RHOADS WRAPS-15'S LOSE THRILLER TO KELSO
Although the core group of players on Astoria's 15-year-old Babe Ruth All-Star team has experienced much postseason success in the past, they have been notoriously slow starters.
The past three years, that start has come in the Don Rhoads Memorial Tournament. The end of the tournament came Sunday against an undefeated Kelso squad in the latest of many showdowns between these teams over the years.
Kelso scratched out an unearned run in the sixth inning to break a scoreless deadlock, then exploded for six runs in the seventh inning to improve to 16-0 on the summer with a 7-2 victory over Astoria. Kelso extended its unbeaten summer run with a 4-1 victory over Hazel Dell Metro in the tournament title game.
Astoria's only losses of the tournament came to the two finalists. And if not for some shaky defensively play in both games, the outcomes could have been very different.
"I thought we played great," said assistant coach Kent Israel, Jr., who managed this team to regional appearanes as 13 and 14-year-olds. "Third time in the tournament and the best showing.
"We basically had two bad innings in the two losses."
Cody Strickland had passed the 100-pitch mark by the time the Kelso bats came around in the seventh inning to plate two runs off the Knappa righthander and four more off reliever Ian Dueber, a Cannon Beach native. Strickland had to throw far too many extra pitches in a game where his defense committed seven errors.
"Cody looked excellent," said Israel. "We figure with the errors he's gonna throw a whole extra inning there. It hurt him. He got a little bit tired at the end."
Astoria had three more errors on one play than Kelso had in the entire contest.
In the sixth inning, Kelso's Brandon Middleton reached on a one-out base hit, only the third of the game against Strickland. Catcher Cody O'Neill followed with a routine ground ball to third base. Marcus Brown bobbled the ball, then made an ill-advised throw to first which sailed wide of first baseman Ian Erickson. Tracking the ball down the the right field line, Erickson fired the ball back toward the infield to try to keep Middleton from scoring. The ball ended up nowhere near its intended target, sailing into the Kelso dugout. Both runners were awarded an extra base with Middleton scoring and O'Neill heading to third base.
Astoria shook off the miscues to retire O'Neill in a long rundown between third and home after a botched squeeze play and Strickland fanned Nick LaRoy to limit Kelso to the lone run.
Middleton continued a brilliant performance on the mound by striking out the side in the sixth inning, before the home team erupted for six runs in the final frame. The righthanded hurler struck out 11 batters with no walks, recording the final six outs on K's. Both pitchers took advantage of a consistently wide strike zone, which widened by about six more inches on the final pitch when Erickson was punched out to end the game.
Middleton, who was a high school JV catcher this past spring, also led the Kelso offense, going 3-for-3 at the plate with a 2-run home run in the final inning.
Astoria got back-to-back doubles from Marc Gallegos and Marcus Brown to score their first run in the seventh, with Brown scoring on an errant throw by the Kelso catcher on a stolen base attempt. Brown finished 2-for-3 at the plate.
Astoria defeated Columbia-Cowlitz 12-2 in six innings Saturday afternoon. Max Johnson (4ip) and Marcus Brown (2ip) combined on a 2-hitter. Erickson went 3-for-4 with a double and two runs scored, Johnson was 2-for-4 with two doubles and two runs and Gallegos went 2-for-3 with a double and two RBI's. Columbia-Cowlitz, a combined 13-15 team, was comprised primarily of Castle Rock players with two from Toutle Lake.
In their final pool play contest, Astoria came back from a 5-0 deficit to defeat Port Angeles 10-5 Saturday morning. Down 5-0 after two innings, Astoria managed just one hit, a Max Johnson double, over their first run through the batting order. In the fourth, Johnson delivered a 2-RBI single as Astoria plated four runs. Johnson's bases loaded fly ball to right field in the sixth inning was misplayed for a costly error, the start of a six-run frame that also featured a bases-loaded hit by pitch to Erickson and an RBI single by Strickland. Johnson finshed 2-for-4 at the plate with two RBI's and two runs scored and Gallegos drove in two runs in the victory. .
"We looked sharp," said Israel. "We looked really sharp [Saturday] and really, really good against Longview (a 3-0 victory on Friday).
"We've got a pretty big squad this year, 15 kids, and we're going to rotate them through and see who can do what before we get home to regionals."
It was feast or famine for the Astoria 14-year-old All-Stars. After two mercy-rule victories to open the tournament Thursday and Friday, the Coastal crew was on the losing end of two blowouts on Saturday, missing the bracket on a runs allowed tiebreaker criteria. Astoria fell to Kelso 14-3 Saturday morning then dropped a 17-7 decision to Hazel Dell in the afternoon. Errors were a critical factor in big innings in both losses.
"We just played horrendously on defense [against Kelso]," said head coach Rob Eterno. "The second game was the same story."
"Every time we got a rally going we ran ourselves into an out, trying to stretch a double into a triple, things like that. It happened a couple of times. It just wasn't our day. The kids feel a little hurt."
It wasn't so much what Astoria did that cost them, but what one of their previous opponents did that ended Astoria's day early. Olympia-Tumwater, which lost to Astoria 12-2 on Thursday, upset Hazel Dell 3-2 on Friday, setting up a three-way tie for third place in Astoria's 5-team bracket. Astoria scored the most runs of the three teams (37), but also allowed 37 runs. Oly-Tumwater advanced as the third seed to the bracket despite being outscored 24-18. Olympia-Tumwater met the South Puget Sound Shockers in their bracket matchup and played deep into the night, completing a 22-17 loss on Sunday morning after the game was halted by darkness. The Shockers, based in the area between Olympia and Tacoma, fell to Kelso 6-2 in the semifinals and Kelso went on to defeat Longview in the championship game.
Astoria's 13-year-old squad had the toughest task. With many players buried on rosters behind older players during the regular season, Astoria's squad had the least experience in an age group that had to adjust to new field dimensions with the move from Cal Ripken to Babe Ruth baseball.
After losing their first two pool games by close margins, Astoria defeated Lacey 14-6 on Saturday, led by Dillon Smith, who pitched the first three innings and went 3-for-3 at the plate with four RBI's. Conor Harber also went 2-for-3 with three runs batted in in the game, which was ended by a preset time limit after four innings.
Astoria advanced to bracket play, taking on a talented, tournament-tested Meridian, Idaho squad., which finished second to Western Longview at last year's Cal Ripken 12A regionals. Astoria struck first with two runs in the third inning on a Harber RBI single and a passed ball that scored Ryan Johnson.
Although Astoria was able to get runners on base throughout the contest, they were unable to execute and move them along. Meridian answered with four runs in the third and pulled away for a 12-2 win. Dylan Krizan went 2-for-3 at the plate for Astoria.
"We're starting from scratch, because we played in a 13-15 league," said Astoria head coach Pat Harber, "and didn't have a lot of kids on any of the teams that were throwing. We're working our pitchers. It's like spring training right now for them."
Astoria was the only team at the tournament that did not have a 13-year-old develepmental league to give the younger players more opportunities to adjust to the larger dimensions of the field.
It was yet another Kelso-Longview showdown in the 13-year-old finals, with Kelso coming away with the title.
Next weekend, the Astoria 15-year-olds will return to Kelso for a tournament Friday-Sunday. No further schedule information is available for the other two teams. District tournament schedules have not yet been announced. The 13-year-old North Oregon State Tournament begins on Wednesday, July 18 at Walker Stadium in Portland with the 14-year-old tournament commencing two days later at Hermiston.
The past three years, that start has come in the Don Rhoads Memorial Tournament. The end of the tournament came Sunday against an undefeated Kelso squad in the latest of many showdowns between these teams over the years.
Kelso scratched out an unearned run in the sixth inning to break a scoreless deadlock, then exploded for six runs in the seventh inning to improve to 16-0 on the summer with a 7-2 victory over Astoria. Kelso extended its unbeaten summer run with a 4-1 victory over Hazel Dell Metro in the tournament title game.
Astoria's only losses of the tournament came to the two finalists. And if not for some shaky defensively play in both games, the outcomes could have been very different.
"I thought we played great," said assistant coach Kent Israel, Jr., who managed this team to regional appearanes as 13 and 14-year-olds. "Third time in the tournament and the best showing.
"We basically had two bad innings in the two losses."
Cody Strickland had passed the 100-pitch mark by the time the Kelso bats came around in the seventh inning to plate two runs off the Knappa righthander and four more off reliever Ian Dueber, a Cannon Beach native. Strickland had to throw far too many extra pitches in a game where his defense committed seven errors.
"Cody looked excellent," said Israel. "We figure with the errors he's gonna throw a whole extra inning there. It hurt him. He got a little bit tired at the end."
Astoria had three more errors on one play than Kelso had in the entire contest.
In the sixth inning, Kelso's Brandon Middleton reached on a one-out base hit, only the third of the game against Strickland. Catcher Cody O'Neill followed with a routine ground ball to third base. Marcus Brown bobbled the ball, then made an ill-advised throw to first which sailed wide of first baseman Ian Erickson. Tracking the ball down the the right field line, Erickson fired the ball back toward the infield to try to keep Middleton from scoring. The ball ended up nowhere near its intended target, sailing into the Kelso dugout. Both runners were awarded an extra base with Middleton scoring and O'Neill heading to third base.
Astoria shook off the miscues to retire O'Neill in a long rundown between third and home after a botched squeeze play and Strickland fanned Nick LaRoy to limit Kelso to the lone run.
Middleton continued a brilliant performance on the mound by striking out the side in the sixth inning, before the home team erupted for six runs in the final frame. The righthanded hurler struck out 11 batters with no walks, recording the final six outs on K's. Both pitchers took advantage of a consistently wide strike zone, which widened by about six more inches on the final pitch when Erickson was punched out to end the game.
Middleton, who was a high school JV catcher this past spring, also led the Kelso offense, going 3-for-3 at the plate with a 2-run home run in the final inning.
Astoria got back-to-back doubles from Marc Gallegos and Marcus Brown to score their first run in the seventh, with Brown scoring on an errant throw by the Kelso catcher on a stolen base attempt. Brown finished 2-for-3 at the plate.
Astoria defeated Columbia-Cowlitz 12-2 in six innings Saturday afternoon. Max Johnson (4ip) and Marcus Brown (2ip) combined on a 2-hitter. Erickson went 3-for-4 with a double and two runs scored, Johnson was 2-for-4 with two doubles and two runs and Gallegos went 2-for-3 with a double and two RBI's. Columbia-Cowlitz, a combined 13-15 team, was comprised primarily of Castle Rock players with two from Toutle Lake.
In their final pool play contest, Astoria came back from a 5-0 deficit to defeat Port Angeles 10-5 Saturday morning. Down 5-0 after two innings, Astoria managed just one hit, a Max Johnson double, over their first run through the batting order. In the fourth, Johnson delivered a 2-RBI single as Astoria plated four runs. Johnson's bases loaded fly ball to right field in the sixth inning was misplayed for a costly error, the start of a six-run frame that also featured a bases-loaded hit by pitch to Erickson and an RBI single by Strickland. Johnson finshed 2-for-4 at the plate with two RBI's and two runs scored and Gallegos drove in two runs in the victory. .
"We looked sharp," said Israel. "We looked really sharp [Saturday] and really, really good against Longview (a 3-0 victory on Friday).
"We've got a pretty big squad this year, 15 kids, and we're going to rotate them through and see who can do what before we get home to regionals."
It was feast or famine for the Astoria 14-year-old All-Stars. After two mercy-rule victories to open the tournament Thursday and Friday, the Coastal crew was on the losing end of two blowouts on Saturday, missing the bracket on a runs allowed tiebreaker criteria. Astoria fell to Kelso 14-3 Saturday morning then dropped a 17-7 decision to Hazel Dell in the afternoon. Errors were a critical factor in big innings in both losses.
"We just played horrendously on defense [against Kelso]," said head coach Rob Eterno. "The second game was the same story."
"Every time we got a rally going we ran ourselves into an out, trying to stretch a double into a triple, things like that. It happened a couple of times. It just wasn't our day. The kids feel a little hurt."
It wasn't so much what Astoria did that cost them, but what one of their previous opponents did that ended Astoria's day early. Olympia-Tumwater, which lost to Astoria 12-2 on Thursday, upset Hazel Dell 3-2 on Friday, setting up a three-way tie for third place in Astoria's 5-team bracket. Astoria scored the most runs of the three teams (37), but also allowed 37 runs. Oly-Tumwater advanced as the third seed to the bracket despite being outscored 24-18. Olympia-Tumwater met the South Puget Sound Shockers in their bracket matchup and played deep into the night, completing a 22-17 loss on Sunday morning after the game was halted by darkness. The Shockers, based in the area between Olympia and Tacoma, fell to Kelso 6-2 in the semifinals and Kelso went on to defeat Longview in the championship game.
Astoria's 13-year-old squad had the toughest task. With many players buried on rosters behind older players during the regular season, Astoria's squad had the least experience in an age group that had to adjust to new field dimensions with the move from Cal Ripken to Babe Ruth baseball.
After losing their first two pool games by close margins, Astoria defeated Lacey 14-6 on Saturday, led by Dillon Smith, who pitched the first three innings and went 3-for-3 at the plate with four RBI's. Conor Harber also went 2-for-3 with three runs batted in in the game, which was ended by a preset time limit after four innings.
Astoria advanced to bracket play, taking on a talented, tournament-tested Meridian, Idaho squad., which finished second to Western Longview at last year's Cal Ripken 12A regionals. Astoria struck first with two runs in the third inning on a Harber RBI single and a passed ball that scored Ryan Johnson.
Although Astoria was able to get runners on base throughout the contest, they were unable to execute and move them along. Meridian answered with four runs in the third and pulled away for a 12-2 win. Dylan Krizan went 2-for-3 at the plate for Astoria.
"We're starting from scratch, because we played in a 13-15 league," said Astoria head coach Pat Harber, "and didn't have a lot of kids on any of the teams that were throwing. We're working our pitchers. It's like spring training right now for them."
Astoria was the only team at the tournament that did not have a 13-year-old develepmental league to give the younger players more opportunities to adjust to the larger dimensions of the field.
It was yet another Kelso-Longview showdown in the 13-year-old finals, with Kelso coming away with the title.
Next weekend, the Astoria 15-year-olds will return to Kelso for a tournament Friday-Sunday. No further schedule information is available for the other two teams. District tournament schedules have not yet been announced. The 13-year-old North Oregon State Tournament begins on Wednesday, July 18 at Walker Stadium in Portland with the 14-year-old tournament commencing two days later at Hermiston.
posted by Matt Richert at 8:12 AM
1 Comments:
At the beginning of the Babe Ruth Season a veteran Mom of the Astoria All State Team said she thought that not having a 13 year old prepatory league would hurt the younger players......But the Coaches (AKA-Dads) said she didn't know what she was talking about.....There is a hugh difference and if there is any way possible the Babe Ruth Coaches need to get enough players to make the league (14-15 yr olds and a 13-year old prepatory league)......
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