Barracudas 13, Challengers 10

Armin Blickenstorfer">Armin Blickenstorfer>

Armin Blickenstorfer hit his team-leading third homer of the season in the bottom of the seventh.

The Challengers lost against the Barracudas in the first game of Saturday's doubleheader after leading 8-3 in the sixth inning. The Barracudas scored seven unearned runs off starter Thomas Landis (4-4) in the sixth after left fielder Makoto Fukamachi couldn't handle a fly ball hit by Holgi Schmidt with two outs.

The host Challengers quickly jumped on starter Ueli von Burg and profited from a shaky performance by the righthander. He had four wild pitches in just 3.2 innings of work and his defense wasn't very solid either. They committed four errors that led to three unearned runs.

The Challengers held an 8-6 lead in the top of the sixth with two outs. With runners on second and first, Schmidt hit a high fly ball to left center and Fukamachi tried to get under the ball but lost it after he had it track down back to the wall. Both runners scored and five more followed on two homers, a base-on-balls and a hit-by-pitch. Landis was relieved after giving up his third homer of the day and Bosshard retired the first batter he faced.

The Challengers then came back in the sixth with a runner on first, but lost him on a pickoff throw from catcher Dave Sekac to first. Eichenberger struck out and Fukamachi redeemed himself by hitting a ball over the left center field wall, the same spot where he dropped the ball just minutes before.

In the seventh, leadoff batter Bryan Shemley was walked and Landis then hit a grounder to short. He flipped the ball to the second baseman who was way off the bag but the umpire called Shemley out at second and von Burg completed the double play by throwing Landis out at first.

Armin Blickenstorfer followed with his third homer of the year to cut the lead to 10-13 with two outs in the seventh. Chris Palatinus was next and hit a hard liner to right field. Adris Linares raced back to the wall and made a spectacular catch just in front of the fence to end the game.

Coach Marvin Moore of the Challengers was thrown out of the game after arguing the umpire's bad call on second base.

The Barracudas were also dissatisfied by the way the plate umpire handled his strike zone, but it didn't matter to them as they came out winners in a hard-fought victory.