Cardinals overcome defensive miscues, down Challengers 9-

The Challengers had two terrible innings which the Bern Cardinals profited from in a 9-8 loss.

Five of those runs were unearned as the Challengers' infield committed four costly errors.

Thomas Burger went 6 1-3 innings in his longest outing since going six innings on August 10, 2008 against the Reussbühl Eagles, and his offense contributed 11 hits in the loss.

Tobias Siegrist led all batters with a 4-for-5 performance against Tobias Imboden, who went the distance. He earned the win by allowing eight runs - three of them unearned - on 11 hits, four walks and two hit-by-pitches.

The Challengers took the lead in the second inning on Jesus Martinez' RBI-triple, followed by Chris Palatinus' RBI-single.

But the Cards came back with four unearned runs as third baseman Biran Hipps made a bad throw on Samuel Paulino's grounder with the bases loaded and two outs.

Shortstop Ueli von Burg followed with a bad throw of his own on the following batter.

But the Challengers responded with four runs on two fielding errors, an RBI-single by Siegrist, and Hipps' two-run single.

Then the two teams settled down and exchanged zeros over the next three innings.

The Challengers extended their lead in the top of the seventh on Carlos Peña's RBI-single and a catcher's interference credited to Jesus Martinez with the bases loaded.

The Challengers couldn't hold their lead, though, as the Cards got to Burger with five singles and a double in the bottom half of the inning.

Siegrist took over and managed to retire the final two batters to prevent further damage.

But his offense failed to score in the final two innings, leaving the bases loaded in the eighth and stranding a runner at third base in the ninth.

Game notes
Siegrist last had four hits on May 19, 2007 against the Lausanne Indians. ...Burger completed his 250th IP in the NLA by retiring Martin Gygax leading off the sixth inning. ...The Cardinals went 3-for-19 with runners in scoring position.