Wahoos Blank Biscuits
July 15, 2013
Pensacola’s red-hot offense rolled into the All-Star Break with another strong performance, smashing seven runs on 14 hits in a 7-0 blanking of the Montgomery Biscuits on Sunday evening at Riverwalk Stadium. The win moved the Blue Wahoos to within two games of first place Mobile and marked the first time this season that Pensacola won four games in a single series.
The Wahoos offense came out early, striking for three runs in the first inning against Montgomery starter Jake Floethe. Donald Lutz, Tucker Barnhart and Travis Mattair stroked consecutive RBI singles in the first to give Pensacola the early advantage. An inning later, Brodie Greene doubled with one out, stole third base and scored on a fielder’s choice off the bat of Corey Wimberly to make it 4-0.
That was enough support for Pensacola starter Ryan Dennick who got the nod after pitching just one inning on Friday before rains suspended that contest. Dennick fired five shutout innings, allowing just two hits with a strikeout and two walks to improve to 5-10 on the season.
Chris Manno, Josh Ravin, Loek Van Mil and Jamie Walczak combined to hold the Biscuits to just three hits over the final four innings to give the pitching staff its seventh shutout of the season.
Pensacola put the game away in the top of the eighth inning against reliever Erik Hamren. With the bases loaded and nobody out, Mattair scored Yorman Rodriguez on an RBI groundout before Mike Costanzo and Ryan LaMarre notched RBI singles to make it 7-0. The knock for Costanzo was his first in a Blue Wahoo uniform this season in 12 at-bats.
Eight of the nine Wahoos starters ended up with at least one hit in the ball game while five players smacked multi-hit games for the fourth time in the series. Corey Wimberly led the attack with a 3-for-5 showing while Lutz (2-for-4), Barnhart (2-for-4), Mattair (2-for-4) and Costanzo (2-for-5) contributed two-hit games. In the series, Pensacola blasted 31 runs on 52 hits for a team batting average of .308 during the five-game set.
The Wahoos will take the next three days off for the Southern League All-Star Game, which will be played on Wednesday in Jacksonville. Pensacola will return to action on Thursday night at home as they open up a series against the Huntsville Stars at 7 p.m. Daniel Renken (3-6, 3.91) is the scheduled starter for the Wahoos while Huntsville has not yet named a starter.
story by Kevin Burke
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