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PCL1 Nashville Sounds

Sounds lose heartbreaker in bottom of ninth

August 7, 2006 - Pacific Coast League (PCL1)
Nashville Sounds News Release


WEST SACRAMENTO, Calif. - The Nashville Sounds suffered a heart-breaking 5-4 loss to the Sacramento River Cats on Monday evening at Raley Field, allowing five runs with two outs in the bottom of the ninth inning.

Sacramento right fielder Hiram Bocachica belted the first pitch he saw from Sounds closer Alec Zumwalt over the left field wall for a game-ending three-run homer.

The River Cats had been down to their final out against Sounds reliever Allan Simpson before Mike Rouse broke up Nashville's shutout bid with a two-out, two-run homer to right-center. Nate Espy, who had walked, scored on the blast, Rouse's sixth of the year.

The rally continued as Sacramento put the potential tying run on base against Simpson as Doug Clark singled and Keith Ginter was hit by a pitch before Sounds manager Frank Kremblas lifted the right-hander in favor of Zumwalt, who threw only one pitch.

The loss, which snapped the Sounds' four-game winning streak, marked the first time in 23 tries this season that Nashville (63-54) failed to protect a ninth-inning lead on the road. The Sounds' lead in the PCL American Conference Northern Division fell to 2 ½ games over Iowa, which has won three in a row.

For the second straight outing, Nashville starter Dana Eveland had a victory taken away due to a blown save. The left-hander was in a groove all night, allowing only two hits, one of which was an infield single, and striking out seven batters over seven scoreless innings. The outing was his sixth quality start of the campaign.

The Sounds were one out away from their league-leading 11th shutout of the year the late Sacramento rally.

The recently red-hot Nashville offense banged out a double-digit hit total (11) for the fourth straight contest but finished the evening only 3-for-13 with runners in scoring position, leaving 11 men on base including eight of those on second or third.

Four Sounds finished with two hits on the night. Laynce Nix went 2-for-4, his seventh multiple-hit effort in nine games for Nashville. The outfielder has now produced at least one hit in 17 of his last 18 contests.

Sacramento sent a pair of rehabbing Oakland A's hurlers to the hill to begin the contest and both performed flawlessly. Left-hander Joe Kennedy worked two innings and allowed only one baserunner on a Graham Koonce walk. Former Sound Scott Sauerbeck followed with two scoreless frames of his own, fanning a pair of batters but didn't put up the second of his two zeroes without a bit of drama.

Nashville loaded the bases with none out in the fourth against the veteran southpaw on singles by Chris Barnwell and Nix followed by Koonce's second walk of the evening. After Brent Abernathy lined out to second, Sauerbeck induced a comebacker 1-2-3 double play grounder from Vinny Rottino to escape the jam unscathed and keep the contest scoreless.

Barnwell's fourth-inning single extended the shortstop's hitting streak to six games.

Left-hander Adam Pettyjohn, the projected River Cats starter, took over in the fifth and the Sounds broke the scoreless deadlock against the southpaw an inning later.

Zach Sorensen led off the Nashville sixth with a single, moved to second on a Barnwell sacrifice, and scored the game's first run when Nix followed with an RBI single to right. With two outs in the frame, Abernathy plated Nix with a single to left and Andrew Beattie wrapped up the inning's scoring two batters later with an RBI single to left to bring in Abernathy for a 3-0 Sounds lead.

The Sounds tacked on a run in the seventh against Pettyjohn on Koonce's bases-loaded sacrifice fly to left that brought home Dave Krynzel for a 4-0 advantage.

Nashville left the bases loaded for the second time in the contest in the eighth. With one out, Beattie singled before Pettyjohn offered only two strikes in a 10-pitch stretch to Chad Moeller and Krynzel to fill the bags. River Cats skipper Tony DeFrancesco summoned reliever Shawn Kohn from the bullpen and the right-hander responded by striking out Sorensen and inducing an inning-ending grounder from Barnwell to escape the jam.

Rottino went 1-for-3 for Nashville to extend the team's longest active hitting streak to seven games, one short of his best effort this year. Jermaine Clark made a pinch-running appearance in the ninth and swiped his team-leading 27th stolen base of the year, three shy of the PCL lead.

Steve Bray returned from a week-long stint on the disabled list to work the eighth for Nashville and struck out two of the three batters he faced.

River Cats reliever Matt Roney (4-2) was the beneficiary of the late River Cats heroics, earning the win after tossing one scoreless inning.

Zumwalt (0-1) took the loss after surrendering the game-deciding homer on the only pitch he threw.

The teams continue their series with a 1:35 p.m. CT matinee on Tuesday afternoon. Right-hander Justin Lehr (3-5, 3.42) takes the hill for the Sounds to face his former club for the first time in his career. Lehr appeared in 86 games for Sacramento over parts of three seasons from 2000-04.

The River Cats will counter with undefeated right-hander Jason Windsor (10-0, 3.79), who has won 14 consecutive minor-league decisions since an Opening Day loss for Double-A Midland.

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