Baysox Nearly Blanked By Senators on Wednesday Night

BOX SCORE

BOWIE, MD – Despite a collective nine-hit effort, the Bowie Baysox narrowly avoided their second shutout of the season, as they fell 3-1 to the Harrisburg Senators on Wednesday evening at Prince George’s Stadium.

The Baysox pitching staff had an effective night. However, right-handed starter Chayce McDermott struggled with consistent command of the strike zone. McDermott walked five batters through his 3.2 innings. After retiring eight of the first nine batters he faced, McDermott walked a pair with two outs in the third. An error from first baseman TT Bowens loaded the bases, but McDermott wiggled out of the jam with a swinging strikeout of Donovan Casey to strand the bases loaded.

Bowie struggled to get the bats going against Harrisburg left-hander Alemao Hernandez. The Baysox had their best chance in the bottom half of the third. After Heston Kjerstad reached on a fielder’s choice, Coby Mayo mashed his Eastern League-leading 16th double of the season, pushing Kjerstad to third and putting two in scoring position with one out. However, Hernandez would elude his own traffic by striking out Hudson Haskin and forcing Cesar Prieto to fly out and strand both runners. The southpaw went on to face just one above in his final three frames. Hernandez (W, 1-1) picked up his first career Double-A win, going a career-high six innings, yielding five hits, striking out six, while walking just one.

Harrisburg finally broke through in the top half of the fourth against McDermott. With one out, McDermott walked Jack Dunn, followed by a bloop single to left field from Leonel Valera – the first hit of the game for the Senators. Valera’s single advanced Dunn to third base. Jackson Cluff proceeded to launch a fly ball to right field, where John Rhodes made the catch. Dunn tagged from third to race home. Rhodes made an accurate throw on one hop to the plate, but Dunn was just able to beat it out and slide in safely, completing the sacrifice fly and giving Harrisburg a 1-0. The night would end for McDermott (L, 3-4) after 3.1 innings, with the right hander allowing just the one earned run on a single hit, striking out four, but walking five. In his last three starts, McDermott has now allowed just three hits, but walked 14 batters across 14.2 innings.

Cluff struck again for the Senators in the eighth inning. After 1.1 scoreless innings from both left-hander Easton Lucas and right-hander Nolan Hoffman, Nick Richmond entered the game for his Double-A debut with the Baysox. After collecting back-to-back strikeouts to open his career at the level, the right-hander surrendered back-to-back hits to Casey and Frankie Tostado. With two outs in the eighth, Cluff laced a two-run triple to right-center, plating both runners and extending the Senators’ lead to 3-0 on his second and third RBI of the night.

Harrisburg’s bullpen continued with the efficiency of their starter Hernandez, as left-hander Lucas Knowles and right-hander Jack Sinclair each twirled a scoreless frame. In the ninth, Bowie was finally able to plate a run, as a leadoff Cesar Prieto single came around to score on a two-out double from Donta’ Williams against Harrisburg closer Joel Peguero to make the score 3-1. Billy Cook came to the plate representing the tying run, but Peguero (S, 7) forced him to ground out, ending the contest.

The loss drops the Baysox to 17-28 on the season. Bowie will continue its series with Harrisburg on Thursday night, with first pitch scheduled for 6:35 p.m. ET from Prince George’s Stadium.