LOST IT ON A TECHNICALITY, News, Bantam OBA, 15U Bantam, 2017 (Mitchell Minor Baseball)

This Team is part of the 2017 season, which is not set as the current season.
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Jul 26, 2017 | Heather Monden | 953 views
LOST IT ON A TECHNICALITY
Back to the rule book I go after the Zehrs Insurance Bantam OBA team played 9 solid innings on the Friday night of their Kincardine Tournament and then lost it in extra innings.

Mitchell batted first and sent their Exeter rivals an early message that they were there to win.  Tanner DIETZ, Ben SMALL, and Eric GETTLER all scored at the top of the 1st giving the Mitchell boys a very comfortable lead.  Kyle RICHARDSON earned himself an RBI.  Exeter's lead off batter #21 scored in the bottom of the 1st and the score remained 3 to 1 in our favour until RICHARDSON scored in the 4th with the RBI going to Evan MACARTHUR.   Mitchell is now up 4 to 1. Eric GETTLER stepped on the mound in the first inning and nearly pitched the entire game.  He got his team to the bottom of the 7th inning with 2 out.  The scoreboard still read 4 to 1 and all we needed was 1 more out and the game was over, but GETTLER hit his 90 pitch limit just one out shy.  Closer, Josh EIDT, took over.   Exeter's bats sprang to life at this point and they decided to make this game a little more interesting by tying things up before we got that 3rd out.  Exeter also brought in a new pitcher who struck out all of our batters, except for SMALL, with ease. Game can't end in a tie, so just like the MLB we head into extra innings.  8th inning 3 up 3 down, 3 up 3 down.  Still tied. 9th inning 3 up 3 down.  Ugh.  Bottom of the 9th we need to hold them again and play the 10th, but then Exeter got a hit, EIDT struck the next kid out, then Mitchell intentionally walked the next batter in an attempt to prevent a big hit.  A fly ball to centre field was out number 2. Here we go!  We got this!  One more out and we're still alive.  Exeter runners advanced to 2nd and 3rd and Mitchell once again decided to "walk the batter and get the force".  This is where things went south.  A catcher's balk was called and the Exeter runners advanced their one base and the game was over!  A devastating loss after playing an incredible game.  The fans sure did get heir monies worth as both teams battled hard back and forth to get the win.  And we all went home learning one more rule about this fantastic sport.

Saturday at 1pm the boys were keen to play once again.  They met up with another WOBA rival, Listowel, and played a competitive four inning game.  Wyatt HUITEMA started the game on the mound and Listowel hit first.  5 runs later Mitchell finally got their turn on the sticks and answered back with 5 runs of their own.  DIETZ, EIDT, GETTLER, HUITEMA and RICHARDSON all crossed the plate.  EIDT got himself into a pickle between 3rd and HP, but was able to deek out his opponents and scored a run.  By the end of the 2nd we were up 8 to 7 after EIDT, GETTLER and HUITEMA all scored again.  RICHARDSON, Devin FENWICK and Wade MONDEN all shared mound duty as well.  The boys struggled to get that final out in the 4th until MONDEN came in and struck the last kid out.  By this time Listowel had taken over the scoreboard and despite a last ditch effort to rally back in the bottom of the 4th we just couldn't get the win.

At 5pm we played Wyoming.  Coach Monden had a good feeling we were going to win this game and the boys did just that with a final score of 8 to 4.  SMALL clinched himself two RBI's and a run in this game.  Mitchell needed this win to move on, so it was a very important win.  Did I mention we did it with just 9 players and DIETZ pitched the entire game?

Their final game of the tournament immediately followed their big win.  They needed this win to put them into the semis.  Despite a huge effort, after playing ball all day with few breaks, Coach Dietz asked the 10 exhausted boys to play hard for one last game.   And they did!  Kincardine scored two runs in the 1st inning.   EIDT put Mitchell on the scoreboard in the 2nd inning.  Then Kincardine padded it's lead with one more in the 4th.  Mitchell wasn't out of this game yet.  Connor WEIR caught two huge fly balls in right field preventing further runs from being scored. DIETZ got tangled up in a pickle in the 5th and beat them to the plate to score Mitchell's 2nd run.  The boys held them and attempted to score at the top of the 6th, but came up short.  Kincardine got one last run at the bottom of the 6th giving them the 4 to 2 win after the time limit. 

Biggest hits this weekend went to GETTLER, HUITEMA, WEIR and RICHARDSON.  Candy of course was their prize. Four great ball games played in two days and another rule learned by many...Catcher's Balk.  When walking a player intentionally, make sure the pitcher releases the ball before the catcher steps outside the batter's box to catch it.  Lesson learned.
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