Andre Chiefs

Malden, MA- The Lexington duo of Junior Pena and Jake Vesling combined for 12 strikeouts when the Chiefs fell to the Blue Sox 5-2 at Maplewood on Thursday night.

Chiefs’ lefty Tim Dunphy allowed only one earned run in his five innings but was victimized by a couple of errors in the three run Blue Sox third inning.

The Chiefs grabbed a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first on singles by torrid Tony Serino, Nate Witkowski, and Steve Passatempo (RBI).

The Sox went the three single route themselves and knotted things up in the top of the second when Julian Alvarez, Mitch Schroeder and Morgan Brown (RBI) turned the all singles trick.

Pena retired the bottom third of the Chiefs order in the bottom of the second. The Blue Sox then capitalized on some shabby Chiefs defense, along with two hits. to grab a 4-1 lead in the top of the third. A John Barry leadoff single, followed by a couple errors from second baseman Evan Reynolds, an RBI fielders’ choice off the bat of Tyler Ferguson, and finally a two RBI single by Alvarez, accounted for the runs.

Dunphy and Pena matched zeros in the fourth and fifth innings as the game headed into the sixth with the Blue Sox still in front 4-1.

Lexington padded their margin to 5-1 in the top of the sixth when Nate Wolf walked, when to second on a wild pitch, and scored on a Brown RBI double off reliever David Kerns.

Vesling came on for Pena and shut the Chiefs down with two K’s in the bottom of the sixth and Kerns held Lexington scoreless, despite an Alvarez one out double, in the top of the seventh.

The Chiefs picked up a run and threatened for more when they brought the tying run to the plate with two outs in the seventh. Michael Nestor and Serino both reached on one out singles. After Nate Witkowski lined to right for the second out, Ben Waldrip (pictured) singled to right, scoring Nestor, to make it 5-2. With Serino at third and Waldrip at first, Vesling secured the win when he got Passatempo swinging to end the game.

Pena (2-0) got the win. The former Kansas City Royals’ farmhand went five innings, allowed five hits, and struck out eight. Vesling worked the final two frames and gave up a run and four hits while striking out four.

Dunphy now 3-3 took the loss. The veteran southpaw allowed just one earned run and surrendered seven hits in five innings. Kerns allowed a run and two doubles and struck out three.

Chiefs Chatter… Both the Blue Sox and Chiefs had nine hits in the game……The Chiefs now have a few days off to regroup and will return to action in a rare twi-night doubleheader against the Reading Bulldogs on Monday starting at 6:45 PM at Maplewood….The ICL regular season will conclude next week with the first round of the playoffs scheduled to begin on August 11th…..Due to the high number of rainouts this summer, both the first round and the semi-finals will be best of three series….Serino remains hot at the plate and with his three for four performance raised his average to .433 on the season….