Green Hope Varsity Baseball Links

Saturday Mar. 7, 2009

Green Hope almost "perfect" in the season opener, 13-0 over Southeast Raleigh

Poythress tags out SER only baserunner

Before the game, GH head coach Mike Miragliuolo had some worries that his team would take an under-manned Southeast Raleigh team too lightly in the season opener, but his team responded with one of the most complete games that GH has played in several years. The Falcons were focused throughout the game, in all aspects of it - it's hard to pinpoint what they did best because everything was done so well.

I guess a good place to begin would be the pitching, since this was the best team pitching performance in GH history !!! One pitch from a perfect game, as GH pitchers faced the minimum 18 batters in 6 innings, allowing NO HITS, striking out 8, and the only batter to reach base on a walk was thrown out trying to steal 2nd (on a nice throw by catcher Matt Nusbaum). Almost the entire pitching staff shared in this record breaking performance - Max Povse, Michael Sondag, Adam Boghosian, Joe Pistacchio, and Nolan Poythress.

Povse (1-0) (1 strikeout) started for GH and was the only GH pitcher to pitch 2 innings, and was credited with the win. Sondag (1 strikeout) came in to pitch the 3rd, followed by Boghosian (3 strikeouts), Pistacchio (2 strikeouts), and Poythress (1 strikeout) who eached pitched 1 inning. All the GH pitchers had excellent control today, with Boghosian having the most "pop" in his fastball.

Joe Pistacchio's 3-run Home Run

Moving on to hitting, maybe the outstanding pre-season has raised expectations a little high, but it seemed that GH didn't fully capitalize on their opportunities today. They left 11 men on base in 6 innings which normally isn't too good. Of course the other side of that stat would be the 13 runs, 14 hits, and 2 home runs hit in those same 6 innings, now that is very good !!! Leading the way was Eric Brady with 4 hits, 3 for doubles which ties David Shambley's all time GH record for a game. Joe Pistacchio and Jeff Weygandt both added 3-run home runs to really close out the game - Pistacchio's in the 2nd to put GH up 6-0, and Weygandt's in the 6th to put GH up 11-0 and making the game a 6 inning event. Other highlights were Matt Nusbaum (2-2 and 1 RBI), Grant Shambley (2-5), and Boghosian, Poythress, and David Josam with 1 RBI. In addition, GH stole 8 bases to continually put pressure on SER's defense.

Jeff Weygandt's 3-run Home Run

Eric Brady on defense

Josam saves no hitter

But the biggest improvement in this year's GH team is the defense. Early in the game, SS Eric Brady made several hard chances look easy, and 1B Michael Sondag made two nice plays on a bad throw and bloop pop up. GH doesn't get a No-Hitter without those plays !!! Then in the last inning, two line-drives which should have been singles were caught by a hard charging Weygandt in left and a diving Josam in right. Plays like those are better to watch than any home run or strikeout.

Green Hope moves to 1-0 on the year.