Michigan Battle Cats at Cedar Rapids Kernels


June 3rd, 2002

Cats
Name POS AB R H RBI
Mike Rodriguez CF 3 0 1 1
Brooks Conrad 2B 5 0 1 2
Todd Shelf 1B 5 0 0 0
Steve Checksfield DH 5 0 0 0
Trevor Mote 3B 4 1 2 0
Mark Obradovich C 4 1 0 0
Kerry Hodges RF 3 1 1 0
Randy Rojas SS 3 1 1 1
Cameron Likely LF 2 1 2 1
Kernels
Name POS AB R H RBI
Ransel Melgarejo CF 4 1 0 0
Justin Turner 2B 3 2 2 1
Jeff mathis C 5 2 3 2
Casey Kotchman 1B 3 1 0 1
Dallas McPherson 3B 4 1 1 0
Nick Gorneault LF 3 0 1 1
Greg Porter DH 4 0 0 0
Tommy Murphy SS 3 1 1 1
Nick Kimpton RF 3 0 1 1

Michigan 0 0 1 1 0 2 0 1 0 5 8 2
Cedar Rapids 1 0 0 1 0 3 2 1 X 8 9 2

E-Tremblay 2, Turner 2, LOB MIC-10, CR-7, 2B-Mote, Mathis, 3B-Gorneault, SB-Mote, Murphy, CS-Turner, HBP-Likely, SACB-Hodges, CI-Rodriguez

Cats
Name IP H R ER BB SO Decison
Cory Doyne 5.2 6 5 5 5 6 L (3-4)
Juan Campos 0.1 1 2 1 2 0 ND
Max Tremblay 1 0 0 0 0 1 ND
Brian Rodaway 1 2 1 1 0 1 ND

Kernels
Name IP H R ER BB SO Decison
David Wolensky 5.1 5 4 2 3 6 ND
Jaime Steward 1.1 1 0 0 1 0 W (2-4)
Adam Thomas 0.2 2 1 1 0 1 ND
Joel Peralta 1 0 0 0 0 1 SV (1)
HB-Wolensky, PB-Obradovich, SO-Shelf 3, Checksfield 2, Mote 2, Hodges 2, Melgarejo, McPherson, Gorneault 2, Porter, Murphy, Kimpton 2, BB-Rodriguez, Mote, Obradovich, Rojas, Likely, Melgarejo, Turner 2, Kotchman, Gorneault, Murphy, Kimpton
T-2:43, A-1,647

Battle Creek Enquirer

The Michigan Battle Cats lost a third straight game, falling to Cedar Rapids, 8-5, in Midwest League action on Monday.

The Cats lose the first three games of this road series in Cedar Rapids, who have seven straight wins overall and have won 11 of the last 12 games at home. The final game of the series is today before Michigan returns home on Wednesday.

With a loss by West Michigan and a rainout in the Fort Wayne game, Michigan holds on to a tie for first place in the Eastern Division.

Four sixth inning walks, two with the bases loaded. Helped give the Cedar Rapids Kernels a 5-4 lead.
The Kernels scored two more runs in the seventh inning on two errors to go up 7-4.

Cory Doyne takes the loss for the Cats and falls to 3-4 on the season.

Brooks Conrad drove in two runs for the Battle Cats, who left 10 runners on base.

Also driving in runs for the Cats were Randy Ruiz, Cameron Likely and Mike Rodriguez.

Cedar Rapids Gazette
by Jeff Johnson

Not every game played in a 140 game minor league baseball season is going to be clean. Especially at the low Class A level.

There are always a few of those laborious contests were pitchers have a hard time firing strikes when they need to, defensive plays are not made, and there are few three up, three down innings.

The Cedar Rapids Kernels have won plenty of well played games during their seven game winning streak. They won one of the ugly ones Monday night.

The Kernels shook off a three error night by scoring six ugly runs in their final three at bats for an 8-5 win over the Michigan Battle Cats on a rainy, muggy, hazy night at Memorial Stadium. The game was delayed at the start by a half hour.

The victory makes it 13 wins in their last 16 games for these white hot Kernels (32-24), who remained 2 1/2 games behind first place Peoria in the Western Division of the Midwest League. Cedar Rapids is four games up on Burlington for second place and a first half playoff berth.

"I guess when you're rolling these are the kinds of things that happen," said Kernels second baseman justin Turner, who was all over the place with two hits, and RBI and two errors, "I guess that's just how it goes sometimes. When you're winning, it goes good. When we were losing, it was things that weren't happening. Things that were happening for the other team."

One consistent thing during this good stretch has been the Kernels' resilency, The gave up first inning runs in four consecutive games over the weekend, including a pair of 2-0 deficits. Yet they always seemed to have an immediate response.

Michigan (32-25) jumped ahead with a pair of unearned runs in the top of the sixth. Consecutive errors by Turner and a fluky catcher's interference call on Jeff Mathis, whose glove ticked hitter Mike Rodriguez's bat during his swing with the bases loaded, gave the Battle Cats a 4-2 lead.

But a couple of singles, combined with four walks and a passed ball, gave Cedar Rapids a three run sixth and a 5-4 lead of it's own. The final two runs came on consecutive, two out bases loaded walks to Tommy Murphy and Nick Kimpton.

Half of the Kernels' runs were scored with two outs.

"We got down three games in a row 2-0 after the first inning, and all three games we came back and won." Kernels manager Todd Claus said, "I think that has helped us to know that even though we're down, we're not out of it."

How They Scored

Bottom 1st
Ransel Melgarejo walked against starting pitcher Cory Doyne to lead off. Justin Turner singled Melgarejo to third and he scored on Jeff Mathis' RBI groundout to second.

Top 3rd
Cameron Likely walked with on eout against Kernels starter David Wolensky. He went to third on a Mike Rodriguez single and scored on Brooks Conrad's infield hit to first.

Top 4th
Trevor Mote singled to lead off. Mark Obradovich followed with a walk. Kerry Hodges sacrificed the runners up a base. Mote scored, Obradovich went to third and Randy Rojas reached on fielder's choice grounder to short.

Bottom 4th
Jeff Mathis had a leadoff bloop double over first base. He scored on Nick Gorneault's two out triple to right.

Top 6th
Obradovich reached on a one out fielding error by Kernels second baseman Turner. Hodges singled to short right with both runner moving up a base on Turner's throwing error. Rojas walked to load the bases. Jaime Steward relieved Wolensky and allowed an RBI infield hit to shortstop by Likely. Mike Rodriguez reached on a catcher's interference call on Kernels catcher Mathiss with Hodes scoring on the play.

Bottom 6th
Turner walked leading off, went to second on a passed ball and scored on Mathis' run scoring single to center. Casey Kotchman forced Mathis with a grounder to short and went to second on Dallas McPherson' ensuing single to left. Gorneault walked to load the bases. After a strike out, Tommy Murphy walked to score Kotchman. Nick Kimpton then walked against reliever Juan Campos to score McPherson.

Bottom 7th
Turner walked leading off and went to third on Mathis single to short center. Turner scored, Mathis went to third and Kotchman reach on relief pitcher Max Tremblay's throwing error. mathis score don another Tremblay throwing error.

Top 8th
Rojas reached on a one out bunt single, went to third on a Likely single and eventually scored on an RBI fielder's choice groundout by Conrad.

Bottom 8th
Brian Rodawayy pitching for Michigan. Murphy singled leading off, stole second and scored on Turner's two out RBI single to center.