Tag Archives: Matthew Bowman

The 2014 Binghamton Mets in GIFs

Posted by on 27 May 2014 Comments Off on The 2014 Binghamton Mets in GIFs

The Manchester experience in 16 moving pictures

Less than two months into the 2014 season, the B-Mets already have played their last regular season game of the year in Manchester, NH.  They leave New Hampshire with a 7-3 record at Northeast Delta Dental Stadium after shutouts, blown leads, big hits, occasional downpours, and a 14-inning finale.  Through all of it, the Binghamton roster has remained almost completely unchanged.  Only backup catchers changed places, with Blake Forsythe (on the DL for his entire 2014 B-Mets stint) dealt to Oakland and Nelfi Zapata (who did not appear in a game in Manchester) replacing Xorge Carrillo after the latter’s call-up to Las Vegas.  That’s effectively a stable 25-man roster to work with.

While I try to cover minor league games with as much useful information as possible, I have my limits.  When it comes to giving an illustrated first-hand account that goes beyond what the box score will tell you, I can at least fake competence.  But when people start asking about mechanics, I’ve got nothing.  I don’t like watching games from behind home plate and I can’t tell a curve from a slider.  I can juggle multiple electronic devices and capture photos and video while live-tweeting a game though.  So I added a video camera to my usual game pack and quickly realized that getting sharp video at night games just wasn’t happening.  Oh well.  What does it all add up to?  Damned if I know.

Let’s kick things off with Wilfredo Tovar enthusiastically grounding into a double play.  Is this something he learned during his stint in the big leagues last year?  Wherever he got it from, that’s a heck of a follow-through.

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16 May 2014 – Binghamton Mets at New Hampshire Fisher Cats

Posted by on 17 May 2014 Comments Off on 16 May 2014 – Binghamton Mets at New Hampshire Fisher Cats

Rain for Matthew Bowman, pain for Kevin Plawecki

The Binghamton Mets started their final series of 2014 in Manchester on a rainy Friday night with Matthew Bowman making his first start at Northeast Delta Dental Stadium. The weather produced the bulk of the offense for New Hampshire, helping the Fisher Cats score 6 runs in the 3rd inning. It took a team effort, but the Mets were able to overcome a two-run deficit to take the first game of the series 8-6.

Box Score

Baseballs 3, Plawecki 3

The last time we saw Kevin Plawecki here, he was not a happy camper after a called third strike ended the series with a loss. Maybe it was karma or maybe it was lingering bad feelings, but Plawecki took a beating in his return to Manchester. He took the first pitch he saw for a called strike, which drew comments from the dugout where they could see that the pitch was just a few inches off the ground. The umpire shrugged off the criticism of a call that was ultimately inconsequential as Plawecki took first base after being hit by a pitch. The message to Plawecki was clear: you’d better swing at anything that doesn’t hit you.

Plawecki’s next time up came with one out in the top of the 3rd. Matt Clark had just driven in his second run of the game to put the B-Mets up 2-0. With the Matts in scoring position (Clark on 2B and Reynolds on 3B), Plawecki sent them home on a single to center. 4-0 seemed like a comfortable lead at the time, but then the weather started getting rough.

Special bonus commentary for lip readers

That was Kenny Wilson tripling to center and driving in Jon Berti to put the Fisher Cats on the board. The rain continued to pick up, clearly giving Bowman trouble with his grip. With the wetness came wildness as Bowman hit the next batter, somehow struck out the next one, and then threw one past Plawecki to allow Wilson to score from third.

Seems like it’s hard to hold on to a baseball in the rain…

It got even worse from there. With the rain coming down in buckets, Bowman walked the next two batters to load the bases. That brought up Andy Fermin, who tripled… His RBI total for the season with a grand slam. Bowman got out of the inning with a strikeout as the monsoon let up, but the Mets’ 4-run lead had evaporated in a deluge of Fisher Cats runs.

Things started getting weird in the 5th when Matt Reynolds reached on a throwing error for the second time and Plawecki, after fouling a pitch off himself and hobbling around in pain for a while, got his second HBP of the night. Cory Vaughn and Dustin Lawley would strike out to strand them, but Lawley’s strikeout was delayed because the catcher was slow to catch on when the umpire never called “Out!” at the end of the at-bat. After some confusion, the catcher tagged Lawley and we were on to the bottom half.

Moving on to the top of the 8th, Lawley singled to lead things off, but was out stretching for two. A Jayce Boyd walk and singles by Wilfredo Tovar and Kyle Johnson loaded the bases for Brian Burgamy, who sent a pitch to the left field warning track for an out his first time up. This time he got a better cut and sent the ball into the left field corner, glancing off Jon Berti’s glove to fall in for a 3-RBI double and give the B-Mets the lead. Kevin Plawecki would drive Burgamy in with his third hit of the night before Cory Vaughn ended his second inning in a row to conclude his 0-4 night.

As for New Hampshire, they didn’t have much fight in them after they dried off. They went down in order in the 5th, 6th, and 7th and had one runner in the 8th when Wilfredo Tovar misplayed a pop fly to the right of the pitcher’s mound. Adam Kolarek was brought in with two outs and somehow managed to induce a double play. Everyone was a bit confused on that one… A single in the 9th was the last of the Fisher Cats offense and Chase Bradford struck out Kenny Wilson to end the game.

Final Score: Bingamton 8, New Hampshire 6