Stars Close To Wild Card

Connor Shreve

The Huntsville Stars set season highs Wednesday night at Regions Field in beating up on the Birmingham Barons 17-4.

Taylor Green extended his team RBI lead, now at 75, with six runs knocked in as part of a perfect 5-5 night from the plate. Green helped spur the team to the seasons best run output (17) and hit total (22).

Birmingham attempted to take advantage of two Stars miscues in the second which built a 2-1 home club lead. But the Barons luck was not enough for a bullpen that has been shaky all season long. The Stars brought ten batters to the plate in a six run fifth inning that only proved to be the beginning of the Stars scoring frenzy.

Greens 11th home run added three runs to the sixth inning total of five. The rest of the offense would not be outdone, continuing to gush through the nozzle that is the Barons pen until the final out mercifully ended a contest that neared the three and one half hour mark. Not one offensive player left the field without at least one hit.

Overshadowed perhaps was the work of Huntsville hurler Mike Bowman, who rebounded from a rough performance last time out to pick up his ninth win of the year. Bowman gave up only the two unearned runs on seven hits. He picked up three punch outs and gave out two free passes to first base.

Huntsville also received some help from the division and wild card leaders and now sit 2.5 games back of the wild card heading in to Thursday's game two. The Stars rotation is set up well; Mark Rogers and Amaury Rivas are set to throw at some point in the next three days.

Thursdays game begins at 7:05 (CDT) on the Stars Radio Network and www.huntsvillestars.com