A good showing for the old MWL with three of four teams advancing to the quarterfinals. I'll be watching the Irish Friday as Thurston and North Eugene travel to South Salem and Bend, respectively.
I attended Willamette's game against Putnam last night. More on that game later....
I mentioned last blog that Churchill bowing out before bracket play was a little too early for me. One of the reasons was that I like the Lancer's style of play and we're going to be losing a lot of Lancer's to graduation. Here's a little look at three teams I thought could find their way to the quarters, but...
The Lancers.
Bye-Bye to:
Jake Lessel
Chase Kearney
Jacob Dezarn
Kyler Wallis
Devin Murray
Skylre Perales
Christene Stolarczyk
Aaron Ingram
That's a load of talent to replace. Kearney was a great backstop and a top notch lead off hitter. Dezarn might have been the most consistent line drive hitter in the league, with a few out of the park. I don't think Dezarn took a liking to the big, towering, bombs away home runs. Just get it over with quick, baby. Lessel was one of the leagues best pitchers, including 6A, in a year of great pitching.
Churchill will be the team most decimated in the starting lineup with graduating seniors. The four potential returners listed below got in a lot of playing time. (The asterisk signifies returning all leaguers) Arruda has a future with Cirque du Soleil. Arruda was second team all league second baseman to Willamette's Tevin Glover. I saw them both quit a bit and they were both spectacular when I saw them. But Arruda was a little more into the aerial acrobatics. Coach Hoberg has to be happy he has these four returning.
* Andy Arruda
* Jordan Thompson
Hank Forrest
Eane Rodriguez
South Eugene
South has 'arrived' as a legit baseball program. By that, I mean this year's Axemen are not a one year fluke. As we have seen throughout the old MWL, facilities are important. While good facilities are not as important as good coaching, poor facilities make the players wonder where baseball fits compared to other sports. South has been making major improvements at their complex, and as importantly the players are improving right along with the facilities. Take a look at this:
Just two graduating players. I think these two seniors were under respected, even though Morrison made second team all league.
Max Morrison
Ben Giland
Then look at this list of returnees. What impressed me with these guys was the consistency on defense that they developed early in the season. Good D will get a team through games when the opposing pitcher is on, or the line drives just aren't dropping. Replacing Giland at catcher will be critical. Giland made catching Schindler look easy, but will a newbie? Coach Chris Vermeer has to be happy with list;
* Joe Schindler
* Kai Delap
Jimmy Grossman
Ian Oakerson
Alex Wectawski
Cameron Jack
Dan Quierolo
Willamette
Just like South, Willamette is a program that is now 'legit' and not a one year sweet dream. Willamette coach Jon Guldager has been no slouch in the facilities arms race. The covered baseball field to start with.... Okay, so when the first support beams went up, I thought the Wolverines were building an ark. This year's improvements included a custom concrete photographers pad from the Willamette dugout to the ark --- just for me. I even have the access code to the electronic keypad to get into the secure area. But more important than the facility improvement has been the improved quality of defensive play on the field and an attitude that the Wolverines are never out of a game.
Football All League linemen/TE's Trent Waggoner and Bryce York were fun to watch tip toe around the bases. I waited all season to see one of them slide at home and the opportunity finally came a few games ago, with York barrelling down towards the catcher. The catcher must have been praying, "Please, throw the ball wide. Please, throw the ball wide." And the ball went wide and my pic is just of York daintily stepping on the plate. Alas, we lose one of them to graduation, as Waggoner grabs his diploma. Lineman Waggoner often times pitched to all-league qb and fellow senior, Dustin Leber. Here's the senior losses for coach Guldager.
Trent Waggoner
Dustin Leber
Zach Selby
Darek Vetter
But take a look at who can return. Just like South, Willamette has to replace a good catcher. Still, the Wolverines are looking good for next year, especially at the 5A level.
* Scott Kuvaas
* Tevin Glover
* Darrin Gorder
* Hayden Olma
* Jalen Drath
* Bryce York
Cole Hathaway
Justin Guldager
Enough of that. It makes me sad to see the old guys go, but excited to think about next year.
Some comments on the Willamette-Putnam game.
Wow, could Putnam ever hit! They started the game by just putting the ball in play all of the time and closed out the last couple of innings with doubles and homers.....
I spend more time during playoff games just watching the game, rather than taking photos, because I don't take pictures of the non-MWL team. But after the first inning, I started taking pics of Putnamites batting. The Kingsmen might have had minor differences in their starting stance, but everyone of them finished with the same classic stroke. Grounder, line drive or homer, they tagged the ball.
Another issue that you couldn't help but notice, as early as warm-ups, was the Putnam guys were studs. I'd like to know their conditioning program. They all looked like they inherited the genes of Jack LaLane. (Youngins, LaLane was a fitness gedi who started it all) And they must take their running drills seriously. No slow pokes on that team. The speed across the board put pressure on the Wolverine infielders to get their throws off early.
Fortunately, Putnam didn't show any pitching prowess. Willamette was very much in the game after six innings even though the Wolverines were down by three. Putnam walked or hit six Wolverines in the second inning. Plus they put on five others for free the rest of the game. Willamette had some chances, but Putnam turned some nice double plays to extinguish any rally.
The key point in the game was the very first inning. Putnam opened with a sharp grounder up the middle. A bloop single was good for an rbi to get Putnam on the board. Willamette could have got out of the inning without too much trouble, but a couple of errors and a walk ended up giving Putnam a 4-0 lead. The score wasn't overwhelming. In fact Willamette quickly got within two after two innings. But the long first inning for Waggoner led to Waggoner only going four innings. For a while, it looked like reliever Hayden Olma would contain the Kingmen as he held Putnam scoreless in the fifth. But the hitting ogres started to get dialed in during the sixth, and put it away in the 7th.
On to the quarters...
Thurston, Sheldon and North will carry the old MWL torch into the quarters. Anything can happen as #27 Beaverton and #22 Oregon City, both quarterfinalists, have proven. Most teams will be back to throwing their ace Friday. But, I can't imagine that Thurston's Kyle Watson's gimpy ankle is ready. Writing of Watty...
Hope you saw the R-G write-up. The Colts were tied 0-0 after Sunset had batted in the top of the 5th. Coach Dube, who was wisely westing Watty's weak wheel, got talked into letting Watty take an at bat. Dube was talked into it by Watty, of course. Watty homers, of course... (My high school English teacher would kill me for that, of course) But the funny thing was that a person, whom I shall not reveal, texted me and said Watty had 'hit a finger'. I'm thinking, "Oh, my gosh. Poor Watty. How's he gonna pitch with a bad wheel and a smashed finger?" Then I remembered that I have tweeted about 'fingers', too. My iPhone always auto corrects 'dingers' to 'fingers'. Auto correct also corrects 'dp' (for double play) to 'do'. That's why I sometimes Tweet, 'The Colts just turned a do to get out of the inning." Auto correct also always turns Shane Quarterly, I mean Quarterly, try it again... Quarterley into Quarterly. See what I mean. It's ....1/4 ell eee why.
Go MWL!!!!
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