Great finish as Sal Ansaldi snags a liner off the bat of Dylan Parker to seal a 3-2 victory for Long Island Baseball.
WP: Ansaldi: 5 IP, 12 K, 2 R pic.twitter.com/WQoTd31nnh
— Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) April 20, 2019
Even at the younger levels, pitching is the name of the game.
LIB Bombers 9U were fortunate to receive an outstanding effort from young hurler Sal Ansaldi on the mound this afternoon against Long Island Junior Ducks. He went five innings, striking out 12 batters and allowing just two runs.
“I felt comfortable on the mound,” said the 9-year-old. “I feel like defensively we played very well. I tried to stay calm on the mound, and tried to strike everyone out,” he added. He nearly did that, as he struck out two in the first, three in the second, three in the third, one in the fourth and three in the fifth. He worked quick and avoided falling behind in the count.
“That’s the name of the game–throw strikes,” said Coach Schiff. “Sal did a great job throwing strikes and letting our defense work. I thought he did an excellent job for us today, he gave us five solid innings against a really good baseball team,” he added.
They got out to an early 3-0 lead in the bottom of the first on a two-run single by Ryan Fiscella and an RBI ground out by MJ Aparicio.
The game stayed 3-0 until the top of the fourth when Dylan Parker smashed a two-run home run to left field to score Evan Bruno to cut the deficit to 3-2. Sal settled down and retired the next two batters to keep the lead in tact.
Kyle Zinger came on in relief in the sixth inning for the save. He allowed a one-out walk and a hit by pitch to put the tying run in scoring position, but he recorded a strikeout for the second out. Parker came up with hopes of coming through with a clutch hit. He hit the ball very well, but Ansaldi–now at shortstop–made a great leaping grab to catch the ball to put an exclamation point on the victory.
“I was super confident he would catch it–Sal’s got great hands!” said Schiff.
