Pitching Matchups; Game of the Day 5/7/11

1:00pm
New Britain Rock Cats (Deolis Guerra 2-3, 8.31)
vs. Portland Sea Dogs (Brock Huntzinger 2-3, 6.30)

1:05pm
Pawtucket Red Sox (Kyle Weiland 2-2, 3.42)
vs. Scranton-Wilkes Barre Yankees (David Phelps 1-3, 4.15)

1:35pm
Binghamton Mets (Brad Holt 1-1, 2.96)
vs. New Hampshire Fisher Cats (Zach Stewart 2-1, 2.64)

Game of the Day – BMets vs. Fisher Cats – Thanks to a five game winning streak to start the month of May, including a three game sweep of then first place Reading, the Fisher Cats are now back in the driver’s seat of the EL’s Eastern Division, mere percentage points over the RPhils. Two top-ranked hurlers hit the hill in Manchester this afternoon. Brad Holt gets his second shot at the Fisher Cats after a solid outing at NeDDS back on April 21st. In that game Holt went 6 innings, allowing only 1 earned run, 2 hits and 2 walks, while racking up a K per inning. He picked up his first “W” of the season on Monday against Erie and lowered his opponent’s batting average to .192 on the year. Zach Stewart gets the ball for New Hampshire today after his fourth straight quality start last Sunday versus Trenton. Stewart has not faced the BMets in 2011, but did go 1-2 again them last season. He has yet to win a game at home in three previous tries, but he did pitch well and picked up a win in his only day start of the season, so the odds are in Zach’s favor since it looks like it is going to be a perfect day out there. Rains are expected to threaten the later innings of this one, but they should get this in without too much of an issue. These two teams have played five games this season and the Fisher Cats have jumped out to a commanding 4-1 lead in the season series, with two rainouts.

Side note prediction (2-4) – Today's predicition: Zach Stewart holds the BMets to 1 earned run or less. Good luck Zach, because this thing is quickly turning into a bigger jinx than an S.I. cover.