After the deluge of rain on Labor Day, the 10U Championship game was postponed until Thursday. While some people were upset about having to leave the field and come back three days later, it wound up being the smart decision as the weather on Thursday was perfect for baseball.
Syosset Braves were riding the euphoria of completing an epic comeback in the semifinal game and holding on to win, 10-9, on a play at the plate in extra innings.
Momentum only carries as far as the starting pitchers, though, and on this day Batting 1.000 had the advantage with hard-throwing Derek Yormack. The big right-handed pitcher stated that he is eligible to play 11U and 10U and has been used to facing the older competition. With the exception of one mental error on the field, there was nary a challenge for him on this evening.
He allowed just a walk, hit by pitch and bunt single over four dynamic innings. He struck out seven batters.
The real story on this day was the offense of the Seminoles.
Leadoff batter, Braden Seligman, got things going with an inside-the-park HR to left field. This set the stage for the game and it was a lead that the Seminoles would never relinquish. They added two more runs on a wild pitch that scored Matthew Tolipano and a sac fly that scored Derek Yormack. It was very aggressive base running as the sac fly was actually a pop up to second base but he did not hesitate to score.
Syosset got on the board in unique fashion in the top of the second. After two strikeouts, an infield error but a runner on second with two outs. After there was some confusion over whether a pitch was strike two or three, the players all walked off the field and the base runner never stopped running and crossed the plate. It was one of those situations that never happen, but baseball presents any number of possibilities in each game.
Despite getting on the board in the second, that was as close as they would come.
The Seminoles high-octane offense went to work in the bottom of the second inning. Derek Fong, batting No. 11 in the order, came through in a big way. He ripped a two-run single to left that score Facciponti and Balkrom, who both singled. It was an impressive display of hitting from all three batters.
After going scoreless in the third inning, the Seminoles went off.
Before the inning commenced I overhead the Head Coach tell the team “lets score six this inning”. They obliged.
After a triple by Jayden Zoller and a wild pitch scored him, an RBI single by Seligman made it 7-1, a two run single by Tolipano made it 9-1 and Ryan Yormack ended it with a two-run double to make it 11-1. That ended it, as the run-rule went into effect.
