Dateline: Browns Chapel 3
It was a cold, bleak morning as the Cards took on the undefeated Orioles. Top of the first. Rei singles to solid center. Carter hits a high popup. Rei alertly leads off the base toward second but as he sees it is about to be caught he runs back to first and makes contact with the fielder. The fielder drops the ball and so Rei heads to second. The fielder then touches first to get Carter by a step. It looks like Cards have a runner on second and one out. The O’s manager points out interference should have been called. After some discussion the umps award the Orioles a double play. Editors Note: The rule on this is clear. It is called interference and the rule is the umps must declare the play dead immediately. Once they do that, the runner who caused the interference is deemed out and the other runners return to the base they were coming from. Interestingly, in this case, the batter-runner (e.g.; Carter) can’t be returned to home. Ergo, it is a judgment call as to what to do with him. If in the umpires judgment, Rei would have been doubled off of first well then a double play could have been called. Given the umps didn’t declare the play dead, one could argue that you really can’t go back in time and fix all this so you could just let the play stand. However, it is youth baseball and we do want umps to end up with some semblance of the right call so maybe one out would be have been OK. But two outs was in our opinion, a bit extreme. “ The Cards went down quietly after that. Bottom of the first and Maxwell went out to the mound. He looked great with two strikeouts in the first three batters. Two hard infield hits scored two runs and a solid single to center scored a third. Maxwell settled down to strikeout the last batter.
Top of the second and the Cards went down quietly with three strikeouts. Maxwell continued on the mound and picked up three more strikeouts. The O’s took advantage of a couple of misplayed ground balls to score one run. After two it was O’s 4 Cards 0. Top of the third and the Cards again went down with three strikeouts. Bottom of the third and Michael came on. A couple of tough grounders resulted in three runs but Michael settled down to strike out the side and end the inning. After three it was O’s 7 Cards 0.
Top of the fourth and the Cards kept battling. Zack reached on an infield single and Carter singled to put runners on at first and second. Jamie made good contact on the first pitch but the first baseman caught the ball for out three. Bottom of the fourth and Jamie came on and threw heat. He struck out one batter and got the next two on grounders back to the mound where he threw to Carter for an out.
Top of the fifth and after two strikeouts, John made good contact but the third baseman made a nice play and caught it for out three. Bottom of the fifth, Jamie led off with more heat. A strikeout was good for out one. A solid double put a runner on third with one out. John made a great play on a grounder at first for out two but alas, the run scored. Jamie settled down to strike out the O’s third hitter.
Top of the sixth and the Cards bench was still alive and cheering. Unfortunately, the game ended when the O’s closer picked up three more strikeouts.
After the game, Coach Grossman was available only briefly as he wanted to start preparations for the upcoming game on Tuesday. He said, “Well the O’s are a solid team and if we want things to work out well against them, we are going to have to make more routine plays and we are absolutely going to have to hit the ball. Our hitters are looking better at the plate and I am sure we will start hitting pretty soon. Its still pretty early in the season so there’s plenty of time. I was especially proud of our guys still cheering and working hard even in the sixth of this game.”
