Smokies crush Stars

By Aaron Morse

The Tennessee Smokies took advantage of a wild Mark Rogers in the first inning on their way to a 13-3 victory over the Huntsville Stars Sunday afternoon.

Early on it looked like Huntsville was going to have a good day. In the top of the first, Caleb Gindl and Brett Lawrie started things with back-to-back singles. One out later Chris Nowak singled home Gindl and Lawrie went corner to corner. A Taylor Green sacrifice fly made the score 2-0 Stars.

But the lead didn’t last long.

After retiring the first batter he faced, Rogers walked the next four hitters in a row in the bottom half of the frame. A passed ball scored the second run of the inning and Brandon Guyer smacked a three-run homer to give Tennessee the 5-2 lead.

With two outs and nobody on in the second, Brett Jackson smacked a solo home run to extend the lead to four. The second inning was Rogers’ last as he went two innings, giving up six runs (all earned) on two hits, both homers. He walked four and struck-out one. The two homers he gave up were more than he’d given up all season entering the game. In fact, all three home runs he’s surrendered in 2010 have come against Tennessee.

A Nate Sampson sacrifice fly in the third against reliever Eddie Morlan gave Tennessee a 7-2 lead.

The score stayed that way until the eighth inning when Andy Machado delivered a pinch-hit RBI double to cut the deficit to four.

Unfortunately Tennessee put the game away in the bottom half of the frame as they exploded for six runs off Stars’ reliever Robert Hinton. Only two of the runs were earned, but the damage was done.

Gindl, Lawrie, and Nowak tallied multi-hit games for the Stars. Meanwhile Morlan (three IP, one run) and Jeremy Jeffress (two IP, one hit, no runs) pitched well out of the bullpen in the loss.