June 21: Patton The Hero As Goldeyes Bats Awaken In 6-4 Win

Rick Forney knows it’s been a struggle for Cory Patton this season, but the Goldeyes manager also knows his centre fielder will eventually start to hit – and hit well.

Saturday night in a thriller at Canwest Park, Patton just might have taken his first baby step out of a monster slump.

With the bases loaded and two out in the bottom of the eighth and the Goldeyes trailing Joliet 3-2, Patton drilled a 3-2 offering from Joliet’s Drew Shetrone into centre to give the Goldeyes a 4-3 lead.

Dee Brown followed with a double to score Kevin West and Patton to make it 6-3 and that’s all closer Matt Davis needed. Although Davis allowed a run in the ninth, it was far from enough for the JackHammers as Winnipeg won it 6-4 and Patton, who came to the plate hitting an even .200 (he was 0-for-3 on the evening before drilling the game-saving single), breathed a sigh of relief.

“It always feels good to do something in a big situation to help your team win,” Patton said. “It’s been a struggle. I know I’m a better hitter than I’ve been this season. Hopefully this will be the start of something. I don’t like to use the ‘S’ (slump) word. We’ll just say I’ve been in a funk. Maybe this is the first step toward getting out of the funk.”

Patton, a 5-foot-9, 215-pound outfielder from Lake Jackson, Texas, has always been a good hitter. As a professional, he came to Winnipeg with a lifetime average of .271 and, last year, hit .305 in 407 at-bats with 13 homers and 70 RBI at Dunedin (Blue Jays organization) in the Florida State League.

But this year, it’s been a struggle. Although he’s fielded his position well and looked solid on the base paths, he just hasn’t looked comfortable at the plate.

“I do get over-anxious when I’m in a funk and I’ll try to do too much with a pitch you can’t do too much with,” Patton said. “Tom (hitting coach Vaeth) and I have been working on my approach. We’ve cut it down to one at-bat at a time. If I can get through that, then we’ll look at a series of 10 at-bats and see how that goes.

“I’ve always been an aggressive hitter so I’ve been a first-pitch hitter a lot during my career. This year, that’s hurt me a bit. I know I have to be a little more patient at the plate and in my at-bat in the eighth inning, I was a lot more patient than I have been. I got the count to 3-1 and then, when he called the second strike to make it 3-2, I knew I wasn’t going to let anything near the plate get by me. The pitch he threw me on 3-2 was a change-up high, probably out of the (strike) zone, but after the 3-1 strike, I wasn’t going take it. This time it paid off.”

Thanks to Patton’s heroics – and the speed he demonstrated by scoring from first base on Dee Brown’s double – the Goldeyes stopped a two-game losing streak. The Fish haven’t lost three-in-a-row this season.

Winnipeg is now 22-9, four games up on second-place Schaumburg. Game 3 in this four-game series goes at 1:30 today at Canwest Park.