By WJBC Staff
PEORIA – The Peoria Chiefs scored two runs in the second and held on to beat the Burlington Bees 2-1 Tuesday night. The win is Peoria’s third in a row and lifts them to 6-7 in the second half and 39-42 overall.
Former Illinois State standout Paul DeJong had two singles in four at-bats in the Peoria Chiefs debut. The Antioch native started at third base.
The Chiefs started the scoring in the bottom of the second against Bees starter Keynan Middleton. Alex DeLeon led off with a double and moved to third on a single by Harrison Bader. After Bader stole second DeLeon came home on a single by Steve Bean. Bader scored from third when Luis Cruz bounced into a double play to give the Chiefs a 2-0 lead.
The Bees got on the board in the sixth against Chiefs starter Jack Flaherty. Zach Houchins led off with a single and Natanael Delgado doubled to move Houchins to third. Houchins scored and Delgado advanced to third on a wild pitch with Steven Mateo batting to make it 2-1. After Flaherty struck out Mateo he gave way to Anderson Gerdel, who induced back-to-back groundouts to end the threat and strand Delgado at third.
Flaherty (4-1) pitched 5 1/3 innings and allowed one run on four hits, one walk, and one hit batter, striking out five. Gerdel pitched 2 1/3 shutout innings of relief, allowing three hits and striking out two. Kyle Grana pitched 1 1/3 hitless innings to get his ninth save of the season, striking out one and walking one.
