Duke Lord over Hagerstown: Crawdads Win 4-2
Duke Welker pitched, aruguably, his best baseball of his one year professional career. Welker threw a career high seven innings, allowing one run on five hits with one walk and seven strikeouts. At one point, Welker retired nine straight Suns hitters and faced the minimum number of hitters from the third through sixth innings. The win was Welker's second of the season and his first since getting the win against Columbus on May 22nd. It was also Welker's first road win of the season.
Colten Willems also pitched well for the homestanding Suns as he held the Crawdads scoreless over the first five innings, retiring ten in a row at one point.
In the sixth inning, Hickory finally broke the scoreless tie with the top of the Crawdads lineup. Albert Laboy led off the inning with a line single to center. One out later, Matt Hague singled to left, advancing Laboy to third base. Tom Hagan followed with a single to center, scoring Laboy and moving Hague to second. The key play of the inning occured when Erik Huber singled to rightcenter field, scoring Hague from second. As Suns CF Mark Gilbea attempted to make a play on the ball, he allowed the ball to go past him bringing Hagan all the way around the bases with Huber advaning to third on the error. Huber scored on a sacrifice fly by Andrew Walker to complete the four run inning.
Hagerstown finally broke through against Welker in the 7th inning. Tim Pahuta and Stephen King opened the frame with back-to-back singles. One out later, Sean Rooney connected for a single to center, scoring Pahuta to break the shutout. However, Welker was equal to the task as he struck out Garrett Bass and Jake Rogers to end the inning.
Mike Felix came on to finish the night for the Crawdads as he pitched a scoreless 8th inning. In the ninth, Hagerstown threatened as Rooney picked up his second RBI of the night on a ground ball out to bring the score to 4-2. However, with the tying run at the plate, Felix got Bass to pop up to end the game and earn his second save of the season.
With the win, Welker goes to 2-6 on the season, while Willems drops to 5-5 on the season.
The same two teams face off in game two as Brad Lincoln (4-5, 5.20) pitches for Hickory against Cole Kimball (3-5 6.66) for Hagerstown. Mike Janela provides the play-by-play on 92.1 FM WMNC and on www.hickorycrawdads.com. First pitch from Memorial Stadium is scheduled for 7:05 pm.
GAME NOTES: As a result of Thursday's game, the Crawdads catching tandem of Andrew Walker, Ronald Pena, and Chris Jones overtook the 2003 catching tandem for the best fielding catchers in Crawdads history--- by 3 millionth of a point. The 2008 catchers entered the game with a fielding percentage of .990369, while the 2003 team is at .990366. Walker currently stands as the best fielding catcher at .994... With two walks given up in Friday's game, the Crawdads are within four walks of allowing 7,000 in their 16th season... Matt Cavagnaro's double play in the field in the 5th moved him into a tie for 7th place for DP's turned by a second baseman in a season and a tie for 9th in a career, tying him with current Crawdads coach Josh Bonifay on both lists.