Dateline: Running Cedar
On a very pleasant early fall morning, the Brewers took the field against the Nationals. Matthew led off with a solid infield hit off the machine. Mert followed with an infield single off the machine and Michael smashed a sharp hit to third to load the bases with no outs. Mitchell grounded back to the mound off the machine and the Nationals threw to third to just get Mert for out one, but Matthew scored on the play. Trenton followed with another grounder back to the mound and the Nats again went to third to just get Michael for out two. Trenton reached base on an infield hit and Arvind came up with a big hit to left field to score Mitchell. Elizabeth beat out an infield hit and Ian drilled a hard shot off the machine to score Trenton. Isaac shook off a bean ball by Coach Goldstein (his first of the year) and hit a nice grounder back to the mound and the Nationals just got him at first. When the dust had cleared the Brewers had scored three quick runs. In the bottom half of the inning, the leadoff man hit a shot to Michael at short who made a great throw to first, but the speedy leadoff man beat the throw. After a single to right and a towering fly to left, the Nationals cleared the bases with a couple of singles and a dribbler in front of the mound that Mitchell charged and the runner slid in safely as Mitchell alertly tossed to Matthew at the plate.
In the top of the second, the Brewers continued their offense with a nice hit to third by Jacob. Marcus followed with a grounder back to the mound that he beat out for an infield hit. Matthew hit a nice shot off the machine but it went right back to the pitcher for out one. The runners advanced to third and second. Mert followed with a infield groundout back to the mound, but it was a key RBI as Jacob scored. Michael beat out an infield hit to score Marcus. Mitchell had a solid single off the machine. Trenton got an infield single on a solid grounder back to the mound. Arvind came up and blasted a long drive to left to score Michael and Mitchell. The Brewers had to stop the hitting as they had reached their four run limit. In the bottom of the second, Arvind fielded a ground ball back to the mound and just about got the runner at first. After two more infield hits, with the bases loaded, Arvind made a great play as he scooped and fired to Matthew at first for out one. After a couple more hits, Arvind charged another grounder and again fired to Matthew at first for out two. Unfortunately, the Nationals did get some more hits and scored their maximum of four runs as well.
In the top of the third, Elizabeth grounded back to the mound for out one. Ian hit a great shot off the machine to short. Jacob grounded out to the mound and Marcus hit a dribbler in front of the plate that the Nationals made a great play and got him for out three. In the bottom of the third, the Nationals scored four runs fairly quickly on some tough grounders and the game ended due to time constraints.
Coach Grossman had to leave the game early due to prior scouting commitments as he continues to watch over the progress of the Brewers farm system. He was reached by this reporter for comment. “Well, anytime you score as many runs as we did you have to pleased with the offense and we have a lot of players starting to look comfortable off the machine. Our defense still needs work, and we’ll clearly focus on that during the practices this week. I’m looking forward to our two-game week and I have already seen tremendous progress this season. Our players are looking much more alert in the field and now its time to really start discussing what do with the ball when we get it. ” Coach Goldstein said, “I like the progress of our catchers and our players showed a lot of resilience at the plate as we certainly had trouble keeping those balls dry.”
Some tickets remain for the Brewers game Thursday night at 6:00 under the lights against the Yankees and then a 12:30 game on Saturday against the Cardinals.
