On a breathless morning at Perth’s Baseball Park the Queensland Rams attempted to put the wind back in their Claxton Shield sails against a South Australian side that had established themselves as early frontrunners in the 2007 championships

After a demoralising 10-1 loss to Victoria a day earlier, the Rams’ bats took their cue from the Perth weather - by turning up the mercury and scorching the ball to all parts of the field on their way to a 13-1 thrashing of the South Australians

Prior to Monday’s clash the Queensland offence had managed just 10 hits over their previous two games and were hitting a measly .167 as a team

But that all changed in a game that had them looking like the relentless Rams’ line-up of a year earlier - as Queensland pumped out 13 runs on 16 hits against a South Australian pitching staff that until now had been the tournament’s best

Both teams started the scoring courtesy of some perfectly executed small ball - and the game looked destined to be a tight battle
However a 5-run 3rd, 2-run 4th and 4-run 5th staked the Queenslanders an insurmountable lead that handed both teams an early mark when the 10-run rule was enforced after 7 innings

The good news for the Rams fans is that their pitching was equally as impressive - evident by Tristan Loetzsch, Wayne Ough and PJ Bevis combining to limit the South Australians to just 1 run on four hits

In fact the only bright spark for the boys from the Barossa was first-baseman Tom Brice who managed a double and triple from his three at-bats, as well as scoring the lone South Australian run

The result leaves both teams with a 2-1 Win and Loss record on what for most sides is the ‘turn’ day of the championships

With home side Perth yet to win a game after a thrilling extra innings loss last night, wins from NSW and Victoria in the day’s remaining two games, would virtually cement the final four places heading into Thursday’s first round of play-offs

I'm not sure where my "irrelevance scale" is so far from these reports, but I just can't resist another irrelevant observation about the names of our starting pitchers today
Tristan LOETZSCH was the winning pitcher for Queensland, while Jay ZIERSCH was the losing pitcher for South Australia - if you don't have an "unusual" name that ends with "SCH" you need not apply

While their names may have had some obscure similarity, I can assure you that there was a difference between their fortunes in this game as big as the state of Western Australia - and that means HUGE!

20yo Tristan Loetsch was considered somewhat of a "late bloomer" when he was signed out of the blue by the Kansas City Royals last year in a rare example to other aspiring Aussies that your hopes of a professional baseball career may not be over if you miss out during your teenage years!
Tristan certainly pitched the way we would expect from a maturing pitcher with a solid enough start to get the Rams firmly on the path to victory

However, Queensland were in no mood to do the South Aussies any favours after losing the previous day when they chose to protect their already bulging 9-1 lead with the highly credentialed duo of Wayne Ough and P.J Bevis
Former New York Mets 'AA' pitcher Ough required only eleven pitches to put away his requisite one inning before handing over to former 'AAA' pro Bevis who also made short work of the last inning of the contest - maybe "contest" is too strong a word?

We have enjoyed some great pitching duels at Thornlie so far, but this was more of a batting "slugfest" - the trouble for SA was that it was their Queensland opponents who were doing all of the effective slugging!

Quality hitters Jay Nilsson 3-3, Brett Roneberg 3-4 and Brad Dutton each enjoyed dining out on three hit feasts, while the also dangerous Andrew Utting and David Sutherland belted two each for good measure

No less than six players contributed RBI's to the Rams score, with Brendan Kleidon cashing in three from his timely bases-clearing double

I wouldn't be doing our SA friends any favours by spending a lot of time detailing the scene that saw their team pulverised 16 hits to four and with a 13-1 scoreline - Queensland needing to bat only six innings to invoke the "mercy rule"

Phrases like "blow out" and "lop sided" do not quite do justice to this game - it was a disappointing "no contest" from the outset

It would be an understatement to say that SA hurlers Ziersch and Langman have had better days after Ziersch served up ten hits in three innings and Eldridge kept the room service coming with five hits from two innings

Todd Langman showed some admirable determination in the last inning when he did his job quite effectively
Unfortunately the horses had already bolted in a stampede over the previous six frames

Only Tom Brice had two hits for South Australia as a half of his team's total strike power on this day

If this all sounds fairly miserable for SA and very good for Queensland then you have been supplied with an accurate picture

But, even in the aftermath of such a demoralising game the cold reality of the situation is that both teams are now pretty well placed with 2-1 records that should see them both in the hunt at the end of the week