Neil K. Warner - Daily Herald | Posted: Friday, July 3, 2009 12:20 am
Two-out rally.
Three up, three down.
He's a tough out.
It's baseball talk. You hear it at nearly every baseball game.
On Thursday night when the Orem Owlz hosted the Ogden Raptors, there was never a more fitting line than "Right man, right spot."
Tyler Mann was the man.
Mann hit a grand slam and drove in five runs on the night to help Orem to a big 14-6 win over rival Ogden.
Mann, a ninth-round draft pick in 2007, provided the big hit of the game in a pivotal first inning when he hit his first professional home run. Ogden jumped on Orem for three first-inning runs that was sparked a two-run homer from Angelo Songco.
Finding themselves down 3-0 so quickly didn't faze the Owlz because they responded in the bottom of the first. Jean Segura struck out swinging but reached first when the pitch got past the catcher. Jon Karcich and Richard Cates both followed with walks to load the bases for Mann.
Mann, a left-handed hitter, went out with a drive that just cleared the fence.
"I was just looking for something I could get in the air, to get a sac fly or something. He left the fastball up. I thought it was a fly ball, but when I looked up it just keep going," Mann said. "It barely got out of there, but it did. It was big because they had just scored three and it helped the pitchers out because they had been doing a great job."
Ogden took the lead back in the fourth when Gorman Erickson made like Gorman Thomas and smashed a two-run homer to right that put the Raptors up 5-4.
But Ogden didn't have the lead for long. Cates tied the game with a double off the wall that scored Karcich in the fifth.
Mann then gave Orem the lead with a single off the hand of Ogden pitcher Javier Solano, who reached back and tried to knock down his hot shot up the middle.
The Owlz tacked on two more runs in the sixth when Braulio Pardo and Marcel Champagnie hit back-to-back singles to start the inning. Raddy Sierra bunted the runners over to set the table for Segura, who extended his hitting streak to nine games by ripping one past second baseman Rafael Ynoa to drive in two runs and push the lead to 8-5.
"Their starting pitching (Luis Vaquez) was up there throwing 94. Mann got the Orem home run, but it's a home run," said Orem manager Tom Kotchman. "We got down 5-4 and then Sierra got down two sacrifice bunts to put men on second and third. They had to play the infield in. That accounted for four runs right there just being able to execute a sacrifice bunt."
Just in case, Orem scored six more runs in the eighth. Pinch hitter Michael Wing drew a bases loaded walk in the eighth and Cates finished off the Raptors with a three-run double to give Orem a 12-5 lead.
The win helped Orem improve to 6-4 on the year, while Ogden dropped to 4-6. The two teams play again tonight at 7 p.m. at Brent Brown Ballpark in Orem.
The Owlz will celebrate the 4th of July holiday with fireworks following the game.