The Lynchburg Hillcats were looking for back-to-back wins for the first time since May but were thwarted by the Carolina Mudcats, who blanked the Hillcats, 6-0, in Monday’s series opener at City Stadium. Ryan Weber gave up three runs in the first inning but allowed just one over his final six innings of work. Shawn McGill and David Rohm each had multi-hit games for Lynchburg in the loss.
Eight men came to the plate against Weber in the three-run first inning. After the leadoff man Tyler Naquin struck out, Jordan Smith got a ground ball single and scored from first on a double off the wall in right-center by Tony Wolters. Joey Wendle followed up with a two-run blast over the wall to make it 3-0.
The Hillcats (4-11, 40-44) bats were silenced by the combination of starter Michael Peoples and relievers Own Dew and Fabio Martinez. Peoples (1-4) got his first win after five shutout innings in which he scattered four hits and struck out six.
Dew retired the first eight batters he faced out of the bullpen, including a streak of four consecutive strikeouts before back-to-back singles put runners at the corners for Kyle Kubitza with two outs in the eighth but Kubitza was rung up on a high fastball. Carolina and Lynchburg combined for ten looking strikeouts in the game.
Weber settled down after the first, tossing four consecutive scoreless frames before Carolina (8-9, 30-57) got to him again in the fifth. Naquin hit a jam-shot double to lead off the inning and later scored on a fielder’s choice from Wolters. Weber (5-4) gave up four runs on seven hits in seven innings of work while striking out six batters, including five looking punch-outs.
Wendle cracked his second homer of the game off of reliever Matt Chaffee in the eighth. Bo Greenwell delivered an RBI-double later in the inning, scoring Jerrud Sabourin from first base. The Mudcats have now won four straight games, their longest win streak of the season.
The Hillcats look to even the series on Tuesday with a 7:05pm first pitch. Gates open at 6pm for Half-Price Tuesday; general admission tickets are just $4 for every Tuesday game at City Stadium, presented by ABC 13. Jarett Miller (5-5, 3.80) takes the mound for Lynchburg against Joseph Colon (0-1, 5.00) for the Mudcats. Listen live with Erik Wilson and Jake Levy starting with the Hillcats On-Deck Show, powered by Honda/Suzuki of Lynchburg, on 97.9 FM The Planet and lynchburg-hillcats.com
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