Madison, Wis. (July 9) – Polishing off a successful 3-2 road swing with a sweep of the Willmar Stingers Wednesday night, field manager Donnie Scott and the Madison Mallards (5-2, 25-17) will return to Warner Park on Thursday for the opener of a key home-and-away series with the Kenosha Kingfish (8-1, 31-14). Tonight’s contest will pit the South Division’s two best clubs by second-half record against one another. First pitch is scheduled for 7:05 p.m. at the Duck Pond.
Last night, the Mallards used home runs from Collin Theroux (San Joaquin Delta CC) and J.J. Gould (Jacksonville) to overcome Willmar’s pitching staff, which has been one of the league’s best thus far. On the hill, Dalton D’Spain (Texas A&M Corpus Christi) provided five strong innings of four-strikeout ball in which he ceded just one run. Logan Browning (Florida) tossed three scoreless innings of relief, setting up Mike Kaelin (Buffalo) to tab his sixth save of the summer.
On the heels of perhaps his best outing of the summer last Friday against the Wisconsin Woodchucks – 6 IP, 1 H, 0 R, BB, 6 K – A.J. Bogucki (North Carolina) will receive his sixth start in tonight’s opener against the Kingfish. Though he did not receive a winning decision for his latest effort, the 6-foot-3 returning right-hander now holds true to a 3.60 ERA and 21:6 strikeout-to-walk ratio. Opposing hitters have managed just a .296 slugging percentage against Bogucki to this juncture.
- Second-Half Slugfest – Tallying two home runs and three extra-base hits in Wednesday’s series finale at Willmar, the Mallards increased their team total in round-trippers to 15 and slugging percentage to .466 in the second half of the season – both highest among Northwoods League clubs. The next closest team in home runs is Kenosha, who has cleared the fence eight times.
Tonight’s contest will feature a Motorcycle Maynard Bobblehead Giveaway presented by WKOW-TV at the front gates of the stadium while supplies last, and a pre-game skydiving and tandem skydive giveaway presented by Great Lakes Skydiving. For tickets, call the Mallards ticket office at 608-246-4277 or visit www.MallardsBaseball.com. Unable to attend? Follow the team on Twitter @MadisonMallards or tune in to 100.5 FM ESPN Madison for play-by-play coverage.
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The Madison Mallards are a member of the finest developmental league for elite college baseball players, the Northwoods League. Playing its 22nd season of summer collegiate baseball in 2015, the Northwoods League is the largest organized baseball league in the world with 18 teams, drawing significantly more fans, in a friendly ballpark experience, than any league of its kind. A valuable training ground for coaches, umpires and front office staff, more than 120 Northwoods League players have advanced to Major League Baseball, including Cy Young Award winner Max Scherzer (WAS) and MLB All-Stars Chris Sale (CWS), Jordan Zimmermann (WAS), Curtis Granderson (NYM), Lucas Duda (NYM) and Ben Zobrist (OAK). All league games are viewable live via the Northwoods League Website. For more information, visit www.MallardsBaseball.com.
