Player of the game Steve Proko threw a complete game for the win. pic.twitter.com/MqL1BDvuPG
— Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) July 15, 2018
3 days ago, Long Island Baseball demolished the Long Island Thunder 12-3 to open the 4th annual Brian Moore Memorial Baseball Tournament.
Today, however, was an entirely different story.
LI Baseball threatened early against Thunder starter Steve Proko. Proko struggled to find the zone early on, walking a pair of batters in the bottom of the first. However, he was able to work out of it.
The teams traded a run apiece as both Proko and LIB starter Zach Zarra settled down nicely. Neither team had a discernible threat until the top of the 6th inning for the Thunder.
Teddy Valenti led off the inning with a solo homerun to right field to give the LI Thunder a 2-1 lead.
Proko would give up a leadoff single in the bottom of sixth but comeback to strike out a pair of hitters and get a groundout with the tying runner at second to retire the side.
After the nine run loss on Thursday, the Thunder were certainly motivated this afternoon. Up on the dugout fence for every pitch, they may have been able to get in the heads of the pitchers for Long Island Baseball, who struggled with command late in the game.
The Thunder would use the wildness from relief pitcher Pellegrino. One run would score on a wild pitch and a second would score after Anthony Crish got a caught in a rundown but stayed alive long enough for a runner to score from third to make the score 4-1.
Proko would come out for the seventh and send down Long Island Baseball in order to secure the championship for the exuberant Long Island Thunder.
While Proko was definitely excited with the title, his mindset coming into the outing was to zone out all of the outside noise and focus on throwing strikes and he did exactly that.
“I was out there just trying to throw strikes and get ahead of batters,” Proko said. “I hoping the field behind me would do the work for me. We lost to these guys 12-3 earlier in the tournament but we didn’t let that get to our heads. We came back from 1-0 down and played hard and showed a lot of heart to come out with the W.”
