The Phantoms win again! Team Echelbarger is now 10-2 for the season and are being called the team to win it all by the other coaches in the league. However, we still have 4 games left in the regular season and other teams are improving as well.
The Phantoms only had 9 players and didn’t seem too interested in playing tonight. Maybe it was that this was the first 5:00 pm game we’ve had in a while and we’ve are used to playing the late 7:00 pm games. The first inning was a disaster for the team in green, missed opportunities and let Point B get 5 runs in.
We only used 2 pitchers and overall we had pretty good pitching after the first inning. Ryan was our starter facing 11 batters in 2 innings. He had 23 strikes, 2 strikeouts, 4 hits, 2 walks and 5 earned runs. Jordan pitched 3 innings facing 14 batters, 31 strikes, 5 strikeouts, 6 hits, 0 walks and 2 earned runs. Both combined for a league season second best 76 pitch count for the evening. The lowest pitch count for the season is 68 by Point B on 3/30 against Wilcox.
Team Echelbarger had 13 runs on the board with 9 hits, 13 walks and 3 hit by pitches. Point B actually out hit the Phantoms with 10 hits, but only got 2 walks for the game. Alex B lead us off again going 2 for 3 at the plate, 1 HBP, 1 RBI and grounded out in the 4th. Ryan contributed with a RBI double in the second.
Defensively Benji caught a pop fly to end the fourth inning and Jordan caught a pop-up at pitcher for the 1st out of the fifth frame.
Our MVP of the game was Reilly. He has been a solid first baseman for the entire season. He leads the team with 32 putouts for the Spring and 5 of those this evening. Reilly had three 1-3 plays with Ryan in the first and second innings. In the fifth inning had a pair of 6-3 plays with Sean. He was patient at the plate with 4 walks and 1 run scored. Awesome job Reilly!
I’m letting the kids play some positions that they normally don’t play in the next couple of games. We’ll also get one last look for the pitchers I haven’t identified for the playoff rotation. We’ll have at least have 5, maybe 7 players going for us on the mound in the post season. I like our chances.
Our next game is a 7:00 pm rematch against team Sparta’s on Monday, May 10th at Lynndale Field 2. See you there! Go Phantoms!
Final Score: Point B 7 – Echelbarger 13
