No-Hitter!

Season: 16-8; Home Stand: 1-0

Wrap, Box, Herald-Sun, MiLB.com

It was a big crowd but we weren’t there. Life’s been getting in the way of baseball lately. But we did see the last several innings on MiLB TV. So not all was lost. What a game! 

Sometimes everything just aligns itself for a player. Last night Mike Montgomery could do no wrong. So much so that the only real threats were a couple of ground balls slickly fielded by Hak-Ju Lee (Welcome Back!) and Mike Fontenot. 

Congrats to Mike Montgomery for a great game.

The coverage by Harold Gutmann in the Herald-Sun is terrific. Take a look. He got the quote of the day: 

Manager Charlie Montoyo said it was the loudest he’d ever been booed at the DBAP when he came out to replace Montgomery with one out in the ninth.

I hope that Charlie knows that most of the fans understand the pitch count issue. And besides a bunch of the folks there last night were New York Yankee fans and they’d be booing anyhow.

We have to mention Vince Belnome’s breakout night as well. Single, double, home run in 4 ABs. His best night of the year and a couple of nice digouts at 1B. Cole Figueroa was no slouch either: 3 for 4, 2 RBI.

Also can’t ignore Brad Boxberger’s beautiful two outs. Otherwise, there’d be nothing to celebrate. And who was the first guy out of the dugout to congratulate Boxberger? Mike Montgomery. 

Update: Nice stories over at Baseball America and at Rays Colored Glasses.

Matchup

The Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRaiders are the Triple-A affiliate of the New York Yankees and probably have the longest name in professional baseball. Typesetters all over the country puzzle over how best to abbreviate their names. 

So far this year they are in 4th place in the six-team North Division and it says something about this year’s weather that they’ve only be able to play 21 games so far, three less than the Bulls. The most obvious statistical difference between the teams is their OPS numbers. They appear to be an impatient team. They have only drawn 52 BBs this year (league least), while the Bulls have drawn 104 (league most).