The Bourne Braves had four hits on Saturday in their playoff opener and trailed for eight innings.
On Sunday, they didn't trail at all. And they had a lot more than four hits.
Behind a 10-hit attack, the Braves grabbed a spot in the Cape League championship with a sweep-clinching 8-0 victory in Orleans yesterday afternoon. The Braves broke through early and piled on late, as three players delivered multi-hit games -- Stefen Romero (Oregon State), Kyle Roller (East Carolina) and Ben Klafczynski (Kent State). Roller hit a home run and drove in three while Pierre LePage (Connecticut) hit his first home run of the summer and scored three runs.
The offense backed a dominant performance by Seth Maness (East Carolina). Coming off a near-perfect game and then a bad start, Maness was a lot closer to the former yesterday. He allowed just two hits and didn't walk anybody in six shutout innings. He struck out five.
The Braves' bullpen, which has been dominant at times this season, polished off Maness' gem with three scoreless innings of one-hit ball, two from Justin Poovey (Florida) and one from Kevin Munson (James Madison).
Orleans had beaten the Braves four times during the regular season and hadn't allowed more than three runs in any of those games. But the Braves came through when it counted. Roller went 4-for-7 in the series to lead the Braves.
Bourne, with Alex Wimmers still waiting in the wings, will have a day off before the championship series begins. Like Harwich last year -- who swept Orleans in the semis -- the Braves will await the winner of a rubber game involving Cotuit.
The Kettleers, who made it to the championship last year after winning game three on the heels of a game-two loss, will have to do the same thing this year. Y-D, which lost two games in a row just twice after the first week of the season, certainly wasn't going to let it happen here. The Red Sox went to Lowell Park yesterday and beat Cotuit 10-5.
If pitching was the story in game one of the series, game two was all about offense, and the Red Sox had a lot of it. After falling behind 1-0, they scored a run in the third and dented the scoreboard at least once in each of the next four innings. They finished with 11 hits and helped the cause by drawing seven walks.
Blake Kelso (Houston), who went 3-for-3 on Saturday, went 3-for-5 yesterday with two runs scored and two RBI. Jonathan Jones (Long Beach State) also had three hits and two RBI, while Caleb Ramsey (Houston) had one hit and drove in two.
Austin Ross (LSU) turned in a solid start for the Red Sox, allowing four hits in six innings.
Game Today
Cotuit at Y-D, 3 p.m.
It'll be Jeff Walters (Georgia) for Cotuit against Y-D's Greg Peavey (Oregon State). Walters has started just one game for the Kettleers and it came last week against Y-D. He went three innings, allowing two runs on two hits. That game was kind of a staff day for Cotuit, and they may do the same kind of thing today.
For Y-D, Peavey finished the regular season with a 2.75 ERA. In his last start, he allowed one run in 5.1 innings and struck out seven.
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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.
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.
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.
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