Green Homers For Nashville As Season-Opening Skid Hits Three
Metairie, LA – The Nashville Sounds suffered their third straight loss on Saturday evening at Zephyr Field, falling 4-2 to New Orleans in the third game of a four-game series.
Nashville has out-hit New Orleans in each of the three games this series but has failed to record a victory. The Sounds registered five hits to the Zephyrs’ four in Saturday’s contest.
Third baseman Taylor Green (2-for-3) gave Nashville its first lead of the 2012 season in the top of the fourth inning when he belted a two-run homer to right off Zephyrs starter Wade LeBlanc. Sean Halton, who preceded Green with a line drive double to left that caromed off the third-base bag, also scored on the blast.The Sounds’ advantage was short-lived, however, as New Orleans jumped in front with a big fly of its own in the home half of the frame.
An erratic Josh Butler, who tallied six walks over his 3 1/3 innings of work in the contest, issued free passes to Bryan Petersen and Luke Montz sandwiched around a strikeout of Ben Lasater to put two runners on base with one out. Matt Dominguez followed by hammering a 1-2 offering over the left field wall for a go-ahead, three-run blast, the Zephyrs’ first hit of the evening. The third baseman’s first longball of the year chased Butler from the contest and gave New Orleans a 3-2 lead.
The Sounds had runners on base in each of the next four innings but were unable to push across the tying score.
New Orleans tacked on an insurance run in the bottom of the eighth against Vinnie Chulk. Scott Cousins led off and hit a liner to left-center that a diving Logan Schafer was unable to catch and the ball rolled to the wall, allowing the Z’s right fielder to reach third on a triple. Petersen followed with a sac fly to center to extend the lead to 4-2.
LeBlanc (1-0) picked up the win with a quality start effort for the Z’s. The southpaw allowed two runs on five hits while fanning four in his seven frames.
Beau Jones worked a scoreless eighth before Zephyrs closer Sandy Rosario wrapped up the victory with a 1-2-3 ninth for his first save of the year.
The Sounds will attempt to avoid a season-opening sweep when the teams wrap up the four-game set with a 2:00pm. Easter matinee on Sunday afternoon. Right-hander Brian Baker will toe the rubber to make his Sounds debut in the contest. New Orleans will counter with right-hander Tom Koehler.
Box Score
New Orleans Zephyrs (3-0) 4, Nashville Sounds (0-3) 2
April 7th, 2012
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | R | H | E | ||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Nashville Sounds | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 5 | 2 | |
New Orleans Zephyrs | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | x | 4 | 4 | 2 | |
Nashville | AB | R | H | RBI | BB | SO | LOB | AVG |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Schafer, CF | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 1 | .077 |
Farris, 2B | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | .143 |
Gindl, RF | 4 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | .462 |
Halton, 1B | 3 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 | .500 |
Green, T, 3B | 3 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | .300 |
Almonte, LF | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | .000 |
Statia, SS | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 | .125 |
Phillips, C | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | .000 |
Butler, Js, P | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | .000 |
Hand, P | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .000 |
a-Buller, PH | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .500 |
Chulk, P | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .000 |
Totals | 33 | 2 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 11 | .202 |
a-Doubled for Hand in the 7th. | ||||||||
BATTING 2B: Halton (1, LeBlanc), Buller (1, LeBlanc). HR: Green, T (1, 4th inning off LeBlanc, 1 on, 0 out). TB: Buller 2; Halton 2; Gindl; Green, T 5. RBI: Green, T 2 (2). Runners left in scoring position, 2 out: Butler, Js; Schafer. GIDP: Halton. Team RISP: 1-for-4. Team LOB: 6.FIELDING E: Green, T (1, fielding), Statia (1, fielding). PB: Phillips (1). |
New Orleans | AB | R | H | RBI | BB | SO | LOB | AVG |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Mattison, CF | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | .091 |
Solano, 2B | 2 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 1 | 1 | .200 |
Cousins, RF | 4 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 3 | .333 |
Petersen, LF | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | .111 |
Lasater, 1B | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 3 | .231 |
Montz, C | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 | .000 |
Dominguez, 3B | 4 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 1 | .167 |
Velazquez, SS | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | .100 |
LeBlanc, P | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .000 |
a-Pedroza, PH | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | .000 |
Jones, B, P | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .000 |
Rosario, S, P | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | .000 |
Totals | 27 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 12 | .173 |
a-Grounded out for LeBlanc in the 7th. | ||||||||
BATTING 3B: Cousins (1, Chulk). HR: Dominguez (1, 4th inning off Butler, Js, 2 on, 1 out). TB: Cousins 3; Dominguez 4; Solano; Velazquez. RBI: Dominguez 3 (3), Petersen (1). Runners left in scoring position, 2 out: Lasater; Petersen; Solano. SF: Petersen. Team RISP: 1-for-5. Team LOB: 6.BASERUNNING CS: Mattison (1, 2nd base by Butler, Js/Phillips), Lasater (1, 3rd base by Hand/Phillips).FIELDING E: Solano (2, fielding), Dominguez (2, fielding). DP: (Solano-Velazquez-Lasater). |
Nashville | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO | HR | ERA |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Butler, Js (L, 0-1) | 3.1 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 8.10 |
Hand | 2.2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 0.00 |
Chulk | 2.0 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 7.71 |
Totals | 8.0 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 6 | 7 | 1 | 3.58 |
New Orleans | IP | H | R | ER | BB | SO | HR | ERA |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
LeBlanc (W, 1-0) | 7.0 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 2.57 |
Jones, B (H, 1) | 1.0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 | 0 | 0.00 |
Rosario, S (S, 1) | 1.0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0.00 |
Totals | 9.0 | 5 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 8 | 1 | 1.20 |
Pitches-strikes: Butler, Js 74-38, Hand 34-24, Chulk 25-17, LeBlanc 101-65, Jones, B 19-8, Rosario, S 10-9.
Groundouts-flyouts: Butler, Js 4-1, Hand 3-2, Chulk 3-3, LeBlanc 9-7, Jones, B 1-0, Rosario, S 1-0.
Batters faced: Butler, Js 16, Hand 9, Chulk 9, LeBlanc 28, Jones, B 4, Rosario, S 3.
Umpires: HP: Brett Robson. 1B: Chris Segal. 2B: Tyler Funneman. 3B: D.J. Reyburn.
Weather: 75 degrees, clear.
Wind: 10 mph, In from RF.
T: 2:37.
Att: 8,377.