Knights get early jump on IronPigs' Savery

Joe Savery and the IronPigs began Friday with a 4:30 a.m. wake-up call in a Toledo hotel.

Then came an hour-long bus ride to Detroit's Metro Airport, followed by flights to Chicago and then on to Philadelphia before another bus ride that ended around 2 p.m. at Coca-Cola Park.

Five hours later, the left-hander took the mound for a start against Charlotte.

Unlike the major leagues, the next night's starting pitcher in the International League usually doesn't get any breaks coming off a long road trip.

''It's the old 'If you don't like it, play better,''' Savery said of the travel schedule.

Some 20 minutes after that, the Knights had five runs on the scoreboard, and Lehigh Valley's modest two-game win streak was pretty much toast. Charlotte went on to an 8-4 victory over the IronPigs (20-34) before 9,633.

''I knew today was going to be a mental grind anyways,'' said Savery, who overcame that first inning, when the light-hitting Knights -- last in the IL in team batting, and hitting .204 over their last 14 games -- strung together five straight hits and collected six overall in jumping to a 5-0 lead. ''I got back to my apartment about 2:30, napped for about an hour, and then it was time to go to the park.''

The left-hander threw 28 pitches in that first inning, facing 10 batters. He surrendered back-to-back doubles down the opposite foul lines, then watched left-handed hitting Josh Kroeger, batting 3-for-38 without an RBI against lefties this season, drive a 2-0 pitch Savery about 420 feet to the base of the billboards behind the right center field concourse.

After two more singles and a two-out walk loaded the bases, Rob Hudson, hitting ninth, slapped a two-run single to cap the inning.

''Having a good outing at that point is out of the door, so your whole goal from that point out is to try to stick it out and save the bullpen.'' Savery said. Somewhat surprisingly, he did just that. Savery followed with six shutout innings, throwing just 46 pitches over the next five innings and 101 overall, allowing nine hits and walking four.

''I was hoping to get through five, and luckily this team swings the bat early in the count, and ironically I was able to get through seven which is my longest outing of the year,'' Savery said. ''After the first inning it turned out as good as it possibly could have.''

''It wasn't pretty but he gave us seven good innings and battled his ass off tonight,'' manager Dave Huppert said.

Lack of sleep or not, however, Savery's game did follow a trend where he struggles early, then recovers to pitch well for the rest of the outing.

''It is frustrating because it's been early in the game, and I kind of put my team behind the eight-ball out of the gate more than I should,'' he said.

''You've got to build on the positives,'' Huppert said. ''One bad inning and six good ones, you look at how he kept his composure and kept battling.''

Meanwhile, Charlotte's Lucas Harrell (2-6) came into Friday's start winless in his last nine outings. But he scattered five hits and allowed a run on Rich Thompson's fifth-inning single over seven innings.

Buck Coats put the game away for Charlotte (24-32) in the top of the eighth when he lined a two-out, two-strike, three-run homer just inside the right field foul pole off Ehren Wassermann. It was another rough outing by the veteran side-winding right-hander, who has now allowed 19 hits and walked 11 while giving up 14 earned runs in his last 171/3 innings over 10 appearances.

Andy Tracy's sixth homer overall and first homer at home, a two-run bomb off the billboards down the first base line, made it 8-3 in the eighth. Neil Sellers had three hits, giving him eight multi-hit games in his last 12 starts. Thompson also had three hits.

From the Morning Call