Flu-stricken Cedar Rapids Kernels keep season going

CEDAR RAPIDS — This special 2023 baseball season seemed destined to end in crappy fashion. Pun very much intended there.

Some sort of stomach flu permeated the Cedar Rapids Kernels clubhouse Thursday prior to the team’s do-or-die Game 2 of their Midwest League Western Division championship playoff series at Veterans Memorial Stadium.

A number of players fell ill, a couple too much to be able to play.

Yet having it be incredibly easy to just go away, end a long season and get ready to go home for the winter, this group took the other route. They persevered, a 9-4 win Thursday night over Peoria sending these teams to a winner-take-all Game 3 Friday night at 6:35 at Memorial Stadium.

The winner advances to the MWL Championship Series against either Fort Wayne or Great Lakes, who also play a decisive Game 3 Friday night.

Cedar Rapids had the best regular-season record in all of full-season minor league baseball.

“We’re here to win,” said Kernels shortstop Noah Miller. “We want it. We don’t want to give up. We’re not just going to let something like this tear us down. We’re still playing at home, and they’ve still got to beat us here.”

Peoria won Game 1, 4-3, Tuesday night at home and took a 1-0 lead early in this game. What had been a frustrating series for the Kernels finally turned in the bottom of the fourth.

Luke Keaschall singled leading off against Peoria starting pitcher Ian Bedell, a Davenport Central High School graduate. Noah Cardenas followed with a double to right-center, and Jose Salas with a RBI single to center to tie the game.

Then it was Jeferson Morales. Andrew Cossetti originally was in the Cedar Rapids starting lineup at designated hitter, but he just couldn’t go, with Manager Brian Dinkelman deciding Morales would take his place.

Morales lined a three-run home run onto the deck in left field to suddenly put the Kernels on top, 4-1, and seemingly shifting the momentum of the entire game and possibly series.

“He’s had good at-bats for us all year. Done a nice job,” Dinkelman said. “When one guy goes down, the next guy steps up there. Jeferson had a great game for us, hit a big three-run homer there.”

A Carson McCusker single chased Bedell, with Miller greeting Peoria reliever Nathanael Heredia with a two-run home run to left-center, a six-run inning making it a 6-1 Kernels lead.

“100 percent. That’s a great way to put it. It gives us a window where we could like breathe a little bit,” Miller said, when asked if Morales’ homer released some tension for the Kernels. “We just got a three-run lead, we can just play baseball now. We don’t have to feel so much pressure. Then, bam, I hit a two-run homer, and we’re up five. I think that’s just what it was. Just a relief, honestly. Especially with the sickness and everything, it just gives us a little wiggle room you could work with.”

Jorel Ortega hit a solo home run to lead off the Kernels seventh, with McCusker adding a two-run double. Peoria got a pair of runs in the top of the ninth, but it was way too little and way too late.

Starter Cory Lewis threw four solid innings for Cedar Rapids, with Malik Barrington, Gabriel Yanez and Jarret Whorff finishing it off on the pitching side. Yanez was credited with the victory.

C.J. Culpepper (2-2, 4.99 earned run average in 10 starts) is expected to be the starting pitcher for the Kernels in Game 3. That’s obviously if he remains flu free.

“All of this in one day? Just nuts. Crazy,” Miller said.

“We’ve played too well all season, we’ve worked too hard for it to kind of go away just like that,” Dinkelman said. “So that those guys went out and played hard and had a good game like we’ve had throughout the year isn’t surprising. Hopefully some of these guys will feel better by tomorrow, and we’ll see what happens.”

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