Patriots
thrill raucous home crowd with a dominant display
Stellar
pitching and clutch bats roll Rams in nightcap
Last season's pitcher of the year Tom Cox
turned in a dominant display; shutting out the arch rival Queensland
Rams through the first five innings and setting the tone for
a comfortable 9-4 New South Wales victory in front of a near
sell-out crowd
Cox, a "crafty" left hander who has proven to be the
Rams' nemesis over the past two seasons, allowed just six hits
before handing over to fellow southpaw Matthew Bennett who also
cruised before a spirited ninth inning rally from the Queenslanders
The game was close early until the Patriots pounded out seven
runs in the bottom half of the fifth inning, highlighted by a
3-run homer to the deepest part of the field by New South Wales
designated hitter Tim Atherton
Atherton's blast effectively put the game out of reach until
Queensland strung together six straight hits in the top half
of the ninth inning to stir the game into life and put a scare
into Patriots manager Shane Barclay
"I won't say I was nervous, but when they punched out six
hits, and were close to bringing the tying run to plate; my heart
skipped a beat or two" Barclay said
For the Rams, one of the few bright spots on a disappointing
night was a mammoth home run in the top of the eighth inning
by first baseman David Sutherland, a shot that broke a string
of seventeen straight scoreless innings for the Rams against
the Patriots, dating back to the end of last season
New South Wales will face Victoria in the final game of the showcase
round in Sydney on Sunday, with the winner assured of a share
of first place in the overall season standings
Patriots
ravage Rams 9-4
Those great rugby league State-of-Origin rivals
New South Wales and Queensland always seem to put on hard-fought
contests in any sport and baseball is rarely an exception
In this case we had the makings of another terrific battle …
that is until the Patriots sent no less than thirteen batters
to the plate in the fifth inning to torment three different Rams
pitchers
Our correspondent at Blacktown suggested that it was like watching
an inning he thought might never end!
The outcome was a game-wrecking seven spot that took most of
the competitive sting out of the contest
There may have been a sign of how this game would ebb and flow
in the third inning when a 0-0 tie would be broken
In the top half of the frame Queensland may have opened the scoring
had it not been for young James Linger trying to stretch a leadoff
single and finding himself out at second base
A subsequent Trent Baker double would have likely scored the
first run of the game and, with none out, things may have been
a lot different for the Rams
On the flip-side, New South Wales were to cash in singles by
Kandilas and Pender with some help from a baulk and an error,
with both runs scoring on ground outs
Former Boston Red Sox professional and Claxton 2008 Golden Arm
Award winner Tim Cox probably would have been able to preserve
a two run advantage, but when this was blown out to NINE, well,
that was game over folks!
Cox, who had to be extra special last year to beat Western Australia's
Mark Kelly and Liam Hendriks for the big award, was mighty good
again
Any chance that the Queenslanders may have had to rattle his
gilded cage disappeared when they failed to take advantage in
that third inning
Cox handed the chucking reins to 27yo Matt Bennett who is competing
in his ninth AMLB campaign and, for a while, it looked like he
was going to collect his fourth career save without too much
fuss
He did allow David Sutherland to break the shutout with a solo
homer in the eighth, but this was little cause for alarm
Eight runs is still a massive lead coming into the ninth inning,
but when Queensland rallied with SIX successive singles to open
the inning there would have been the hint of a twitch in the
Patriots’ dugout with two runs on the board, bases loaded
and still nobody out … yep, the tying run had just started
warming up in the on deck circle!
It wasn’t to be on this day, but you can never quite trust
our game of baseball to follow any type of script
Former professional league journeyman Chris Mowday looked capable
of keeping his team in the contest until he was knocked off the
mound by Michael Lysaught’s two-RBI triple in the fifth
when 78 pitches was just about enough for him
Former Minnesota Twins rookie league pitcher Nathan Crawford,
who played Independent League ball in 2008, was next to face
the music in that fateful fifth inning
He would not have enjoyed trading four hits and four runs for
his solitary out
He did nail the second out of the inning when he struck out the
first batter he faced, but things turned sour when Tim Atherton
took him deep for a three-run bomb three batters later
Young Atlanta Braves rookie pitcher Matt Timms finally locked
down the fifth and he didn’t allow a run from his 3.1 innings
in another decent display
Veteran AMLB rookie Brett Montgomery was given the chance to
exorcise some demons from his nightmare debut on Wednesday but,
although he managed to avoid any further damage to his ERA, it
was another shaky effort
A double-play at the end helped him to work around a double,
a walk, a wild pitch and a hit batter in the eighth
No less than five Queensland batters managed two hits in a game
where the hit count was fourteen each
Wade Dutton and Matt Studeman both added a walk to their two-hit
efforts, while emerging young pros Naughton, Linger and Baker
each batted a solid 2-4
The Rams' runs were
supplied by the Dutton brothers, Roneberg and Sutherland with
one apiece
David Sutherland claimed his RBI via the third home run of his
AMLB career with a solo shot to right field
The bulk of New South Wales’ runs came from former pro Michael
Lysaught with three and rookie pro Tim Atherton who delivered
three with his one home run swing to centre field in that fifth
inning uprising
Pat Maat continues to prove his batting talent with another 3-4
plus a walk, while fellow young tyros David Kandilas (2-3 plus
a walk) and Shannon Pender (2-4) also continue to impress
Former Florida Marlins pro Trent D’Antonio also produced
two hits to continue his fine competition
A valuable win for New South Wales and a loss for Queensland
… they will meet again in 2009 |
