Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, May 27, 1993                   TAG: 9305270181
SECTION: SPORTS                    PAGE: B2   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: By BOB TEITLEBAUM STAFF WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

SPIRITS BEAT BUCS IN WILD ONE WINSTON-SALEM RALLIES, WINS 18-6

Winston-Salem beat the Buccaneers 18-6, handing Salem its second loss in a row in front of 5,305 fans on Val-Pak night.

Winston-Salem's offense erupted after the Buccaneers had scored five runs in the bottom of the first inning to start winless Jason Angel on what looked like the path to his fourth consecutive loss.

Just under three hours later, Angel had survived for his first victory of the year with four-inning relief help from Rene Quinones, who got his first save.

The Spirits wiped out the five-run deficit and outscored Salem 18-0 from the first to the bottom of the ninth when the Bucs added their final run. In that span, Winston-Salem slammed six homers including two each by Eugene "Motorboat" Jones and Bobby Perna.

Jones became the central piece of the night's biggest oddity that saw Salem use two position players to finish up the pitching chores.

Jones was hit by relief pitcher Jason Christiansen to start the eighth inning. That brought a warning to both benches from umpire Marco Pinto.

The Spirits then scored six runs including a bases-loaded homer by Perna that sent many fans scurrying for the exits. It also forced Salem manager Scott Little to bring in outfielder Jeff Conger to pitch the ninth.

Jones was the first hitter and Conger's pitch hit the Spirits' left fielder. While Jones had angrily confronted Christiansen after being hit, he was nonchalantly headed to first when Pinto tossed Conger.

"No comment," said Jones about whether he thought Christiansen tried to hit him.

"I don't think he [Conger] tried to hit me," Jones added about the second plunking.

Little argued with Pinto, and Conger, who hadn't pitched since he was a senior in high school three years ago, looked confused by the turn of events. Little was forced to bring in outfielder Joe Farrell to finish the ninth.

"He [Pinto] said, `I've got to do it,' " explained Conger. "He said he had warned the teams and he was going by the book. It's going to be expensive. Twenty-five dollars, at least [for being thrown out]."

By then, the game was a farce. Farrell didn't bother to go into a stretch with runners on base and the Spirits didn't try to steal.

"All we're trying to do," said Little of the ninth, "is get through the inning. We're out of relief pitchers because we've got two [Kevin Rychel and Jim Martin] on the disabled list."

Salem's offense fizzled after the first. The two Spirit pitchers faced only 27 hitters the last eight innings - three over the minimum - while scattering eight hits. That's because two Salem runners were thrown out trying to stretch base hits, one was picked off, another was thrown out stealing and the Bucs hit into two double plays.

"I don't want to take anything away from their pitchers, but they made the pitches when they needed them to get the double play ball," Little said. "But we made a couple of base-running boo-boos and got that runner picked off. We were our own worst enemy."

Keywords:
BASEBALL