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Niles, OH -- One win short of a championship.
That is where the 2009 New York-Penn baseball road ended here Wednesday night for Mahoning Valley as the Scrappers fell 5-2 to the Staten Island Yankees before 1,933 fans at Eastwood Field.
“It is hard to lose big games and these guys had a great summer,“ said Fryman of his club. “You want the guys to home on a positive note because it is tough when you lose big games like this one and I don’t think in any way, shape or form should this loss take anything from what they accomplished this summer.”
The Scrappers drew first blood with a pair of runs in the second inning.
With one out, Ben Carlson beat out an infield single and with two outs, Rafael Vera chased Carlson across the dish with the game’s first run with a RBI triple to the right-center field gap.
With his first plate appearance since hitting his dramatic home run in Tuesday night’s win, Chun Chen ripped a double into the leftfield corner, Vera scoring to give the Scrappers a quick 2-0 lead.
Trailing by the pair of runs, the Yankees cut their deficit in half with a run in the fifth inning and tied the game with another run in the seventh.
In the fifth, Neil Medchill led off with a double off the boards in right-center and scored on a RBI single by Zoilo Almonte. Two innings later, Almonte was again in the middle of things for the Islanders as he led off with a single to left and scored on Kyle Higashioka’s RBI double to right.
With the Scrappers unable to add on against the Staten Island bullpen after scoring their two runs in the second, the Yankees took the lead for keeps in the eighth.
Jimmy Paredes led off with a double to right and DeAneglo Mack walked. After Paredes moved to third on a fly ball out to center, Medchill plated him with the go-ahead run on a fielder’s choice for a 3-2 Staten Island lead. On the heels of Paredes run, Almonte quickly made it 5-2 Baby Bombers with a 2-run double into the leftfield corner.
While the Scrappers bullpen was roughed up for the final four SI runs, the Yankee relievers were almost flawless as they only allowed Scrapper hitters one hit after the second inning, a one-out single by Jesus Brito in the sixth.
“They had 11 hits to our four and that kid (relief pitcher Ben) Watkins did a tremendous job out of the bullpen,” said Fryman. “He stepped up big time for them out of the bullpen and that was the really the difference in the game. I have said before that I believe they are by far the most talented team in our league. They just had too many hitters and Watkins picked up the load for them.
“In my opinion, this club was a group of over-achievers and again, they had a tremendous summer,“ continued Fryman. “You want them to go home with an understanding on what they need to work on during the off-season and what they need to do to get themselves ready for spring training. It is over now and all we can do is prepare for next year.”
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