Aberdeen 11
Cyclones 2
July 22 at MCU Park
Brooklyn jumped out to an early lead, but failed to shut the door on the victory, falling 11–2 to Aberdeen on Friday at MCU Park.
“It was a fun game for five innings and the last four was like the Nightmare on Elm Street,” Cyclones manager Tom Gamboa said.
The Cyclones took the lead in the bottom of the third inning. Gene Cone drew a two-out walk and Nick Sergakis reached on a bunt single. Colby Woodmansee then singled in Cone to get Brooklyn on the boad.
Brooklyn extended the lead in the fifth as Woodmansee drove in Cone again. Then, things started to fall apart for the Cyclones.
Kirvin Mosequit began the Aberdeen sixth by reaching on an error by Sergakis at second. A single by Ryan McKenna put two runners on. Mosequit scored on a wild pitch from Cyclones starter Merandy Gonzalez. Two batters later, Jason Heinrich doubled to left, tying the game and sending Gonzalez to the dugout after five-and-one-third innings.
Alejandro Castro came on and struck out Jaylen Ferguson for the second out before intentionally walking Seamus Curran to load the bases. Unfortunately, Castro couldn’t find the strike zone. The reliever threw three balls to Stuart Levy and then hit the batter to score the go-ahead run. Even if Castro hadn’t hit Levy, Gamboa said it was likely the pitch would have been a ball – something he wasn’t pleased with.
“I’m the worst with pitchers on base and balls,” Gamboa said. “I literally crucify our pitchers, always have, because I’ve never been one to understand how a guy making a living throwing a ball 60 feet, six inches and not be able to throw it in the strike zone.”
Aberdeen’s defense preserved the lead in the seventh as Sergakis reached on a two-out single. Sergakis tried to score on Woodmansee’s double – waved home by third base coach Sean Ratliff – but a relay from Ferguson in left to Clare at short to Levy at home caught Sergakis by a mile.
The IronBirds exploded for four runs in the eighth and four more in the ninth. Dillon Becker surrendered four runs in one-and-one-third innings and Taylor Henry gave up the final four in the ninth.
“Our bullpen was embarrassing,” Gamboa said. “Dillon Becker threw 43 pitches to get four outs.”
If there was a positive in the late-game breakdown, it came later in the eighth when Gamboa got a call overturned. McKenna singled to right field and appeared to be tagged by Woodmansee between first and second, but ran to second anyway. No call was made and McKenna was assumed safe until the Cyclones skipper got the umpires to confer and change the call.
“We all know umpiring is a tough job. I just don’t know how that got missed when it was so blatant,” Gamboa said. “The umpire was in the right position. He watched the play. Woody ran the guy back and the guy bent over to try to avoid the tag and we could clearly see from the dugout that he tagged him on his back right down by his belt. ”
In a game where so much had gone wrong for the Clones, Gamboa needed to get this right.
“I wasn’t even upset, I was just like, ‘why is there no call being made?’ And he was like, ‘well I didn’t see him tag him,’” the skipper said. “And I said, ‘well you can’t be serious. I can clearly see that from the dugout. I don’t get upset about anything in this league but this is just blatant.’ And he goes, ‘well do you want me to check with my partner?’ And I said, ‘you’re goddam right I do because I don’t know what you’re looking at.’
As Gamboa summed it up: “the game had been a cluster—- enough by that point that we gotta get the outs that we’re entitled to.”
The 15–19 Cyclones are back in action on Saturday at 6 pm in the rubber match against Aberdeen. It is also Star Wars night and the first 2,000 fans will receive a “glowing” Cyclones cap.
UPS AND DOWNS
Friday’s game was played as the 10 pm fireworks went off. It seems all Friday night games go past three hours. The games aren’t halted although hitters occasionally step out. “I would hope that we could play a normal baseball game in two-forty or two-forty-five and not have it be a factor but it does seem to always be a factor,” Gamboa said. “The other alternative would be to maybe push the Friday games to 6:30 to make sure that, unless it goes extra innings, that the game is over before it comes up.”
