Black Sox improve GLBL record

The Soo Black Sox improved their Great Lakes Baseball League record to 2-0 on Friday night against the Mancelona Orange Crush.

Backed by a strong pitching performance from Andrew Toni, the Black Sox blanked the Orange Crush 6-0 in their first GLBL home game this season. Toni threw 97 pitches, 64 for strikes, over seven innings to earn the complete game shutout.

"I just wanted to come out and throw strikes," Toni said. "You never want to struggle in the last few innings because that could end up killing you against good teams. I was impressed with our defence today, They all worked pretty hard behind me."

Black Sox coach Mike Lebel echoed Toni's comments and added that some breakdowns defensively by Mancelona early also helped.

"He had one tough inning there (in the fifth), he walked two guys in the inning but he worked out of it," said Lebel. "He never gave in and just kept pounding the strike zone. The big difference between (Mancelona) and us was they broke down a bit early in the game and gave us a few extra at-bats and a few extra runs."

Toni finished the night with nine strikeouts and also managed to secure 10 ground ball outs in the win. The veteran gave up just four hits in the win.

"I'm not really a strikeout pitcher usually but I got a lot of ground balls today too," Toni said. "My curve ball was working today so I got those strikeouts and those help a lot. We've got a solid defence here and when everybody plays top notch we're not going to get beat by too many teams."

After opening up a 1-0 lead through one inning, the Black Sox broke the game open with a four-run second inning. Some sloppy plays defensively by Mancelona and the Black Sox getting key hits from the likes of Joey Lesage, Kyle Sayers and Jacob Lake allowed the home side to break the game open.

Sayers finished the night with a pair of singles and knocked in a run for the Black Sox.

The same two teams will square off again on Saturday morning at 11 a.m. at Strathclair fields locally.