By MIKE ASHMORE
For The Trentonian

TRENTON -- Before the game, Thunder starting pitcher Brett Marshall walked a past a lone reporter in the hallway that leads to both clubhouses and held up ten fingers.  But he wasn't looking for high fives.

The talented 22-year-old righty was instead thinking about getting his Eastern League-leading tenth win, but instead came up an inning short, despite Trenton defeating Portland, 4-3, on Saturday night at Waterfront Park.

Marshall was recently selected to the Eastern League All-Star Game, which is to be held in Reading on Wednesday, and given that he's expected to possibly start the contest or at least pitch an inning in relief, he was held to a lower pitch count than usual.  After a season-high 105 in Portland in his last start, Marshall threw just 69 pitches through four innings tonight, and was clearly disappointed that he couldn't claim his milestone victory.

"I understand why it happened, we have the All-Star Game coming up, and I'm excited about that," Marshall said.  "But I wish I could have finished that one more inning, because tonight's more important."

Marshall said after the game that he hit his pitch count faster than he expected, which put acting manager Luis Dorante in a difficult position.

"The pitch count got to him, but that's one of the things he needs to do, he needs to find a way to use less pitches per innings and hopefully get deeper into the game," Dorante said.

"We've got to keep all the pitch counts intact.  I hate to (take him out), but that comes first.  I know he's got nine wins before the All-Star break, and it would have been nice if we got one more inning out of it and gotten the win.  But it didn't happen."

Somewhat lost in the shuffle was that Trenton won, which combined with a New Britain victory, kept them a game and a half ahead of the Rock Cats in the race for first place in the Eastern Division.

Luke Murton got Trenton off a 1-0 lead with some aggressive hitting.  After a Melky Mesa single led off the inning, Murton had the green light on a 3-0 offering from Sea Dogs starter Jeremy Kehrt and stroked the pitch down the left field, scoring Mesa and putting Trenton on top, 1-0.

Although Portland did not score in their half of the third, Marshall's 17-pitch frame certainly was an eventful one.  After a one-out walk drawn by No. 9 hitter Zach Gentile, Jackie Bradley, Jr. appeared to have taken Marshall deep to give Portland a 2-1 lead.  But center fielder Melky Mesa never gave up on the play, and attempted a leaping catch at the base of the fence.  Although he didn't corral the ball, he did keep it in the ballpark, which left runners on second and third with one out instead of a 2-1 deficit.

Marshall's defense continued to do wonders in the inning.  Jeremy Hazelbaker followed Bradley, Jr.'s at-bat with a hard-hit line drive to first base, but Murton cleanly fielded it and threw home, trapping Gentile in a rundown which would utlimately lead to the second out of the inning.  Murton came up big -- he is 6-foot-4, 235 pounds after all -- one more time to end the inning, picking a low throw from third baseman Addison Maruszak to end the inning.

An RBI single in the fourth inning by Peter Hissey was the only blemish on Marshall's line, but this time it was his offense that would pick him up in the bottom half of the inning.  Zoilo Almonte led off the fourth inning by depositing the first pitch he saw from Kehrt over the right field fence to put Trenton on top for good, 2-1.  Mesa followed that with a single, and Murton took over the league lead in home runs with 18 one batter later with a longball that was stopped only by the left field foul pole.

Lee Hyde, Ryan Pope and Kelvin Perez combined to shut down Portland through the next four frames, but things got interesting in the ninth once Jon Meloan entered the game to attempt to close it out.  Hissey hit a weak ground ball to Murton, and Meloan was quick off the mound to cover the bag, but slowed down in what appeared to be a miscommunication between he and Murton on who would complete the play.  By the time Murton tossed it to Meloan, it was too late, and Hissey was safe at first with nobody out.

Meloan retired the next two batters he faced in order, but Bradley, Jr. stroked a double deep to right center field that plated Hissey and narrowed Trenton's advantage to just one.  But the former major leaguer recovered and struck out Hazelbaker to end the threat and the game, giving Trenton the best record in the Eastern League for the first time all season.