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Gabelsville grinds out another
win
The Owls' 4-1 win over the Northern Yankees
is their 650th franchise regular-season win.
SCHERERSVILLE
-- The Gabelsville franchise picked up their
650th regular season win Wednesday in typical fashion -- taking advantage of
their opponents' mistakes -- en route to a 4-1 win over the Northern Yankees.
The Gabelsville Owls started as the
Gilbertsville Rangers in 1981 and incredibly, as they play their 27th season in
the Tri-County League, they have won over 80% of their regular season games...
You read that correctly: over 80%.
The Owls came into the 2006 season with
an .806 winning percentage (638-154) and they aren't exactly losing ground this
year as they raised this season's record to 12-3 (uh, yes, 80%).
Gabelsville has the same formula year
after year. Good pitching, good defense, good players. They are fundamentally
sound. They rarely make mistakes and they wait for the opposition to make
mistakes. And they take advantage of those mistakes. They rarely beat
themselves, but, they will gladly let their opponents beat themselves.
Case in point was Wednesday's game against the Yankees. The Owls didn't do
anything spectacular, but they made enough plays to grind out a victory.
Starting pitcher Gary Hessler made the first "play" for the Owls in the bottom
of second. After Max Fada walked, Landon Parker singled and Marshall Garger
sacrificed both of them up 90 feet for the first out, Hessler got a big strike
out and pop up to end the first scoring threat of the game.
Then Gabelsville got to work in the
fourth on Matt Reppert, who had faced just one over the minimum number of
batters through three innings.
A.J. Bohn, one of the toughest outs in
the league, worked the count full and then slapped the seventh pitch of the
at-bat to left for a lead-off single. Shawn Betz took an 0-2 pitch the other way
for a single to right, and everyone in the ballpark knew what was coming next.
As is their want, the Owls always sacrifice bunt with runners on
first and second and no outs. That is Boyertown baseball. But after Adam
Tsakonas failed to get the sacrifice down on the first pitch, third-base coach
(and manager -- and DH on Wednesday) Matt Danner took the bunt off and let
Tsakonas swing away.
The result looked bad at first as he hit
a grounder to short, but it wasn't hit hard enough to turn a double-play and the
Owls got a bonus when the grounder was booted to load the bases with nobody out.
Steve Burdan stepped up next and made the Yankees pay seven pitches later with a
sharp single just out of reach of third baseman George Kressley for a two-run
single and a 2-0 Owls lead.
With runners still on first and second,
Brett Umstead gave himself up and laid a perfect bunt down the third-base line
that would have been an extremely tough play for Reppert, who hurried to make
the throw, and when he bobbled the ball, it went for a bunt single. But Reppert
bore down to get a swinging bunt on the next pitch (a change-up) that catcher
Ian McCutcheon pounced on for a 2-2-3 double-play as he stepped on the plate
and threw to first in plenty of time. Reppert then induced a grounder to short
to end the inning and keep the Yankees in the game.
Things stayed quiet until the sixth, when
the Owls capitalized on another Yankees' miscue. Tsakonas reached on an error
(again) to start the frame and promptly stole second on the first pitch. After
Burdan walked, Umstead sacrificed both runners up 90 feet, which produced a run
when Mike Ziemak's grounder with the infield in was fielded nicely by Kressley,
but he had ranged far to his left, and by the time he set himself to throw, he
had no shot at Tsakonas at the plate and had to settle for throwing out Ziemak
at first and it was 3-0 Owls.
The Yankees however, came within about
half-an-inch of tying the game in their half of the sixth. Adam Sandt lined a
single to left-center and Darrin Lenhart followed with a single to left. After
Danner visited the mound, Kressley stepped up and cranked a deep fly to left,
but you could tell by Kressley's reaction that he had just missed the sweet spot
and caught it just a little bit toward the end of the bat as it stayed in the
park for a deep fly-out.
After a strikeout, Hessler had appeared
to wriggle his way out of another jam with another strikeout for what should
have been out number three, but the pitch was in the dirt, smothered properly by
the catcher, but even though there was lots of time to throw the runner out, he
short-armed it into right-field for a rare Owls' defensive miscue, and Sandt
scored from second and then suddenly, there were runners on second and third and
the Yankees trailed just 3-1. But a grounder to short on a 2-0 pitch ended the
threat.
Exit Reppert. Enter Nick Keppel.
Keppel plunked catcher Kyle Laskoskie on
the second pitch. Pinch-runner Steve Jaffe was moved up 90 feet on a sacrifice
by Jon Kalejta and Jaffe scored two pitches later when Bohn laced a RBI single down
the right-field line for a 4-1 Gabelsville lead. Betz flew out to the fence in
right to end the inning.
Exit Hessler. Enter Todd Stapleton.
Stapleton, the Owls' closer worked a
fairly easy seventh for the save, allowing just a single to Sean Steigerwalt and
the Owls had yet another win, staying 4-up in the loss column on second-place
Limeport. The Yankees fell to 10-7.
Bohn finished 2-for-4 for Gabelsville and Lenhart went 2-for-3 for the Yankees.
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