Friday Roundup
With Bourne having a day off yesterday, and Cotuit losing to Yarmouth-Dennis, Hyannis and Falmouth took advantage of the opportunity to pull a little closer to the top teams in the West. Falmouth helped themselves with a 6-2 victory over Wareham; while Hyannis shutout Harwich, 5-0.
In the East, Chatham’s 5-3 win over Brewster allowed the Anglers to keep pace with Y-D. Both teams have 26 pts., but Y-D has played two more games. Orleans was idle and although the Firebirds are 6 pts. behind the leaders, they have played four fewer games than Y-D. By dropping their games yesterday, Brewster (19 pts.) and Harwich (18 pts.) fell further off the pace.
Cotuit is struggling. The Kettleers have lost four in a row and are 1-6-1 in their last eight games. 2008 All-Star Kevin Patterson (Auburn) has 3 homeruns but has struggled to a .196 average. Chris Bisson (Kentucky) and Rico Noel (Coastal Carolina) each have 16 stolen bases but they have been around that figure for awhile. Bisson’s OBP is .286 while Noel sits at .284 so they aren’t getting many opportunities to run. In last night’s 9-1 loss to Y-D, Vanderbilt’s Navery Moore started and did not record an out in the first inning. He walked three and hit a batter. All four eventually scored and Moore saw his ERA skyrocket to 9.82.
The batter who was hit by Moore was Austin Wates (Virginia Tech), who is leading the league in batting with a .385 avg. Wates was hit on an arm and although he scored a run, he was later removed from the game.
In that same game, Y-D’s Chris Sale (Florida Gulf Coast) moved to 3-1 on the year with six innings of four-hit ball. He struck out eight while walking two. Sale lowered his ERA to 1.06 and he leads the league with 38 strikeouts.
For Hyannis, Seth Rosin (Minnesota), Kevin Moran (Boston College), Mark Gormley (Brown) and Thomas Girdwood (Elon) combined on the four hit shutout of the Mariners. Moran’s pitching line was one of the stranger ones as he issued four walks and gave up a hit in his two innings of work, but still managed to keep Harwich off the board.
Leon Landry (Louisiana State) made his Cape League debut for Harwich after recently arriving from the College World Series. Landry singled and doubled in four trips to the plate.
Falmouth rocked UConn’s Matt Barnes to the tune of 9 hits and 5 runs (4 earned) in his three innings of work. Coming into the game, Barnes had only allowed 5 hits in 13.1 innings. Hunter Morris (Auburn) led off the second inning for the Commodores with his second homerun of the summer. Hunter’s Auburn and Falmouth teammate, Brian Fletcher, had two more hits to raise his average to .370.
Wareham’s Derek Dietrich (Georgia Tech) was 0-4. As a team, Wareham is batting .197. Some of the Gatemen averages?? George Springer (UConn) .203; Alex Dickerson (Indiana) .193; Brett Eibner (Arkansas) .190; Shea Vucinich (Washington State) .188; Ryan Pineda (Cal St.- Northridge) .186; Ryan LaMarre (Michigan) .182; Jake Lemmerman (Duke) .123; Connor Rowe (Texas) .071 and Tyler Albright (Harvard) .059.
In the Chatham victory over Brewster, the Anglers offense was aided by seven walks and two wild pitches. Half of Chatham’s six hits came consecutively at the start of a three-run fourth inning. Chatham scored single runs in the sixth and ninth innings without the benefit of a hit.
Baylor’s Logan Verrett pitched five innings of one-hit ball to get the win. In 10.1 innings over two appearances, Verrett has not allowed a run and has only given up 2 hits while striking out 15. He was followed to the mound by Virginia Tech’s Jesse Hahn who gave up just one walk in his two innings. One area of concern for Chatham would seem to be that closer Russell Brewer (Vanderbilt) has struggled to pitch clean innings recently. Brewer picked up his fourth save last night, but gave up 2 hits and a run in the process.
Hey, Dennis Eckersley… you are a Hall of Fame pitcher but as an analyst, puh-leeeze stop with the “that pitch had some hair on it,” “wow, there was some gas,” “good cheese” and “paint” comments. Please! By now, there isn’t a NESN viewer who doesn’t know that as a pitcher you “needed that” when the ball is four inches off the plate.
I know the reported attendance figures are a guess-timate at best, but those are some small crowds in Wareham. Their average attendance (589) is only slightly more than half of what the rest of the league’s average attendance is.
Dave – You risk opening the “attendance conversation can of worms” again!! Wareham has two things that have been different and/or going against them. The first is that John Wylde, who was the official scorer for so many years, did the attendance number for Wareham. I’m not saying he upped his number; just that someone new is doing that now and my be using a different “system”. Secondly, I’m not sure there has been a team more affected by the weather than Wareham. Even in many of the games that they’ve played, it has been drizzling or cold. I think they played the other night when in was 59 degress with drizzle all night. Lastly, they’ve had exactly THREE games on either a Friday or Saturday at home. Overall, I think attendance is down everywhere – at least that is my sense.
You’re right, CapeMan. What was I thinking?? Or, maybe I should say, I wasn’t thinking! Knowing how some folks get so worked up about the reporting of attendance, I made a promise to myself to not mention that subject again and now I went and broke the promise. I’ll never learn!
I wasn’t aware that Wareham has had only three home dates on a Friday or Saturday. That would certainly contribute to smaller attendance numbers. I also think you are correct when you say that Wareham has been affected by bad weather more than most teams. It certainly has been a strange spring and summer weather-wise for everyone, but every time I turn around, Wareham is playing in less than ideal conditions. Two days ago was a good example. All four games in the league were played, but Wareham was the only town that was under a severe thunderstorm watch. I’m sure that contributed greatly to the reported attendance of 306.
Give Bourne credit for risking playing guys well out of position for the sake of offense?