Wahoos Win 2-1 Over Rival Mobile BayBears

August 15, 2014

Hometown prospect Ben Lively remains winless in front of his friends and family at Pensacola Bayfront Stadium.

But that doesn’t matter as long as the Pensacola Blue Wahoos starter keeps pitching like he did Thursday night. The 6-foot-3, 215-pound righty shut out the Mobile BayBears over six innings, allowed just three hits and struck out seven.

What matters to Lively is his team pulled out a win in the 11th inning, 2-1, against Southern League rival Mobile, which is 26 games over .500 with the best record in the South Division at 73-47.

Travis Mattair lead off the bottom of the 11th inning with a triple off the centerfield wall and the very next batter Devin Lohman drove him home with the winning run on a deep fly ball to right field.

A Gulf Breeze High School baseball standout Lively entered the game with a 0-4 record and 4.73 ERA. Afterwards his comment: “It’s a team sport. As long as we win, I don’t care.”

Pensacola Manager Delino DeShields said Thursday was one of Lively’s best performances in front of the home crowd.

“He was really good tonight,” DeShields said. “I wish we would have held the lead for him and gotten him the W.”

Lively’s had a bit of hard luck that his overall 1-6 record doesn’t explain. Consider this: When allowing two runs or less, which Lively has done in six of his 10 starts with Pensacola, Lively has 1 win, 2 losses and 3 no decisions. Plus, in half of his 10 starts, he’s allowed just three hits or less, with opposing hitters batting .196 against him.

Lively bounced back from his last home start against the Jackson Generals, he allowed five runs – the most all season – in six innings and struck out three batters – his fewest all season.

Mattair, who nearly won a bet that he would blast a homer, said playing at first base behind Lively on the mound is always exciting.

“He has just been lights out,” said Mattair, who has a home run, triple, three doubles and two singles in his last seven hits. “He has that mentality that he’s going to beat you.”

Lohman, wearing a collar of shaving cream, said he was just looking for a pitch to drive out of the infield, which was playing in. He let a first pitch fastball go by and was angry at himself before hitting the walk-off sacrifice fly. Like Lively, he just wanted to get a victory and end their two-game losing streak to Mobile.

“Lively is very intense and the kind of person who fires the team up,” Lohman said. “He plays to win. We’ve had a lot of close games against Mobile this year. It was good to get the win. ”

BLACKED OUT GAME RESUMES The first ever Pensacola Blue Wahoos game suspended because the ballpark lights went out Wednesday resumed Thursday. The BayBears were in the middle of a ninth-inning rally when the blackout happened and the game restarted with the bases loaded with one out and Mobile ahead, 4-3.

Mobile picked up where it left off, adding four more runs on two more hits to win the game, 8-3. In all over two nights, Mobile sent nine batters to the plate and scored six runs on six hits off Pensacola closer Shane Dyer, who had saved 12 games in a row. Dyer, who earned the loss to fall to 0-3, has only blown two saves in 18 tries.

It was the first time in 26 home games this season that the Wahoos lost after leading the game after eight innings.

During the day, Pensacola hired an electrical contractor who repaired a breaker in the malfunctioning lights on the first base side of the field.

GAME NOTES

The fourth game of the five-game series with Arizona Diamondbacks Double-A affiliate the Mobile BayBears (73-47) gets underway at 6:30 p.m. Friday. RHP Robert Stephenson (5-8, 4.59) takes the mound for the Wahoos (52-71) and is scheduled to be opposed by the BayBears LHP Clayton Richard (0-0, 18.00).

by Tommy Thrall

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Written by William Reynolds · Filed Under News, Sports, TOP sports