Snider's Cycle Lift Lugnuts

LANSING– Lansing's Travis Snider entered Saturday night's game in a 4-for-33 skid at the plate. Consider the slump over. Snider went 5-for-5 and hit for the fourth cycle in Lugnuts history, leading his team to a 9-3 thrashing of the Fort Wayne Wizards at Memorial Stadium Saturday night.

Snider began his assault in the first inning as he smashed a two-run homer to right field to give the Lugnuts a 2-0 lead. It was his second homer in as many days.

Fort Wayne cut the lead to 2-1 in the second when Sam Carter hit a leadoff homer to left field off of Lansing starter Kyle Ginley.

Ginley (2-5) would settle down after that allowing just three more hits over 5 1/3 innings while picking up his second win of the season.

Snider stepped to the plate for the second time in third inning, where he tripled off of the left field wall to plate Scott Campbell and push the Lugnuts ahead 4-1. Lansing would add another run in the frame when Jonathan Jaspe's groundout scored Snider to make it 5-1.

Snider's next at-bat came in the fifth, where he lifted a double over the center fielder Javis Diaz's head to put him a single shy of the cycle.

He was able to complete the feat in his fourth at-bat, when he dropped a broken bat single into center field to load the bases.

Snider capped off his perfect performance in the ninth inning when he dropped another single into left field. The Lugnuts would add three runs to the lead in the ninth to put away the win.

Snider becomes the fourth Lugnut to ever hit for the cycle, joining Corey Patterson (1999), Donnie Hood (2003), and Chip Cannon (2005).

Lansing (44-42, 9-8) and Fort Wayne (39-46, 8-8) will continue the series on Sunday afternoon at 2:00 p.m. Ray Gonzalez (4-2, 3.33) will take the bump for the Lugnuts, while Drew Underwood (5-6, 5.19) will hurl for the Wizards.