by Namur Angels, www.namur-angels.be
The Namur Angels extended their winning streak to four games Thursday evening with a 6-0 shutout of the Brasschaat Braves. The game featured a pitching duel for the ages, as both starters combined for 21 strikeouts. The highlight of the night, however, was Jake Hummel’s masterful performance on the mound. In Hummel’s complete game, he surrendered just one hit, did not walk a batter, and struck out 15. He had a perfect game through the first 3.2 innings of the game before giving up a groundball single through the left side with two outs. Only two batters reached base the entire night as Hummel was absolutely dominating.
Hummel’s counterpart was Braves starter James Wise, who was equally as dominant early on in the contest before losing command in the middle half of the game. Wise worked a perfect first inning, but ran into trouble in the second. Williams Rosario drew a one out walked and reached second on a passed ball. Luke Auger followed with a swinging strikeout that skipped to the backstop and allowed him to touch first safely and advance Rosario to third. Auger then stole second to put two runners in scoring position with one out. However, Wise escaped the jam by striking out Jerome Sana and inducing a fly ball to right from Cedric Nauts. Wise was again on the brink of surrendering a run an inning later when he had runners at second and third with one out. Unfortunately, the Angels were unable to prevail and Wise once more got a strike out and fly out to end the inning.
After five very quick innings, the Angels would finally break the game open in the bottom of the sixth inning when Greg Van Sickler singled to left. Theodore De Bellefroid followed with a great bunt to advance Van Sickler to second base. Hummel stepped to the plate and delivered a single into left, as Van Sickler was held at third base. With runners at the corners and one out, Vincent King executed a squeeze bunt that was fielded by Wise and flipped to home plate. However, Van Sickler was safe at the plate, as the ball was dislodged from the catcher. With runners at first and second and Rosario at the plate, Wise was called for a balk and Hummel and King both advanced one base. Rosario struck out his plate appearance for the second out of the inning. Auger was next and hit a hard groundball to third base that was bobbled and all runners were safe. Hummel crossed for the second run of the inning, King advanced to third, and Auger was safe at first. Sana came through with a single to right field to plate King and the Angels took a 3-0 lead heading into the seventh.
Namur tacked on two more runs in the seventh inning after Van Sickler hit a one out double to left. De Bellefroid was hit by a fastball by reliever Brendan Schoemaker, who came on for Wise after Van Sickler’s double. Wise threw 6.1 innings, giving up five runs on five hits, walked two and struck out six. With runners at first and second, Hummel hit a chopper up the middle that skipped off the shortstop’s glove and into centerfield. Van Sickler came around to score on the play. The throw from center to third base to get De Bellefroid advancing was high and flew out of play, allowing De Bellefroid to trot home. The Angels scored one more in the eighth before turning it over to Hummel in the ninth to complete his masterpiece.
One run proved to be more than enough for Hummel to seal the victory. No Braves runner reached second base the entire game. Throwing all four pitches for strikes, Hummel had 1-2-3 innings in all but two innings during his gem. In the first eleven outs of the game for Hummel, eight came via strikeout. The Angels improve to 13-4 on the season with the victory.