Story courtesy San Jose Giants

(7-1-22) Celina’s Seth Lonsway (Ohio State) fired six scoreless innings of one-hit ball on Thursday evening in a 3–1 Giants victory over the Modesto Nuts at Excite Ballpark. Lonsway’s gem, along with a standout night at the plate from Carter Williams, who drove in all three San Jose runs, led the Giants (44–28, 4–2 second half) to their 12th win in the last 14 games.

Lonsway (7–0) earned his league-leading seventh win of the season with Thursday’s masterpiece. The left-hander walked three, struck out three and induced 11 groundouts during his start. He retired the final 13 batters of his outing.

Modesto threatened in the top of the first against Lonsway, but left a pair of runners in scoring position. With one out, Edwin Arroyo drew a walk before Harry Ford’s potential inning-ending double play grounder was mishandled by Aeverson Arteaga at shortstop for an error. A wild pitch then advanced the runners to second and third, but Lonsway escaped when he retired Robert Perez Jr. on a groundout to first and Walking Cabrera on a line out to second.

San Jose then took their first lead of the series when Williams smacked a home run in the bottom of the first. Grant McCray struck out to start the inning, but was able to reach base safely thanks to a passed ball. After Arteaga flied out, Williams stepped to the plate and launched a two-run home run to right. The round-tripper was Williams’ fifth of the year in the California League and it gave the Giants a 2–0 lead.

Lonsway had to work out of another jam in the top of the second as a leadoff walk to David Sheaffer and a bloop single into shallow right from Colin Davis put runners on first and second. Milkar Perez though followed by grounding into a 5–4–3 double play and then after Randy Bednar worked a walk, Ben Ramirez bounced out to end the inning.

After Lonsway breezed through a 1–2–3 top of the third, San Jose added to their lead with a single tally in the bottom of the inning. Rayner Santana led off by reaching on an error before McCray walked and Arteaga singled to load the bases. Williams followed with a line drive to deep center that was caught by a leaping Bednar on the edge of the warning track, but Santana was able to tag-up and score on the sacrifice fly to make it 3–0.

Lonsway then didn’t allow another baserunner for the remainder of the night. He needed only six pitches to cruise through a perfect top of the fourth before setting down the side in order in both the fifth and sixth innings as well.

Jose Cruz entered from the bullpen to begin the top of the seventh with the score still at 3–0 and fanned two in a 1–2–3 inning. In the eighth, Bednar blasted a one-out solo home run to deep center bringing the Nuts within 3–1, but Modesto would get no closer. Cruz bounced back with consecutive strikeouts of the next two hitters — Ramirez and Arroyo — to retire the side. Then in the ninth, Jorge Guzman quickly set down the first two batters on a pair of groundouts. Back-to-back singles from Cabrera and Sheaffer put the potential tying runs on base, but Guzman recovered as he induced the next hitter, Davis to ground into a force out to finish the game.

Lonsway’s Start: The six innings pitched by Seth Lonsway was a career-high and matched the longest start by any San Jose hurler this season. Lonsway needed 48 pitches to get through the first two innings (five baserunners), but only 36 pitches over the final four innings (no baserunners). He lowered his season ERA to 3.21.

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