Tired Turman roughed up by Modesto's powerful bats

Modesto erupted for seven runs in the fourth and fifth innings to drop Lancaster's Jason Turman to 1-7 and the team 15 games under .500

By DAVE RASBACH
Valley Press Staff Writer

He was, after all, taking his turn in the rotation a day earlier than expected after Brandon Parker was scratched from his start because of a cut he suffered on his left, non-throwing arm.

The Modesto A's showed little mercy, though, battering an obviously tiring Turman for seven runs in the fourth and fifth innings.

That rally spurred the A's to their 12th win in 13 games, a 10-6 victory before an announced crowd of 2,012 hearty fans that probably was much smaller on a less-thantropical Hawaiian Night at Lancaster Municipal Stadium. The attendance on the unseasonably cool June evening was the lowest regular season total in the JetHawks' four seasons in the Antelope Valley.

The Lancaster offense, which showed improvement after suffering its fourth shutout of the season Tuesday, still was unable to keep pace with the high-octane Modesto attack. The JetHawks out-hit the A's 15-10, but left 13 runners on base, including nine in the first five innings.

The result was the JetHawks' fourth loss to Modesto in six days. It also dropped the club a franchise-low 15 games under .500.

Despite pitching on only three days' rest, Turman was sharp early Wednesday. The right-hander, who took the loss in Lancaster's 9-0 defeat at Modesto's John Thurman Field on Saturday, retired the first nine A's batters he faced in his second time facing the Cal League's top hitting team. Four of those outs came via strikeouts.

But things suddenly fell apart for Turman in the fourth inning, although it started innocently enough with Esteban German's infield single. Lancaster third baseman Cirilo Cruz made a nice diving stop on the play, and just narrowly missed throwing German out from his knees.

But as innocent as the play was, it seemed to be all the A's needed to get things going.

Turman's control suddenly vanished at about the same time. After needing only 32 pitches to get through the first three innings, Turman used 28 in the fourth and threw another 20 pitches before being lifted in the fifth.

Two batters after German's single, Eric Byrnes doubled off the left-center field wall, scoring the Modesto second baseman with the first of his four RBI on the night and cutting the JetHawks' lead in half.

After Turman allowed his first walk of the game to Jason Hart, the Lancaster lead evaporated with Jacques Landry's RBI single, which scored Byrnes from third. Modesto took the lead one batter later when Oscar Salazar's single plated both Hart and Landry to give the A's a 4-2 advantage.

The JetHawks trimmed the margin to one run with Harvey Hargrove's RBI single in the bottom half of the inning, but the A's continued their assault on Turman in the fifth.

Miguel Olivo opened the frame with a triple off the top of the leftfield wall. He might have been able to stretch the hit into an inside-the-park homer, but still scored on German's sacrifice fly.

Hart added a two-run single, which ended up chasing Turman after 4 2/3 innings and making the score 7-2.

All seven runs allowed by Turman were earned on six hits, a walk and a hit batter. Turman (1-7) dropped his fourth consecutive start and his fifth straight decision.

The JetHawks staked him to a 2-0 lead in the first inning, thanks to an RBI double by Greg Connors and a run-scoring single by Shawn McCorkle, but missed too many scoring opportunities the rest of the way.

While Modesto stranded only two runners, Lancaster left six runners in scoring position.

Reliever Jake O'Dell won his first decision after shutting out the JetHawks through three innings on three hits while striking out five.