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July 23, 2007
When Brandon Moss entered the batters box in the bottom of the 10th inning for Pawtucket, he knew he had the chance to win the game.
And that’s just what he did.
With runners on first and second base and one out, Moss ripped an 0-2 Brian Shackelford pitch between the first and second base gap. The ball continued rolling into right field.
David Murphy (3-for-5, 2 runs scored) rounded third base and sprinted home. Louisville right fielder Dewayne Wise’s throw home went wide right and Murphy slid in safely to score the game-winning run. Pawtucket won 3-2.
Moss was 0-for-4 prior to his game-winning hit.
“I was just trying to have a good at-bat, especially with runners in scoring position,” said Moss, who leads the PawSox in RBI with 62. “I was just trying to barrel the ball up, especially with him being down 0-2. I knew he was going to throw a strike. I didn’t know if it was going to be a fastball or a cutter but I knew it was going to be in the strike zone so I just got geared up and got ready to hit. It worked out well thank goodness.”
Pawtucket starter David Pauley had a perfect game going through four innings but Aaron Herr broke it up in the top of the fifth frame with a leadoff double.
“He pitched outstanding,” Moss said of Pauley. “You don’t see a much better performance than that. He pitched great.”
Herr’s hit didn’t faze Pauley. He retired the next three batters to end the inning. Pauley pitched 7 2/3 innings in all, allowing only two runs on six hits with seven strikeouts and no walks.
“He was outstanding,” Pawtucket manager Ron Johnson said of Pauley. “He had really good stuff. He had really good command of his stuff and we needed that today. We had a tired bullpen and it has been used a lot in the last couple of days so we needed that kind of performance.”
Travis Hughes closed out the game for Pawtucket, going 2.1 innings. He allowed just one hit with four strikeouts.
“He was outstanding,” Johnson said of Hughes.
Pawtucket racked up 13 hits last night, but only two came in a clutch situation which resulted in the close game. Pawtucket was 2-for-10 with runners in scoring position, including 0-for-3 with the bases loaded.
Joe McEwing snapped out of his hitting slump in style when he sent a Victor Santos offering into the bullpen in left field for a solo home run in the bottom of the first inning to give Pawtucket a 1-0 lead.
Jeff Bailey drove in Murphy with an RBI single in the bottom of the fourth inning to give Pawtucket a 2-0 cushion. Louisville manager Rick Sweet decided that he had seen enough and pulled Santos (3.1 innings, 5 hits, 2 runs, 1 walk, 3 strikeouts) after that.
It turned out to be a wise decision. Relief pitcher Jason Kershner got George Kottaras to ground into a 4-6-3 double-play to end the inning.
Louisville caught up to Pauley in the sixth frame and cut Pawtucket’s lead to 2-1 on a Chris Dickerson RBI sacrifice fly.
The PawSox had a chance to do a lot of damage in the bottom of the sixth inning when they loaded the bases with no outs but they came away empty handed.
Louisville put runners on first and third base with no outs in the top of the eighth inning against a tiring Pauley but he got Janish to ground into a 6-4-3 double-play. Ryan Hanigan, however, scored on the play from third base even the score.
--ROB LEE
Posted by Corey Bourassa 
at 10:57 PM to PawSox
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