Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: FRIDAY, April 22, 1994 TAG: 9404220079
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-5 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RAY COX STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Predictably, the Wilmington Blue Rocks' sweep of the Salem Buccaneers was followed by a chat between Salem manager Trent Jewett and his ballclub.
"Just a little heart-to-heart," Jewett said after a lengthy closed-door lecture. "They're not trying to lose. They're not trying to commit errors."
But the losses have been coming with depressing regularity, the latest frown-maker an 8-5 setback to the Rocks that was accompanied by three more lethal Bucs errors before a somber audience Thursday night at Salem's Municipal Field.
Salem (5-9) has lost eight of nine and looks like a different club from the one that played the first two weeks of the Carolina League season.
Part of the reason is injuries. Salem is down to three outfielders now that Jake Austin, the No. 3 hitter in the lineup, is out with a pulled hamstring. That sent Jon Farrell to center field for the first time this season and moved Daryl Ratliff to right. Jeff Conger (.333, 11 runs) is chilling on the disabled list with sore ribs.
The batting order also has been juggled as a result, with Chance Sanford moving into Austin's spot and Farrell being bumped from cleanup to sixth.
"Things are going bad," Jewett said. "That's baseball. When things are going bad, they're bad, whether it's football, baseball or selling cars."
The game came apart for Salem suddenly and without warning in the fourth inning. Bucs starter Ted Klamm had been pitching well, getting five of his first six outs on strikeouts. Then, with two out and one on, Klamm tried to make a spectacular play on an infield bleeder by Lance Jennings and threw the ball wildly past first base as the runner hustled around to score and Jennings went to third.
"That ball you have to eat," said Dave Rajsich, Salem's pitching coach.
Ramon Martinez and Felix Martinez, the last two batters in the Wilmington order, followed with back-to-back RBI doubles, and Johnny Damon came through in the next at-bat with a run-scoring single.
"The physical error carried over to the next couple of batters," Rajsich said. "Klamm's an emotional young man, very involved in the game. He got too caught up in the error when he should have forgotten about it and gone on."
Wilmington (8-5) piled on three more runs in the sixth inning off newly promoted Jason Abramavicius to make the score 8-1. The killer blow was Damon's first homer of the year, a three-run shot.
"It was a 1-1 count, and I think it was a high slider," Damon said of the pitch. "I really wasn't thinking about anything. He just threw it in the right spot and I swung and hit it on the right spot."
Damon had five hits the previous night and is 7-for-11 in the past two games.
"Mostly, balls are falling where nobody is," Damon said.
Salem scored four runs in the seventh and eighth innings, but it was too little, too late.
"Most teams that just lost three in a row wouldn't have scored another run after going down 8-1," Jewett said.
Dario Perez snuffed a Salem rally when he came on with a man on second and two out in the eighth and struck out Raul Paez looking. Perez retired the side in order in the ninth.
"We let them get close, but Dario shut the door on them," said Mike Jirschele, Wilmington's manager.
\ BUCSHOTS: Salem added a coach this week in Jay Bluthardt, who played high school baseball with Jewett in Carrollton, Texas. . . . Abramavicius had not given up a run with Augusta of the South Atlantic League. He pitched Wednesday night, then hit the road for Salem, where he ran into a detour on Interstate 77 in North Carolina and had to cut back through Greensboro, where he encountered another detour. The trip was many hours longer than it should have been. . . . Ben Oglivie, the Pittsburgh Pirates' roving hitting instructor, was in town Thursday, joining fitness guru Bill Henry, who has been here all week.
Keywords:
BASEBALL
by CNB