BEACH BUMS DOWN CRUISERS 3-2

7/29/2010 - TRAVERSE CITY, MI –- The Traverse City Beach Bums made three first inning runs and J. T. Hall made a diving catch to end the game as the Beach Bums downed the Oakland County Cruisers 3-2. Jonathan Alia hit a 2-run triple, photograph by John L. Russell.

With the win, the Beach Bums pulled to within 4.5 games of Oakland County. Traverse City also holds a two game lead over Windy City for the wild card spot in the East Division.

After a quick top of the first, the Beach Bums went on the offensive in the bottom half of the inning as Matt Brown and Chase Burch singled, followed by a J. T. Hall walk to load up the bases with one out. C. J. Ziegler hit a sac fly to bring in Brown for a 1-0 TC lead. The next batter, Jonathan Alia, drove a triple into the left-center gap to bring home Burch and Hall to put Traverse City up 3-0.

Oakland County would get on the board in the third when Bobby Andrews singled home Robbie Tolan to make it 3-1. Pitching would dominate the rest of the game as both Enrique Lechuga and Wayde Kitchens flashed their best stuff. Lechuga went six innings, allowing six hits and one run, walking two and striking out seven. Kitchens did not surrender another hit after the first inning, giving up a three unearned runs on three hits.

The Cruisers would make things interesting in the ninth as Andrews drove home Mike Epping to make it 3-2. After an error put runners on the corners with two out, Joash Brodin hit a sinking liner into left. J. T. Hall raced in and made a diving catch to record the final out of the ballgame.

Lechuga (6-3) earned the win for TC while Kitchens (4-3) took the loss for Oakland County. Scott Mueller picked up his 12th save of the year.

Offensively, Matt Brown had a single and two walks to extend his consecutive game on base streak to 38 contests.

The series concludes with a FANtastic Fireworks Friday at Wuerfel Park, one of only three left in the 2010 season (Friday, August 13th and Sunday, September 5th are the final two FANtastic Fireworks dates). Michael Moore (5-2, 2.32) goes for Traverse City agains Kevin Asselin (5-3, 3.68) for Oakland County. For more information or tickets, call 943-0100 or log on to www.tcbeachbums.com.