The Iron Comes to Town
Twenty Inning Thriller Highlights Week
by Caitlen Sullivan
Vancouver Sun Sports Reporter
June 23, 2035
June 16th
Rubber game in Des Moines saw the Mounties score eight times on twelve hits. Gebre-Egziabher Mwaka hit his twelfth home run; Jésus Marte hit his sixth. That wasn’t even close to good enough as the Kernels exploded for 10 runs in the sixth and won a laugher, 16-8 final. Kernel catcher Cisco Areolo had seven RBIs.
June 17th
A rare Sunday day-off at home! The Mounties had a team BBQ and swim party for the players, coaches, and their families at Third Beach at Ferguson Point in Stanley Park.
June18th
Mexico City came to Northwoods Outpost leading the Johnson League Sun Belt Division. The Mounties jumped ahead 4-0 in the second inning, the Aztecs tied it in the top of the fourth, and then the Mounties jumped right back ahead by three in the bottom of the fourth. That was enough in an eventual 10-5 victory that had the crowd rocking. Guy Webb was player of the game with four hits, five RBIs and two home runs. Gutsy José Zamora got his fifth win (5-5) with a complete game in which he gave up fourteen hits and yet threw only 102 pitches.
June 19th
Vancouver again jumped quickly on top with three in the first inning and salted the victory away with five more in fifth. Catcher Dave Robertson had a home run and Scott Harper was Player of the Game with three hits, two runs, and two batted in. Not to be outdone by Zamora’s 14-hit complete game yesterday, José Morales notched a complete game despite the Aztecs getting fifteen hits. Morales threw 151 pitches and yet didn’t allow a run until singleton scores in the seventh and eighth.
June 20th
With a chance at a sweep the Mounties battled hard but eventually succumbed 6-5 in eleven innings. Rick Ward took the loss. Guy Webb and Jésus Marte had home runs. The Mounties took the series two games to one.
June 21st
With Sun Belt leader Mexico City out of town, Vancouver welcomed the Calgary Pioneers who are battling the Seattle Storm for leadership in the Mounties’ Frontier Division of the Frick. The Mounties may as well have allowed the AAA Victoria Canucks to play the game for them. Calgary scored eleven times on fifteen hits whereas the Mounties managed just three singles off Cristobal Hernandez. Calgary’s eight runs in the second inning made it a long boring night for those few fans who stuck around until the end.
June 22nd
A game for the ages! It was 3-3 after three innings, but Calgary scored in the fourth, fifth, twice in the sixth, and in the seventh to lead 8-3 when the Mounties came to bat in the bottom of the eighth. The Mounties scored five, highlighted by a bases-loaded base-clearing double by Alfredo Bermúdez. It was a brand new ballgame going into the ninth. Manuel Solíz was not effective and allowed all eight Pioneer runs. Then the bullpen took over. Dermot Halford and Rodrigo Lugo, and Rick Ward got the game into extra innings. Ward kept Calgary off the board through the thirteenth inning. Then it was Ricardo Arellano’s turn. He threw three scoreless innings. Ray Perkins took the mound in the seventeenth inning. He struck out six in his three-inning stint. Finally, rarely used Alexandre Doyle came in. After a solid nineteenth inning, he got in trouble in the twentieth. A leadoff double and an error put runners on first and third with one out. But Doyle got Francisco Marin to roll it softly back to mound. After holding the runner at third, he barely threw Marin out at first. With runners now on second and third, dangerous Juan Karyabwite grounded out to short for the final out. In the bottom of the twentieth, Jésus Marte led off with a single. Rashardo Menne III struck out after trying to sacrifice the runner to second. Zi-jing Lou then singled with Marte stopping at second. Alfredo Bermúdez bounced a slow roller toward third and was thrown out at first. Second and third, two outs, and up came weak-hitting catcher Hotha Popo. A ball, a strike, a ball, a foul ball and it was 2 balls - 2 strikes. Popo looped the next pitch into left center where it dropped in for a walk-off game-winning single. The game started at 7:05 PM and ended seven hours and forty minutes later at 2:45 AM. No curfews at Northwoods Outpost!
