By WJBC Staff
TRAVERSE CITY, Mich. – The Normal CornBelters dropped a back-and-forth battle in 10 innings, 6-5, to the Traverse City Beach Bums on Wednesday night at Wuerfel Park.
The CornBelters opened the scoring by stringing together three one-out singles in the third inning, scoring when Aaron Dudley drove home Mark Micowski. The Belters added an unearned run when Richard Lucas led off the fourth by advancing to second when his popup on the diamond was misplayed, followed by a sacrifice to send him to third and an RBI infield single by Cameron Monger.
The Beach Bums tied the game in the fourth inning when Jose Vargas led off with a double that one-hopped the right center field wall followed by a two-run homer to the left field berm by Brandon Jacobs.
The Bums took a 4-2 lead in the fifth inning by loading the bases on two walks and an infield single. One of the runners was cut down at the plate on a wild pitch, but Belters starter Rob Blanc was injured on the play and relieved by Chandler Jagodzinski. Vargas clubbed his second double of the game to the left center wall with two outs to plate both remaining runners.
The Belters cut the deficit to 4-3 in the sixth inning when Dudley drew a lead-off walk, went to third on a fly out and scored on a sacrifice fly to right field by Lucas. Pat McKenna tied the game with a lead-off home run to right in the seventh, his first homer since June 30.
Traverse City regained a 5-4 lead in the seventh with a two-out rally including a double by Jeff DeBlieux and a single to right by Alex Tomasovich after he was given new life when the Belters couldn’t reach a foul popup.
The CornBelters again forced a tie by loading the bases in the eighth on an error, a single and a walk with the tying run coming home on a sacrifice fly to center by Ozney Guillen to score Santiago Chirino.
The Beach Bums got the lead-off man aboard in the ninth inning on an error on a strikeout and moved him to third on a sacrifice, but Belters reliever Cole Brocker induced another strikeout and a ground-out to send the game to extra innings. The hosts captured the victory as Vargas led off the 10th with a home run just over the left field wall for his third RBI of the night.
Andrew Brockett (3-0) received the win while Brocker (2-1) took the loss.
The series concludes at 6:05 p.m. Central on Wednesday as Chris Carmain (4-2, 3.31 ERA) makes his first CornBelters start since June 19 while Luis DeJesus (5-3, 2.86) takes the ball for the Beach Bums in a match-up of right-handers. Broadcast time on WJBC.com is 5:50. The CornBelters then continue the road trip with a three-game series at first-place Rockford on Friday, Saturday and Sunday.
