Salt Lake Bees pitcher Sean O'Sullivan couldn't have been happy to see Colorado Springs' Eric Young Jr. come up to the plate in the fourth inning on Thursday night at Spring Mobile Ballpark.

But he wasn't trying to bean him.

That's the Bees' story, anyway, even if the umpire didn't believe it.

Young had already hit two long home runs off of O'Sullivan — one in the first inning and again in the second. Then, on first pitch of Young's third plate appearance, O'Sullivan plunked him with an inside fastball.

Home-plate umpire Jeff Latter, without a warning, immediately ejected O'Sullivan from the game as Young appeared to contemplate rushing the mound before being held back. That brought usually mild-mannered Bees manager Bobby Mitchell out of the dugout to stick up for his pitcher.

Mitchell then got tossed out of the game as well — for the first time in his two seasons as the Bees skipper.

The two ejections seemed to ignite the Bees for a time, but it wasn't nearly enough. The division-leading Sky Sox gained a game on Salt Lake with a 9-3 victory.

"The umpire was wrong," said Mitchell. "We don't throw at hitters when they are hitting good against us. We just don't do that. He had no reason to throw him out. All O'Sullivan was doing was trying to establish the inside corner and he hit him. We're going to pitch inside so we may hit somebody, but we're never going to hit somebody on purpose."

O'Sullivan, in his first game back with the Bees after making four straight starts for the parent Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, had a rough outing even before being ejected. Young homered on the game's second pitch and added a three-run shot in the second.

It was 6-0 — following a two-run homer by Jonathan Herrera — when Young got beaned and the fireworks with the umpires ensued.

The Bees scored three runs of their own in the bottom of the third on a solo homer by Sean Rodriguez, a run-scoring single by Ben Johnson and an RBI groundout by Gary Patchett to cut the gap to 6-3.

That was as close as Salt Lake would get, however. Young added a single and a run-scoring triple later in the game to finish going 4-for-4 with five RBIs. Salt Lake dropped to 45-43 with the loss, 5.5 games behind the 50-37 Sky Sox.

The same two teams will play the third game in a five-game series tonight at 7. Dan Denham (6-4, 4.37 ERA) is scheduled to start for Salt Lake against Alan Johnson (8-3, 5.70).

BEES WAX: The Bees have activated relief pitcher Jose Arredondo from the disabled list. He'd been out with a right ulnar collateral ligament sprain since June 25. Salt Lake also added infielder Abel Nieves from double-A Arkansas, while sending catcher Chris Rosenbaum back to single-A Rancho Cucamonga. ... Salt Lake turned one double play on Thursday night to increase their league-leading total to 94. ... Attendance on Thursday was 7,123

e-mail: lojo@desnews.com