Dieterich, Miners get revenge in 13-inning no-hitter

Miners LHP Blake Dieterich held the Oilers
hitless through nine innings.

The Mat-Su Miners, fresh off a no-hitter loss to Eddie Orozco and the Oilers, showed last night that they weren't quite ready to give up first place in the ABL. What did they do? Put up a no-hitter of their own in a game that proved to be about as perfect a definition of the phrase "pitching duel" as any I've ever heard of.

Blake Dieterich got the start on the mound for the Miners and threw nine stellar innings of baseball, giving up no runs on no hits and walking just two. Dieterich also struck out three over the nine complete frames. At the end of regulation play, however, the scoreboard was still reading all goose-eggs. This game would go into extra innings and Dieterich would not get the official complete game.

The pitchers for the opposing Oilers were throwing beautiful baseball as well. Kellen Moen went five strong innings, surrendering three hits and two walks while striking out five. Taylor Garrison carried the shutout through the eighth with three innings, two hits, no walks, and sitting down a pair. Jorge Marban came in to close out the ninth with a perfect frame, and went on to total 3.2 IP, 1 H, 0 BB, and 3K. In extra frames, Adam Heredia threw a hit-less 1/3 inning, walking one as well.

It was big man Kolby Moore of the Oilers who stumbled in the top of the 13th to break the logjam, though he had plenty of help from the Oilers defense in giving the game away. Miner Brett Schwartz doubled and scored the go-ahead run on an error; Matt Ozanne and Nick DeBiasse would cross the plate on some manufactured insurance runs thanks to another error and an RBI by Pablo Bermudez.

Reflections: Pilots @ Miners, June 7 2010

Last night's preseason exhibition between the Anchorage Glacier Pilots and the Mat-Su Miners was a good one. I'm still in Oregon, so I had to catch the game audio online at the Glacier Pilots' website, and participated in the live chatroom available from the Miners. But the play-by-play was excellent and I'll share my thoughts with you from afar.

It was kind of a bad night for Ben Mount. He gave up three runs in the first two innings, and he's lucky to have escaped without more than that. He seemed like he was hit-or-miss on the night; it sounded like his breaking stuff was sharp but had trouble with his location. In any event, he racked up almost 60 pitches in the first two innings and the Pilots lifted him for local product Jesse McCartney.

After that it was solid pitching. And where the heck did McCartney come from? He's a local guy from the Anchorage adult league, listed as a fielder, but after Mount got smacked around he came in to pitch and totally tamed the Miners' bats. I don't know if he's for real or not, but A+ performance. On the other side, how about Miners left-hander Blake Dieterich out of the University of Georgia? To me, it didn't sound like he was treating it as a preseason warm-up; he was in it to win it. He pitched into the fifth when Bradley left-hander Joe Birch and then Florida State rightie Gage Smith came in to successfully close it out. Both looked very good.