Down on the Farm: Tsuyoshi Wada leads Iowa Cubs to win

Class-A Advanced: Lakeland Manatees 8 – Daytona Cubs 9 (F)

The Daytona Cubs pushed four runs across in the bottom of the 11th inning Sunday, erasing a three-run deficit and coming from behind to beat the Lakeland Flying Tigers, 9-8, in a surprising win.

Daytona (34-45) opened the frame with back-to-back singles before a groundout advanced the runners to second and third with one out. A wild pitch by Brennan Smith allowed Chad Krist, who was on third, to score, and Pin-Chieh Chen to move to third, cutting the Tigers’ lead to 8-6. Gioskar Amaya drew a walk to put men on the corners with one out and a throwing error by Lakeland second baseman Curt Powell allowed Marco Hernandez to reach, cutting the deficit yet again.

Smith then elected to intentionally walk Albert Almora, a decision which would come back to haunt him. That would be the last batter Smith faced as Alex Burgos entered the game, looking to preserve the slim lead. The first batter he faced, Bijan Rademacher, hit a sacrifice fly that tied the game and Dan Vogelbach then delivered the game-winning RBI single to left, sending the home faithful to their cars happy.

Lakeland (45-33) led for much of the game, scoring three times in the top of the 11th to take what seemed to be a commanding lead. However, the aforementioned defensive woes proved costly as the Cubs rallied. Four different Daytona players – Hernandez, Almora, Vogelbach and Krist – tallied two hits on the night, with Rademacher driving in three runs in the win.

Cubs starter Felix Pena (1-6, 3.21 ERA) allowed just two runs on seven hits in the win, but did not factor into the decision. He struck out six and walked one in the start.