Schimpf, Talley lead D-Jays to 10-1 rout

With his struggles very much apparent since being brought up from Lansing almost two weeks ago, Ryan Schimpf was trying to shake off an 0-for-5, two error performance on Saturday night where he collected the "golden sombrero," striking out four times.

Thanks to his game on Sunday against Clearwater, Schimpf must have forgotten about the night before pretty easily.

Schimpf hit a grand slam in the seventh inning to break open a close game and thanks to three-hit games from him, Jon Talley and Brian Van Kirk, the D-Jays took game two of their three game set with Clearwater in a 10-1 rout.

It wasn't exactly as easy as the score made it out to be. Thanks to great starting pitching performances from Dunedin's Chad Beck (3-6) and Clearwater's Philippe Aumont (2-4), the game was tied 1-1 going into the seventh inning.

After three pitches in the seventh, heavy rain fell on Bright House Stadium, causing a 39-minute delay and Aumont's exit from the game. Jordan Whatcott, who finished the at-bat by walking Brian Van Kirk to lead off the inning, replaced him after the delay, but because Aumont started the at-bat, Van Kirk was his responsibility.

That put Aumont on the hook for the loss, and the D-Jays made sure he got it with an offensive barrage in the sixth that started with Van Kirk's walk and was punctuated by the Schimpf grand slam.

Leading up to the grand slam, Dunedin got RBI singles from Ryan Goins and Kenny Wilson, and then after Anthony Gose drew a walk to load the bases, Schimpf unloaded on a pitch to deep center field to essentially put the game away for Dunedin, making it a 7-1 ballgame at that point.

Schimpf added an RBI double in the eighth inning and Jon Talley and Brian Van Kirk went back-to-back with solo homers in the ninth inning to push Dunedin into double digits.

Talley's 3-for-5 day included two doubles and the solo homer, while Van Kirk's 3-for-5 included the double and homer. Schimpf also went 3-for-5 with his grand slam, double and a season-high 5 RBIs.

Every Dunedin player except for Mark Sobolewski reached on a base hit on Sunday, and of Dunedin's 14 base hits, nine of them went for extra bases.

Beck allowed his only run in the sixth inning on a Stephen Susdorf double, but outside of that, he was very good, allowing only four hits in his six innings while striking out four and walking none.

With rain in the forecast for Monday, Dunedin and Clearwater will try and finish off their season series on Monday night with the D-Jays sending Chad Jenkins to the hill for the start.