It wasn’t quite the “alumni game” it once could have been, but Saturday night’s visit by the Sedalia Bombers to “June” Shaffer Memorial Park, home of the Chillicothe Mudcats, still had a little spark, a little edge to it, and that probably was a good thing for the shorthanded Mudcats.
Having completed a two-weeks-plus stretch of 12 road games in 14 outings, the night before with their first “dud” of the 2009 season, a 12-3 loss at Junction City, Kan., and with their major run producer joining their top hitter in being away from the club, the Mudcats appeared to still be a bit lethargic through three innings Saturday night.
However, outfielder Kyle Standridge provided key plays first with his arm and then his bat to get them ahead and a combination of continued timely hitting and shutout pitching by spot starter Brett Casto (1-0) and three relievers over the last seven innings got the blood pumping again as Chillicothe posted a 7-2 victory over the MINK League’s clear-cut South Division leaders.
Standridge, playing every day in center field while Matty Johnson – the regular – remains gone for an indefinite length of time, cut short Sedalia’s only scoring inning by throwing out his opposite number, Don Lambert, at home plate on a two-out single in the second inning.
"That's the kind of throw you ask for in a big situation,” complimented very appreciative Mudcats head coach Adam Steyer.
"The thing about (Standridge) is you count on him to make those plays because he works on those things in pre-game, BP (batting practice). He's a hard worker. He gets those kinds of reps at game-speed looks, which makes making the play in a tight situation just repetition and habit.
“That's a credit to his hard work."
Down only two, rather than three or more because of Standridge’s peg that got the Bombers center fielder by a couple of strides as he tried to score from second, the Mudcats were in a position to continue to play their chip-away style of offense. After three relatively-uneventul innings, they finally got to 2008 Mudcats pitcher Nolan “Bubba” Martz for three tallies in the fourth and tapped the Bombers’ third pitcher, Zach Hall, for four more in the sixth to improve to 11-7 overall and 9-6 in the league. It was their eighth-consecutive league win after a terrible start to the summer.
“It only builds onto the confidence and the depth of this team,” Chillicothe head coach Adam Steyer remarked after the contest about the many significant contributions several non-core Mudcats had in the triumph.
Beyond Standridge’s two key moments and Casto’s hit-and-miss five innings in his first start, recent additions J.L. Jones and Scott Limbocker made their presence felt, catcher John Creely again showed signs of finding himself with the bat after a sluggish start, and little-used Jimmy MacWilliam had his finest moment yet as a Fish.
Even though the Bombers, a first-year team, were making their initial trip to Chillicothe – they’ll be back again next month, a handful or so members of their traveling party knew the way very well.
Sedalia head coach Justin “Jud” Kindle guided the 2008 Mudcats to the organization’s most wins ever in a season at 32-17 and at least five members of that team still are with him again this summer, only wearing the Bombers colors. Several others were with Sedalia earlier, but were taken in the recent Major League Baseball draft of amateur players and have turned pro.
Martz, who went 3-2 as a midseason addition to Chillicothe’s hill staff a year ago, took the familiar mound Saturday already owning a 4-1 record as a Bomber. Behind him defensively were ex-Fish TS Reed at second base and Kyle Zimmerman at third, while outfielder Tyler Knight served as designated hitter. On the bench was another 2008 Mudcats pitcher, Aaron Kleekamp.
It was Knight who got the Sedalia scoring inning going, working Casto for a one-out walk in the top of the second. After he was wild-pitched to second base, he scored on Jordan May’s two-out double to right-center field, giving the visitors a 1-0 lead.
With Casto, still scraping off considerable rust after a serious illness and other injuries kept him off the college diamond at northern California’s College of the Redwoods this past school year, continuing to have trouble throwing his curve ball for strikes, No. 8 hitter Don Lambert walked.
With May, who advanced on a passed ball while Lambert batted, at third and Lambert at first, the trail runner took off for second on a steal attempt. Creely pump-faked a throw while checking whether May was cheating down the line at third, then belatedly threw toward second, only to short-hop second baseman Darian Sandford. The ball rolled away and May, who was holding at third, went home without a play, making it 2-0.
Casto then finished another walk to Zimmerman, who hit only about .150 as Chillicothe’s regular shortstop last year and often had trouble with making contact. That brought Sedalia leadoff man Travis McComack, a left-handed swinger, to the dish to face the Mudcats righthander.
Anticipating that Casto might groove the next pitch after the free passes, the Bomber ripped a sharp single to center, but Standridge charged, fielded the ball cleanly in shallow center, and threw a short-hop strike to Creely to cut down Lambert and avert further damage.
Whereas the night before Mudcats starter Chris Williamson had not been able to get out of an early jam with only moderate damage, instead allowing a two-out, three-run homer which put his team in a quick 5-0 hole which eventually led to the snapping of their eight-game winning streak, Casto and Chillicothe had caught a break from Standridge and took advantage.
Oregonian Casto, who recently discovered through family members’ inquiries that he and Chillicothe teammate Tyler Minto from Alabama are cousins, responded with a quick, eight-pitch third inning and then wiggled off a first-and-third, two-out hook in the fourth with the first of three Zimmerman strikeouts.
As the lower half of Chillicothe’s somewhat-piecemealed lineup took its second look at Martz in the fourth, the Mudcats began to make up ground.
Creely blooped a single over Reed’s head at second to open the home fourth and J.L. Jones, filling in at third base for ailing Brett Sowers, whose four home runs and 21 runs batted in are at least twice the next-highest Mudcat’s total thus far, found the hole on the left side with a grounder.
Jones, who only joined the team after an 17-hour drive from Panama City, Fla., last Wednesday right before it headed off on a four-hour bus ride to Beatrice, Neb., had ended a personal 0-for-6 start to his Mudcats career by beating out a shattered-bat roller toward the second baseman in the second inning.
With two on and no outs, slumping Zach Amrein, given another chance to start as the designated hitter with the roster a bit short, fanned a second-straight time, but Martz was still unraveling as Amrein chased a pitch out of the strike zone on strike three.
Bryan Mason, batting only .150 at game’s start and retired on a weak grounder his first time, watched four pitches miss the strike zone to load the bases for the top of the order.
Then, as Sandford batted, a low-and-in pitch got away from the Sedalia catcher for a passed ball and Creely scored Chillicothe’s initial run.
Martz got Sandford on a borderline-high called third strike to get close to escaping with the lead, but Standridge, a .321 batsman coming into the action, placed a grounder perfectly up the middle. It sneaked through off the shortstop’s glove and Mason followed Jones home without a play as the Mudcats took the lead.
Needing to get through the fifth without blemish to be in line for the victory which eventually was his, Casto made it interesting.
He plunked Reed with a 3-1 pitch with one away and, with two down, plunked cleanup man Jon Wegener and walked Knight a second time to load the sacks.
Against the wall with his control dicey, Casto came through, fanning Jose Behar on three pitches – the last a called strike – to deny Sedalia and preserve the 3-2 lead.
MacWilliam, an Arizona lefthander who hadn’t seen game action in nine days after walking four in a 11⁄3-inning stint, came on in the sixth, replacing Casto.
Impressively, the 2008-09 Chandler-Gilbert Community College freshman set the side down in order on nine deliveries in his first inning. He needed a big defensive play to preserve his team’s lead in the seventh.
A pair of singles had two on with one out in the seventh before a routine fly to right put things up to Knight.
Chillicothe, Mo. —
