April 20, 2009 — The Cardinals are sending a strong message to all of the teams in the Raphael Jackson Double-A Baseball League that they will be a force to reckon with this year after knocking off the Suns Sunday night 15-3 behind a dominating pitching performance by Puerto Rican import Edwin Lisboa.
Lisboa gave up just two hits while striking out nine in six innings of work at the D.C. Canegata baseball field to pick up the win on the hill for the Cardinals. Lisboa is one of several Puerto Rican hurlers who will travel from Puerto Rico to St. Croix to pitch for the Cards this season. Eddie Martinez got the loss for the Suns.
While Lisboa was holding the Suns hitless and scoreless over the first four innings, his offense was taking a liking to the Suns pitching.
After a scoreless first inning, the Cardinals' offense got rolling in the bottom of the second inning. Eric Flynn got things going with a two-run single, and his team added an unearned run in the bottom of the inning to lead 3-0 after two innings.
An RBI triple by Leandre Reyes in the bottom of the third extended the Cardinals' lead to 4-0.
The Cardinals put the game away in the bottom of the fourth, plating five runs on a two-run single by Sylvester McIntosh, an RBI single by Edwin Derweer and two unearned runs to go up 9-0.
The Suns finally got on the board in the top of the fifth with one run on Charles Billings' RBI single. It was the first hit allowed by Lisboa. The Cardinals, however, answered mightily in their half of the inning with six runs to take an insurmountable 14-run lead at 15-1. Of the six runs scored, only one was earned. Wildness by their pitching staff and three errors by the Suns in the inning accounted for the other five. Flynn had the RBI single in the inning for the Cards.
The Suns came to bat in the top of the sixth inning needing to score six runs to avoid enforcement of the 10-run mercy rule. However, they were only able to score two runs on rookie Mark Knight’s two-run double, and the game was called with the Cards winning 15-3.
The Cardinals were led offensively by Flynn, who went 2 for 2 with three RBIs; Derweer, 2 for 3 with one RBI; McIntosh, 1 for 3 with two RBIs; and Reyes, 2 for 4 with an RBI. For the Suns, Knight went 2 for 3 with two RBIs and Billings went 1 for 3 with one RBI.
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