Trimble at Athens

From Wednesday, April 9.


Athens plays small ball in win over Trimble

NICK BROCKMAN

THE PLAINS -- Athens baseball coach Fred Gibson will take a win anyway he can get one and Wednesday night the Bulldogs won playing small ball.

Athens did it the old-fashioned way as the Bulldogs got runners on, moved them over, and brought them home to defeat the Trimble Tomcats 12-2 in five innings.

"Any time you get a win, you're tickled to death," Gibson said. "We are going to try and be aggressive as we possibly can."

The Bulldogs scored in four of their five at-bats, but did most of their damage in the first and fifth innings. In the bottom of the first inning Athens jumped ahead 4-0. Up 7-2 in the bottom of the fifth inning the Bulldogs scored five more times to end the game.

During Athens' rallies the offense capitalized on walks by moving the runners over with sacrifice bunts and fly balls as well as singles. By game's end the Bulldogs scored on three sacrifice flies.

In the fourth inning Bulldog Greg Pach scored on a Jared Cline fly ball to a backpedaling second baseman in short right field.

Once again in the fifth inning the Bulldogs caught the Tomcat defense off guard on a sacrifice. A.J. Cadamagnani hit a fly ball that was caught in foul territory down the right field line. An alert Kyle Dean tagged from third base and safely scored. An error on the play allowed a second Bulldog to score and increase the lead to 10-2.

"You give a good team extra outs and it could hurt you," Trimble coach Phil Faires said. "Our right fielder, with the bases loaded, catches the ball and then doesn't know to throw home with the runner tagging and he just stands there with it. That's just an example of not having your head in the game."

Offensively, Trimble put runners on base, but struggled all game to find a break through hit. Athens pitching gave up eight walks and limited Trimble to just three hits all game.

"Guys aren't swinging at bad pitches," Faires said. "That's a good thing. If the pitcher is having trouble, we're making him throw."

Trimble left seven runners on base including the bases loaded in the third inning.

Although Gibson said he was not happy with how many walks Athens allowed, he still felt good about starter Mitch Crabtree's outing.

"Our starting pitcher went four innings and I thought he had good stuff," Gibson said, "But he also threw 88 pitches in four innings. He obviously made some extra pitches. It was a good first effort."

Athens improves to 2-1 with the win and Trimble drops to 1-5 overall.

Athens 12, Trimble 2

Trimble 010 10 - 2 3 4
Athens 410 25 - 12 14 0

Trimble: pitchers Charles Kish, Chas Craig (5), catcher Kasey Cruse
Athens: pitchers Mitch Crabtree, A.J. Cadamagnani (5), catcher Kyle Dean

WP: Crabtree
LP: Kish