Category: Sports

The Nashville Sounds launched four home runs and got a solid performance from starter Chris Jensen en route to a 7-5 win over the New Orleans Baby Cakes Friday night in New Orleans.

Franklin Barreto got the party started immediately when he drilled the first pitch of the game from William Cuevas over the center field wall for a leadoff home run and 1-0 lead for Nashville.

Ryan Lavarnway, Chad Pinder, and Yairo Munoz added solo blasts for the Sounds (47-52). The four homers are the second-most for Nashville in a single game this season.

It was plenty of run support for Jensen who worked six innings as he earned his fifth win of the season. Jensen allowed one unearned run on six hits. He walked one and struck out one in the quality start.

The third inning was full of fireworks for both sides. Lavarnway started the top of the inning with his sixth home run of the season to give Nashville a 2-0 lead.

After Cuevas retired Matt McBride on a fly out, the right-hander drilled Barreto in the back with a pitch. He was immediately ejected from the game by the home plate umpire. New Orleans Manager Arnie Beyeler and pitching coach Scott Budner were also ejected during an argument.

McBride extended the lead to 3-0 with a sacrifice fly in the fifth, and Pinder started the sixth with a solo homer to right field to make it a 4-0 game.

New Orleans picked up a run with the help of a Barreto error in the sixth. Other than that, Jensen worked a relatively stress-free outing to lead the Sounds to their third straight win.

Munoz cracked the fourth home run of the night with one out in the seventh. It was his fourth home run with the Sounds and 10th of the 2017 season.

Reliever Ryan Dull replaced Jensen and worked a perfect seventh inning. Working on rehab assignment, it took Dull only eight pitches to get through the inning.

Felix Doubron worked a scoreless bottom of the eighth, but Tucker Healy ran into trouble in the ninth. Healy allowed three hits and three walks before giving way to Patrick Schuster who finished it after four the Baby Cakes scored four runs in the inning.

Game two of the four-game series is set for Saturday night in New Orleans. Right-hander Zach Neal (1-4, 4.09) starts for the Sounds against right-hander Scott Copeland (6-9, 6.00) for the Baby Cakes. First pitch is scheduled for 6:00 p.m. CST.

As the fall sports season gets ready to crank up, Thunder Radio sports continues our series of previews for the fall prep sports teams.  Each day, we will spotlight a different team as we count down to the opening of practices and games of the upcoming season.  Today, we look at the Coffee County Middle School football team.

Coach Bryan Morgan begins his 2^nd season at the helm of Red Raider program as his young football team has spent this week working out in shorts and shoulder pads.  Practices with full pads begins on Monday as Morgan wants “to see who is gonna hit and take it to the next level.”  Morgan is excited about the upcoming season as he goes into it with a full coaching staff for summer camp.  Ryan Wood has joined the Raider staff as he joins returning coaches Kenny Lockhart and George Pearson.

Coffee County has added some new formations and wrinkles to their read option attack this year on offense.  Coach Morgan is looking for some players to step up at wide receiver as he continues to move a wealth of skill position folks around looking for the best fit.  On defense, the Raiders will need to nail down a starting line but the linebacker and secondary appear to be the strength of that unit.

The Red Raiders return a wealth of experience in the offensive backfield in returning starter Conner Shemwell at quarterback along with Kelby Walker and Ethan Baker who logged considerable minutes at running back and linebacker in 2016.  Coach Morgan has also been impressed with Kurt Jesch who has made the move to center and looks to be the middle linebacker on defense.  8^th grader Jamie Norris has had a good camp and may find his way into the starting lineup at a skill position on offense or defense.  Ashton Ferrell and Robbie Gilley, a pair of 7^th graders, have also impressed the coaches in the line.

The Raiders will conclude their preseason workouts with a scrimmage against Oakland Middle School on Thursday, August 3^rd at Oakland.  That scrimmage will get underway at 4 PM.  The Red Raiders open the season on August 10^th at Tullahoma in the annual Coffee Cup game.  Thunder Radio will be on hand to broadcast the Coffee Cup game as part of the First National Bank Hometown Sports Series.

The Coffee County Central High School golf team completed their final tune-up for the regular season on Thursday as they took part in the James C Uselton Invitational Preseason Tournament in Tullahoma.  All 5 Red Raider golfers carded scores in the 80’s for the 18 hole stroke play event at Lakewood Country Club.

Junior Samuel Prater picked up right where he left off in 2016 as he shot the low score for the Raiders with an 80.  Senior Reid Lawrence was 2 strokes back at 82 while junior Austin Farris got around the par 72 course in 83 strokes.  Junior Josh Perry shot an 86 while fellow junior Matthew Hale carded an 89 on the day. Palmer Saolowski of Father Ryan shot a 70 for the day’s low round.

The Red Raiders will open the regular season on Monday when they welcome Grundy County to Willowbrook for an 18 hole match.  That match is set to get underway at 9 AM.

The Coffee County Lady Raider volleyball team had a record of 1 and 2 in their trio of matches on Thursday at the Eagleville camp.  Coffee County opened the day with a 3 set loss to Community by scores of 23-25, 25-18 & 10-15.  Coffee County bounced back to defeat Grundy in 3 sets 25-17, 23-25 & 15-12.  The Lady Raiders closed out the day with their best performance at the camp thus far in a straight set loss to Smyrna.  Coffee County dropped the 2 sets 22-15 and 23-25.

Coach Andrew Taylor was again pleased with his young team’s effort.  As is often the case with young squads, Coffee County struggled with bouts of inconsistency.  Senior Tyana Fenton had another good day as she led the team in digs and aces.  Sophomore Amanda Mukai led the team in assists and also was a team leader in service aces.  Sophomore Keelie Hillis was the leader for Coffee County in kills.

Coffee County returns to Eagleville for a double elimination tournament on Friday.  The Lady Raiders will open up bracket play at 8:00 AM.  Coach Taylor will be a guest on Saturday’s Coffee Coaches Show to talk about the camp and the upcoming scrimmages for his Lady Raiders.  The Coffee Coaches Show is broadcast each Saturday at 10 AM from the showroom of Al White Ford/Lincoln and is held exclusively here on Thunder Radio.

 

The Braves crashed the party at Dodger Stadium on Thursday night with a 6-3 victory, snapping the Dodgers’ 11-game win streak. It was just Los Angeles’ fifth loss in its last 36 games.

Freddie Freeman had two hits and two RBIs, while Kurt Suzuki added a two-run homer to back a strong start from Mike Foltynewicz, as the Braves ended their three-game skid. Foltynewicz allowed three runs in 6 1/3 innings, striking out five. The Braves right-hander has gone 5-0 in his last nine starts, striking out 51 and walking 21, while posting a 3.33 ERA and limiting opponents to a .248 average.
“He was on the attack,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said. “It looked like a lot of confidence in what he was doing, the ball was coming out of his hand good. It was just really a nice aggressive outing.”
Playing in front of their home crowd for the first time in 11 days, the MLB-best Dodgers took their first loss at Chavez Ravine since June 26 against the Angels, and their first against a National League opponent at home since June 6 vs. the Nationals. It was also their first loss since July 2 in San Diego.
“It’s a weird feeling,” Dodgers manager Dave Roberts said. “It’s different. Even to that last out, I thought we were going to find a way to win the game. But I guess we have got to start another one tomorrow.”
Dodgers starter Brandon McCarthy took the loss, allowing six runs on nine hits over four innings. Yasmani Grandal, who had a root canal earlier in the day, hit a two-run homer, and Cody Bellinger had an RBI single.
McCarthy has a 7.64 ERA over his last four outings, and Roberts said his next start is “to be determined.” McCarthy has dealt with a blister on the middle finger of his pitching hand since Spring Training, and it appeared again Thursday. However, the right-hander said it’s not the reason for his recent struggles.
“The blister has been since spring, it just hasn’t ever gone away,” McCarthy said. “There’s no correlation, positive or negative. Command the last few, things have gotten really sloppy, and mechanics have been really shoddy, and this week, we really went to work trying to clean it up. Oddly enough, I feel happy with what happened today, outside of the results.”
The Braves got to McCarthy for two runs in the first, as four of the first five batters had hits. Ender Inciarte led off with a single, then scored on a one-out single by Freeman. Matt Kemp followed with another single, and Matt Adams ripped a double to score Freeman.
Dodgers pinch-hitter Trayce Thompson stepped to the plate representing the tying run in the bottom of the ninth, and with runners on second and third, he lifted a shallow popup into right. But Braves rookie second baseman Johan Camargo made an over-the-shoulder catch for the final out.
“That was a helluva play, wasn’t it?” Snitker said. “That’s just kind of willing yourself to catch that ball, it looked like to me. That’s a huge play.”
With the Dodgers’ loss, the 2013 Braves remain the most recent NL club to win at least 12 games in a row, as they won 14 straight from July 26-Aug. 9 that year.
Braves second baseman Brandon Phillips exited after the top of the sixth with right hamstring tightness. Camargo moved from shortstop to second, and Dansby Swanson entered at shortstop. Phillips, who went 1-for-3 with a triple, is day to day.
Lefty Jaime Garcia (2-2, 4.61 ERA) is scheduled to start, although a reported trade that would send him to the Twins may happen before Friday’s 9:10 p.m. CT game. Aaron Blair was scratched from his scheduled start for Triple-A Gwinnett on Thursday, so he may start should the Garcia trade get finalized.

 

Renato Nunez clubbed a go-ahead two-run homer in the top of the ninth inning to lead the Nashville Sounds to a 7-5 win over the Iowa Cubs Thursday afternoon at Principal Park.

The home run by Nunez was his Minor League Baseball-leading 25th of the season and snapped a 5-5 deadlock in the series finale.

It was the second consecutive day the Sounds beat Iowa after trailing for most of the game. The Cubs scored four runs in the second inning to jump out to a 4-0 lead. Nashville closed the gap to 4-3 in the middle innings before Iowa got another run in the fifth to make it a 5-3 game.

Reliever Josh Smith played a huge part in the come-from-behind win. The right-hander took over for Jesse Hahn in the sixth inning and threw four scoreless frames to pick up his fourth win of the season. Smith allowed one hit and struck out four.

Bijan Rademacher’s three-run homer off Hahn gave Iowa a comfortable 4-0 lead in the second. Nashville chipped away with single runs in third through sixth innings to draw close.

Franklin Barreto launched a solo homer in the third, Matt McBride drove in a run with a sacrifice fly in the fourth, Nunez singled home a run in the fifth, and Kenny Wilson’s sacrifice fly scored a run in the sixth.

Cubs’ reliever Felix Pena put up a zero in the seventh to protect Iowa’s 5-4 lead, but coughed it up in the eighth thanks to the sun.

Mark Canha hit a fly ball towards Iowa center fielder Jacob Hanneman to start the eighth. Hannemann lost the ball in the sun allowing Canha to scamper to third with a leadoff triple. Yairo Munoz followed with a run-scoring double down the left field line to make it 5-5. The RBI double capped a perfect 4-for-4 game for Munoz who’s hitting .347 in the month of July.

After Smith fired a 1-2-3 bottom of the eighth, the stage was set for Nunez who belted the two-run homer after Joey Wendle singled with one out. Smith came back out for the ninth and set the side down in order to help the Sounds earn a series split.

Wendle went 3-for-5 and extended his hitting streak to a career-best 12 games.

The Sounds open a four-game series in New Orleans Friday night. Right-hander Chris Jensen (4-1, 4.42) starts for the Sounds against right-hander William Cuevas (1-2, 3.04) for the Baby Cakes. First pitch is scheduled for 7:00 p.m.

As the fall sports season gets ready to crank up, Thunder Radio sports continues our series of previews for the fall prep sports teams.  Each day, we will spotlight a different team as we count down to the opening of practices and games of the upcoming season.  Today, we look at the Coffee County Central High School and Coffee County Middle School cross country teams.

Coach Nathan Wanuch begins his 2^nd year as the helm of the high school and middle school programs.  Coach Wanuch returns most of his runners from last season and has added some promising runners to both the high school and middle school teams.  Sarah Pearson and Emily St. John will highlight the biggest high school girls’ team in the program’s history.  On the boys side, Bradley Kishpaugh, Reuben Chaput, Neil Slone, Larson Meltzer and Andres Cavalie will be looked at to lead the boys team as they seek to replace 2 of their top runners from last year that were lost to graduation.

For the middle school teams, the Red Raiders will field a complete team as they have added as many as 5 newcomers this season.  Expected to lead the way are Ethan Welch, Jacob Rutledge, Ethan Beaty, Bradley Escue, Breyton Anderson and Clayton Bryant.  The girls’ team is still undermanned as summer conditioning continues.

The Raider thinclad teams will begin their season on Saturday, August 20^th at Siegel.  Coffee County will host a pair of meets this year.  The first meets will be held on September 12^th with the second one being held on September 26^th.

The Coffee County Lady Raider volleyball team and the CHS Lady Raider soccer team each opened play on Wednesday in a pair of preseason team camps.  The volleyball team had 3 games at Eagleville beginning at 8 AM.  The soccer team traveled to Lee University and opened up play on Wednesday evening with a JV/varsity doubleheader.

The Lady Raider volleyball team had a record of 1 and 2 in their trio of 3 set matches.  Coffee County fell to Riverdale 24-26, 27-25 and 13-15.  In game #2, the Lady Raiders defeated Eagleville 25-22, 22-25 & 15-13.  In the final match, Coffee County lost to Central Magnet 18-25, 26-24 & 11-15.  Coach Andrew Taylor praised the play of senior libero Tyana Fenton while acknowledging the hard work of all of his players.  Coffee County returns to Eagleville for 3 matches on Thursday.  The matches will be played at 8:00 AM, 9:30 AM & 11:00 AM.

The Lady Raider soccer team traveled to Cleveland on Wednesday to open up a team camp at Lee University.  Coffee County tangled with Chattanooga Christian in a JV/varsity doubleheader.  The JV team faced Chattanooga Christian first falling 3 to 1.  The varsity followed that up with a 3 to 1 defeat in the 2^nd game.  In spite of the 2 losses, Coach David Amado said that he saw several encouraging signs going into Thursday’s camp action.  Coffee County will scrimmage Walker Valley on Thursday evening.  The JV will play at 5:40 PM while the varsity will play at 7:50 PM.

As the early portion of the season’s second half has unfolded, the Cubs have altered the National League’s playoff picture and begun the surge many have long anticipated they would make. The defending World Series champions captured their sixth straight victory and completed a three-game sweep with Wednesday afternoon’s 8-2 win over the Braves at SunTrust Park.

“We won six in row, and we have this momentum,” Cubs manager Joe Maddon said. “I guess, synonymously, the vibe has been different. The vibe and energy has been great, and I want to see that continue.”
Addison Russell highlighted his four-hit game with a pair of RBI doubles and Mike Montgomery enjoyed the thrill of hitting his first home run while also limiting the Braves to just two hits and one run over six innings. Kris Bryant exited in the first inning with a left pinkie strain suffered while attempting to steal third base. But that was one of few lowlights experienced this week by the Cubs, who are within 2 1/2 games of the first-place Brewers in the NL Central race as they prepare for this weekend’s home series against the Cardinals.
“I knew the last couple of outings that, mechanically, my timing has been a little bit off,” Montgomery said. “Today, it was trying to slow things down a little bit and getting back to commanding the ball. I think the last couple of days working in the bullpen really helped.”
R.A. Dickey surrendered solo shots to Montgomery and Tommy La Stella en route to allowing four earned runs over seven innings. The knuckleballer had gone 37 consecutive innings without allowing a homer, and he entered this outing having allowed just three runs over his past 27 innings at home. His performance added to the frustration felt this week by the Braves, who had entered this series in the thick of the NL Wild Card race and feeling good about having just swept the D-backs.
“You know [the Cubs] are a team that’s not going to stay dormant all year,” Braves manager Brian Snitker said. “They’re too good. They were on a good run, just like we had been. It’s just one of those series where we’ve got to regroup and get after them tomorrow.”
Montgomery kept the Braves hitless until Danny Santana doubled with one out in the fifth and scoreless until Ender Inciarte opened the bottom of the sixth with his eighth homer. But the Cubs southpaw’s fondest memory of this game will come courtesy of the two-out, fifth-inning homer he hit into the second deck of the Chop House restaurant located in right field. The home run traveled a projected 393 feet per Statcast™.
“That’s the first time in my career a pitcher has swung at a 2-0 pitch with nobody on after the first [batters] got out on three pitches,” Dickey said. “Normally, the pitcher is going to take, especially when he doesn’t have a hit all year. He ambushed me there, and I’ve got to tip my hat. I laid it in there, thinking he wasn’t going to swing, and he put a good swing on it.”
After exiting in the fifth inning because he was feeling ill and dehydrated, Freddie Freeman was replaced by Matt Adams, who notched one of the three singles Koji Uehara allowed before exiting in the eighth with the bases loaded. Pedro Strop halted a potential Braves rally when he needed just two pitches to get Matt Kemp to ground into an inning-ending double play.
“He has been a linchpin in a lot of really good moments for us, and that is a tough spot to come into, as Kemp has been swinging the bat well,” Maddon said. “I am looking for him to get through Kemp and Flowers right there.”
Mike Foltynewicz will be on the mound when Atlanta opens a four-game series at Dodger Stadium Thursday at 9:10 p.m. CT on MLB.TV. Foltynewicz will be pitching in California for the first time since carrying a no-hitter into the ninth inning of his June 30 start in Oakland.

The Nashville Sounds got huge home runs from Matt Olson and Ryan Lavarnway in a come-from-behind 11-8 win over the Iowa Cubs Wednesday afternoon at Principal Park.

Olson hit a two-out grand slam to cap a six-run eighth inning, and Lavarnway launched a two-out, go-ahead three-run homer in the top of the 11th to give the Sounds a lead they held on to.

Right-handed pitchers Kendall Graveman, Jharel Cotton, and Chris Bassitt all appeared for the Sounds as part of rehab assignments with Oakland. Graveman started and allowed four runs in 2 1/3 innings. Cotton allowed four runs in 3 1/3 innings while neither factored into the decision.

Iowa built a 7-1 lead after five innings with two in the first, two in the third, and three in the fifth. Stephen Bruno launched a three-run homer off of Cotton in the fifth to give the Cubs a comfortable six-run lead.

The comeback bid started in the sixth when Lavarnway knocked in Nashville’s second run of the night with a sacrifice fly. The Cubs got the run right back in the seventh to extend the lead to 8-2.

Nashville’s six-run eighth inning started with a Joey Wendle infield single off Pierce Johnson. After Lavarnway was retired on a fly out, Matt McBride was hit by a pitch that ended Johnson’s night.

Matt Carasiti relieved Johnson and struck out Kenny Wilson for the second out in the inning. With two on and two out, Jaff Decker singled in a run to make it 8-3. Melvin Mercedes followed with another run-scoring knock with a hit up the middle to cut the deficit to 8-4.

Franklin Barreto drew a walk to load the bases for Olson who drilled an opposite field grand slam to pull the Sounds even at 8-8. It was Olson’s 19th homer with Nashville and 23rd overall in 2017.

The designated hitter also drew four walks to tie a Nashville Sounds franchise record for most walks in a single game.

Bassitt did his part with a successful rehab outing. The righty went 1 2/3 scoreless innings before giving way to Lou Trivino who did the same over three frames.

The game stayed 8-8 until Lavarnway’s two-out blast in the 11th. It was his fifth home run of the season and first since May 19th.

The series finale is scheduled for Thursday afternoon at Principal Park. Right-hander Jesse Hahn (0-0, 4.50) starts for the Sounds while the Cubs have yet to announce a starter. First pitch is scheduled for 12:08 p.m.