Sunday, June 26, 2005

L 5-2

Zebulon, NC --- Chris Young homered twice to lead the Birmingham Barons by the Carolina Mudcats 5-2 on Sunday afternoon at Five County Stadium.

Young homered on a two-strike pitch in the first inning to hand the Barons (40-35, 4-2) a 2-0 lead, then took Carolina starter Yorman Bazardo (L, 5-5) deep again in the sixth to complete a three-RBI day.  Young homered against Mudcats reliever Ross Wolf on Saturday night.

Sean Tracey (W, 8-3) became the league's third eight-game winner, allowing two runs over 6 1/3 innings, despite walking five.  Carolina (45-29, 4-2) put the leadoff batter aboard in six of Tracey's seven innings, but scored just twice.

Bazardo allowed a season-high 10 hits over six innings, fanning one and intentionally walking one.  Ryan Baker pitched two scoreless innings allowing two hits, while Mike McNutt permitted a solo homer to Pedro Lopez in the ninth inning.

Jeremy Hermida had two of Carolina's six hits, walked and scored one of the Mudcats runs.  Carolina's major scoring chance came in the fourth inning, loading the bases with no outs, but managing just one run.  Drew Niles' grounder scored Hermida, forcing out James Shanks at second base, but Niles was picked off at first, followed by a bouncer to Tracey off the bat of Dennis Anderson.

Josh Johnson (7-3, 2.99) will start Monday night at 7:15 PM ET against Birmingham RH Charles Haeger (1-0, 7.20)

BIRMINGHAM            2 0 0   1 0 1   0 0 1   ---   5   13   0   7

CAROLINA                0 0 0   1 0 0   1 0 0   ---   2    6   0   5

WP - Tracey (8-3)

LP - Bazardo (5-5)

S - Jenks (17)

HR - Young 2 (15, 16), Lopez (1)

Time:  2:27

Att:  3,669