Fourteen. That's how many Charlotte Knights got left on base in Durham on Sunday evening — fourteen runners who reached and never came around to score. Charlotte out-hit the Bulls, put a rally together in nearly every inning, and lost the ballgame 3-2 anyway. That, folks, is how you drop a series to a team you've spent all season pushing around.
Let me back up, because Saturday was a different story entirely.
On Saturday night, your Charlotte Knights looked like the team that had owned Durham all year. They fell behind 2-0 in the first inning and then just started hitting — fifteen hits by the time it was over, a 7-5 win, and their tenth victory in eleven tries against the Bulls this season. Rikuu Nishida, Michael Turner, and Caden Connor each rapped out three hits. Nishida alone drove in three runs, and he did it three different ways: an RBI triple in that four-run second, a bunt single in the fourth, an infield single in the eighth. The kid found three different ways to be a problem.
The second inning was the whole ballgame. Connor singled one in, Jason Matthews tied it with a sacrifice fly, Nishida tripled home the go-ahead run, and Everson Pereira tacked on another with a single. Four runs, one inning, and Charlotte never trailed again. Ryan Galanie added a solo home run in the fifth for good measure. The bullpen — Shane Smith, Jairo Iriarte, Garrett Schoenle, Wikelman Gonzalez, and Javy Guerra — walked nine Durham hitters and plunked two more, the kind of thing that makes a manager reach for the antacids, but they wriggled out of all of it. Guerra slammed the door with a scoreless ninth for the save.
And then came Sunday.
Here's the maddening part: the Knights were the better team in the finale, too. They more than doubled up Durham in the hit column. They had runners on in nearly every inning. They held the Bulls' offense quiet for most of the afternoon. And they lost, 3-2, because they could not get the one hit that mattered.
They left the bases loaded in the second. They left them loaded again in the third. By the time the game was knotted 2-2 after four innings, Charlotte had already stranded ten baserunners. Ten! Nishida did everything he could — 3-for-4 with an RBI and a stolen base out of the leadoff spot. Dru Baker went 3-for-4 against his old team. Caden Connor doubled twice. The hits were there. The timing was not.
The dagger came in the bottom of the seventh. Two outs, nobody on, and then Durham drew a walk and followed it with an RBI triple. One swing, one run, and that was the ballgame. Charlotte finished the day having left fourteen men on base and struck out fifteen times. You can lose a lot of ways in this sport. Out-hitting the other guy and still coming up short is the one that keeps you up at night. (Your Knights did it to themselves in Nashville last week, too.)
So Durham takes the series, two games to one — after grabbing the opener 8-2 on Friday and snapping a nine-game Charlotte win streak in the process. The same Bulls Charlotte had handled all season. Baseball, folks. It'll humble you in a hurry.
Now here's the good news, and there is good news. The bats are awake. Nishida is locked in. Baker is swinging it. The Knights come home to Truist Field for a six-game homestand against the Norfolk Tides starting Tuesday, first pitch 7:04. Six games in your own building against one opponent is a chance to bank some wins — and to turn all those stranded runners into something that counts.
Fourteen men on base and nothing to show for it on Sunday. Let's see what this lineup does when the big hits finally start landing.