Baby Cakes notch second straight shutout

Odrisamer Despaigne tossed six scoreless innings as the New Orleans Baby Cakes defeated the Nashville Sounds on Monday afternoon, 8-0, for their second consecutive shutout.
The 'Cakes scored the final 18 runs in the series, and recorded back-to-back shutouts for the second time this season, having also blanked the Sounds in seven-inning games on June 19-20. The last time New Orleans pitched consecutive nine-inning shutouts was April 18-19, 2014.
The Baby Cakes jumped all over Kendall Graveman (0-1), who was making his second rehab start from the Oakland Athletics. The 'Cakes scored three times in the opening inning and tacked on four more in the second to build a 7-0 advantage.
Mike Aviles led off the bottom of the first with the first of his three singles and came around to score on Steve Lombardozzi's double into the Sounds bullpen down the left field line. After a sacrifice bunt and a walk, Brandon Barnes singled to right to score Lombardozzi, and Cal Towey followed with an RBI double.
An error by Sounds third baseman Renato Nunez opened the floodgates for a big inning in the second. His throwing error put two on with two outs before the next four hitters reached base, including a single by Towey which drove in two runs. Barnes also raced home on the play when he saw center fielder Yairo Munoz hold onto the ball too long before throwing it back to the infield.
That was more than enough offense for Despaigne, who retired the first nine batters he faced and allowed only two hits in his six innings. Despaigne (2-4) owns a 1.73 ERA over his last five starts, with 10 scoreless innings against Nashville.
Drew Steckenrider, Kyle Lobstein and Kelvin Marte each chipped in an inning of relief to complete the Baby Cakes' 10th shutout of the season, second-most in the Pacific Coast League.
The Baby Cakes travel west for an eight-game trip through California, starting with Tuesday's opener of a four-game set in Fresno. First pitch is scheduled for 9:05 p.m. Central.