Emporia A-16 Blues coach Jerry Cook felt bad that El Dorado made the drive up to Emporia for just six innings of baseball Tuesday night at Soden’s Grove.
But Cook felt pretty good about how those six innings went in his team’s 9-0 run-rule victory.
“That’s games coaches love right there,” Cook said. “We came out and scored every inning. Our pitchers did a great job. We did have one error, that’s going to happen. The hitters, we hit up and down the lineup, had a couple key hits when we needed them and stayed after them and put them away.”
The Blues, 23-11, needed a nice confidence-builder after showing their youth over the weekend at the Mike’s Classic. It was only the second time all season the Blues have not come away tournament champions. In fact, they were far from it, finishing 1-3 against older competition at the AAA tournament.
“We’re getting kind of close to the State tournament and time when we really need to be playing well,” Matt Fry said. “Just trying to make sure we get some last-minute tuneups in and we’re ready to go.”
El Dorado was a last-minute tuneup, a late addition to the schedule because the Blues wanted to get in a couple of games this week.
El Dorado had a makeshift squad that included several AAA players, but that didn’t matter, as the Blues jumped out to an early lead and never let up, scoring at least one run in all five of their at-bats.
James Rodriguez gave Emporia a 1-0 lead with a double down the left field line that scored Dusty Maas. Rodriguez finished the scoring as well, giving the Blues the run-rule cushion with a two-run homer in the fifth.
Rodriguez turned on a high, inside fastball and hit a line drive that just carried over the right field wall, his first homer of the season.
“I was just trying to get on base, because it’s hard to hit a slow pitcher,” Rodriguez said. “When I hit it, I didn’t think it was going over, but then I started running and saw the ball go over, and I’m like, ‘Sweet.’”
The Blues’ big inning came in the second when Dalton Cooper led off with a single and later came around to score on a wild pitch. Brett Lechien and Maas worked one-out walks, and Rodriguez drove in the second run of the inning and reached on an error. Matt Fry followed with a two-run double.
Dustin Lingenfelter added a run with an RBI double in the third and Cooper drove in a run with his second single in the fourth inning.
The Emporia pitching and defense matched the effectiveness of the offense; however, things were not quite as smooth.
Lechien opened the game with two straight hitless innings, then gave up a leadoff double in the third. Lechien walked the bases loaded with two outs, but he escaped unharmed, getting Garrett Armstrong to fly out to right.
Brian Keisler relieved Lechien and also started strong with a perfect fourth inning. Keisler ran into trouble in the fifth, hitting Matt Hockley with a pitch, giving up a single to Dalton Wheat and walking Gage Grant to load the bases with only one out.
Keisler kept the shutout alive by inducing a ground ball to second that resulted in an inning-ending double play.
Remington Pinick closed things out, and once again made it interesting. Pinick gave up back-to-back two-out singles and walked Mark McNown to load the bases. He got out of the jam and finished off El Dorado by getting Hockley to lazily fly out to Keisler at second.
“Our pitchers, they were doing their best, but all our arms are kind of sore,” Fry said. “We need to heal up, but luckily our defense was able to pull it out for them.”
Emporia travels to El Dorado on Friday for another scheduled nine-inning game, the final tuneup before the state tournament.
Tuesday at Soden’s Grove
Emporia Blues 9, El Dorado 0 (6 innings)
El Dorado 000 000 — 0 4 2
Emporia 141 12X — 9 9 1
WP — Lechien. LP — Brown.
2B — ED: McNown; EMP: Rodriguez, Fry, Pinick. HR — EMP: Rodriguez.