CarL1 Potomac Nationals

Potomac Nationals Game Notes

Published on August 21, 2009 under Carolina League (CarL1)
Potomac Nationals News Release


POTOMAC NATIONALS (32-21, 69-51) VS. SALEM RED SOX (23-28, 55-65)

LHP Will Atwood (6-7, 4.76) vs. RHP Stephen Fife (2-1, 3.13)

August 21, 2009 -- 7:05 p.m.

G. Richard Pfitzner Stadium - Woodbridge, Virginia

Game #121/Home #57

TODAY: The Potomac Nationals penultimate homestand of the season begins Friday night when the P-Nats host the Salem Red Sox in a brief three-game series from Pfitzner Stadium. This trio of games will be the final meetings of the season for these in-state rivals with both teams battling for playoff positions in their respective divisions. Potomac just finished a 5-2 road trip but still trail the Wilmington Blue Rocks by 1.5 in the Northern Division. Meanwhile, the Red Sox are just 6-11 in the month of August and have fallen into third place in the South. With that said, Salem remains just 3.0 games behind Winston-Salem for the top spot in the division and just a game back of Kinston who owns the second-best record out South.

VS. THE SOX: Trent Jewett's ballclub owns a 10-6 advantage in their season series with Salem despite only hitting .231 against the Red Sox with more strikeouts (142) than hits (121) in their 16 previous meetings. Potomac has also hit the fewest number of home runs against Salem compared to their other CL counterparts with just five long balls this year and for the year, the defending champs are slugging at just a .353 clip against their in-state rivals. P-Nats pitching conversely, owns a 3.73 staff ERA against the Sox and have been at their best in many close meetings this season. *In 16 matchups with one another, nine of the games have been decided by three or fewer runs and Potomac is 7-2 in those "close encounters."

TODAY'S OPPOSING STARTERS: RHP Stephen Fife, 23, was selected in the 3rd round (85th overall) by the Boston Red Sox in the 2008 First-Year Player Draft out of the University of Utah. He pitched for the Utes for two years after spending a spring at Everett Community College in the state of Washington. As a junior at Utah, Fife was 7-5 with a 3.72 ERA in 15 starts and led his club in wins, starts, innings pitched (92.0), strikeouts (78) and opponents batting average (.252). With that kind of workload last spring at the collegiate level, Boston elected to use Fife primarily as a reliever in his first pro season with the short-season Lowell Spinners where the righty finished 1-1 with a 2.33 ERA in 14 appearances. With Lowell, the former member of the Boise, ID team that advanced to the 1999 Little League World Series held opponents to just a .198 BAA and went at least 2.0 innings with at least one strikeout in all 14 games.

Fife returned to starting games in 2009 where he began the year with Greenville of the South Atlantic League. While tossing for the Drive, Fife showed outstanding command by fanning 35 batters while only walking four in his 36.2 innings of work. He did not hit a batter in that time and also served up just one home run in his eight starts at the Low-A level. He made his Carolina League debut on July 16 but didn't factor into the decision against Winston-Salem despite allowing just one run on six hits in a 6.0 inning performance. He won his first game of the year in his following start against Frederick and enters tonight's opener with a 2-1 record and a 3.13 ERA in six outings with the Sox. He's allowed more than two runs in a start with Salem only once (8/9 @ KIN, 5ER/4.0IP) and has held right-handers to just a .235 BAA (12-for-51).

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