Miracle rally late, defeat Bradenton 6-5
Trailing 5-0, and lacking all signs of offensive life, the Fort Myers Miracle bats woke up in the seventh inning against Bradenton Saturday for six runs to escape with a 6-5 victory at Hammond Stadium.
Fort Myers sent 10 batters to the plate in the decisive inning as Jair Fernandez capped off the scoring outburst with a two-out, two-run double to the left-field wall. The Miracle (16-19) split a two-game series with Bradenton (20-15) after losing a 1-0 heartbreaker Friday.
After going scoreless for 18 consecutive innings dating back to the seventh inning against the Tampa Yankees two games ago, the Miracle broke the streak with a full team effort. All nine batters in the Miracle order had productive at-bats to put together the six runs. Ramon Santana led off the inning with a line-drive that went off the foot of Bradenton reliever Mike Colla – picking up a single. Brandon Roberts followed with an opposite-field hit to put two on for Nick Romero, who drew a walk to load the bases. Colla was then removed from the game as the Marauders went to right-hander Tom Boleska.
With Boleska on the mound, Paul Kelly delivered the first RBI, a single scoring Santana. Chris Herrmann then hit a sacrifice-fly with the bases loaded to bring in Roberts, making it 5-2. Nate Hanson followed with a single to reload the bases for Evan Bigley, who was hit in the helmet to score the third run. With the bases still loaded, Chris Cates picked up a second sacrifice-fly RBI to score Kelly and bringing the Miracle within a run. Then, with runners at first and second and two outs, Fernandez scorched a double in the left-field alley to score the final two runs.
Up 6-5 in the eighth, the Miracle went to 20-year-old reliever Andrei Lobanov who recorded two quick outs. Manager Jake Mauer then went to closer Billy Bullock to nail down the rest of the game.
After a two-out single by Tony Sanchez in the eighth, Bullock induced a groundout to head into the ninth. Bullock also allowed a single to lead off the ninth, but recovered to strike out two of the next three batters, including a strikeout of Greg Picart to end the night. Bullock picked up his eighth save of the year, and has now converted six consecutive saves dating back to April 28.
The Miracle welcome the Clearwater Threshers to Hammond Stadium for a four-game series, beginning at 4:05 p.m. Sunday.