THUNDER BAY -- Not even Anthony Brocato could save the Thunder Bay Border Cats on this night.
Brocato belted his team-leading eighth home run of the season and doubled in two more runs for a four-RBI night, but it was all the offence the Cats could muster at Tbaytel Park and they went down to a 7-4 defeat Wednesday night at the hands of the visiting Waterloo Bucks.
He’d trade it all for a win.
“We had a big win the other night and it would have been nice to sweep a series,” said Brocato, who has eight homeruns and increased his RBI total to 27.
Typical of the Border Cats this season, it’s the little things that went wrong against the Bucks, who also rode a stellar pitching performance from starter Brett Solano, who lasted into the seventh, allowing just three runs on eight hits.
Take the eighth inning as an example.
It started well, in fact, about as well as a team down by three runs, could hope.
Gui Gingras, Jordan Gillerman and Mitch Bigras hit back-to-back-to-back singles, to start the inning, a golden opportunity to claw their way back into the contest.
But the clutch hit never came.
Jesse Lee struck out swinging and catcher Michael Papierski grounded into a first-pitch double play to end the threat.
Brocato said the team can’t blame one at bat for losing the game.
“If Jesse strikes out, we still have to try to squeak something by. (Papierski) did a pretty good job putting the ball in play it just didn’t fall our way,” he said.
Waterloo manager Scott Douglas said sometimes the bounces just don't go your way -- and sometimes they do.
"Anytime you win a ballgame, I don't care what anyone says, you're going to get lucky. You're going to squeeze out of some jams and you've got to have some flares fall in for you. Maybe perhaps we had a few more than them," Douglas said.
The Bucks, still in the playoff hunt based on the team’s overall record, scraped their way to the lead, scoring single runs in the second and third off Border Cats starter Dan McBryan, then added three more in the fourth off reliever Angelo Spedafino to take a 5-0 lead.
Luke Barry singled to score two, stole second then scored himself on a Lane Milligan hit.
The Cats (7-11) finally got on the board in their half of the fourth, Brocato slamming a 1-2 count over the outfield fence after Shane Shepard had walked to open the inning, closing the Thunder Bay deficit to three at the time.
He doubled over the wall in centre in the seventh to plate two more, the final runs of the contest. Patrick Boyle went three innings of relief for the Border Cats, with Cameron Churchill coming out of the pen to pitch a perfect ninth.
Kyle Crowl was 3-for-4 with an RBI for the Bucks (8-11), who were outhit 12-10 on the night. All-star Derek Hendrixson tossed a 1-2-3 ninth to collect the save, his fourth.
Thunder Bay heads to Rochester on Thursday.
