Sloppy Sunday Ends in Freedom Loss
August 2, 2009 - Frontier League (FL)
Florence Y'alls News Release
TRAVERSE CITY, MI - The Traverse City Beach Bums and Florence Freedom combined to make six errors, walk 11 and hit two batters in a sloppy Sunday afternoon of baseball from Wuerfel Park.
In the end, the Beach Bums came away with a 13-6 victory and won for the second straight night.
Traverse City had to rally back against a red hot Freedom attack in the first. Tim Grogan led-off the game with his ninth home run of the season. Five more hits followed including RBIs from Justin Pickett, Johnny Welch and Zach Goldberg to put the Freedom up 4-0 heading to the bottom of the first against Jason Kiley.
Andy Clark sat down the first three Bums in order in the first, but ran into a buzz saw in the second. The first four Beach Bums all reached on hits and Clark would exit the game with the score 4-3 Freedom due to an apparent right arm injury. Brad Miller tied the game in the second with a sacrifice fly.
Clark had to be removed from the rotation due to an earlier problem in his right elbow this season. He finished lasting only 1 1/3 innings and 31 pitches overall.
Florence took their last lead of the game in the top of the fourth. Grogan's one-out, RBI double made it 5-4 Florence. The Freedom later loaded the bases in the fourth with still just the one out, but couldn't scrape across another run as the momentum changed dugouts.
Traverse City went on to score three in the bottom of the fourth on Brian Lapin's three-run dinger. Lapin's second in as many nights make it 7-4 and the Beach Bums wouldn't surrender the lead again.
Lapin finished up 3-4 and a double away from the cycle.
Ryan Kruszka (1-0) replaced Kiley in the fourth and went 1 2/3 innings for the win. Billy Schlee (0-1) surrendered the Lapin homer and took the loss for the Freedom.
The bullpens ended up being the difference in the game. Florence used five relievers with all five giving up at least one run. They combined to go 6 2/3 innings, allowing nine runs, seven earned, 11 hits and six walks. Traverse City's bullpen went 5 2/3 innings, giving only one unearned run and one hit.
Florence (31-33) looks to get back on track Monday night against the Beach Bums. The Freedom have now dropped four straight after winning four in a row. Game time is set for 7:05 p.m. from Wuerfel Park.
Frontier League Stories from August 2, 2009
- Otters Sweep Doubleheader for Fourth Straight Win - Evansville Otters
- Beach Bums Rally Past Freedom - Traverse City Beach Bums
- Bolts Drop a Pair - Windy City ThunderBolts
- Miners Walk Off with Win - Gateway Grizzlies
- RiverHawks Take Third in a Row from River City - Rockford RiverHawks
- Sloppy Sunday Ends in Freedom Loss - Florence Y'alls
- Lake Erie Downs Kings - Lake Erie Crushers
- Sliders Survive 'Slugfest' - Midwest Sliders of Ypsilanti
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