Louisville Bats Notes: May 22

GAME TWO: The Louisville Bats and Indianapolis Indians meet Tuesday for the second contest of a four-game series at Victory Field. For the Bats, they are in the final stretch of their longest road trip of the season, a 10-gamer that started on May 15 in Durham. LOU is 1-6 so far on the road trip after last night's 3-2 loss in the opener, with its longest homestand (10 games) of the season starting this Friday, May 25 against the Durham Bulls (5/25-5/28), Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders (5/29-5/31) and Gwinnett Stripers (6/1-6/3).

AGAINST INDIANAPOLIS: Last season, the Bats went just 8-15 against the Indians, 4-7 in their home ballpark. The defending IL West Champions outscored Louisville 117-64 in the 23 contests. In an interesting International League scheduling quirk, Louisville and Indianapolis did not have their first scheduled game against each other until June 22, playing all 23 of their matchups from that point on. In the clubs' first series of 2018, Louisville's 3-1 win over Indianapolis in the opener on May 7 snapped a season-long 6-game losing streak.
FINNEGAN HOMERS: Last night's starting pitcher, Brandon Finnegan , clubbed a two-run home run that scored catcher Garrett Boulware to provide Louisville's only 2 runs in the 3-2 loss...
Notes on LOU Pitcher HR's: Finnegan's home run was the first of his professional career, and the first homer by a Bats pitcher in nearly 7 seasons, since Daryl Thompson did it June 11, 2011 at Lehigh Valley in an 8-7 IronPigs win in 13 innings. Interestingly, in that game LHV starting pitcher Brian Gordon, who gave up the homer to Thompson, homered himself, a two-run shot off Thompson. Finnegan's blast with a runner on base was the first non-solo HR hit by a Louisville pitcher since at least the 2001 season.
RIGHT BACK WHERE WE STARTED FROM: After 40 games last season, the Bats owned a 13-27 record like they do right now. Today's starting pitcher, left-hander Cody Reed, won the Bats' 40th game of the season last season at Toledo, snapping the team's 8-game losing streak at the time.
BATS IN THE MORNING: Louisville will play its fourth of seven scheduled morning games this season, and first away from Louisville Slugger Field this season. The Bats are 2-1 in morning games this season, with their first 2 morning games going into 10 innings. Last morning game was actually against Indianapolis on May 9, with the Bats winning 4-3. Last season, the Bats went 2-2 in games that started before noon, 1-1 at home and 1-1 at Toledo. In 2016, the Bats went 4-2 in morning games, 3-0 at Louisville Slugger Field.
OPENING GAMES RECORD: The Bats fell to 5-8 in series openers after last night's 3-2 loss. Louisville started off 0-5 in its first 5 series openers of the season, but has managed to go 5-3 in the first games of series since the 0-5 start.
SO DONE WITH ONE-RUN: The Bats fell to 5-9 in one-run games after Monday, their second straight loss decided by one run. LOU's .357 winning percentage in one-run affairs ranks second-worst in the IL, ahead of only Gwinnett's .250 (3-9) winning pct. Last season, LOU ranked 9th in the IL in one-run games with a 19-20 (.487) record.