It has been said, that playing for something in any sport is the most fun time of a season. The Lowell Spinners are in such a position, but if the last few nights are any indication, maybe this team is not ready for that kind of fun.
Vermont, behind solid starting pitching and a two home run attack, took care of the Lowell Spinners eight to two. And in doing so, they delivered another blow to the Spinners playoff chances.
After the ballgame, manager Cory Wimberly said he told his team with ten games left “to go play baseball and have some fun”. It may be hard to believe, but is it possible that his team is taking the wrong approach to playing meaningful games down the stretch? If Friday night was a test, the home team failed badly.
Yorvin Pantoja got the start for Lowell. In his last three starts for the Spinners, he has gone at least five innings while allowing one earned run. Friday night, he was asked to get the Spinners back to their winning ways.
Vermont decided not to corporate. In the first, after the first two Lake Monsters were retired, Jonah Bride singled to center field. He would trot home in front of a Jeremy Eierman home run. The blast to left-center was his seventh of the year and traveled an estimated 408 feet.
2-0 Vermont
It would be the only blemish on Pantoja’s night, (five innings, four hits, two runs, one walk, four strikeouts, one home run). After the game, his manager said: “he battled all night and had good fastball command”.
Vermont ran out Rafael Kelly to the mound. He was able to escape trouble on a couple of different occasions. One time that he did not came in the bottom of the first. With two down, Lane Milligan and Devlin Granberg reached on back to back walks. Milligan would come around to score on a base hit down the left-field line by Tyler Esplin. The Spinners cut the deficit in half.
2-1 Vermont
This ballgame, would turn in the bottom of the sixth. Spinners still trailing by a run, got the first two men on base. Both runners moved up on a Kelly wild pitch. With no one out and runners in scoring position, putting bat on ball became critical.
Instead, Kelly (five and two-thirds IP, four hits, one run, four walks, three strikeouts ), would get both Esplin and Trey Ganns to strike out swinging. Vermont manager Aaron Nieckula went to his pen and brought on Josh Reagan. He got Alberto Schmidt to ground out weakly to first base. A golden opportunity became an even bigger squander.
The missed opportunity came back to bite the Spinners in the very next inning. Oddanier Mosqueda, now pitching for the Spinners, gave up a leadoff walk to Anthony Churlin. Mosqueda retired the next two hitters on strikes. Lake Monsters catcher Jose Rivas drove a Mosqueda pitch to right field and Spinners right-fielder, Dylan Hardy tried to play the ball on a hop. Instead, the ball skipped by him all the way to the wall. Churlin scored and Rivas ended up at third base on a single and two-base error.
3-1 Vermont
The Lake Monsters then busted the game wide open in the eighth. A four run inning was highlighted by a two-run home run by Bride, his third of the year. The 370-foot shot to left came off of Alex Denchak and ended any hopes of a Spinners rally.
Each team scored in the ninth to make the final score Vermont eight Lowell two.
With ten games left, Lowell still trails Tri-City by four games in the loss column for the division lead. The Valley Cats also lost on Friday night at Hudson Valley.
In the wild card standings, the Spinners lost ground as both Brooklyn and Staten Island won their games.
The Spinners, (33-32) will try to snap their losing streak and stay in these races. They host Vermont (32-34) on Saturday with first pitch at 5:30 pm.
Kelly gets Friday night’s win and is (5-5), Pantoja takes the loss and is now (4-2).
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