by James Ryder
The Long Island Thunder played the Merrick Bellmore Thunder Friday night on Field 3 at Plainedge Park. Despite sharing the same nickname, the two teams didn’t share much in terms of performance for most of this game. Merrick Bellmore struggled in comparison to LI due to some lapses on defense and stranding runners on base. Despite this, Merrick Bellmore almost won the game by rallying for three runs in the top of the sixth inning. Unfortunately, their sudden surge on offense fell just short, as Long Island held on 6-5.
Both starting pitchers got off to a great start. Matty Sharon started for LI and struck out three straight batters after allowing a leadoff single. Max Goodman also recorded all three outs in the first inning via strikeouts. Goodman struck out another three batters in the second inning, while Sharon gave up the first of two earned runs. James Smith got the RBI on a groundout to first. He brought home Andrew Tamburo, who led of the inning with a single to left field.
However, Sharon would come back strong to start the third inning when he forced a leadoff groundout and added two more strikeouts. The third inning was also when LI would come alive offensively. Anthony Branscum Jr. has a leadoff walk and scored their first run on Jackson Bianchi’s opposite field RBI triple. Two walks loaded the bases while a third gave them the lead. Anthony DiLuzio-Peterson followed this up with a dribbler to shortstop for an RBI infield single. Finally, a single to center field by Tony Mastrangelo made the score 4-1.
In the fourth inning, Sharon retired three of four batters before hitting a triple to left-center field. The triple didn’t make a difference, but it did succeed another run for LI. Their fifth run of the night came when Branscum Jr. stole second and proceeded to go home because the through by the catcher sailed into the outfield.
Both teams score one run each in the fifth inning. First, it was Merrick Bellmore’s Luke Giglio that hit a leadoff triple to LF. He crossed the plate on Goodman’s grounder to third base. In the bottom frame, Matthew Judge reached first after his hit to second resulted in an E4. He stole second and third and was brought home when Mastrangelo hit the ball to SS where another error was made. The score stood at 6-2 after five.
Jack Schneider came in for Sharon in the top of the sixth for the save opportunity. He struggled to get an out, allowing Merrick Bellmore to build toward a walk-off. Gavin Herzog and Tamburo led off with back to back singles. Liam Delmore’s walk loaded the bases and Smith earned another RBI on a single to LF. The first out was made on this play when the runner on second also tried scoring, but was thrown out at home. Giglio walked to load the bases again. Goodman took a strike, and as the ball was thrown back to the pitcher, Tamburo stole home. Goodman grounded out to SS, which made it a 6-5 game with 2 outs. Schneider forced a comeback ground ball for the third out to finally put away Merrick Bellmore.
Matty Sharon pitched 5 innings and had 7 strikeouts to go along with a triple. He gave credit to his team for “hitting bombs,” but didn’t forget to acknowledge his opponents success. Bombs and good sportsmanship is why we love Baseball! pic.twitter.com/w2nAC0ycn1
— Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) July 20, 2019
Sharon finished the game with 7 strikeouts in five innings pitched, allowing only two runs. The LI Thunder offense scored just enough to hold of a late comeback from their opponents. Final Score: LI 6, Merrick Bellmore 5.
