It was a cool, misty night at The Coke tonight but it didn’t cool off the Ironpig bats who, for a second straight night swatted out 12 hits! Thanks to Philly Pretzels who will donate $60 to our National Brain Tumor Society fundraiser for this effort!
Tonight the story wasn’t so much the pitching as it was the resolve of the hitters.
Rich Thompson had the best night of the season for any Ironpig this season going 4-5 with 3 stolen bases to take over as the leading base stealer in the International league! (Columbus’ Carrera is second with 14, with 1 caught stealing) Thompson has not been caught yet this season!
Another Pig, Erik Kratz got the team back in the game with a monster solo HR over the bullpens. Kratz also had a 2 run hit to come out with 3 RBI for the game.
Herndon came on in the 6th and took home his first AAA win of the season. Starter Shoeless Eddie Bonine only lasted 2.2 innings looking like his control was a bit off, issuing 4 walks and allowing 5 runs.
We also got a glimpse of Jeff Larish at 3rd base. Ok, he doesn’t play there often but two throws to home from Left Field were cut off that, from my angle, looked like they should have gone through. Larish seemed to be the ring leader of a pop up that the entire infield watched fall onto the mound allowing 2 runs to score in the 4th inning.
Final score Ironpigs 8 Tide 7.
Tomorrow is an early game. Love those days. Baseball in the afternoon and we get to relax at home in the evening.
See you there!
noisenation.mlblogs.com 
Outstanding offensive display from Jimmy T’s cousin Richie from Reading. Local product Kratz also distinguised himself tonight to be certain. The old “I got it but you take it” fiasco only served to set the stage for a character-building, come-from-behind triumph.
And, Zagurski striking out the side to end the evening and drop his ERA below 1.00 was also noteworthy as the only team in baseball that really matters anyway wins again.
An official attendance of 9,259 will lift the IronPigs’ already all-of-30-team-AAA-leading total to top off a thoroughly entertaining Saturday evening.
Could not have scripted this, myself, any better…
Ironpigs are 2-0 with Domonic Brown coaching first!
Regarding Larish at third, the jury is still out. He really only had one groundball with throw that I recall and he handled it fine. Regarding the cutoffs, both throws were weak and would not have resulted in a play at the plate. It’s usually the catcher who tells the cutoff man what to do since his back is to homeplate. I would assume Kratz was telling him to cut.
Friday I think I saw the longest single ever hit when Kratz hit one high off the left field wall and Saturday I think Kratz may have hit the longest homerun to left field I’ve seen at CCP. As for shortest, that infield popup by Rhyne Hughes (I think) of Norfolk may have been the shortest double. At least the Ironpigs infielders can’t claim that losing the popup was due to the smoke from the Wawa coffee cup.
In the “chalk one up for our side” category, Tagg Bozied was WAY out of the basepath on the rundown that resulted in Tides manager Gary Allenson getting tossed and extra kudos to Rich Thompson for scoring from second on a wild pitch in the first inning. He was also the only lefty who seemed to be able to handle that wicked sidearm pitch for Alberto Castillo.