It was a slow start in the 3-1 win for the Monarchs on Tuesday night Night at Legends Field in Kansas City, Kansas.
It was a battle of the pitchers between winning Monarchs right-handed pitcher Justin Shaffer (2-1) and losing RailCats right-hander Jack Alkrie (1-3) in the first six innings with six strikeouts each.
Shaffer allowed one run on six hits during six innings of pitching.
“It was [Shaffer’s] best outing,” Monarchs manager Joe Calfapietra said, “He had most control of everything–his pitches, his body–he was just in total command of the game.”
Gary SouthShore scored one run in the fourth inning, unequaled until the sixth when Kansas City ended the inning with runs scored by Morgan McCullough, Darnell Sweeney and Ryan Grotjohn.
“[McCullough] does an outstanding job,” Calfapietra said, “No matter what role you put him in, he gets outs, we wouldn’t be in this situation without him,”
Shaffer, the winning pitcher, is now 2-1, and Carlos Diaz got the save. The losing pitcher, Jack Alkrie, is now 1-3.
Kansas City (13-10) and Gary SouthShore (13-13) will meet for the second game of the series Wednesday afternoon at 1 p.m.
The game can be heard on the Monarchs Broadcast Network with the pre-game beginning at 12:40 p.m. Wednesday and the video stream will air on aabaseball.tv.
-Information from Monarchs