With a home game smashed between seven road games this week, the Santa Barbara Foresters bounced back offensively against the Bakersfield Sound with a 13-4 win.
Texas lefty Ty Culbreth took the mound for the CCL game against the Sound and finished with seven innings pitched and eight strikeouts with plenty of ran support behind him.
Culbreth allowed a run in the opening inning, as the Sound knocked back-to-back singles to start the game. With a man on third and two outs following a double play, first baseman Micah McCulloh singled in a run.
The Foresters loaded the bases with two outs in the bottom half of the first, but Tyler Krieger struck out in his first at-bat of the season to strand all three men.
Small ball, a bit of clutch hitting, and an error pushed four runs across in the second inning for the Foresters. Lechich lead off with a bloop a single to kick off the inning, stole second and moved to third on a Michael Deceglie sacrifice.
With two outs, Colt Atwood singled in Lechich. Keaton Jones followed up with his own single and Atwood scored after Sound center fielder Ryan Land missed catching the ball on a dive. Garrett Mattlage followed up with another single to score Jones and Mattlage moved to second on the throw home.
Mattlage came home after stealing third and running home after catcher Ross Hough’s throw to third went wide.
Another run came across in the third, Krieger singled and Lechich tripled him home right away.
In the fourth, the Foresters threatened again with an Atwood single and Jones getting hit by a pitch. After a wild pitch moved both runners up 90 feet, Ryan O’Hearn walked to load the bases with one out.
Even a pitching change for the Sound couldn’t stop the scoring, as Austin Darby bounced a hopper over the head of Sound third baseman A.J. Steimel to score two more runs, pushing the score to 7-1.
From there new Sound pitcher Tyler Davis struggled to work his way out of the inning. Despite striking out Krieger after Darby’s hit, Davis hit Lechich, walked Deceglie and Swanner, allowed a single to Atwood and finally walked Jones before the inning came to an end. In total, six runs came across in the inning.
The Foresters did allow another run in the sixth, after a hit batter and a single, a passed ball brought home the second Sound run.
Brendon Shoemake entered in the eighth to serve mop up duty with a 10-run lead. He allowed his first two runs of the year in his two innings of work to end the game.
