 |
| Olé! Happ, IronPigs Shutout Bulls in Opener 7-0 |
| IronPigs Bats Come Alive as LV Continues Dominance in Series Openers |
| The IronPigs offense was relentless and J.A. Happ was nearly unhittable as Lehigh Valley earned its third shutout in franchise history with a 7-0 thrashing of Durham on Monday. Jon Knott and Brennan King each homered for the visitors in support of Happ who allowed just one hit over 6.0 innings while striking out nine to earn his fifth win of the season. |
| Lehigh Valley was on the board in their first at-bat when Brandon Watson starting things off with a double and came around to score on a one-out single to left by Mike Cervenak against Bulls’ starter Mitch Talbot (6-6). Cervanak later doubled in the contest and finished 3-for-5 with a run scored and an RBI raising his batting average to .314. |
| Then Knott, who hit the first grand slam in team history last Friday, added a solo blast to his road trip totals when he took Talbot deep leading off the 2nd inning. The IronPigs’ left fielder has hit five of his six home runs this season for Lehigh Valley and now has 27 RBI in his 46 games with the Phillies’ Triple-A affiliate. King added his fifth long ball of the year in the 5th to give Happ a 3-0 advantage with hardly a threat coming from the Durham offense. |
| Happ (5-6) was dealing through the first four innings of the game only allowing a pair of walks while striking out six batters. The lefthanders flirtation with a no-hitter was spoiled by a line drive single to left off the bat of Andy Cannizaro with no outs in the 5th. He struck out the next batter and ended the Bulls’ “threat” by issuing a double play ball to Hector Gimenez to end the inning. |
| The IronPigs broke it open in the top half of the 6th when they scored three times off Talbot on RBI singles by Andy Tracy, Jason Jaramillo, and Brennan King to give Lehigh Valley a commanding 6-0 advantage. The Durham right-hander would not finish the inning and allowed six runs on nine hits in 5.2 innings en route to his third straight loss. |
| The good guys completed their scoring in the 8th when Tracy and Knott hit back-to-back doubles off Durham reliever Steve Andrade to put the IronPigs up by a touchdown. Lehigh Valley outhit the Bulls 12-5 and Watson, Cervenak, Tracy, Knott and King all registered multi-hit games for the victors. As a matter of fact, Dave Huppert’s club has outhit their opponents in 21 of their last 33 games (and tied in four) and are 18-15 in those games. |
| LHP R.J Swindle (1.0 IP, 2 H, SO) and RHP John Ennis (2.0 IP, 2 H, 4 SO) helped preserve the shutout for Happ and the IronPigs. Lehigh Valley had previously held their opponents scoreless on May 13 vs. Norfolk (7-0) and June 11 (Game 2) vs. the Buffalo Bisons (3-0) – both of which occurred at Coca-Cola Park. |
| With the win, the IronPigs improved to 11-11 in series openers this season. They are 10-4 in their last 14 after beginning the year 1-7 on the first day of a series. It’s a sharp contrast from what Lehigh Valley has done in series finales this year. Including Sunday’s 7-2 loss to Charlotte, the IronPigs are 5-16 in series finales this season. |
| The Pigs and Bulls will do it again on Tuesday night at 7:05 p.m. and you can hear all the action with Matt Provence on the IronPigs Radio Network. Coverage for game two begins at 6:35 p.m. with the AT&T pre-game show on flagship station 90.3 FM WXLV and 95.1 HD-2 WZZO, “The Digital Home of the IronPigs.” |
| The Lehigh Valley IronPigs return home on Friday for a weekend series against the Syracuse Chiefs and exciting promotions and giveaways are planned for the entirety of the three-game set. |
| The festivities begin when the IronPigs and Chiefs open the series on Friday night at 7:05 p.m. Immediately following the game a post-game fireworks show will commence as part of Friday Night Fireworks presented by Chevrolet. Also, Fly-Away-Friday presented by the Lehigh Valley International Airport will award a lucky fan a trip for two to Florida on Allegiant Airlines. |
| Single-game tickets, new second-half mini-plan packages and group tickets for the IronPigs inaugural season, presented by Capital BlueCross, are on sale now and can be purchased at the Coca-Cola Park Ticket Office, online at www.ironpigsbaseball.com or by calling (610) 841-PIGS. |
