Potomac’s rally falls short
Jeff Mankie/For the News & Messenger
Erik Arnesen took the loss for Potomac, allowing three home runs in five innings.
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By Robert Daski
Published: August 12, 2008
Michael Martinez was scampering toward home plate and he was counting on his speed to slip underneath the tag.
The throw arrived just before Martinez and Keys catcher Justin Johnson applied the tag. Martinez was out.
After Andrew Lefave grounded out to shortstop, the Potomac Nationals had fallen 8-7, leaving manager Randy Knorr to live with his decision to send Martinez home with one out.
“Sometimes you got to take a chance,” Knorr said. “You’ve got to make people make the plays and [Abreu] made the play.”
The Nationals (70-51 overall, 28-23 second half) appeared poised to pull off another come-from-behind win.
They narrowed an 8-3 deficit to 8-6 by scoring three runs in the bottom of the eighth. Lefave and Dee Brown scored on a Michael Burgess double.
Burgess came home on Stephen King’s triple.
But the rally died when Aaron Seuss swung at the first pitch he saw from Fredy Deza and popped out to Abreu.
Prior to those runs, the Keys picked up their final run in the eighth. Paul Winterling scored when King handled a ball hit by Danny Figueroa. He threw to second baseman Martinez in an attempt to turn an inning-ending double play.
Martinez could not secure the throw and was charged an error.
Nationals starting pitcher Erik Arnesen suffered the loss after allowing seven runs on seven hits in five innings. He issued two walks and recorded five strikeouts.
But he made three bad pitches where each resulted in home runs.
With Potomac trailing 1-0 in the third inning, Arnesen allowed his first round-tripper, a two-run shot by Brandon Snyder.
Billy Rowell hit a fourth inning solo home run to put Frederick up 4-2.
Arnesen began the fifth by walking Danny Figueroa, who went to third base on Snyder’s single.
Following Snyder’s at-bat, Vinyard sent a 3-0 fastball past the reach of Nationals center fielder Francisco Plasencia. That blast gave the Keys a 7-2 lead.
“Snyder hit a fastball and the pitch I made to Rowell was a decent pitch, but he just got a hold of it,” Arnesen said.
“Really the home run balls were the pitches that made the difference in the game,” Arnesen added.
Burgess went 2-for-4 with three RBI and two runs scored. Seuss had two hits and an RBI. Jhonatan Solano was 2-for-4 and hit his second home run as a Potomac National.
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