CornBelters come from behind to take finale from Traverse City

Posted on July 31, 2015

By WJBC Staff

TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. – The Normal CornBelters surged from behind for a 9-7 win over the Traverse City Beach Bums on Thursday night at Wuerfel Park.

The Beach Bums opened the scoring quickly with a one-out line drive home run in the first inning over the right field wall by Alex Tomasovich. The Bums added a pair in the fifth inning extended by an error on a wild pitch and an RBI single by Jeff DeBlieux for a 3-0 lead.

The CornBelters registered their first hit in the sixth inning with a lead-off double to the left field corner by Cameron Monger, who took third on a fly out and scored on a sacrifice fly by Mark Micowski.

The Bums answered with an unearned run in the sixth for a 4-1 advantage when Brandon Jacobs and Yazy Arbelo led off with singles with Jacobs scoring on a passed ball.

The CornBelters surged ahead in the seventh inning with a grand slam by Jason Merjano for a 5-4 lead after two walks and a single loaded the bases. Santiago Chirino added a run in the frame with an RBI single up the middle to score Jim Vahalik for a 6-4 advantage, and Aaron Dudley plated Vahalik to give the Belters a 7-4 lead at the stretch.

The Beach Bums got two of the runs back in their seventh with a two-out throwing error on a ground ball to cut the Belters lead to 7-6.

The Belters got the runs back on a two-out, two-run single by Monger to score Sam Judah and Richard Lucas, who slid a hand just under the tag on the play at the plate, to put the lead back at 9-6.

Traverse City collected a lead-off triple from Greg Harisis in the eighth inning and scored him on a sacrifice fly to center field by Kendall Patrick to trim the Normal lead to 9-7. The Beach Bums put a lead-off single aboard in the ninth but the Belters erased it with a double play.

Yoandy Fernandez-Garcia, a Cuban native, earned the win in relief in his CornBelters debut. Bret Dahlson (0-3) suffered the loss. Race Parmenter pitched the final two and one-third innings for his 13th save.

The CornBelters continue the road trip with a weekend series at Rockford. The Aviators lead the Frontier League West Division by over the Belters. Game time at Aviators Stadium is 7:05 p.m. Friday and Saturday and 3:05 p.m. Sunday and all can be heard on WJBC.com.

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