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Tuesday, February 9, 2010 | Serving Del Rio and Val Verde County: Since 1929
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Tournament title up for grabs
Published July 24, 2006
You can take the “if necessary” tag off today’s Babe Ruth championship game.
After dropping its first game Friday evening, Del Rio’s 15-year-old All-Stars eliminated Flax and San Antonio Saturday, Eagle Pass Sunday, and then took the first championship game from Tri-County Sunday evening to set up tonight’s winner-take-all game against Tri-County.
Tonight’s South Texas State 15-year-old Babe Ruth All-Star Baseball Tournament Championship game will be played at 6 p.m. at Roosevelt Park. The winner advances to the Regional tournament, which will be played in Levelland, Texas, beginning Aug. 4.
Before it could even get to Tri-County, though, Del Rio had to get by a feisty Eagle Pass team.
Del Rio’s 15-year-old All-Stars took their place in the championship game with a 13-12 win against Eagle Pass Sunday.
Eagle Pass picked up a run in the first.
Fernando Nava was first up and reached base on a single and crossed home off a hit by a fellow teammate.
Del Rio was unable to pick up any runs in the first inning with Michael Arreola being the only batter to reach base.
Eagle Pass was able to pick up four runs in the second inning off two hits, one error and three runners were left on base, 5-0.
Del Rio tied it up in the second inning with five runs of their own.
Tino Pruneda was up first, drawing a walk and Jesse Treviño came in next for a hit to shortstop that forced Pruneda out at second.
Paco Avendaño slammed a double to the outfield to bring in Treviño. Michael Wancho sacrificed himself and Zekey Rodriguez slapped a single.
Arreola grabbed first on an error and a pitch hit Diego Escobedo. Jack Mayfield landed a single but made his way to third on errors and the third out was called before he could score.
In the third inning, Eagle Pass was only able to get one batter on base.
Del Rio grabbed a two run lead in the third inning.
Trevino slapped a single and Wancho slammed one over the outfield fence to clear the bases.
In the fourth inning Eagle Pass grabbed the lead with three runs off two hits and one was left standing on base.
Del Rio came back in their half of the inning to score four runs.
Escobedo singled, Mayfield was walked and Pruneda shot a double for an RBI.
Trevino was walked and Avendaño doubled to bring in Trevino, 11-8.
In the fifth inning Eagle Pass was able to get one runner around the bases.
Arreola and Mayfield landed on base but could not cross the plate at home.
Eagle Pass tied it in the sixth with two runs off two hits, one error and one runner was left on base.
Pruneda was able to land on base but no one could follow up to move him off first.
In the seventh inning, Eagle Pass took the lead by one run after the batter was walked.
Eli Guajardo slapped a single and Arreola took first on an error. Homero Cadena managed to bring in Guajardo with a double and Mayfield had a single for the winning RBI, advancing them to the championship game.
Once that was settled, Del Rio set its sights on Tri-County.
Tri-County handed Del Rio its only loss of the tournament, 5-2, on Friday. After that, they defeated Eagle Pass 14-5 Saturday evening to move into Sunday’s championship game.
Tri-County took the lead in the top of the first.
Joe Tallerine reached on an error by Cesar Echavarria at second base. After stealing second, Tallerine would come around to score on a single by Nathan Tienert, giving Tri-County a 1-0 lead.
Tri-County had a chance to add to its lead, putting two more runners on base in the inning, but Treviño, Del Rio’s starting pitcher, was able to coax a fly ball out from Kyle Supak to end the at-bat.
In the bottom of the first, Del Rio set the tone for the game with a three-run inning of its own.
Guajardo started things off with a one-out walk. Mayfield and Pruneda followed Guajardo’s lead, drawing walks of their own, and loading the bases for Del Rio. That brought out the Tri-County coaches and starting pitcher Tallerine was replaced with Garret Huebner.
Huebner struck out the first batter he faced to give Del Rio its second out. But Echavarria would not leave Del Rio’s runners stranded as he turned on the first pitch he saw and hammered it to the left field wall for a double, scoring Guajardo and Mayfield. Pruneda eventually scored on a passed ball and Del Rio led 3-1.
Both teams went quietly in their next at-bats.
In the third, Tri-County cut Del Rio’s lead to one.
Tallerine was hit by a Treviño offering to start the inning. After a fly-out, Ryan Hackemack doubled down the left field line to plate Tallerine and make the score 3-2.
Again, Treviño settled down to retire the next two batters and keep Del Rio on top.
Del Rio was retired in order in the bottom of the third, but Treviño did his part to keep Tri-County in check as he kept the team off the board in the top of the fourth.
In the bottom of the fourth, Del Rio resumed its offensive onslaught.
Echavarria again drilled the first pitch he saw for a double to begin the Del Rio at-bat. Avendaño drew a walk to put runners on first and second. Wancho then hit a single to score Echavarria and put Del Rio up 4-2.
After Escobedo dropped a sacrifice bunt to move the runners over, Arreola drew a walk to load the bases. Guajardo kept the bases loaded with an RBI single, and Del Rio led 5-2.
Tri-County then made its second pitching change, bringing in Jordan Williams.
The first batter Williams faced was Mayfield. Mayfield hit a hard ground ball to the third baseman who quickly stepped on third base for the second out, and then threw to first to try and get Mayfield. Mayfield beat out the throw, but the play was thrown into confusion when Wancho, who was standing on third, didn’t break for home right away. That left Guajardo stranded between first and second and Arreola standing on second base unsure if he was out or not.
In all the confusion, Wancho finally tried to score from third. Tri-County fired the ball home where the catcher did not tag Wancho, but did touch home plate. The home plate umpire called Wancho out, and the inning was brought to an end, despite the protests of Del Rio’s coaches who argued that since Arreola was called out at third on the force play, the force was off and Wancho had to be tagged with the ball to be called out.
Tri-County took back one of its runs in the fifth.
Tallerine led off with a triple to right field, but Treviño picked him off third. Tienert smoked a double, and then scored on a single by Hackemack. That made the score 5-3 in favor of Del Rio.
Del Rio struck for two more runs in the bottom of the fifth.
With one out, pinch hitter Cadena hit a ground ball to the second baseman. The second baseman was unable to cleanly field the ball, and then threw the ball into the visitors’ bullpen to send Cadena to second.
That brought Echavarria to the plate. This time, his hit didn’t stay in the yard as he crushed the Williams offering over the left field wall for a two-run home run and a 7-3 Del Rio lead.
After Tri-Count went quietly in the sixth, Del Rio unleashed one more offensive barrage.
Arreola started things off with a one-out walk. Guajardo was hit by a pitch and Mayfield reached on a fielder’s choice to loaded the bases. Arreola eventually scored on a passed ball to put Del Rio up 8-3.
Pruneda smacked an RBI single to score Guajardo and make it 9-3. That brought out the Tri-County coaches again and Trent Popp replaced Williams.
Popp struck out Treviño for the second out of the inning, but then his wild ways allowed Mayfield to score and put Del Rio up 10-3.
Echavarria made it 11-3 when he ripped his third double of the game, scoring Pruneda.
Del Rio loaded the bases when Avendaño and Wancho walked and Escobedo was hit by a pitch for the sixth time in four games, but Del Rio was unable to push across any more runs as Arreola was retired on strikes.
Tri-County added two more runs to its score in the seventh as Tienert hit a one-out single, Hackemack walked and Cameron Behrend slapped a RBI single off Mayfield, who was brought into replace Treviño.
After striking out Chris Migl, Mayfield gave up an RBI single to Brandon Ramirez. But that would be the final hit for Tri-County as Mayfield struck out Stephen Appelt to end the game.
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