Garrett Gould collected his first win of the season.
photo by Tim Evearitt
Starting pitcher Garrett Gould (W, 1-4) was on the rubber for the Chattanooga Lookouts (12-17) in Sunday afternoon’s game against the Tennessee Smokies (16-14). Gould started the game looking for his first win of the year as well as attempting to hold off a five game sweep by the Smokies. The Lookouts were up to the task, getting a 6-4 win to close out the 10-game home stand.
In the first inning Smokies' top prospect Kris Bryant made his third error in the last four games to put Noel Cuevas on second base after an errant throw to first.
Two walks and a wild pitch later, Cuevas scored, giving the Lookouts a 1-0 lead in the first inning.
In the fourth inning tensions between the two teams began to rise when Ozzie Martinez stepped up to the plate and eviscerated a ball out of the stadium to plate Scott Schebler who reached earlier in the inning on a walk. Martinez's homer off of Corey Black (L, 2-2) was his first dinger of the season.
After the Smokies scored their first run of the game in the top of the fifth, the Lookouts tacked on three more runs in the bottom of that inning. Two of those runs came when Jeremy Hazelbaker lined one into right-center for his league leading sixth triple of the year . First baseman O’Koyea Dickson was the next one to come to the plate, grounding a single into shallow right field, but still far enough to score Hazelbaker easily.
On the mound Gould (W, 1-4) had his best outing of the year, giving up only one run in five innings while striking out five. That performance was good enough to not only get his first win of the year, but also lowered his season ERA by over a run, dropping it from 7.48 to 6.41.
The Smokies lineup made it interesting late in the game by scoring three runs over the last two innings, but Juan Noriega and Juan Gonzalez closed out the 6-4 win, preventing the Smokies from sweeping the series and snapping a four game losing streak.
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The Lookouts will have a much happier trip to Pensacola this afternoon after getting the win. The team starts a series against the Blue Wahoos (12-17) on Monday night at 7:30 p.m eastern time. The Lookouts’ next home game is Saturday night against the Huntsville Stars on Negro League Baseball Night.
Notes: Lookouts' pitchers struck out eight Smokies' batters Sunday afternoon, which gave them 47 strikeouts in the five-game series.
Noel Cuevas beat the throw to home as the Lookouts scored in the bottom of the first on Corey Black's wild pitch.
photo by Tim Evearitt