Orange 28 Crushes Scarlet 16

There are lots of new players in the American Division this year (and from last) making their debuts this season. So every team is loaded with hitters. No one notices the defense, except when we give the other teams five or six outs in an inning.

In the battle today of the winless Orange and Scarlet, Orange finally put together a few innings of good defense and the very solid pitching of Ike Garcia to soundly defeat Scarlet 28-16. Putting up 28 runs didn't hurt either.

The game was a lot closer than that in the middle innings. The Orange Crush went 1-2-3 in the top of the first but then tallied ten in the next three innings to take a commanding 10-2 lead. The offensive highlight was two run shot over the right center fielder's head by Greg Wilson who touched them all. The defensive highlights were snag/putouts at rover by Mark Narciso and Mike Saindon at third in the fourth and just a crazy good catch in left by Brian Black, on a ball that was seemingly smashed over his head until he reached up and snared it.

In the third we scored five runs on five two out hits by the Coach, Black, Mark Edelstone, Kevin Hopkins, and Vince Francesco. We were on our way.

Ike was dealing and shut out the tough Scarlet lineup for three innings. But Scarlet pecked away with two in the fifth and when we had a defensive relapse in the sixth, they scored six to narrow our lead to 12-10. Our only runs in the middle were on a booming run scoring triple by Saindon, who then also scored on a sac fly by Steve Sloat.

Unlike last week though, this week we were determined to keep our lead. We tallied five in the seventh and four in the eighth punctuated by a triple to left by Narciso. In the ninth we put it away when we batted around with nine of the first ten batters reaching base. We netted seven in the open inning and the 28-16 lead held in the bottom of the ninth.

Francesco was a perfect 5-5, Wilson and Gabe Tanaka had four hits, and Black, Hopkins, Edleston, Saindon, Garcia, Narciso, and Kravin all had three hits to lead the offense.