Indy Indians Offense Brings the Fireworks in 12-6 Rout of the Mud Hens
It was a beautiful Memorial Day yesterday as the Indians took the field against the Mud Hens in a mid-division dustup. The Indians went into yesterday’s game with a 24-27 record with the Hens close behind with a 23-28 record.
Trouble for Flowers Early
JC Flowers was the man picked to take the mound for the Indians yesterday and it was clear early that he did not have his stuff. Flowers found it difficult to locate just about any pitch he tried to throw and racked up his pinch count early. It looked like this was going to be a death by a thousand cuts for the Indians as the Hens found a way to get a man across the plate in each of the first three innings.
JC Flowers would only get through 1.1 innings by the time Miguel Perez hooked him. Flowers would leave the game with 53 pitches, 2 earned runs, and giving up 5 hits. Stratton would come on in relief to close out the 2nd inning but would get pulled after immediately giving up a solo shot in the third.
Emanuel Rights the Ship
This is the real star from tonight. Emanuel came in when things looked really uncertain for the Indians. JC Flowers ran up his pitch count early and struggled to get the 4 outs he did. Stratton gave up a solo bomb. So Miguel Perez put in Emanuel to right the ship and boy did he.
Suddenly the Hens were struggling to make contact and Emanuel cruised through the next five innings only allowing one earned run, one walk, and striking out five.
Indians Offense Lights Up Scoreboard
All of this brings us to the bottom of the third inning where the Indians were trailing by three runs. The scoring onslaught began with Young singling to left field. With Young on base, Nick Gonzalez would belt a double off the wall. Young hauled around the bases and brought the crowd to their feet when he barely beat the throw home to put the Indians on the board for the first time.
From this point on, the Hens defense completely fell apart. An error would bring Gonzalez home on what should’ve been a routine single that ended with runners on the corners. Next, Andujar got on base after the Hens made an error on a routine ground ball, and then Mitchell would hit a bases clearing double down the first base line that would give the Indians the lead for the rest of the game.
The Hens would end the game with three errors all of which occurred in the third inning. The scoring onslaught would continue as the Indians would tack on three runs in the 4th and three more in the sixth. The Indians would go on to win 12-6, moving two games ahead of the Hens in the IL West standings and 1.5 games back from Nashville.
