Swing Get More Heroics from Hill to Beat Bees

Print

Swing Get More Heroics from Hill to Beat Bees
07/28/2007 11:48 PM ET
By Randy Wehofer / Burlington Bees

Burlington, IA (July 28, 2007) - Steven Hill continued his hot hitting with four more hits, including a game-tying home run in the eighth inning, and four RBI to lead the Swing of the Quad Cities (20-13, 58-44) to a 6-4 win over the Burlington Bees (17-17, 47-56) at Community Field tonight. In three games in this series, Hill is now 9-13, with a double, three home runs, and 13 RBI, helping the Swing three wins. The Swing now lead the season series 8-2 over the Bees.
The Swing jumped on Bees' starter Everett Teaford for two runs in the top of the first inning. With one out, Jared Schweitzer doubled and Tony Cruz singled. Hill drove in the first run with a base hit to left. After a popout, Jaime Landin grounded a base hit up the middle to bring in Cruz with the second Swing tally. The Bees bounced back with a run in the bottom of the first against Swing starter Elvis Hernandez. Kurt Mertins drew a leadoff walk, stole second, moved to third on a single by Joe Dickerson, and scored on a groundout by Brady Everett. The Bees then took the lead in the bottom of the third. With the bases loaded and one out, Jamar Walton ripped a single up the middle that drove in two and put the Bees up 3-2. The hit also extended Walton's hitting streak to 17 games, matching the team-high. Luis Castillo drew a walk to reload the bases and Hernandez forced in a third run by hitting Jesus Soto in the backside with a curve ball that gave the Bees a 4-2 lead.
Teaford worked through six innings and allowed one more run in the fifth. Antone DeJesus singled, stole second, and scored on a two-out hit by Hill to get the Swing to within one at 4-3. Ed Cegarra took over for Teaford in the seventh and retired the first four batters he faced before Hill came up and swatted his sixth home run of the season to tie the game at four. Cegarra (1-3) then hit Christian Reyes with a pitch, but got Landin to foul out for the second out of the inning. Cegarra appeared to be out of the inning when Christian Lopez hit a bouncing ball right to Soto at third base. Soto threw towards second base to get the force out on Reyes to end the inning, but the throw sailed low and went past Mertins into right field for an error that also allowed Reyes to get to third. Jose Ramirez stood in next and lined a base hit to left field to drive in Reyes with the go-ahead run. The hit snapped an 0-15 streak for Ramirez over his last four games.
Hill added an insurance run with another RBI single in the ninth inning, but the Swing didn't really need the extra tally thanks to great work from their bullpen. Mike Schellinger (5-3) took over for Hernandez in the four innings and allowed just two hits over four shutout innings to get the win. Kyle Mura finished the final two innings to earn his first save of the season. The Bees did get base hits from Matt Morizio and Mertins in the bottom of the ninth inning to get the tying runs on base, but Mura struck out Jeff Bianchi and got Dickerson to popout on the infield to end the game with the runners stranded.
NOTE: Eduardo Perez of Great Lakes was 0-3 at Wisconsin tonight ending an 18-game hitting streak leaving Walton with the longest current hitting streak in the Midwest League and one game shy of tying for the longest in the league this year.
The Bees and Swing wrap up this series tomorrow afternoon at 2:00 at Community Field. The gates open at 1:00 for Louisa Communications Kids Day sponsored by Today's Light Favorites 93.5 KKMI. All kids 12 and under get into the game for free and get to run the bases after the game. RH Jason Godin (4-1, 2.20) will be on the mound for the Bees against RH Tyler Herron (8-5, 3.71) for the Swing. The game will be broadcast live on KBUR AM 1490 and KBKB AM 1360 with the pre-game show starting at 1:40.
This story was not subject to the approval of the National Association of Professional Baseball Leagues or its clubs.