Miller Dominates Snappers; Rattlers Win 3-1

A great pitching performance from Rattlers starting pitcher Matt Miller (pictured below) led Wisconsin to a 3-1 victory over the Beloit Snappers on Wednesday night. Miller looked shaky in the first inning, walking the first two batters and allowing the lone run of the game. He quickly settled down though and pitched 7 2/3 innings to earn his fifth victory of the season. Miller struck out six and was still hitting 92-94 on the stadium gun in the eighth inning.
After falling behind 1-0 in the top of the first, the T-Rats offense fought right back for two runs in the bottom half of the inning. Nick Shaw walked to lead off the inning, and went station to station for the team's first run. He took second on a wild pitch. Moved to third on a Mike Brownstein ground out, and scored on a T.J. Mittelstaedt ground out to short. Chad Stang (pictured below) then followed by blasting his second home run of the year to give Wisconsin the 2-1 lead. The Rattlers tacked on one more insurance run in the fifth. Greg Hopkins reached on a fielder's choice, stole second, and then scored on Brownstein's second single of the game. Recently promoted Brandon Macias also had a pair of hits to pace the Wisconsin attack.
The three runs would prove to be plenty as Alan Williams came on in relief of Miller in the eighth to get the final out of the inning, and Adrian Rosario (pictured below) worked a 1-2-3 ninth, striking out the side for the save.
Sadly, there are only twelve Rattler home games left in 2011, I hope to get out to Sunday's game to finally get to see Brooks Hall in action. Here are the rest of my images from Wednesday night.