The German Baseball-Bundesliga concluded its regular season on Saturday with four make-up games in the southern division. In the lone open decision for the standings, the Mannheim Tornados swept a doubleheader against the Tubingen Hawks and clinched seventh place in the south. They now will square off with the Bad Homburg Hornets in round one of the playdowns, while the Hawks have to face the Stuttgart Reds.
In game one Marvin Appiah drove in three and Matthew Downey and Michael Durham two each to lead Mannheim to a 9-3 win. They broke a tie in the eighth and scored five runs in the ninth to blow the game open. Jan-Niclas Stoeklin struck out 11 in eight innings for the win. Faustino De Los Santos took the loss after eight strong innings. In game two the Tornados scored the game-winner of a 3-2 victory in the tenth. Matt Kemp struck out 13 in nine innings. Christian Schuler closed it out. Rouven Fuehrmann went 3-for-4 with a solo home run for the Hawks.
Two more games were played on Saturday. The Mainz Athletics prevailed 11-10 against the Stuttgart Reds, splitting the series. Max Boldt and Andreas Lastinger combined for six hits, three runs and six RBI. Boldt also went deep. Mainz scored the tying and winning runs in the bottom of the eighth. Joshua Little homered for Stuttgart. He drove in four. Matti Emery scored three times.
Meanwhile the Heidenheim Heidekoepfe crushed the Haar Disciples 12-2 to complete a sweep. Simon Guehring hit two of Heidenheim’s five home runs. He scored three times and drove in four. Jay Pecci, Luke Sommer and Alexander Lauterbach also went deep. Klaus Nicolio hit a solo home run for Haar.