Late Steamroll From Locos Drops Clips in Ten 

Jonathan Timm

Muskegon, MI: The Muskegon crowd was on the edge of their seat until the final out of a heartbreaking Clippers (8-14) to the Lima Locos (15-6) with a final score of 5-4 at Marsh Field on July 1st.  

Locos led 4-3 after scoring two runs in the seventh. Down to his last strike in the bottom of the ninth with two outs and with the, Ethan Delgado smashed a double into the left center field gap to revive the Clippers chances. Taylor Head skied an infield pop up that got lost in the West Michigan sky, and dropped to allow Delgado to score.

Alex Hardacre would get his first loss of the year after the Locos took the lead right back in the top of the 10th off of an RBI-single from Cole Crafton to go ahead 5-4.

Starting pitcher Reid Leonard kept the game close in his six innings pitched, allowing two earned runs, one walk, seven strikeouts and four hits, bringing his season ERA to 1.80.

Leonard’s first bit of run support came from Delgado’s 2-RBI single in the second inning to make it 2-0.

Locos scratched their first run of the game in the third, but Ashten Wong got the Clippers lead back to a pair in the fourth inning with an RBI-double to score the previous double from Nolan Zajac to make it 3-1.

After a throw to second went into center field, the Locos got one more in the top of the fifth inning when scored an RBI-single to bring it to 3-2 Clips. 

Chase Schwierking was the first man in relief for Leonard and went 2.2 innings while racking up four strikeouts, four hits and two earned runs. 

In the 10th inning, after Hardacre was figured out by the Locos, Davis Weeks inherited runners at the corners down five runs to four. A line drive was hauled in by Head at shortstop who couldn’t throw out the runner trying to get back to third, but put the ball in the hands of JUCO teammate Casey Barnes, who noticed a Loco in no man’s land across the diamond, completing a 6-5-3 double play. 

Marion Creech only allowed his second earned run of the year in the bottom of the ninth. The Clippers came close to getting a third in the bottom of the tenth after Braden Graves doubled in the same spot as Delgado. With a runner in scoring position, Joe Chrapliwy would be the final out of the game in the 5-4 loss. 

Clippers will try to tie the series up on Wednesday at Historic Marsh with first pitch at 6:35.