When the weather dips below 50 degrees and there’s high-end pitchers on the mound pitching to batters with wood bats, you can expect offense to be at a premium.
That’s exactly what happened in the first game of the Antonia Agostinelli Memorial tournament tonight at Baseball Heaven, in which Long Island Baseball topped Team Steele 2-1.
Photo Credit: Vinny Messana
With Team Steel clinging to a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the fifth and runners on second & third with two outs, the third-place batter lofted a fly ball to right field which was dropped and allowed the tying run to score. The next batter smacked a single to right field to score the go-ahead run which proved to be the winning run.
Both starting pitchers battled through command issues but allowed zero runs through four innings. Each team stranded a bevy of base runners in scoring positions–including two runners a piece in the first inning.
Steel’s starter–2018 Ward Melville grad Drake Eggleston–showed plus stuff tonight. He used a deceptive delivery and an 87-MPH fastball to compile five strikeouts in his four shutout innings of work.
His offense got on the board in the top of the fifth on an RBI single by Tristan Chaimowitz to drive in Virga.
They left the bases loaded, though, which proved to be a huge factor in the game.
Vinny Borelli came on in relief for Steel. He did strike out the first batter, but then lost his command. He walked the next two batters and hit the next one to load the bases. LI Baseball was able to capitalize on that bout of wildness and the error in right field.
The Steel went down quietly in the next two innings with the exception of a single by Ryan Picarello.
