Expos Place 2nd in USSSA Summer Celebration Tournament

This past weekend, the Expos won silver in their second and final of two U.S tournaments. With 3 AAA bodies unable to make the tournament in Puyallup, WA the Expos called up 2 AA players, Bryan Symons and Mats Fukuoka to round out the roster this weekend. There were mercy games, there were slaughter games, there were tight back-and-forth competitive games and in the end, the TC Saints came out on top as they proved they were the best team in this tournament.

Vancouver came into game 1 expecting competition they faced last U.S tournament, a tournament where they murdered the competition and easily went 4-0 en route to a 1st place finish. They were welcomed to their second tournament by the TC Saints (from Lacey, Washington) who in this game had no problem handling the Expos. TC Saints, was the first Majors team the Expos had faced in the U.S and it was evident that the TC Saints were the better team in this contest. TC won the coin flip and opted to choose to hit first, the move would pay off as the Saints  put up a 5 spot on the Expos in the first inning. The further mound distance and poorly designed portable mound proved to be a nuisance for Hutchings, Vancouver's tall crafty lefthanded ace. Very disciplined at-bats by TC hitters drew 3 walks off Vancouver's ace as all pitchers struggled to find the strike zone today. Overall, the first game was a wash. Of note, Antiporda and Yamamoto had 4 of Vancouver's 7 hits, while Howse pitched well in relief against a strong Saints team.

Game 2 of pool play saw Vancouver beat up on a lowly Longhorns team from Washington. The Expos scored 17 runs in the first inning and 19 total runs in two inningsl All AAA Vancouver players crossed the plate at least once, and Symons (AA) recorded his first career hit as a Bantam AAA player with a 2 run single to RF. 3 hit 5 RBI day from Hutchings, 2 hit days from Antiporda, Domingo, Inomata and Baybay. Domingo threw well in the two innings he was tasked with, only allowing a single batter to reach base (via. BB) and throwing a "no-hitter". After pool play, the Expos placed 3rd in their pool and would face NWDS Red (6th place) in the quarter finals.

In the quarterfinals, Ellis looked good in the start as he didn't allow a run over 4 complete frames. Yamamoto and Inomata stayed hot, both with another multi-hit game. Vancouver jumped out to a 6-0 lead against NWDS Red and got a scare as the enemy brought it within 3 but Yamamoto was able to close out the 7th to secure a spot in the semis vs. Buzz Baseball.

The semis saw Buzz Baseball, the 2nd of two Majors teams in the tournament face off against Vancouver. Buzz Baseball was ranked 2nd after pool play and gave Vancouver their most competitive tight ball game of the tournament. The game saw the lead change hands 5 times and was an all-out slugfest as both teams traded blow after blow in their offensive half of the inning. This game finished in 5 innings due to time limit. Down 5-7 in the top of the 5th and the game quickly approaching its time limit, Vancouver knew they had to come up big this inning or else they would be driving back North earlier than anticipated. A rally is what they did, With the bases loaded and 1 out, Howse barely beat out the 4-6-3 double play to make the score 6-7 but more importantly extend the inning. Buzz Baseball's stud shortstop and coaches were not at all pleased with the call at the first that extended the inning as Buzz Baseball's shortstop was tossed from the game and coaches were warned. This got Vancouver even more fired up as Fukuda would execute a perfect steal of home to knot things up at 7-7. Symons (AA) would then come up huge as he delivered a 2-out RBI single to help Vancouver take the lead 8-7. Yamamoto would hit a 2 run double to have the Expos up 3 and cap a 5 run inning. The bottom of the 7th saw Vancouver make things interesting with numerous free passes and errors but in the end a wild ballgame ended up in Vancouver's favour with a 10-8 win.

About to embark on their third game of the day, the Expos were exhausted and were going up against TC Saints again who were playing only their second game of the day (with an extended break in between games). TC once again took it to Vancouver as they scored 6 runs in their first offensive inning and really was no contest in this one. The Saints once again pounded the baseball, showed the discipline to lay off the breaking stuff, ran the bases well, Came was real effective on the bump and the Saints defence made 0 errors en route to a 13-5 mercy victory in 5 innings. Antiporda and Howse had 2 hit days, Antiporda had a beautiful straight steal of home on the turf field that ignited the Vancouver crowd but it was too little too late as TC continued to flex their muscle and show why they finished their season 43-13 with 4 tournament wins.

The Vancouver Minor Expos should be proud of the 2nd place finish, it was a tough draw and a tough tournament that saw Vancouver miss 3 of their regular players and had to supplement with 2 AA players. Big thanks goes out to Mats Fukuoka and Bryan Symons who joined the AAA Expos for this tournament down south. Symons definitely did not feel out of his element as he went 4-8 (.500) with 3 RBIs. Fukuoka got to experience AAA calibre baseball as he caught multiple innings behind the dish for AAA quality pitchers. Overall, the Expos came into the tournament wanting to get their confidence back at the plate going into provincials and that they did as they finished the tournament with a .478 AVG and .569 OBP; individual standouts go to Antiporda who had 10 hits in 2 days, Yamamoto second with 8 hits in 5 games and Hutchings racked up 10 RBIs over the course of the tournament. Vancouver now travels to Nanaimo, BC for their final games of the year, the BC (Minor) Baseball Provincials.