The Florence Freedom (19-20) won a wild Monday night game at Champion Window Field. The Freedom beat the Traverse City Beach Bums 8-6 to win the series and move to one game under .500. Timely hitting and a couple breaks helped the Freedom win the last game in June.

Traverse City drew first blood when they scored one run in the top of the 2nd inning. Mike Epping reached on an error and stole two bases to move to third base. Epping scored on a single from Joe Blackburn.
Florence evened things up in the home half of the second. Angel Molina walked to lead off the inning and scored on a groundout from Eddie Gonzalez. Eddie Gonzalez added a two run single in the 5th inning; Gonzalez drove in three runs to lead the Freedom.

The game see-sawed back and forth and the Freedom were up by two heading into the seventh inning. The leadoff hitter Mike Goetz hit a single and was able to move to second on a bizarre play. Starting pitcher Everett Saul wanted a new baseball and flipped the current ball towards the Florence dugout. Mike Goetz was awarded second base because Saul did not have permission to get a new ball and he tossed the ball that was in play off the field, resulting in an error. Mike Goetz scored on a single from Mike Young to cut the lead to one. Traverse City tied the game on an unlucky triple from Kyle Manus. Manus hit a line drive single into center field but the ball took a horrible bounce and all Garth McKinney could do was watch it roll on to the wall. Yosandy Ibanez relieved Saul and got the Freedom out of the inning with no further damage, but the game was now tied at six.

Florence would receive a couple breaks of their own in the bottom of the 8th inning. Landry got hit by a pitch and Basham walked to give the Freedom two on with two out and Angel Molina at the plate. Molina hit a pop up to the right fielder, Brad Roblin. The ball bounced out of his glove and both Landry and Basham were able to score to give the Freedom an 8-6 lead. The Freedom scored two runs without getting a hit in the bottom of the eighth inning.

Cody Castle came in and shut down the Traverse City Beach Bums in the top of the 9th inning. Castle has been great this season, and he is now seven for seven on save opportunities. The Florence Freedom will carry momentum into their series against the Chillicothe Paints. Chillicothe comes to town on July 1st for a three game series with the Freedom.

The Florence Freedom posted a 14-15 record in June. The Freedom only had one off day during the entire month of June.