听
Andrew Kemmerer is one of the best pitchers in the West Coast League and on Thursday night the Victoria HarbourCats found out why.
Not even HarbourCats鈥� bench boss Graig Merritt switching up half his team midway through the game could rattle Kemmerer as he silenced the Victoria bats en route to a 2-0 Bells victory at Joe Martin Field in Bellingham.
The loss leaves the HarbourCats (18-21) eight games back of the West Division-leading Bells (26-13). Victoria also dropped a game in the wild-card race and now trails Corvallis and Yakima Valley by three games.
Kemmerer (2-0), who will be a senior at the University of Central Arkansas in the fall, came into the game, his seventh start, with the league鈥檚 second-best ERA at 1.46.
He didn鈥檛 allow his first hit until Alex DeGoti singled in the third inning. Kemmerer went seven innings and gave up just two hits, a walk, and struck out seven Victoria batters.
In the bottom of the fourth inning, with the Bells leading 1-0, Merritt made four substitutions, but not even that breathed life into the HarbourCats. Newcomers Chase Lambert at third and Michael Gretler at first made errors, but fortunately for them, Victoria all-star Dominic Topoozian (3-4) was on top of his game. The righty, who threw one inning in Monday鈥檚 all-star game, went seven innings on Thursday, scattering seven hits while giving up the two runs. Shawn Kennedy pitched a scoreless eighth.
Bellingham got an RBI single from Jesse Kuet in the second and an RBI double by Chris Beall in the fifth.
The HarbourCats return home for a three-game set with the Walla Walla Sweets beginning tonight at Royal Athletic Park. The Sweets (20-19) come to town two games better than the HarbourCats so are very much in the wild-card hunt as well.
