The Mahoning Valley Scrappers were finally able to get one over on Williamsport taking the finale of the three game set, 3-0. In front of 3,945 fans on fireworks night.   Marty Popham had his best career start with help from two relievers to keep the Crosscutters off of the scoreboard. 

Popham was the story in this game as he reached career highs in innings pitched throwing six scoreless frames.  He also struck out six batters, another career best.  He walked no one and was never really in trouble.  Popham’s shutout effort was preserved by Guido Fonseca and Cory Burns.  Burns recorded his second save.

Mahoning Valley got on the scoreboard in the bottom of the fifth inning.  John Allman walked and scored on a Kyle Bellows RBI double.  Bellows later scored on a Tim Palincsar RBI single making it 2-0 in favor of the Scrappers.

The Scrappers added an insurance run in the bottom of the seventh when Bellows reached on a throwing error.  With one out, Kyle Smith and Tim Palincsar walked to load the bases.  Catcher Dwight Childs groundout to second base was enough to score Bellows to make it 3-0 in favor of the home team.

Interestingly enough, the Scrappers only had two hits and still managed to score three runs.  Manager Travis Fryman said, ” Timely hits are certainly better than a plethora of hits.  Timely hits are the best kind.”

Jason Smit had a weird game for the Scrappers on offense.  Smit was hit by pitches in his third and fourth at-bats.  His second at-bat resulted in a poor call by the two-man umpire crew as Smit hit a laser to center that everyone but the umpire saw the center fielder trap.  The umpires called Smit out.  After the game, Smit commented, ” Definitely a strange game, not too many things went my way tonight.  I took one in the back and also got hit pretty hard in my achiles.  The thing is that they’re here (the umpires in the Penn League), just like we are, to learn.  They’re trying their hardest, so what can you do.”

Fourth-round draft pick Kyle Bellows commented on how it felt to finally come through fot the Scrappers offense.  ” It feels great to help the team win.  We’ll take ’em how we can get ’em right now.  We aren’t scoring a lot of runs, we’re working hard and it’s been paying off.”

The Scrappers head out to Jamestown for a special 1:05 start time for the 4th of July.