Defs take Home Opener 3-2 over FisherCats....

as five Connecticut pitchers combined on the win. Ryan Sadowski gets the win in relief of Adam Cowart with Ronnie Ray,Osiris Matos and Sergio Romo finishing up. Romo was lights out fanning all three batters he faced in the 9th for the save. Ray, pitched out of a bases loaded, no outs jam he created in the the 7th by getting the first and second outs on K's and and fly out to end the threat.
The Defs got all their runs in the fourth. Antoan Richardson reached on an error, stole second and came around on a Travis Denker double, the Def's first hit of the season. Adam Witter followed with a homer down the right field line for a 3-0 lead.
In the top of the 5th, Cowart, who always pitches from the stretch with a variety of side arm angles, and with the Cats seeing him for the third time around gave up two straight singles to start the inning. The next batter hit a grounder to SS Trey Webb, who could have taken the out at second himself and thrown over to first for the double play but tossed to Denker instead and only got the force out at second. With runners now on first and third a slow roller to third baseman David Maroul brought scored one run and Maroul's throw to first went over TI's head to put runners on second and third still with on out.
Ryan Sadowski then came on for Cowart and struck out the next two batters with a run scoring wild pitch in between.

Misc. Fan notes: Richardson is a little guy and FAST. He also was picked off twice.
EME: batting 8th in the lineup went 0-3--called third strike, weak grounder to second and a pop out to right field (some things don't change) and was replaced in left field in the 9th by Carlos Sosa.
Simon Klink was the DH; curious to see him at first as reported.

Bien Figueroa, new Defs manager, who stuck with Ray with the bases loaded--a real manager? Joe Perez of the Norwich Bulletin asked him in an interview posted today about Dodd:
"BF: I don’t want to hear excuses about the field. First, you’re supposed to learn how to hit. I told my players that I don’t want any excuses about the park. This is the only park in the league that it’s hard to hit the ball out of. Most of the parks in this league have very short fences. If you can it in this park, you can hit in all the other parks, its very simple."
Nice...very nice.

It was cold, maybe 2000 or so in the stands. Rain in the forecast however this weekend.

Great seeing Hondo after seven months.

Pictures from top to bottom: Cowart, Witter's HR, Ray with Denker at second and Copeland in right, Romo with Denker/Copeland