Clipper Pitching Dominates

Season: 18-19; Home Stand: 3-2
Wrap, Box, Herald-Sun

One of the joys of Triple A baseball is that some nights you get to see world-class baseball. Unfortunately for the Bulls, last night what we saw was a world class, 89 pitch, 29 batters faced performance by the Clippers’ Josh Tomlin. This was the first shutout of the Bulls in 2014. They only put three men on base, Hak-Ju Lee (twice) and Wilson Betemit and the Bulls are the team with the second-best OBP in the entire International League. So, gotta congratulate Tomlin and hope he gets called up before the Bulls face him again.

In the good news department, Kevin Kiermaier was back on the field after missing four games. Hak-Ju Lee got his first clean hit that we’ve seen, a double in the 6th, and he managed to avoid a take-out slide to pull off a nice double play.

Outside the game —

• The Rays opted to take advantage of the relatively new rule that lets them expand their roster to 26 players for a double header. They called up reliever Brad Boxberger and put him in against the Red Sox last night. He did just fine and is hanging on to his 0.00 major league ERA (4 appearances, 6 innings). He’s gonna stick up there before the end of the year, I’m guessing.
• In the oddities department, former Bull Grant Balfour got two saves in one day as the Rays swept the double header against the Red Sox.