Today’s game not only has two teams going head-to-head, but also brings out anyone that loves an A&W Family Fun Sunday or a memorable root beer Float as well as 4,962 fans.
The C’s look to rebound from the loss Saturday evening which saw them jettison a 6-3 lead after five innings at Scotia Bank Field at Nat Stadium.
This four game series concludes on Monday with the C’s looking at moving up in the standings. The Indians stormed back with 5 runs over the last four innings pulling out the victory, which was just the 12th time in 36 games.
With popularity on the rise for the C’s, sources tell me that one of the more popular items for sale in the home of the Jay’s is the Canadian’s ball cap.
Spokane is the farm team for the Texas Rangers while the C’s represent Canada and the Blue Jays.
The Canadian’s Eric Brown (1-4) takes the mound and has a solid strikeout to walk ratio, but in doing so he has walked nine and struck out 21.
The Spokane sends C.J. Edwards who started the season in the Arizona League with the Rangers where he was 3-0 in four games.
In 20 innings with the Rangers he had 25 strikeouts, with only 6 walks.
Through the first five, he struck out 9 and at one point he had 6 in a row.
Brown started slow in the top and the first four batters had some questioning why he was the starter, before seeing a trip to the mound to settle him down.
Those on hand are waiting for the Jay’s first round draft selection Marcus Stroman take the mound, who calls Medford NY home in the off-season.
Marcus insists he personally “has a good chance of joining the Toronto Blue Jays as a reliever this season.” Jay’s manager John Farrell says “Stroman might just be correct in his expectations. Because he was so advanced coming out of the draft, I don’t think anyone has ruled out that possibility”.
Stroman is a first-round pick of the Blue Jay’s in June and collected a (US) $1.8-million signing bonus and the Blue Jay’s are expecting some impressive things from him.
GM Alex Anthopoulos and other team officials, he says he expects to advance to Double-A New Hampshire in “a couple weeks. ”In Stroman’s first outing he was told by the pitching coach to slow down his pitching as they were concerned he could injure himself.
His first two pitches from the mound were 92 and 93 mph respectively. He also retired the first three batters and speculation is his next outing could be Thursday in another nooner.
Stroman seemed to give the team new life and coming to the plate was Jorge Flores who had to duck the first pitch, which was followed by a double scoring two to tie the game.
Spokane goes to the bull-pin and sends Melo takes to the mound with the game tied # 28 Fuenmayor hammered a fast ball to the right field wall seeing the ball dropped.
This allowed two runs to score giving the C’s a 4-2 lead. Balligod was stranded at third, with the bases loaded again.
The top of the 9th see’s the C’s with a 5-2 lead take to the field and did what many thought would not happen – defeating Spokane.
Johnson lines out to CF, Onaka struck out and Rog grounds out to SS who throws it to Fuenmayor for the win.
Edwards was solid for the Indians, but the C’s offense was even better.
Stroman retired all six hitters he faces in order to grab his first professional victory.
Total time for the game was 2 hrs. 47 minutes.
