The Louisville Bats carried a two-hit shutout into the ninth inning before the Nashville Sounds rallied for an improbable 5-4 win at First Horizon Park on Friday evening.
Carson Spiers made his second start of the season for the Bats after returning from a year-long absence recovering from right elbow UCL reconstruction surgery. Each team was held scoreless in the first, with Spiers recording back-to-back strikeouts on called third strikes to begin his outing.
Noelvi Marte provided the game’s first hit to lead off the second inning. He was quickly cut down on a fielder’s choice that Michael Chavis legged out to avoid a double play. The effort translated to a run scored when Orlando Arcia, playing his fourth game with Louisville, doubled down the left-field line to give the Bats a 1-0 lead.
Spiers mirrored his first inning in the second, striking out the first two Sounds batters he faced to make it six up, six down.
A fifth Spiers strikeout to open the bottom half of the third gave way to the first Nashville base runner of the game following a walk. Dominic Pitelli then committed a fielding error at third, allowing two Sounds runners to reach without a hit. A fielder’s choice placed runners at the corners with the potential tying run 90 feet from home, but Spiers eluded trouble by recording the third out on a harmless fly ball.
Will Benson walked and swiftly stole second base in a scoreless fourth for the Bats offense, his 10th Triple-A swipe of the season.
The Sounds notched their first hit of the game to open the bottom of the fourth, a hard-hit ball off the bat of Blake Burke that resulted in a leadoff double. Two ground outs and a strikeout kept the one-run lead intact.
Spiers allowed only his second hit of the game to leadoff the fifth. The righty stifled any further offense with his seventh and eighth strikeouts of the game, including an inning-ending strikeout-throw-out double play capped off by P.J. Higgins.
Louisville’s offense went down 1-2-3 for the second straight inning in the top of the sixth, failing to record a hit since the run-scoring second inning.
Two ground outs separated by a fly out ended a sixth and final shutout inning at the hands of Spiers, whose night ended with eight strikeouts, two hits, and one walk.
Chase Petty entered with the Bats clinging to a 1-0 lead in the seventh. He worked a clean inning highlighted by a strong play on a ground ball deep into the hole at shortstop by Arcia.
In search of insurance runs, the Bats offense got the first two batters of the eighth on base, led by a single from Higgins and a bunt base hit by Pitelli. Following a strikeout, Leo Balcazar walked to load the bases for Benson. A weak pop-up into foul territory brought the Sounds a step closer to escaping the inning.
Marte provided an important two-out hit, clearing the bases with a three-run double to extend the Louisville advantage to 4-0.
Petty worked another perfect inning in the bottom of the eighth, supported by two strikeouts. The Sounds remained hitless since the fifth inning.
Anthony Misiewicz began the bottom of the ninth with Bats pitching twirling a two-hitter. Trailing by four runs, the Sounds began to rally with consecutive singles. A hit-by-pitch loaded the bases and improbably brought the tying run to the plate.
Misiewicz was replaced by Zach Maxwell (L, 2-2) following a first out that kept all base runners stagnant.
Maxwell recorded the second out on a threatening fly ball to right field, scoring Nashville’s first run of the game. A second run scored on a single, further narrowing the deficit. The Sounds then made it a one-run game on an infield hit that Balcazar double clutched before throwing too late to first.
With the tying and winning runs in scoring position for the Sounds, Maxwell delivered a wild pitch into the dirt that evaded his catcher. Scrambling to gather the loose ball as the tying run scored, Higgins failed to relay a throw to Maxwell covering home plate, allowing the walk-off, game-winning run to cross underneath the tag.
Louisville pitching allowed five runs to score on four hits and an error in the final inning, squandering an otherwise excellent night of pitching from the combination of Spiers and Petty. The loss is the Bats' fourth-straight one-run defeat this week in Nashville.
The Bats (58-76, 19-42 2nd half) continue the six-game road series against the Nashville Sounds (75-60, 32-28 2nd half) on Saturday evening. First pitch is scheduled for 7:35 p.m. at First Horizon Park. Nick Curran will be on the call for Talk Radio 1080.