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| Luke Ritter's swing as he connected on his 13th Triple-A home run of the season for Syracuse (Herm Card - Herm4444@gmail.com). |
Syracuse, NY – It just wasn’t the Syracuse Mets’ day on Wednesday. Buffalo scored the final 12 runs in the ballgame on the Bisons’ way to a 14-2 win over the Mets in the Wednesday afternoon game at NBT Bank Stadium. The six-game series is now tied at one game apiece.
It took two batters for Buffalo (59-61, 24-21) to shoot in front. Nathan Lukes led off the top of the first with a single, followed by a Rafael Lantigua two-run home run that powered the Bisons to a 2-0 advantage. Lantigua had three hits in Tuesday evening’s series opener and entered this week’s series batting .345 against the Mets this season.
Syracuse (50-69, 17-28) tied the game right back up with two runs in the bottom of the third via maybe their hottest hitter. With Ronny Mauricio on first base and two outs, Luke Ritter slugged a game-tying, two-run shot over the fence in right-center field. Ritter now has 27 home runs between Double-A and Triple-A this season, which leads all Mets minor leaguers. Ritter has also hit home runs in four out of his last five games.
From there, the scoring deluge for the Bisons began. Buffalo took the lead for good with three runs in the top of the fourth, sending nine men to the plate in the process. The Bisons scored the three runs on just two hits, benefitting from two costly Mets errors while drawing two walks and also scoring a run when a batter was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded. A two-run single from Lukes highlighted the three-run frame for Buffalo, but the errors made all three runs unearned as Buffalo took a 5-2 lead.
The scoring would only continue from there for the Bisons. Buffalo scored three more times in the sixth to make it an 8-2 game. Three additional hits helped to push across the three runs, highlighted by a two-run single from Orlevis Martinez. The highly-touted Blue Jays prospect bounced back nicely with the run-producing hit, as he had struck out three times in Tuesday night’s game.
Buffalo capped off their scoring flurry with two runs in the seventh, a lone run in the eighth and three more runs in the ninth. In the seventh, Mason McCoy hit a two-run homer to make it a 10-2 game. In the eighth, an RBI single from Ernie Clement pushed the lead to 11-2. Clement entered the week batting .469 against the Mets this season. In the ninth, the scoring bonanza came to a fitting conclusion when Martinez crushed a three-run shot over the left-field fence to make it a 14-2 game. Martinez finished the game 3-for-3 at the plate with a double, a single, a home run, two runs scored, and five runs driven in.
While the Bisons offense rightly deserves praise, Buffalo’s bullpen was the unsung hero in Wednesday’s game. After Mitch White allowed two runs in his four-inning start, five other arms got the job done the rest of the way. Brandon Eisert, Matt Wisler, Zach Pop, Connor Cooke, and Rowan Wick tossed the final five innings in scoreless fashion, allowing just one hit and two walks while striking out eight batters. In fact, the Syracuse Mets had just one baserunner in the final four innings of the game.
Syracuse continues the second half of its two-week homestand this week against the Buffalo Bisons. The third game of this six-game series is slated for a 6:35 p.m. start time on Thursday. Left-hander Joey Lucchesi is slated to start for the Mets.
Ronny Mauricio now has a hit in 15 of his last 16 games
— SNY Mets (@SNY_Mets) August 23, 2023
He has a hit in all but 2 games in the month of August pic.twitter.com/4HAAFp7fO9
Luke Ritter: unconscious
— Syracuse Mets (@SyracuseMets) August 23, 2023
He ties this one up with a two-run blast - his 27th HR of the season 💪 pic.twitter.com/mUiRmrfZZA
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