Cardinals Come Out Of The Gate Sloppy and Give Up 5 in the 1st; Bulldogs Red Don't Look Back and Cruise to a 10-1 Victory over West Coast in the Gold Semi-Final of the Firecracker Classic

The 10am semifinal pitted the 1st place (after pool play) Bulldogs Red against your 4th place West Coast Cardinals. The semi final was played at Curtis High School a turf infield with grass outfield, which was a far better quality field then the Cards had been accustom to the first two days of the tournament. This game over in a hurry, the dagger in the side of the Cardinals was quick and precise, a 5 spot given up in the 1st and 4th innings, 10 runs (only 1 earned) charged to Yuen. Here’s how it went down:

BulldogsRed 10 CARDINALS 1

In a surprising move, the Bulldogs Red manager as the higher seed chose to be away for the 10am semifinal, the decision seemed to be a brilliant one as Yuen could only watch his defence pay for its mistakes. The first batter of the game for the Bulldogs took advantage of a 0-1 mistake by Yuen over the plate driving it up the middle for a single. The very next hitter, hit a high fly ball that the Cardinal left-fielder had troubles tracking, leadoff batter would score all the way from 1st on the 2-base error; just like that 3 pitches in and the Cards were down a run. During the same first inning, the Bulldogs loaded the bases with 1 out and a weak line drive was hit to the Cardinal 2nd baseman who bobbled and dropped the ball, opting to throw home instead of 2nd to get the force out; unfortunately, the error cost them a run and no out was recorded, 2-0 Bulldogs. Hendriks would make a spectacular catch ranging backwards from his position at SS into CF territory for the second out but the Bulldogs would score a 3 more runs, 1 off a wild pitch and 2 off a bloop single into RF. Just like that, 5 run deficit.

West Coast would get one back in the bottom half as Sugi led off with a single, moved to second on a wild pitch, Baybay would continue his hot streak at the plate and hit a 2 out RBI single up the middle scoring Sugi from 2nd to cut the deficit to 4. 5-1 Bulldogs after 1.

It looked like Yuen had settled down in his next two innings, the defence also looked a lot sharper for the Cards. However, it wouldn’t last the 4th inning was just as ugly as the 1st. Bulldogs led off the inning with a routine fly to LF which was botched by the Cardinal left fielder leading to a 3 base error to kick off the inning. A single, double and another error this time by a Cardinal infielder led to 3 more runs making it 8-1. Then the one that hurt the most, a suicide squeeze with the Bulldogs up 8-1, the backspin fooled both Crozier (now in relief of Yuen) and New, the throw to 1st was late as the runner from 2nd also came home to score on some aggressive baserunning. 10-1 Bulldogs after 4.

The mercy rule, 8 runs after 5 innings kicked in and the deficit looked to much to overcome against a very good all-around Bulldogs Red team. Powell came in for relief in the 5th and made quick work of the Bulldogs, flashing off his “Canadian” knuckleball as he retired the side in order, one of the few bright spots in this contest for the Cardinals. 10-1 Bulldogs Red over West Coast in 6 innings.

The Bulldogs Red were a good all-around team, well-coached, good pitching, very defensively sound and most importantly every one of their hitters was always locked in at the plate ready to explode through the baseball. The difference was black and white, the Cardinals didn’t come ready to play and the better team won and deserved to go to the finals (Bulldogs Red ended up beating Narrows Baseball for the second time this tournament in the gold final). West Coast is off Tuesday and back to work Wednesday preparing for the last stretch of the season that includes crucial qualifiers and provincial tournaments. An .827 fielding percentage this tournament just isn’t going to cut it when the West Coast Cardinals get back to work in B.C, they’ll be up against teams that will be going all out to take down the top team in the league. We wish Baybay, Hendriks, Powell, Sugi, Yuen, Coach Yam and the rest of the BC 15U Select Team best of luck as they head to Evanston, IL this week to compete in the 15U Great Lakes Wood Bat Classic. Practices and an exhibition game vs. Cloverdale are on tap for the rest of the team this week. When the team gets back together in a week, it’ll be all business for what looks to be an exciting finish to this year's Bantam AAA season.