ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Tuesday, May 7, 1996 TAG: 9605070066
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C-1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: RAY COX STAFF WRITER
Just about any time a baseball team that has been going well for a while falls flat with a poor outing, somebody almost invariably says, ``They were due.''
It's almost as though they're saying the team had somehow deserved such an unhappy fate.
Only a cold and heartless sort would say anybody deserved the type of game the Salem Avalanche had Monday night at Memorial Stadium. The Avalanche was clobbered 9-4 by the Prince Williams Cannons as a crowd of 4,124 looked on until rain finally drove the fans for cover.
The Cannons, the only team in the Carolina League that has a winning record against Salem (the Avalanche hasn't met the Durham Bulls this season), won for the third time in four outings against Salem.
``We've caught them at the right time, I guess,'' said Dave Huppert, Prince William's manager. ``When we played them up at our place, it was cold as heck in the first series of the season.''
There wasn't much cold about this game unless you're using the term to loosely describe the condition of the pitching and defense. A combined 27 hits (16 by the Cannons) indicated the pitching problems affected both dugouts at various times. Seven errors (five by the Avalanche) said all that needed to be said about the play in the field.
``Maybe now we can get this out of our system,'' said Bill McGuire, Salem's manager. ``You could see this coming in the last couple of days. We were building up to this. You could tell.''
The Avalanche was getting bounced and battered almost from the start. Prince William pounced for three runs on four hits in the third inning off Salem starter Matt Pool. After Scott LaRock came in to pitch in the fifth, the Cannons were ready to bash. By the end of that inning, they'd run off Pool and LaRock on the way to taking an 8-1 lead.
The Avalanche's response was a Nate Holdren home run that looked as though it might have carried through the fence if it hadn't been hit over it. That was Holdren's team-leading fourth homer of the year.
Additional runs proved to be more elusive as the game progressed. Leadoff doubles by Steven Bernhardt in the sixth and John Giudice in the ninth were turned into Salem's final two runs of the night.
``You can't just show up and rely on your pitching all the time,'' McGuire said. ``It's about time the hitters get together and decide they're going to pick up the pitching. The pitching has sure picked them up enough.''
Salem (19-12) remained in a dead heat with the Durham Bulls atop the Southern Division standings. The Bulls were blanked 2-0 by the Frederick Keys on Monday.
Of the Cannons' 16 hits, four of them came off the bat of left fielder Jason Evans. The No.2 hitter in the Prince William lineup, Evans went 4-for-5 with a triple, a walk and two runs batted in.
``He had a nice year at South Bend last year,'' hitting .281, with six home runs and 36 runs batted in, Huppert said. ``He's been hurt and is just now getting back for us.''
Five other Cannons had two hits each.
The most effective Salem batter was Bernhardt, who saw a lot of fastballs in the No.9 slot in the order. Bernhardt went 3-for-4 with a run scored. Brian Culp, who is struggling along with a .164 batting average, celebrated a move to the No.7 hole in the lineup by drawing three walks.
``We have the best pitching in the league,'' McGuire said. ``This should have been an interesting matchup.''
Much of the interest was derived from some of the offbeat events of the evening. How often is it that umpires call catcher's interference twice and a batter's interference once?
``One or two games like this out of every 30 isn't too bad,'' McGuire said. ``Call it a mulligan and go on to tomorrow.''
LENGTH: Medium: 72 linesby CNB