Trenton Thunder Fall 9-1 To West Virginia Black Bears

Baseball, Other Sports, Professional, Trenton Thunder

August 13, 2022

Last night, the Trenton Thunder returned home to face West Virginia Black Bears as they lose 9-1. It was a special night for their manager Jeff Manto as he got inducted into the Trenton Thunder Hall of Fame in a pregame ceremony with his family. It was also fireworks night for the fans who had 4,030 in attendance.

With this loss, the Thunder fall to 24-30 and the Black Bears improve to 36-22. Trenton Thunder's pitching was great in the beginning but stared to struggle in the third. They also made two errors during the game.

Manto's induction to the Trenton Thunder Hall of Fame meant a lot to him being from close by, playing with this team, coming full circle to coach these young players and his family who had his back from day one. Last night's pregame ceremony had the whole staff, players, coaches and people in baseball saying congratulations to Manto on the big screen and the fans showing support as always. They had really great speeches, including Manto who thanked everyone who has been a big influence in his life. It was also his ninth Hall of Fame induction with a team.

The Trenton Thunder still struggled tonight giving up nine runs and 13 hits, while one only scoring once and making two errors, which the West Virginia Black Bears took advantage of big time. The Thunder hitters had no hits thru six innings until Christian Merriwether put down a perfect bunt single to break up the no-hitter against starter Shandon Herrera. He went 6.1 innings, allowing three hits, one run, one walk and four strikeouts. Herrera had an of 19.00 era coming into last night's game and lowered it drastically with his performance. Gregg Caserta, who is the Trenton Thunder's play-by-play announcer, said he pitched like Greg Maddux last night with how he was fooling the hitters.

Herrera had everything going from the beginning of the game for West Virginia Black Bears and the bullpen backed him up in a big way by only giving up one walk. You can't make mistakes against a team like West Virginia Black Bears because they will make you pay. Trenton Thunder's offense was not able to cash in when they had other opportunities to score. Most of the West Virginia Black Bears hitters are also hitting over three hundred on the season which is incredible.

The West Virginia Black Bears are one of the top teams in the MLB Draft League along with Williamsport, who has a lot of talent starting with Turner Hill and a deep roster. The Trenton Thunder need to find a way to stop Hill from getting hits because he has been killing them this season and has been a tone setter that gets everything going for the team. This offense was able to get to the Trenton Thunder's bullpen also and found ways to score more runs.

Trenton Thunder who are now 24-30 are still fighting to be in the playoffs which is important to find ways to win these games against tough opponents and build up confidence. They need all the momentum to stay competitive, forgot about this game and move on to the next one.