Midwest League Action: Games of September 12, 2009

Bees 8)

Bees strike first

Burlington Bees manager Jim Gabella figured it was going to be a dogfight.

Not only was the season series with the Cedar Rapids Kernels almost a 50-50 split (Kernels 8-7), but the teams' personnel have been battling for two years, last year in the short-season Pioneer League and this year in the Midwest League.

It was only fitting that Game 1 of the MWL Western Division Championship Series would also be close.

"Getting down 2-0 in a playoff game is tough, but we've battled all year," Gabella said. "We may not have always won, but we have battled."

The Bees seem to know what it takes for the stretch run. An imperfect team becomes incredibly solid, and it's happened two years in a row.

"Once we started to think of what's best for the team, that's when we took off," Gabella said. "Everyone is doing what it takes for the team."

By my count, that's nine straight post-season wins for the Bees.

Kernels 8(

Burlington beats Kernels in Game 1, 3-2

The bats got packed. So did the gloves and all the other gear.

Everything that was supposed to make the trip to Community Field did last night. Except for the late-inning magic.

Burlington scored three times in the fifth, got a game-saving defensive play in the seventh and held on to beat the Cedar Rapids Kernels, 3-2, in Game 1 of the Midwest League Western Division championship series. A do-or-die Game 2 is Sunday afternoon at 2 at Memorial Stadium.

The Kernels swept Peoria in two games in the first round with unique ninth and 10th-inning rallies. There were none, unique or otherwise, last night.

“Didn’t quite happen,” said Kernels first baseman Gabe Jacobo.

This is how opposite the fortune meter swung against the Kernels. Jacobo crushed a ball leading off the ninth against Burlington closer Blaine Hardy that center fielder Patrick Norris caught at the fence in left-center.

The baseball normally doesn’t carry much at all at Community Field.

“Yeah, I thought I got it,” Jacobo said. “He threw a changeup, and I was looking for it … That one I thought at least would get off the wall.”

Speaking of Norris, he made the defensive play of the game and perhaps the series when he fielded Tyson Auer’s two-out single in the seventh and threw a one-hop strike to home plate to nail Matt Crawford by a healthy margin. Crawford was trying to score from second base.

“I’d do that a million times. It was two outs, with Crawford,” Kernels Manager Bill Mosiello. “They play really shallow in center and left, and they can both throw. I tip my hat. He made a great throw.”

ZOMG!!!! LOOOOOOOOOOOOS! ELEVENTY! :D

Loons rally to beat Fort Wayne in series opener

Just when it looked like it couldn’t get any more dramatic for the Great Lakes Loons, they went and topped themselves again.

The Loons, who have made a habit of rallying in the late innings en route to their first-ever playoff berth, came from behind four different times Saturday to beat the Fort Wayne TinCaps 11-10 in an 11-inning thriller at Dow Diamond. The victory gives Great Lakes a 1-0 lead in the best-of-three Midwest League East Division championship series.

Great Lakes, which trailed 4-0 early, eventually won the game on a two-out RBI-single by Jerry Sands in the bottom of the 11th — sending the crowd of 4,00-plus into a full-fledged frenzy.

“You’ve just got to believe. That’s all we say — you’ve just got to believe,” said manager Juan Bustabad, whose Loons won their first playoff series on a dramatic 10th-inning homer by Jaime Pedroza at West Michigan on Friday night.

“ ... It was two great teams going at each other,” Bustabad added. “We had the last at-bat, and Sands came through with a big hit.”

Fort Wayne >:/

Game 1 extra-painful loss for TinCaps

Zach Herr took off his hat and slowly walked off the field.

After the TinCaps reliever got to the dugout, he kicked a trash can repeatedly.

It was just like the kick in the stomach Fort Wayne had just received.

Jerry Sands knocked in pinch-runner Parker Dalton with the game-winning single off Herr as Great Lakes scored twice in the 11th inning to beat the TinCaps 11-10. A crowd of 4,029 fans was treated to a 4-hour, 16-minute thriller in which the TinCaps squandered four leads.

“We’re disappointed, no doubt about it,” TinCaps manager Doug Dascenzo said. “And we would have been joyful if the outcome was different. That means they care about what they do. They’ll come out ready to go (today).”