Home and Away Series

Game #07 v Victoria

Sunday 14th December 2008

GAME REPORTS

Victoria led all day - well, almost all - until an extraordinary ninth innings that saw the Rams score four with two out and have Victoria on the ropes in the equaliser
But, again with two out, the Aces came back to fall just tantalizingly short of their third win of this weekend's Claxton Shield round against Queensland

Although Queensland out-hit the Aces ten to seven, they also committed three fielding errors (to none) in what developed into a great game of defensive strategy and a very even contest overall

Both sides stranded nine runners on base

Victoria started the game in ominous fashion, with a Rutgers walk, a Harman double and a Dingle single scoring two in the bottom of the first

After that it was an arm wrestle as starters Drew Naylor (Rams) and Dean Barker (Aces) settled in to their work

Right arm Naylor - on the Phillies 40-man roster - held the strong Victorian offence until he was relieved in the top of four, having given up the two earned runs on three hits
Reliever Simon Morriss landed in a bit of early strife by loading the bases with one out in the fourth, but was strong enough to get out of the innings by striking out Berg and drawing a ground ball

When Barker hit the lead-off in the top of six, Aces manager Phil Dale went to the pen for Glen Richards
Barker’s outing was superb again, scattering four hits for no runs and just the sole BB and HPB

In the top of seven, Richards walked Studeman and Clinton Naylor, spelling the end for him as Matthew Blackmore came to the hill
In a tricky situation - with none out - he was good enough to get out of trouble with a strikeout and two infield fly balls

Victoria threatened again as Karlsen reached second, with two out in the seventh, but Morriss came up with the big pitches to strike out Harman with no damage done

Blackmore gave up singles to Wade Dutton and Brad Dutton in the top of eight and left-hander Biddle came in from centrefield to relieve against the heart of the Rams' order, drawing two fly balls and a grounder to snuff out that particular threat

Morriss, who had been effective for the Rams, was replaced by Matthew Timms, who resisted another Victorian assault in the bottom of eight

In the top of the ninth, the Rams mounted one last challenge as Lamb-Hunt walked with one out
Biddle fanned Naughton for the second out
Trent Baker doubled, bringing the go ahead run to the plate – lead-off Wade Dutton
Going to the pen again, the Aces sent youngster Blake Cunningham to the hill and Biddle back to centrefield
Dutton, who had an exceptional game, singled to score both, and the game was alive at two apiece
But the Rams were on a roll, as Brad Dutton tripled to score and Roneberg singled to drive in the fourth for the innings, all with two out, in an stunning turnaround

In the bottom of nine, again with two out, Rutgers walked, Harman singled, Berg drew an intentional walk and Tristan Crawford was given the call
He walked Biddle for the Ace’s third run before Russell flied out to give the Rams a narrow victory from what seemed an unlikely position when Victoria was just one out away from sweeping the series

Brad Dutton (four hits and an RBI), Wade Dutton (three hits and two RBIs) and Brett Roneberg led a Rams’ offence that was otherwise fairly subdued, while Brad Harman, Berg and Dingle were best with the bat for the Aces

The result was crucial for the Rams, who go to three and four, while Victoria – at five wins and two losses – are a win clear at the top of the table with the Patriots downing Perth in the last of their series

Mildura baseball was the winner when the Victoria Aces took on the Queensland Rams in a three-match Claxton Shield on the weekend

The Aces won both games at the Sunraysia Ballpark on Saturday, but couldn’t hold on to the third on Sunday with Queensland coming from behind to win

Originally only two games of the Australian baseball premier competition were scheduled in Mildura but the game to be held in Melbourne on Friday night was postponed because of the rain

Nick Carroll from Sunraysia Baseball said they only found out about hosting the third game at the last minute
“They were ready to play in Melbourne but the rain stopped them so we found out that we’d be hosting the third” Mr Carroll said

Queensland (3-4) scored four runs in the top of the ninth to spoil a sweep by Victoria (5-2), as the Aces remained at the top the ladder despite the 4-3 loss

Wade Dutton two-run, two-out double tied the game in ninth off of reliever Blake Cunningham (0-1), before rightfielder Andrew Russell dropped the third out allowing the third run to score
Brett Roneberg then singled to make it 4-2

"We were still overmatched this weekend" said Queensland Manager Yates
"Our guys fought hard, but we still have a lot to do
Our younger guys are doing the work, and for our experienced guys, its just a matter of time

Victoria mounted a rally in the ninth off of winner Matthew Timms (1-0) and Tristian Crawford, but Crawford got Russell to fly out to end the contest for his first save
After Timms got the first two outs, the Aces loaded the bases with two walks and a single, as Crawford came on and walked Biddle on four pitches to make it 4-3
Crawford settled down with Russell, the next batter, to end the game

Victoria took a 2-0 lead in the first off of three hits and were cruising with Dean Barkers five shutout innings and scoreless innings from Glen Richards, Matthew Blackmore and Biddle, before the ninth

Victoria travels to South Australia next weekend, while Queensland travels to Western Australia

Here we go again, subscribers … regular readers would have already consumed my report on the last game of this series where we emphasised the unpredictability associated with this marvellous baseball game of ours
Well, it took less than twenty-four hours for this to become more evident than ever when the visiting Queensland Rams highjacked a series sweep from right under the noses of the Victorian Aces

There the Aces were within one out, with one on, in the top of the ninth inning and still protecting a 2-0 shutout but, hold the phone, the final twist in this drama was yet to be written

Suffice to say that the Queenslanders, who might have returned home badly bruised with their tails between their legs, will now be feeling a whole lot better about their visit to the sumptuous south
Meanwhile, the Victorians, who might have been strutting around like prize-winning roosters, will now leave Mildura feeling more like they have lost the series, rather than the more pleasant reality of a 2-1 victory

That is the way sport works folks, sometimes you are only as good as your last game and, in this case, the last game of this series would taste horribly bitter and the huge chunk of humble pie will stick for a while in the throats of the Aces

The Dutton brothers must have looked like quadruplets to the Victorian hierarchy who, every time they looked up, were menacingly on base for the Rams in this game
Wade Dutton has been setting a cracking pace offensively in Claxton 2009 so far, but his Independent League pro brother Brad is obviously unprepared to let him grab all of the Queensland headlines for himself
Cop this … B. Dutton contributed 4-4 including a RBI triple, while W. Dutton could only manage a miserable 3-4 with a two RBI single
Yeh, and both brothers were also hit by pitches as what sounds like a very good (unintentional) tactic under the circumstances
Most significantly, the Dutton brothers were at the forefront of the two-out rally that snatched the game for the Rams like thieves in the night … happy families fellas!

In case you are wondering, these blokes were the only ones to register more than one hit in this game, but then what game report on ‘Flintoff & Dunn’ would fail to include Ben Wigmore for SA or Brett Roneberg for Queensland
The Victorian Aces have done pretty well to keep Roneberg relatively under wraps in Claxton 2009 so far; that is if you exclude his “Grand Salami” last night
There he was, like clockwork, chiming in with his game-deciding RBI in that eventful ninth inning to force his name into our worst-selling book for yet another time!

‘Drew-K’ (a nickname patented by F&D) Drew Naylor has not yet been able to translate his electric stuff from professional baseball with the Philadelphia Phillies onto the AMLB stage just yet, but he was very good after allowing two runs in the opening frame against the Aces, who have been very fast starters in most games of this competition
Simon Morriss continues his solid form from the 2008 event to make sure that the Aces could not add-on over those vitally important middle innings
Matt Timms, a current Atlanta Braves pro, managed to work out of a minor jam in the eighth, but he may have got the jitters when Victoria threatened to hit back in the bottom of the ninth
Doing the job of a highly credentialed and highly experienced “safety valve” was nine-year pro Tristan Crawford who reached ‘AAA’ with Minnesota, before pitching ‘AA’ ball with Washington in 2008
He walked in a run, but he then extinguished Victoria’s last hope of reclaiming a game that had slithered away from them right at the end

For the disconsolate Aces, lefty Geelong starter Dean Barker was not far short of brilliant in this game to back up his previous very good start in Claxton 2009
The simple fact that he struck out one per inning and allowed only six base runners through five scoreless innings says plenty about how effective he was … it’s good to see Dean’s ‘big league’ career well and truly back on the rails
Glen Richards, a former Atlanta Braves pro pitcher, finished the sixth inning in style then he was lifted after allowing duplicate walks to start the seventh
It was a similar story for Matt Blackmore who rescued the seventh, but then two leadoff hits by the Dutton duo chased him from the mound too
Same again for Elliot Biddle, a recent Minnesota pro, who cleaned up the eighth, then found himself in strife after issuing a one out walk and this was soon followed by a Trent Baker double that concluded his day
It was a lot to ask of youngster Blake Cunningham, a premature talent, to save the day for the Aces at this stage of his fledgling career
I suppose that it will be regarded as a stern “test of character” for him to suffer such an agonising loss at this too early stage

Many of our subscribers were left to ponder why Lee Hogan, still a pitching ace in Victorian baseball and the Aces' current pitching coach, wasn’t used in this situation
There is no way on this planet that ‘Hoges’ would have surrendered a two run lead in the last inning of this game … forget it!

Offensively for the Vics, Australia's 26th major leaguer Brad Harman was the No.1 gun once again with his 2-4, while Biddle Dingle and Berg were the RBI guys
Danny Berg may have, for once, failed to produce an extra base hit in this game but, then again, he had the rare honour of being walked intentionally to proclaim what kind of threat he has become

To repeat what we have already said often enough, there is no game on earth as exciting and unpredictable as our great game of baseball … this was just another invigorating chapter!