inning. On this night, that would have been enough, but Kingsport added some insurance runs -- with Wuilmer Becerra responsible for many of them.

Becerra, the reigning Appalachian League Player of the Week, homered to almost straightaway center field in the eighth inning. Then, in the ninth, he lined a two-run single to center that capped a three-spot for the K-Mets and pushed the game out of reach.

Becerra and Caraballo had three hits each and combined for all five RBIs -- Becerra three and Caraballo two.

Both of Greeneville's hits came off the bat of first baseman Yonathan Mejia.

K-METRIC: Coming out of Tuesday's action, Caraballo (.333) and Becerra (.325) rank seventh and eighth, respectively, in the Appy in batting average. Kingsport is one of just two Appalachian league teams to have two hitters in the current top 10. Johnson City is the other.

NOTES: Christian Montgomery, David Roseboom and Nicco Blank relieved Taylor. Montgomery walked four of the seven men he faced, including two batters to start the eighth, but Roseboom got back-toback strikeouts to escape the jam. ... A swinging strike by Mejia in the seventh inning saw him lose the grip on his bat, which went sailing and landed in the basepath between first and second base. ... Austin Nicely (1-5) took the loss despite allowing just the one early run on two hits in his five innings.

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