roundup: wednesday, june 27

Thursday, June 28, 2007

roundup: wednesday, june 27

Winners
Bourne, Falmouth

Losers
Cotuit, Wareham

In Short
Bourne stays in first place...Matt Hague stays hot for Falmouth

Scores
Bourne 4, Cotuit 2
Falmouth 5, Wareham 3

Bourne 4, Cotuit 2
Bourne to 7-3-1, Cotuit to 6-5

Bourne got two in the first on a tw0-run double by (Stetson) Brian Pruitt and never gave up the lead
The win was Bourne's fourth straight
Wade Kapteyn (Evansville) earned the victory, allowing one earned run and three hits in six innings
Cotuit's Ryne White (Purdue) went 1-for-3, putting his average at .414.

Of note, team-style: In its four straight wins, Bourne has allowed only eight runs. Kapteyn, T.J. Hose (East Carolina), D.J. Mitchell (Clemson) and Steven Hensley (Elon) earned the victories with solid performances on the mound.

Of note, player-style: White, a sophomore who's starting at first base for Cotuit, wasn't among the league leaders in average when the night began, but he is now. He got to 29 plate appearances, the minimum to be listed on the leaderboard. His .414 average puts him second. White hails from Chicago and was a freshman all-american in 2006. He hit .452 this season to lead the team, with an OBP of .521.

Falmouth 5, Wareham 3
Falmouth to 4-7, Wareham to 1-10

Falmouth got three in the third on a two-run shot by Matt Hague (Washington) and never looked back
Luke Burnett (Louisiana Tech) earned the win with three solid innings of relief
The loss is Wareham's 10th straight. Nearly all of them have been by one or two runs
Six players had hits for the Gatemen, but they could string nothing together

Of note, team-style: Falmouth has won three straight to get within striking distance in the West. They're just two games back of Hyaniss for third place.

Of note, player-style: Falmouth's Hague stayed hot. The junior from Washington has multi-hit games in four of Falmouth's last five, and is hitting a league-leading .429 in 10 games. He went 2-for-3 Wednesday with three RBI and his first home run. For Washington this spring, Hague hit .353 with 13 home runs. As a junior, he was eligible for the draft this year, and the Cleveland Indians took him in the 11th round. That's pretty good, but I guess he thinks he can do better. That's why he's on the Cape, either to get more money from Cleveland or have a big summer and head back to school with his stock rising.

STANDINGS
East
Y-D...............8-3
Orleans..........7-4
Chatham.......7-4
Brewster......6-5
Harwich.......3-8

West
Bourne........7-3-1
Cotuit..........6-5
Hyannis......5-5-1
Falmouth....4-7
Wareham....1-10

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as the fog settles in

The left-field sunset has faded. It is chilly now. You slip a sweatshirt on. The stat sheet you hold in your hands almost feels wet, the air is so damp. But the ink doesn't run. You can read it. That kid from LSU is still leading the league in home runs. That pitcher who they say throws 95 -- he's way up on the list in strikeouts.
The game is close, 3-2 through seven innings. You're staying till the end.
You look out at the field. Some fog has slipped in. It settles like smoke, just off the grass in front of the right fielder, like a cloud. When he runs through it to catch a fly ball, it looks almost magical, maybe even spiritual, like he's playing baseball in heaven.
Maybe he is.
The baseball is pure here. The players eager. The fans, maybe some of them don't know what they're seeing, maybe they just heard it was a fun night out, good for the family and everything -- but they know. They know somehow that this thing, this Cape League, is special.
Really, there's nothing like it.
I'm going to try and keep up.

Stop waxing poetic

The Cape Cod Baseball League is the top college summer league in the nation. Plenty of other leagues have cropped up of late, and some are having success, but the Cape League is still the model -- and the pinnacle. In 2006, 198 Major Leaguers had spent time in the Cape League.
The rosters are like a who's who of the best college baseball players. All the top prospects want to spend their summers on the Cape. The only better opportunity is Team USA. There are 10 teams in the league, divided into two divisions. Over the course of two months, they play 44 games. Scouts will watch many of them. They come because of the combination of talent and wood. Unlike college baseball, the Cape uses only wooden bats, providing an accurate picture of what players might do at the next level.
What else? Players live with host families. Some have part-time jobs (Jeff Bagwell worked at Friendly's). There's no admission charge at games. The level of baseball has been compared to Single A.
That should sum it up. If you have never experienced Cape League Baseball, you have missed out.

Thursday, June 28, 2007