Baseball Game Preview: Melbourne Bulldogs vs. Palm Bay Pirates

Melbourne has gone 8-2 against Palm Bay recently and they'll look to pad the win column further on Thursday. The Melbourne Bulldogs will head out on the road to face off against the Palm Bay Pirates at 6:00 p.m. Melbourne's pitching crew has only allowed four runs per game this season, so Palm Bay's hitters will have their work cut out for them.

On Tuesday, Melbourne earned a 5-2 win over Sebastian River. The Bulldogs haven't had any issues with the Sharks recently, as the game was their third consecutive victory against them.

Jacob Hershey

Batters Struck Out (Career)

03/04/25 vs Sebastian River	6
04/25/24 @ Space Coast	4
04/10/24 vs Astronaut	4
03/05/24 vs Palm Bay	4
02/28/25 vs Vero Beach	3

Melbourne got a great performance from Jacob Hershey as he struck out six batters over six innings while giving up just two earned runs off three hits. The dominant performance gave Hershey a new career-high in strikeouts.

On the hitting side, the team relied heavily on Tony Burrows, who went 3-for-4 with two runs and one triple. Those two runs gave him a new career-high. Dominic Tamburrino also deserves some recognition as he hit his first double of the season.

Meanwhile, Palm Bay came up short against Heritage on Tuesday and fell 14-9. The Pirates have struggled against the Panthers recently, as the game was their sixth consecutive lost meetings.

Jose Rivera led a balanced group of hitters, scoring two runs while getting on base in three of his four plate appearances. The team also got some help courtesy of Jacob Hines, who scored three runs while getting on base in three of his four plate appearances.

Palm Bay's loss dropped their record down to 5-2. As for Melbourne, they now have a winning record of 4-3.

Everything went Melbourne's way against Palm Bay in their previous meeting back in March of 2024, as Melbourne made off with an 18-3 win. The rematch might be a little tougher for Melbourne since the team won't have the home-field advantage this time around. We'll see if the change in venue makes a difference.