Emporia AAAs sweep doubleheader for first time this season
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
It took the Emporia AAAs’ offense a game to get going on Tuesday in a doubleheader sweep at Augusta. So in Game One, the AAAs had to get creative.
Ryne Cook was up to the the task.
Cook stole home twice and the AAAs manufactured enough runs to pull out a 6-5 win in the opener. The bats got going in Game Two, and Emporia swept for the first time this season with a 12-0 run-rule win in five innings.
The Emporia offense took advantage of errors and mental lapses in Game One. Cook’s first run came when the Augusta catcher lazily threw the ball back to the pitcher without paying attention to Cook, and he snuck in before the pitcher could get the ball back to the catcher.
Cook scored again in the fourth inning when coach Brad Kelly signaled for him to steal home with the Augusta pitcher pitching out of the windup. The run was the AAAs’ sixth and turned out to be the winning run.
Sean Carr pitched a complete game, holding the Augusta offense in check until the sixth inning when a couple of errors turned into three unearned runs.
Emporia sharpened up on defense and offense in Game Two.
After spending the weekend at the Bartlesville tournament — where the AAAs went 2-3 — they were used to high-velocity pitchers. It took a game to get used to the slower Augusta pitchers, but once they did, the offense got going.
“We were just hitting the ball all over the place,” Kelly said.
Michael Knight pitched a complete-game shutout, holding Augusta to just one hit.
The first time the AAAs played Augusta this season, they won by run-rule in the first game and then dropped the second game. Lately, they’ve been playing more consistently and it showed on Tuesday night.
“We’re still playing with nine guys. They’re playing real hard. We’re playing the right way now. We’re playing hard,” Kelly said. “Our defense and pitching has really been pretty solid. We had been giving up too many walks, but the guys have been pitching strikes the last few weeks.”
The AAAs improved to 10-17 with the sweep. They were scheduled to play a doubleheader tonight at Manhattan, but those games have been canceled. They play next on Friday at the Mike’s Tourney in Emporia.
Comments
Post a comment
We allow registered users to post comments on this Web site. Our goal with this feature is to encourage thoughtful discussions about the news stories. Using the comment feature to make random attacks on people is not acceptable. Emporiagazette.com neither endorses nor guarantees the accuracy of any user contribution. Responsibility for what is posted or contributed to this site is the sole responsibility of each user. To learn more about our posting policies please read our User Poster Agreement Policy.
(Requires free registration.)