Monday, July 30, 2012

Game 36: Greeneville Astros at Bluefield Blue Jays

Check out the @BluefieldJays Twitter page for mid-game updates

ASTROS (22-16)

1 Jose Monzon CF
2 Marc Wik LF
3 Jean Batista 2B
4 Ernesto Genoves C
5 Ariel Ovando RF
6 Terrell Joyce DH
7 Angel Ibanez 3B
8 Michael Martinez 1B
9 Jimmy Howick SS

RHP Daniel Minor (0-0, 3.45)

BLUE JAYS (15-20)

1 D.J. Jones CF
2 Eric Arce DH
3 Seth Conner 3B
4 Dwight Smith Jr. LF
5 Santiago Nessy C
6 Christian Lopes 2B
7 Dickie Joe Thon SS
8 Jordan Leyland 1B
9 Jacob Anderson RF

LHP Daniel Norris (1-1, 4.87)



FIRST-PITCH TIME: 7:05 P.M.

BROADCAST INFO: Sorry folks, no broadcast tonight. But I'll be on the air tomorrow night at 6:50 for the 7:05 game.

WEATHER:

UMPIRES: PLATE Ryan Wills  FIELD Evan Barger

ABOUT LAST NIGHT...: In a game that featured three ties and five lead changes, the Greeneville Astros plated a run in the top of the ninth inning on a Julio Carmona wild pitch to turn away the Bluefield Blue Jays 8-7 at Bowen Field on Sunday. Dickie Joe Thon hit a game-tying homer in the seventh and Christian Lopes stole home and had three RBIs, but the visitors took the opening game of the series. Both offenses got off to quick starts in scoring twice in both halves of the second inning. Ariel Ovando’s two-run homer off Tucker Jensen gave the Astros a 2-0 lead. Bluefield rallied to tie it when Lopes scored on a perfectly executed first-and-third delayed double steal and Jacob Anderson followed with an RBI single to score Thon. Anderson led the team with three hits in the loss. Greeneville snatched the lead back when Ernesto Genoves homered in the top of the third inning, but a Lopes three-run double in the bottom half gave the advantage to the Jays at 5-3. Astros righty Michael Feliz struggled in his first Appy League game. He dominated the Gulf Coast League to earn a call-up on Thursday, but he allowed five runs , four earned, in three and two-thirds innings. The Astros tied it once more in the fourth on D’Andre Toney’s two-out two-run bloop single to center field. Greeneville benefited from another two-out dying quail hit in the sixth inning, this one from Brian Blasik off Shane Davis also plated two and made it a 7-5 game. The Baby Jays cut the lead in half on Seth Conner’s RBI single in the sixth, but Christian Lopes was called out on strikes with the bases loaded to end the frame. Thon led off the bottom of the seventh with a dramatic game-tying blast off reliever Andrew Walter and after seven the score was tied at 7-7. The eighth and ninth innings belonged to Bluefield’s Carmona and Greeneville’s Jordan Jankowski, with the Astros reliever winning the duel. The two righties exchanged zeroes in the eighth before Greeneville scratched out the winning tally in the final frame. Ernesto Genoves led off with a walk and moved to third base on Ovando’s chopper over the leaping first baseman Conner. Carmona uncorked a wild pitch that scored Genoves with the go-ahead run. Genoves finished a triple short of the cycle. Carmona (L, 0-3) recovered to strike out the side but it was too late. Jankowski (W, 4-0) struck out Santiago Nessy, Lopes and Thon in order for a perfect ninth to lock down the victory.

VS. THE ASTROS: The Blue Jays and Astros split their six-game season series in 2011, with the road team taking two out of three twice. In Bluefield on August 3, the Jays scored two in the ninth to force extra innings, but Chase Davidson’s 11th-inning single won it for Greeneville. Bluefield won the middle game before the Astros won the rubber game. In Greeneville from August 22-24, the two teams split the first two contests and the Jays won the third game to win the series and earn a season split.

- TONIGHT’S PITCHING PROBABLES -
 

LHP DANIEL NORRIS: Lefty Daniel Norris, one of the most highly-touted prospects in the Toronto farm system is back on the mound after 12 days off. The rotation has been thrown out of whack with all the rain that has followed the Blue Jays and Norris will pitch for the first time since July 18. That home start against Princeton was his toughest outing of the season as he was tagged for seven hits and five runs in four innings. The 2011 second-round pick was rated by Baseball America as the fourth-best prospect in the Jays’ entire organization. In 2011 BA ranked him second among high-school prospects and 91st overall. The former Clemson signee struck out 123 batters in 68 innings as a senior at Science Hill HS in his native Johnson City, TN.

RHP DANIEL MINOR: Right-hander Daniel Minor gets the start in the middle game of the series for Greeneville. He last pitched on Tuesday in Burlington, allowing three runs on nine hits in six innings. The 21 year old out of Dripping Springs, Texas was selected by Houston in the ninth round of this year’s draft, the same round that the Blue Jays chose Bluefield first baseman Jordan Leyland. Minor attended Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, where he went 10-3 with 110 strikeouts in 110.1 innings as a junior this spring for the Islanders.

WELCOME BACK: Righty Joe Musgrove, who spent the first month of the season with the Baby Jays, returns to Bluefield for the first time since being traded to the Astros on July 20. Toronto and Houston made a ten-player trade that included the 2011 supplemental first-round pick. Musgrove allowed one run on five hits in eight innings of work for the Baby Jays prior to the deal. Joe went to the Astros along with RHP Francisco Cordero, OF Ben Francisco, RHP Asher Wojciechowski, 2011 Bluefielder and LHP David Rollins, C Carlos Perez and a player to be named later in exchange for RHP Brandon Lyon, LHP J.A. Happ and RHP David Carpenter. Musgrove is scheduled to toss two innings of relief after Minor throws tonight.

THE TERMINATOR: Seth Conner batted cleanup for the first time last night and contributed an RBI single in the sixth inning. He’s been on a tear for the Baby Jays, as he’s 6-for-17 (.353) with a homer, two doubles, four RBIs and three runs scored during a five-game hitting streak. On Friday he hit his first Appy League homer, a three-run shot in the top of the first against Princeton ace Blake Snell. The Rogersville, MO native is one game short of equaling his longest hit streak of the season, a six-gamer that was run up from June 30-July 13. The converted third baseman has seen most of his playing time at catcher while Santiago Nessy missed two weeks with a hamstring injury, but with Art Charles called up to Vancouver, Seth has more recently played first base. Conner leads Appy League catchers (min. 60 PA) with a .321 batting average.

DRAWING FIRST BLOOD: Greeneville scored twice in the top of the second inning last night and although the Jays immediately tied the game in the bottom half of that inning, it didn’t bode well for Bluefield. That’s because the Baby Jays are 1-16 (including 13 straight losses) when their opponent scores first. In contrast, Bluefield is 14-4 when they are the first to get on the scoreboard. The only game the Jays have won after allowing the first run was on June 23 against Johnson City in the second home game of the year. The Cardinals scored twice in the top of the first inning, but the Jays rallied and won the game in the tenth inning on Jacob Anderson’s walk-off double.


Bluefield Blue Jays Game Notes 7-30

Check out the @BluefieldJays Twitter page for mid-game updates

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