• Classifieds
  • Search
  • Garage Sales
  • Place Ad In Paper
  • FREE Online Ads
• WNY Blogs
• PLUS! Coupons
• Garage Sales
• Your Photos
  • View Photos
  • Add Your Own Photos
• Your Pet Stories
  • View Pet Stories
  • Add Your Own Pet Stories and Photos
• Sports
  • College Sports
    • Army Black Knights
    • Canisius College
  • Bisons
• Steam
  • View Steam
  • Add Your Steam
• Events
  • Search Events
  • Add Your Event
• Business Directory
• Helpful Links
• WNY Woman

The Herd was limited to four hits and struck out 10 times against Charlotte Knights starter Jack Egbert and reliever Randy Willams, and a Chip Ambres solo homer in the first inning accounted for their only run in a 4-1 loss.

Since playing their last home game on June 16, the Bisons’ roster has been impacted by 14 transactions. Three players – Wily Mo Pena, Javier Valentin, and Bobby Kielty – were released. But even with shortstop Javier Castillo and second baseman Wilson Valdez making their home debuts, Buffalo couldn’t get their offense in gear.

The Bisons, trying to establish momentum after winning the final two games of a 4-4 road trip, were also battling the effects of a horrendous travel day, in which they had a 3:30 wake-up call for a flight back to Buffalo from Gwinnett, Georgia. Starting pitcher Brandon Knight tried his best, but scattered eight hits over 5 1/3 innings and took the loss.

“It was a constant struggle,” said Knight (4-7), who failed to get through the sixth inning for the sixth time in seven starts. “It falls on me. I have to keep us in the game and I don’t think I did that. I made some decent pitches, they put the ball in play, and I got beat.”

“We’ve got to find a way to win at home,” Bisons manager Ken Oberkfell said. “It’s very frustrating when you come home and you don’t play well.”

Things didn’t start off well, even before the game. Anthem singer George Harb was victimized by a dead wireless microphone, so the Bisons had to resort to a pre-recorded version.

Then after Ambres hit his fifth homer of the season, Knight allowed two runs in the second inning and single tallies in the fifth and sixth.

The second inning featured an RBI double by Wilson Betemit and a sacrifice fly by Cole Armstrong. The Knights added their insurance runs on RBI doubles by Miguel Negron and Brandon Allen.

The Bisons bats also fell silent, scratching out only a two-out single in the third and grounding into a double play after back-to-back singles in the fifth.

“When you got somebody in the first three batters getting that hit, you hope things kind of catch on,” Ambres said. “It never really got going. We needed some offense and we didn’t come through.”

Buffalo was stymied by Egbert (6-2), who didn’t allow a walk and struck out seven while throwing 65 of his 99 pitches for strikes.

“He had pretty good stuff,” Oberkfell said. “We didn’t get anything in the middle of the plate. We were a little overanxious, too.”

In the ninth, the Bisons got a leadoff walk from Cory Sullivan (their only free pass of the game), but Williams fanned Jesus Feliciano, Ambres, and Emil Brown to end the game.

………

A bright spot for Buffalo was lefthanded reliever Jon Switzer, who was perfect in 2 2/3 innings.

He was making his first appearance since being sent down by the parent New York Mets, with whom he worked four games and had a 8.10 earned run average in 3 1/3 innings.

“He was that way before he went up,” Oberkfell said. “He came back and did a nice job. We’re glad to have him back.”

………

Attendance was 10,045, bolstered by the annual appearance of the Famous Chicken, the legendary mascot who started as the San Diego Chicken almost 40 years ago.