Chen Stymies Tigers in Marauders Victory

BRADENTON, Fla. — Po-Yu Chen pitched seven scoreless innings and Jase Bowen slugged two home runs Sunday afternoon for the Marauders, who defeated the Lakeland Flying Tigers, 5-1, at LECOM Park.

The victory gave the Marauders (19-11, 48-47) a four-games-to-two series win over Lakeland (12-16, 44-50).

Chen retired 12 straight batters in four innings to begin his outing, a stretch that included five strikeouts. The right-hander allowed his first baserunner at the beginning of the fifth by hitting Justice Bigbie with a pitch, then allowed a soft line-drive single to Daneurys de la Cruz on the following at-bat. But Chen escaped the inning with the help of a double-play grounder, then saw the Marauders infield turn double plays in the sixth and the seventh to support his effort. Chen’s seven-inning performance matched his career-high in innings pitched and was the longest start by a Marauder of 2022.

Jase Bowen went 2-for-4 with a pair of solo home runs for Bradenton—one in the first inning and one in the seventh—and now has 10 RBI in his last six games.

Left-hander Carlos Pena pitched five respectable innings for Lakeland, allowing Bowen’s solo home in the first and a Sergio Campana RBI-single in the third that stretched Campana’s on-base streak to 12 games. Pena struck out five and walked none but took the loss due to the lack of run support.

The Marauders added two runs in the sixth inning off Tigers reliever Tyler Mattison, as walks by Campana and Deivis Nadal set the table for RBI-singles by Darwin Baez and Jasiah Dixon.

Wilkin Ramos pitched the final two innings for Bradenton. The right-hander worked around a two-out walk in a scoreless eighth inning before encountering trouble in the ninth. Alvaro Gonzalez drew a leadoff walk and advanced to third on a Manuel Sequera single, and Roberto Campos drove Gonzalez home on a groundout, spoiling the Marauders’ shutout bid. But after Ramos hit Bigbie with a pitch, he induced a game-ending popout to second baseman Tsung-Che Cheng, securing the win.

The Marauders travel to Fort Myers on Tuesday to open a six-game series against the Fort Myers Mighty Mussels, Single-A affiliate of the Minnesota Twins. First pitch is scheduled for 7 p.m. at Hammond Stadium.

For more information about the Bradenton Marauders, please call (941) 747-3031, visit BradentonMarauders.com, or email [email protected].

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