The $5mil Man – Deactivated

New enhanced fireworks - in the park

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On a (warmer) Friday the 13th, firework extravaganza night, the IronPigs derailed the Syracuse Chiefs to earn the series sweep and their best start ever at 7-2 along with the first 3 game sweep at Coca-Cola Park with the best record in the entire IL!

The story of the night was Syracuse starting pitcher, $5 mil man John Lannan and Adam Kilgore of The Washington Post has the call.

Posted at 07:10 PM ET, 04/03/2012

John Lannan optioned, Ross Detwiler to the Nationals rotation: Initial thoughts

The $5 Million Dollar Man (Photo courtesy of Chery Pursell)

By Adam Kilgore

The entire article is clickable above (good read on this interesting story – below is an excerpt.)

“Lannan becomes the highest-paid player ever optioned to the minors before the end of spring training, and also the first healthy pitcher to post a sub-4.00 ERA and get optioned to the minors before the end of the following spring.”

There was much talk of John “Lee Majors” Lannan and his $5mil contract. During his warm-up in the ‘Pen it seemed like he had decent stuff including a strange 4 finger grip (new camera coming soon).

Pigs Jump to a 5-0 Lead – Syracuse Shoddy

"Life is a Highway" (Photo courtesy of Cheryl Pursell)

Regardless, the scoring began in the 2nd when Hector Luna singled, Cody Overbeck singled off the glove of 3rd baseman Carlos Rivera and Lou Montanez drew a walk. Tuffy Gosewisch had a chance to go back to back 4 bangers, but alas it was not to be. Tuffy did grab an RBI scoring Luna on a ground out to 3rd. The Iron’ strikes first and leads the Pigs lead 1 – 0.

Then it got bizarre as a lazy fly to left off pitcher (Tom “Life is a Highway”* Cochran) jumped out of left fielder Cory Brown’s glove – he caught it and it just jumped out – it reminded me of the old “let’s pull a rabbit out of my hat” trick and scored Overbeck and Lou Montanez who drew a previous walk. Pigs up 3 – 0

Two more would score in the 3rd after a Frandsen single, a Dominick Brown double and an error on short-stop Seth Bynum. ‘Pigs are now cruising with a 5-0 lead.

Bryce Harper hits his only single of the evening (Photo courtesy of Cheryl Pursell)

Chiefs Get on the Board

Jason Michaels and Bryce Harper would single and Michaels would score in the 4th on an error by Hector Luna. Tyler Moore who did not hit any home-runs this game for a change – popped out to Overbeck to stem the train. Pigs 5 – Chiefs 1

More Chiefs

The Chiefs would score again with two outs in the 5th when Cory Brown walked, Seth Bynum singled followed by a Jason Michaels single to score Brown. Instead of his traditional HR,Tyler Moore doubled to left to scoring Bynum and Michaels. Tyler Moore would advance to 2nd when a throw home went through both catcher Tuffy Gosewisch and pitcher Tom Cochran. Friday the 13 was certainly if full swing (more on that later). Pigs 5 – Chiefs 4 (and the nail-biting ensues)

Overbeck goes yard for a 3 run homer (Photo courtesy of Cheryl Pursell)

Overbeck Over the Wall

No need to chip a tooth as Lannan got the hook in the bottom half of the 5th after a 3 run blast on Cody Overbeck’s first HR of the season and then a walk to Hector Luna. Overall LHV knocked the bionic out of “Steve Austin” for 8 runs (4 earned) on 9 hits with 3 BB and 3 SO. Austin Babbins-Dirkx came on to end the inning despite a two out Andres Blanco Single Pigs 8 – Chiefs 4

Here come the Chiefs

The Chiefs added two more runs in the 6th when Jhonatan Solano reached on a 6 pitch walk, Jarrett Hoffpauir reached on a the 3rd IronPigs E on the night this time by Kevin Frandsen.

David Purcey took the mound in relief of Cochran and promptly surrendered a triple to pinch hitter Mark Teahan scoring Solano and Hoffpauir.

Michael Schwimer pitched two scoreless innings while striking out 3 to earn his 2nd save (Photo courtesy of Cherly Pursell)

Tyler Moore steps to the plate after sucessive walks to Seth Bynum and Jason Michaels. This time Moore is less and fouls out to right fielder Lou Montanez. Pigs 8 – Chiefs 6 (and the nervousness ensues).

Purcey goes on to pitch the rest of the 6th and the 7th giving up 2 hits, 0 runs, 2 BB and 1 SO.

With the score 8 – 6 top 8th who would you make the call to? Yes, “Phear the Phro” ‘Scwim’ is in and proceeds to pitch 2 strong innings surrendering 1 hit, no runs and striking out half the hitters he faced. LHV remains undefeated at Coca-Cola Park.

The Box

This was certainly an odd evening and it was after all Friday the 13th. The IronPigs have been lucky in Friday the 13th games all-time going 3-1 and outscoring their opponents 22-17.

The Pig Pen

In this 3 game series the ‘Pen has surrendered only 8 hits in 9.2 innings pitched, 1 earned run, 13 SO and 2 BB for… wait for it an ERA of .93. “How do you like all that”*

The Harper/Moore Effect

While it was unfortunate to be unable to speak with Bryce Harper (media blackout), in a conversation with GM Kurt Landes he mentioned Harper’s actually a nice kid – shame we couldn’t have found out for ourselves. Come to think of it there was no helmet throwing incidents or kisses blown to IronPigs pitchers and consequently not much action at the plate either.

Tyler Moore on the other hand had an outstanding series but it was all for naught.