Maxx Garrett stepped up to the plate in the bottom of the twelfth inning with the Wild Things trailing 2-1 riding an 0-for-27 streak. He proceeded to hit a two-out, two-run home run to give the Washington Wild Things an improbable 3-2 victory over the Florence Freedom on Saturday evening at CONSOL Energy Park.
The Garrett home run capped off an intense night of baseball that saw the Wild Things (29-36) being one-hit through six innings while trailing 1-0.
They would tie things in the seventh thanks to some small-ball. David Popkins led the inning off with a single and took second on a stolen base. Third basemen Cody Herald moved him to third on a sacrifice bunt and Austin Wobrock provided the RBI with a single to left field.
Both teams then exchanged zeros on the scoreboard until the twelfth when Florence scored a run in the top of the inning without recording a hit thanks to the International Tiebreak rule.
Washington responded, however, when Garrett sent an 0-1 fastball over the right-center field fence with Andrew Heck on second — thanks to the International Tiebreak rule — to produce Washington’s second walk-off in as many nights and end his offensive skid.
“What else can you do?” said Garrett. “Coach Davis has been helping me a lot and I’ve really been listening to him. The biggest thing about this is these guys out here have my back. That makes it easy to come to the yard and put in work to help break out of it.”
Matt Fraudin started the game for the Wild Things and kept them within striking distance thanks to a five inning, four-hit, one-run performance while striking out two and walking one.
“Fraudin did a great job tonight,” said Wild Things manager Bob Bozzutto. “He threw strikes, he battled through it and did a good job. He did his job and got us through the fifth.”
The bullpen then took over and pulled out a gutsy, seven innings of relief while allowing the one international tiebreak run, which is unearned, to score.
Washington pulls to within five games of the final Frontier League playoff spot with the win and will look to sweep Florence Sunday afternoon at 2:35.
Starters Lines
(WAS) Fraudin (ND): 5 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 2 K’s. 75 Pitches (48 Strikes).
(FLO) McGrath (ND): 5.2 IP, 1 H, 2 BB, 8 K’s. 75 Pitches (52 Strikes).
(Photo Credit: Washington Wild Things)
