Pitching Match-up is Hernandez vs. Wainwright
SBN is looking to continue its winning ways at PNC and clinch the WS. The rematch of the top starters for each team set the stage for a tight exciting game as the teams returned to PNC, BEL's home park.
BEL jumped out to an early lead as Markakis lead off with a double followed by a Jaso triple but McCutchen and Adams struck out to kill the chance to extend the lead.
Headed to the bottom of the 5th, SBN had only a single and BEL held the slim lead. A two out triple by Lemahieu was wasted so the teams headed to the 6th with BEL ahead 1-0. Two singles sandwiched around sac bunt tied the score and tightened the managers thinking considerably. Both managers avoided quick hooks but through 7 innings, Wainwright allowed three singles and no walks while Felix while almost matched this exactly allowing only five hits.
In the top of the 8th, Kipnis and Perez doubled and after a Beltre error a sac fly gave SBN a 3-1 lead with 6 outs to go and Felix still on the mound. Felix got all three hitters in the 8th and Giles got all three in the top of the 9th. So it's on to the last gasp for BEL.
McCutchen and Adams hit singles to start the 9th and SBN brought in Sanchez while BEL pinch ran for Adams with Cowgill since he represented the tying run. Beltre hit a Sac Fly leaving a runner on first with one out. This where a little Stratomatic realism/oddity changed the game. With Tulo at SS and he has the top fielding rating of "1" meaning he cannot give up a single, however, the quirk in the rules is that if the runner on first is being held (and he was) and the batter (Holt) is left-handed, the SS is thought to shade toward second base and his fielding rating drops to a "2". As luck would have it, a groundball to SS resulted in a single advance two bases yielding a first and third with one out, ratcheting up the excitement.
This brought up another critical moment. Maybe not realistically, but the BEL manager yanked Edwin Encarnacion, who hit 34 HRs in the regular season and is strong vs RHP but has struggled a lot in the playoffs. Also, ignoring the lefty/righty switch and leaving Scooter Gennett on the bench, BEL chose to have Cervelli PH for Encarnacion. After considering a safety squeeze and ignoring the DP chance with a slow runner like Cervelli, BEL had him hit away and he drew a walk.
That brought up Jose Reyes who has been doing well in this series and is a lower DP chance. With the winning run now on 2nd, the entire situation seemed very realistic. Reyes had a chance for a hit but it turned into a line out keeping all runners where they were and now brought up Daniel Murphy (not the Mets David Murphy). Murphy entered the game as a pitch hitter for Lemahieu as he frequently did and then moving to left field and Holt took over at second.
Murphy had a good year and exceeded his regular season goals but was only 4-24 in the entire playoff season. Since there were two out and the bases loaded, I realized that this was probably the last at bat for this team (a thought I didn't have on any of the previous hitters although the risk was there.) In the most shocking outcome in recent history, Daniel Murphy hit a walkoff Grand Slam home run for a 6-3 BEL victory sending the series to a game 7. A truly remarkable and unexpected outcome!
The box score looked like this...
SBN is looking to continue its winning ways at PNC and clinch the WS. The rematch of the top starters for each team set the stage for a tight exciting game as the teams returned to PNC, BEL's home park.
BEL jumped out to an early lead as Markakis lead off with a double followed by a Jaso triple but McCutchen and Adams struck out to kill the chance to extend the lead.
Headed to the bottom of the 5th, SBN had only a single and BEL held the slim lead. A two out triple by Lemahieu was wasted so the teams headed to the 6th with BEL ahead 1-0. Two singles sandwiched around sac bunt tied the score and tightened the managers thinking considerably. Both managers avoided quick hooks but through 7 innings, Wainwright allowed three singles and no walks while Felix while almost matched this exactly allowing only five hits.
In the top of the 8th, Kipnis and Perez doubled and after a Beltre error a sac fly gave SBN a 3-1 lead with 6 outs to go and Felix still on the mound. Felix got all three hitters in the 8th and Giles got all three in the top of the 9th. So it's on to the last gasp for BEL.
McCutchen and Adams hit singles to start the 9th and SBN brought in Sanchez while BEL pinch ran for Adams with Cowgill since he represented the tying run. Beltre hit a Sac Fly leaving a runner on first with one out. This where a little Stratomatic realism/oddity changed the game. With Tulo at SS and he has the top fielding rating of "1" meaning he cannot give up a single, however, the quirk in the rules is that if the runner on first is being held (and he was) and the batter (Holt) is left-handed, the SS is thought to shade toward second base and his fielding rating drops to a "2". As luck would have it, a groundball to SS resulted in a single advance two bases yielding a first and third with one out, ratcheting up the excitement.
This brought up another critical moment. Maybe not realistically, but the BEL manager yanked Edwin Encarnacion, who hit 34 HRs in the regular season and is strong vs RHP but has struggled a lot in the playoffs. Also, ignoring the lefty/righty switch and leaving Scooter Gennett on the bench, BEL chose to have Cervelli PH for Encarnacion. After considering a safety squeeze and ignoring the DP chance with a slow runner like Cervelli, BEL had him hit away and he drew a walk.
That brought up Jose Reyes who has been doing well in this series and is a lower DP chance. With the winning run now on 2nd, the entire situation seemed very realistic. Reyes had a chance for a hit but it turned into a line out keeping all runners where they were and now brought up Daniel Murphy (not the Mets David Murphy). Murphy entered the game as a pitch hitter for Lemahieu as he frequently did and then moving to left field and Holt took over at second.
Murphy had a good year and exceeded his regular season goals but was only 4-24 in the entire playoff season. Since there were two out and the bases loaded, I realized that this was probably the last at bat for this team (a thought I didn't have on any of the previous hitters although the risk was there.) In the most shocking outcome in recent history, Daniel Murphy hit a walkoff Grand Slam home run for a 6-3 BEL victory sending the series to a game 7. A truly remarkable and unexpected outcome!
The box score looked like this...
BOXSCORE: 2015
South Bend Fighting Irish At 2015 Bellingham Bozos 11/8/2015
Fighting Irish AB
R H RBI AVG Bozos AB R H
RBI AVG
R.Weeks DH 4
0 1 1 .236
N.Markakis RF 4 1
1 0 .226
T.Snider LF 3
0 0 0 .211
J.Jaso C 4 0
1 1 .316
A-M.Holliday PH,LF 0
0 0 1 .240
D-S.Vogt C 0 0
0 0 .087
A.Rizzo 1B 4
0 0 0 .176
A.McCutchen CF 3 1
1 0 .204
T.Tulowitzki SS 4
0 1 0 .318
M.Adams 1B 4 0
1 0 .255
J.Reddick RF 4
0 0 0 .240
E-C.Cowgill PR 0 1
0 0 .182
N.Arenado 3B 4
0 0 0 .293
A.Beltre 3B 3 0
0 1 .290
M.Ozuna CF 3
0 0 0 .197
B.Holt LF,2B 4 1
2 0 .296
J.Kipnis 2B 3
2 2 0 .250
E.Encarnacion DH 3 0
0 0 .286
B-C.Hernandez
2B 0
0 0 0 .500
F-F.Cervelli PH 0 1
0 0 .308
S.Perez C 2
1 1 1 .239
J.Reyes SS 4 0
0 0 .246
D.Lemahieu 2B 2 0
2 0 .256
C-D.Murphy PH,LF 2 1
1 4 .143
-- -- -- --- -- -- -- ---
Totals 31
3 5 3
Totals 33 6
9 6
A-Pinch Hit For
Snider In 8th Inning
B-Subbed
Defensively (2B) For Kipnis In 8th Inning
C-Pinch Hit For
Lemahieu In 8th Inning
D-Subbed
Defensively (C ) For Jaso In 9th Inning
E-Pinch Ran For
Adams In 9th Inning
F-Pinch Hit For
Encarnacion In 9th Inning
Fighting
Irish.. 0 0 0 0 0 1 0 2 0
- 3 5 0
Bozos...........
1 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 5
- 6 9 1
Fighting Irish
(11-8) IP H
R ER BB
SO HR ERA
F.Hernandez 8 7
3 3 1
9 0 3.20
A.Sanchez
L(1-2) BS(1st) 0 2/3 2
3 3 1
0 1 3.12
Totals 8 2/3 9
6 6 2
9 1
Bozos
(10-6) IP H
R ER BB
SO HR ERA
A.Wainwright 7 1/3 5
3 2 0
7 0 1.19
A.Chapman 0 2/3 0
0 0 0
1 0 1.13
K.Giles
WIN(2-1) 1 0
0 0 0
1 0 1.93
Totals 9 5
3 2 0
9 0
ATTENDANCE-
36,847 DATE- Sunday, November 8th 2015 TIME- Night
UMPIRES- Mike
Dimuro, Jerry Crawford, Mike Everett, Brian Gorman
T- 2:32
LEFT ON BASE-
Fighting Irish: 3 Bozos: 4
DOUBLE PLAYS-
Fighting Irish: 1 Bozos: 0
ERRORS-
A.Beltre
DOUBLES-
J.Kipnis(1st), S.Perez(5th), N.Markakis(3rd)
TRIPLES- J.Jaso(1st),
D.Lemahieu(2nd)
HOME RUNS-
D.Murphy(1st)
RBIs-
R.Weeks(3rd), M.Holliday(7th), S.Perez(14th), J.Jaso(4th), A.Beltre(9th),
D.Murphy-4(7th)
SACRIFICE HITS-
S.Perez
SACRIFICE
FLIES- M.Holliday, A.Beltre
WALKS-
A.McCutchen, F.Cervelli
STRIKE OUTS-
R.Weeks, T.Snider-2, A.Rizzo, T.Tulowitzki, J.Reddick-3, J.Kipnis,
N.Markakis, J.Jaso, A.McCutchen,
M.Adams-3, A.Beltre-2,
E.Encarnacion
GIDP-
E.Encarnacion
2-out RBI-
D.Murphy-4
RLISP 2-out-
A.Beltre, M.Ozuna, A.McCutchen, N.Markakis, A.Rizzo
TEAM RISP-
Fighting Irish: 2 for 5 Bozos: 2 for 9
WEB GEMS- Top
8th: D.J. Lemahieu robbed Marcell Ozuna of a base hit.
Brock Holt had
2 base hits as the Bellingham Bozos won in dramatic fashion
over the South
Bend Fighting Irish by a score of 6 to 3 at PNC
Park.
Bellingham had
the game winning rally in the bottom of the 9th inning when
they scored 5
runs on 4 hits. The highlight belonged
to David Murphy who
elicited a roar
from the hometown fans when he caught a hold of a fastball
for a Grand
Slam homerun. Bellingham had 9 hits for
the night while South
Bend had
5.
Ken Giles(2-1)
got credit for the victory, pitching 1 inning and allowing no
runs. Aaron
Sanchez(1-2) was the losing pitcher in relief.
He gave up 3 runs
and 2 hits in
2/3 of an inning.
Steve Spiegel
was in great spirits in his post-game interview. Yet, when
asked about his
feelings after the thrilling comeback victory, he
volunteered,
'I'll tell you this much - I know how my counterpart, Tom
Benson, feels
right now - and it's not very good. It's
terrible when you
come up on the
short end of one of these!'
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