TROY – Tri-City ValleyCats rightfielder Carson McCusker had a possible base hit taken from him, given back and taken again in a rare double-reversal by the umpiring crew on Tuesday night.
Even after that unusual occurrence in the sixth inning, McCusker had a chance to play the hero in the seventh inning. One of the Frontier League’s hottest batters came up with the bases loaded and two out.
But after getting ahead 3-0 in the count, McCusker struck out swinging against reliever Trevor Kuncl, ending Tri-City’s final threat in a 1-0 loss to the Lake Erie Crushers at Bruno Stadium.
“I felt good,” McCusker said. “Just disappointed I couldn’t come through for my team right there. But it’s baseball.”
After scoring 24 runs in a victory at Gateway on Sunday, the ValleyCats managed only two hits on Tuesday while being shut out for the first time this season. They left 10 men on base against the Crushers, who walked seven.
“We left way too many people on base,” ValleyCats manager Pete Incaviglia said. “We just didn’t get the big hit when we needed it.”
McCusker thought he had a double with one out in the sixth that would have put the tying run in scoring position. He drove a ball into the rightfield corner.
But first-base umpire Antonio Archina ruled the ball was foul as McCusker was approaching second base. That brought Incaviglia out of the dugout to argue it was fair.
Archina conferred with home-plate umpire Tony Gisonti and David Sherman. Then Gisonti awarded McCusker second base, which immediately brought out a very demonstrative Lake Erie manager Jared Lemieux.
“That’s a rule in the book, that once you call a ball dead (foul), you can’t overturn that call because you never know what would happen,” Lemieux said. “It’d be one thing if it was a fair ball, you can overturn that and call that a dead ball. But…
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