Offense struggles again as Kernels fall to Burlington, 1-0

CEDAR RAPIDS — You can say one thing about these Cedar Rapids Kernels. They can be confounding.

A 1-0 loss Monday afternoon to Burlington at Veterans Memorial Stadium defintely was that, among other things. The home team did nothing offensively, not even picking up its first — and only, as it turned out — hit until there were two outs in the eighth inning.

Thank you, Travis Blankenhorn, for avoiding what would have been the Midwest League's second no-hitter of the season. He lined a single back through the box and into center field.

This was a carryover from Sunday, when Cedar Rapids had three hits and a run in the first inning but only two hits and no runs the rest of the way in a 4-1 loss to the Bees. The Kernels had 22 hits and 15 runs in a win Friday night over Burlington and 12 more hits in a win Saturday night.

Confounding.

'I just think a lot of guys don't have plans (at the plate),' said a confounded Kernels Manager Tommy Watkins. 'They think they can just roll bats and balls out there. We didn't really look like a playoff team today. It's like we've talked about. Some days, we play great. Then today, it looked like they didn't even want to be here.'

The Kernels (36-28) are in a fight with Kane County and Quad Cities for the two available first-half playoff spots in the Midwest League. With this loss, Cedar Rapids' lead for first place is just a half-game on Kane County (which had its game rained out Monday) and two games on Quad Cities, with a three-game series at Davenport on tap beginning Tuesday night.

Kane County has seven first-half games remaining, QC and Cedar Rapids six each.

'I think you're bound to have some struggles in a 140-game season,' said Kernels catcher Mitchell Kranson. 'The last couple of games have kind of been like that. We might be swinging at some pitches we don't normally swing at, which can happen. The good thing is we've put ourselves in a good spot leading up to the last week of the first half. Even with these struggles, we still have a good shot at securing a (playoff) spot.'

Burlington (25-36) scored its run in the second against tough-luck Kernels starting pitcher Tyler Wells (3-1). The Kernels loaded the bases on walks against Bees starter Erik Manoah in the fifth, but Blankenhorn grounded to shortstop on a 3-2 pitch to end the threat.

Ronnie Glenn threw two perfect relief innings for Burlington. Blake Smith gave up Blankenhorn's hit and walked Kranson with two outs in the ninth, but got Ariel Montesino to fly to right to end it.

The Kernels have been a free-swinging team all season, drawing the fewest walks in the MWL. These past two games have seen them swinging at a lot of pitches out of the strike zone, especially offspeed pitches.

'Very disappointing,' Watkins said. 'Guys get up 2-0 (in the count), they're in the driver's seat. They can swing hard, don't have to be chasing pitches out of the zone. Or a first pitch. We're swinging at pitcher's pitches instead of getting our pitch early in the count ... The first two strikes, those are yours. I'm not going to chase out of the zone or swing at a borderline pitch just because it's a strike. I want to get my pitch. The last two games, we've been swinging just to swing.'

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