State College 12
Cyclones 1
July 15 at MCU Park
This is getting ridiculous.
Cyclones reliever Trent Johnson allowed six hits and eight runs in one-and-two-thirds innings and the boys lost their fifth game in a row — their 19th loss this season, this time to the Spikes.
Brooklyn was down 2–0 before even stepping to the plate as starter Mike Gibbons threw a wild pitch to score Scott Hurst before Yariel Gonzalez singled to score Evan Mendoza.
The score remained that way until the sixth when manager Edgardo Alfonzo called on Johnson, who promptly surrendered a single to Mendoza then hit Joshua Lopez with a pitch, before Gonzalez doubled to score Mendoza.
Dennis Ortega then reached first on a costly fielding error by Matt Winaker before Ricardo Batisa singled to score Gonzalez. Caleb Lopes then singled to score Ortega before J.D. Crowe doubled to score Batista.
Two consecutive ground outs by Hurst and Mendoza led to both Lopes and Crowe scoring to make it 9–0.
For some odd reason, Fonzie left Johnson in to pitch the seventh. The move looked genius when he got the first two hitters out, but a triple by Ricardo Bautista was followed by a wild pitch that scored a run and ended Johnson’s night.
Curtis Horne got the Clones out of the seventh, but couldn’t stop the Spikes in the next inning.
After loading the bases in the eighth, Horne surrendered a single to score Hurst. Fonzie then replaced Horne with Cannon Chadwick, who allowed the Spikes’ final run when Joe Gomez grounded into a force out to score Mendoza for the third time to make it 12–0.
The Cyclones finally got on the board in the ninth when Scott Manea singled to score Reed Gamache, but to polish what was arguably the team’s worst performance of the season, Walter Rasquin grounded out to end both the game — and his 14 game hitting streak.
After the game, Alfonzo stressed that both sides of the field have to do their job if the team is going to improve.
“We could play better. That’s no question but we’ve been coming up short,” Fonzie said. “It’s hard when you don’t hit and the pitching doesn’t do a good job. It’s tough to win like that but it’s what we’ve been through all year.”
This humiliating blow-out now puts the Cyclones at 6–19, which not only has the squad dead last in the McNamara Division, but is also the worst start in franchise history. With a third of the season in the books, the team needs to resolve its issues quickly because time is not on its side.
The Cyclones hope to do something right against the Spikes today at 4 pm at MCU Park.
