Jones dazzles, Mussels walk-off Mets 3-2
FORT MYERS — Eli Jones tossed 5.2 shutout innings and Quentin Young drove in two runs, as the Fort Myers Mighty Mussels walked off the St. Lucie Mets 3-2 Wednesday night at Hammond Stadium.
Jones started on the mound for Fort Myers (50-72, 23-35), and held St. Lucie (76-51, 42-20) scoreless across 5.2 innings of work. By recording two outs in the top of the sixth inning, Jones reached 100 complete innings of work on the year.
He became the first Mussels’ era player to throw 100 innings in a season and first Fort Myers pitcher to do so since Tyler Watson in 2019 with the Miracle. He reached the mark by throwing a season-high 94 pitches with 63 strikes.
In the bottom of the ninth inning, Daniel Pena reached on an infield single and advanced to second on a throwing error on the play. He was replaced by Ryan Sprock, who entered to pinch run.
Bryan Acuna and Bruin Agbayani drew back-to-back walks to load the bases for Quentin Young.
Young then broke his bat on a ground ball to St. Lucie second baseman Mitch Voit, who bobbled the ball before throwing home to try and retire the baserunner Sprock. The throw beat Sprock to the plate, but St. Lucie catcher Chase Meggers pulled his foot off home. That allowed Sprock to score and gave the Mussels a 3-2 victory.
The walk-off was the eighth of the season for the Mussels and it also came on the birthday of manager Seth Feldman. Fort Myers is now 11-6 in games that are tied after eight innings.
For the second straight night, Fort Myers opened the scoring with a run in the home half of the first inning.
Emmanuel Rodriguez led off the frame with a single to right field at 105.4 mph, before stealing second and moving to third on a throwing error by Meggers.
Rodriguez touched home on a sacrifice fly by Young, which gave the Mussels a 1-0 lead. It was the first professional RBI for Young.
In the bottom of the third inning, Fort Myers added on. Rodriguez reached on a walk to start the frame and advanced to second on a groundout by Agbayani.
Rodriguez then moved to third on a flyout from Enrique Jimenez, before scoring on an RBI single by Dameury Pena to extend the Mussel lead to 2-0.
Jonathan Stevens recorded the final out of the top of the sixth inning, closing the line for Jones.
Stevens struck out the first two batters in the top of the eighth inning before running into trouble. Randy Guzman reached on a bloop double, ahead of an error by Young, which allowed AJ Salgado to reach.
With runners on the corners and two outs, Simon Juan tied the game 2-2 with a two-run double. Both runs were unearned against Stevens.
Stevens recorded the first two outs of the top of the ninth inning, but was replaced by Will Armbruester (1-1), who retired the final batter of the frame.
The final series of the season continues today at 7:05 p.m. at Hammond Stadium. Christian Becerra (3-2, 2.76) will get the ball for Fort Myers in game three of the series. Coverage begins at 6:45 on the Mighty Mussels Baseball Network.