Thursday Mar. 12, 2009

East Chapel Hill punishes a sloppy Green Hope 16-2

Poythress grabs short chopper

Pistacchio almost robs Ruch's triple

Green Hope's bubble burst tonight, as everything which was going right this year, went terribly, even horribly, wrong. GH went into the game with a tired and sick pitching staff, and with 3 more games scheduled for next week, including two conference games, not an ideal situation. Coach Mike Miragliuolo hoped starting pitcher Nolan Poythress would go deep into the game, and then hopefully be able to put in some younger pitchers to close out the game. In addition, with the onset of conference play, he wanted to give a few players an opportunity to play, before play becomes really serious.

But those plans didn't work out tonight.

Poythress certainly threw alot of strikes, but ECH hitters were really disciplined, consistently making solid contact, mostly to the opposite field, throughout the game. The first pitch Poythress threw was ripped into right for a hit. After a strikeout, a high fly to left was dropped, putting runners on 1st and 2nd. After another single loaded the bases, a high drive to left scored the runner at third via the sacrifice fly.

In the 3rd, again ECH kept hitting hard, a leadoff single was erased when Anthony Colantino threw out the runner attempting to steal 2nd. The next batter hit a slow roller in front of the plate which Poythress fielded bare handed to get the second out. After a walk, and a single, ECH pitcher David Ruch ripped a shot down the right field line that right fielder Joe Pistacchio almost caught, but didn't, scoring both runners and Ruch ending up at 3rd with a triple. The next batter doubled to make it ECH up 4-0.

In contrast, GH hitters seemed to be a little anxious, sometimes over swinging at very hitable pitches from ECH's Ruch. The first 2 innings saw 4 popups and 2 strikeouts, as Ruch was able to breeze through the GH lineup. Now down 4-0 in the 3rd, GH caught a bit of a bad break, after a leadoff strikeout, Will Yoder walked, and Anthony Colantino appearred also to have walked on a 3-2 pitch, that was inside, but called strike three. Instead of runners on 1st and 2nd with 1 out, there were now 2 outs and only a runner on 1st. After a Grant Shambley single put runners on 1st and 2nd, Eric Brady ripped a single down the left field line, which scored Yoder from 2nd, but Shambley was thrown out at 3rd to end the inning. Unfortunately the home plate umpire ruled that the third out was made before Yoder scored, and therefore the run did not count.

Pistacchio's HR as ECH bench watches

Ump ensuring Pistacchio scores before someone else gets out at 3rd Just Kidding !!!

Not surprizing, this call did not sit very well with GH fans or coaches, especially since it happened after the strike three call, and only after the ECH bench had asked for the call. But I think the umpire probably got that call correct, as he was in perfect position to see the play (along with the ECH bench), and it looked to me that Yoder and Shambley were equal distance from their destinations halfway down the line - although I did not have an angle to see both bases simultaneously (as the umpire and ECH bench did). Bad breaks aside, GH made it a game in the 4th, after a walk to Poythress and HR from Joe Pistacchio, it was ECH up only 4-2 with 3 innings to play.

But in the 5th, ECH put the game away scoring 12 unearned runs. There were 5 errors from the left side of the GH infield, along with at least as many hard grounders which were singles to the right side of the infield. ECH didn't letup the pressure until both Poythress and Yoder were replaced. Adam Boghosian finally came in to end the inning, but this game was long since over.

Poythress takes the loss and Green Hope goes to (3-1).