Miners close out home season with win; in battle for ABL crown

PALMER — Winners of four straight, the Mat-Su Miners find themselves in a close race for the Alaska Baseball League title as the summer season winds down.

Mat-Su (17-11) sit just 1.5 games behind first-place Alaska Goldpanners with seven games left to play — and the final four games of the season are on the road against the Goldpanners July 25-27.

In fact, the Miners will play all their remaining games on the road after capping their 2013 home season at Hermon Brothers Field with an exciting 5-4 win Sunday over the Chugiak Chinooks. That followed a dominating 13-2 drubbing of the Chinooks the night before.

Miners 5, Chinooks 4

The Miners won their final home game and remain undefeated against the Chinooks on the season (5-0) in dramatic fashion Sunday. The Chinooks had the tying run at third base with one out, but could not get the run across as the Miners turned a 6-4-3 double play to end the game.

“They hit me kind of a slow ground ball and it was going to be a tough double play,” shortstop AJ Simcox said. “[Brenden] Farney made a heck of a turn right there; he got rid of it quick and we got the guy, I think, by a half a step to win the ballgame.”

Simcox gave the Miners an early lead with an RBI single in the bottom of the third inning. After Chugiak tied the game in the top of the fifth, Mat-Su answered in the bottom half of the inning to take a 2-1 lead on a Spencer Mahoney RBI double.

Catcher Nick La Face extended the lead with an RBI triple and then came home to score on a wild pitch, making it a 4-1 lead for Mat-Su. The triple was the second of the year for La Face, who tied Christin Stewart for the team lead in that category.

“I was just running out of the box really fast and I’m glad it got down,” La Face said. “I haven’t hit this many triples in such a short span of time since tee-ball.”

Following the seventh-inning stretch, Ben Wylly hit a solo home run for the Miners over the right field fence to make the score 5-2. Wylly finished the game 2-for-3 at the plate with a walk and two runs scored to go along with his first home run of the season.

The Chinooks scored two runs in the top of the ninth to make it a one-run game before closer Drew Smith got the ground ball to Simcox,who started the game-ending double play. Steven Keenum picked up the win, improving to 2-0 and Smith earned his fifth save.

Simcox finished the game 3-for-4, raising his batting average to .339 on the summer and extending his hitting streak to 10 games. In 27 games played, the Knoxville, Tenn., native has recorded a hit in 25 of them. Simcox leads the Alaska Baseball League with 37 hits while the Miners lead the league with a .275 team batting average.

“I definitely didn’t have that type of success freshman year of college. There were some definite growing pains there,” Simcox said. “I think as a whole, as a team, we’ve kind of matured as the season’s gone on and our approaches have been good throughout the year.”

In the final home game, Mat-Su generated its largest attendance with 1,192 at MTA Fan Appreciation Day at the ballpark. The Miners have seven league games remaining that include two in Chugiak against the Chinooks, one in Anchorage against the Pilots and four in Fairbanks against the Goldpanners. The Miners are in second place in the standings trailing the Goldpanners by a game and a half.

“It’s important to not scoreboard watch and see what other teams are doing,” La Face said. “It’s really important to take one game at a time, know that whoever’s in front of us we take care of business and beat them.”

Miners 13, Chinooks 2

Before Sunday’s home closer, the Miners took care of the Chinooks on Saturday at Hermon Brothers Field, beating the Chugiak-Eagle River team 13-2 final in an error-filled game. The Miners entered the night following two off days — the first off days since June 24.

“That 18 games in 16 days is pretty tough when you’re in the grind and finally you have the off day to reset,” center fielder Ben Wylly said. “We did a really good job of staying focused and not having a hangover for this game and being ready to go from pitch one.”

Wylly finished the game 3-for-4 at the plate with a walk, two runs and two RBI. Wylly is 6-11 over of his last three games with a walk, three runs and three RBI in that span. Catcher Micheal Thomas also had a multiple-hit game, going 3-for-5 with a double, a run and two RBI. Thomas has nine RBI over his last eight starts.

“It’s just more of the mental aspect of ‘see ball, hit ball’ kind of deal,” Thomas said. “It’s coming together pretty nicely for me and I’m glad that it’s doing so at the right moment.”

The Miners took a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the third inning as both Wylly and Spencer Mahoney scored on a wild pitch and error. The Miners added one more run each in the fourth and fifth innings to make the score 4-1 as both runs were generated as a result of errors from the Chinooks defense.

“Those small things are going to help us win this league,” Thomas said.

Mat-Su continued to push runs across the plate, scoring four in the sevent and five runs in the eighth. The offense finished the contest with 15 hits. Five of the nine starters in the batting order had a multiple-hit game and eight of the starters scored a run.

Ty Schlottmann led the Miners on the mound Saturday evening. Schlottmann showed some command issues in the first two innings, but was able to get out of jams without surrendering any runs.

“I think I settled in in the third and I really started getting a better feel for all my pitches,” Schlottmann said. “Mike [Thomas] was seeing some things with my mechanics, which I think helped a lot when he gave me a few tips.”

Schlottmann’s night was done after six innings in which he gave up one run on three hits with four walks and eight strikeouts. The left-handed pitcher from Brenham, Texas, improved his overall record to 3-1 on the summer.

“When your mechanics are off but you’re still getting out of jams, that builds a lot of confidence,” Schlottmann said.

The Chinooks committed five errors on the night leading to five unearned runs for the Chugiak pitching staff.

“We’re the type of team that’s going to capitalize on mistakes because that’s the way we play,” Wylly said. “You can’t beat us and give us extra outs; that’s never going to happen.”

The Miners will finish out the season with seven road games. They next play two more games against the Chinooks — 6 p.m., Tuesday and Wednesday — at Chugiak-Eagle River at Loretta French Field. They then have a week off before playing the Anchorage Glacier Pilots at Mulchahy Field in Anchorage, then play four games against ABL-leading Alaska Goldpanners July 25-27 at Growden Memorial Field in Fairbanks.

Miners notes: The Mat-Su Miners have won four straight games. … Christin Stewart continues to lead the Alaska Baseball League in RBI. His 27 RBI leads by nine over the next player on the list. … Pitcher Philip Orr is No. 3 in the league in ERA with a 0.95 mark. Logan McAnallen of the Peninsula Oilers leads the league with a 0.61 ERA.

Mario Gonzalez is a media advisor for the Mat-Su Miners.