Senior Sox edge Kerwins in wild 10-inning contest at State
EDITOR’S NOTE: Because the look back at each day in Bryant athletic history has been so favorably received during the time when there was no sports during the COVID-19 shutdown, BryantDaily.com will continueposting past stories of Bryant athletics either posted on BryantDaily.com (from 2009 to the present) or published in the Bryant Times (from 1998 to 2008).
By Rob Patrick
NORTH LITTLE ROCK — It’s been a bit of a scuffle for Bryant Black Sox second baseman Austin Benning this season. His batting average hasn’t been above the old “Mendoza line” (.200) all season and he’s had a game or two where his glove turned on him a bit. But he’s persevered, waited out enough walks to be second on the team and put the ball in play for the most part.
And he kept battling.
So when he came to bat with runners at first and third and two out in the top of the 10th inning against the Kerwins Sportsmen of Fort Smith on Saturday night, the fact that he fouled off four two-strike pitches was kind of fitting. Along the way, Brady Butler stole second, leaving early from first in hopes of getting in a rundown so Hunter Mayall might sneak home from third with the tiebreaking run in the 11-11 game. The Sportsmen, however, didn’t take the bait and let Butler have second while holding Mayall. Brad Gilliam, the third Kerwins pitcher, then returned his attention to Benning.
And lo and behold, the Bryant second sacker came through with a shot up the middle for an RBI single that snapped the tie. And when Tyler Sawyer, the fourth Bryant hurler, waded through the core of the Fort Smith batting order in the bottom of the inning, the Black Sox had a hard-earned 12-11 win that vaulted them into the winners bracket final of the Senior American Legion State Tournament.[more]
The were set to take on Zone 4 rival Texarkana at 7 p.m. on Sunday in a battle of the last two unbeaten teams in the tournament.
Bryant appeared to be on the way to an 11-9 victory when, in the bottom of the ninth, Kerwins scored two runs on a double by Kyle Pippin. Aaron Cluck had reached on an error to start the inning and Sawyer was called on to relieve Justin Blankenship. Daniel Ramsey walked then, on an 0-2 count, Pippin raked a double to the gap in left-center to tie it.
Gilliam sacrificed Pippin to third with the potential winning run. Zach Miller followed with a hard bouncer to the right side. Playing in, first baseman Brady Butler stabbed the ball, bobbled it, picked it up and fired home just in time for catcher B.J. Ellis to tag Pippin out on a huge defensive play. But the Sox were still not out of the inning. Miller stole second with lead-off hitter Matt Henry at the plate. Henry then shot another bouncer to the right side and, again, Butler ranged to his right to grab it, tossing to Sawyer covering first to end the inning.
As one sage observer noted, often when a team rallies late but doesn’t get over the top, it has a hard time mustering another uprising to win it later.
And such was the case on Saturday. In the top of the 10th, Mayall and Kaleb Jobe drew walks. With one out, Butler bounced into a force at second but beat the relay to first, avoiding the inning-ending doubleplay. That set the stage for Benning’s dramatic at-bat.
“I just hugged those guys in the post-game (meeting),” said manager Craig Harrison of Benning and Butler. “I said, ‘You know, we talked at the first of the season that everybody contributes. And those two have probably been as maligned as anyone this year with Brady coming up in (RBI) spots and Austin just hasn’t hit very well this year.
“The game was on the line,” he continued. “I made a bad pitch call to Pippin. Right before Tyler delivered it, I told Tic (Harrison), ‘I just called the wrong pitch,’ and we saw what happened. Then Brady made two outstanding plays. The first one was better than the second one, diving to his right, the ball falls out, he turns and makes the throw to the plate. And the second one was a difficult one when our season was possibly in jeopardy.
“Then Benning — wow!” Harrison added. “He battled and battled. We thought after they got ahead they were going to try to get him out on the breaking pitch. We were going to try to steal one if it got away. But they kept plugging, fastball, fastball, and when he fouled one over here (over the Bryant first-base dugout), I said, ‘Hey, he’s having a pretty good at-bat.’ And, man, he hit a bullet into center.”
It was a game that might be better chronicled with chapters. It went back and forth dramatically. The start couldn’t have been much better for the Sox. With one out in the opening frame, Caleb Garrett and Sawyer singled then Mayall walked to load the bases against Cluck, the Kerwins starter. Kaleb Jobe slashed a drive down the left-field line that hit off the foul pole but, because it wasn’t above the fence, it was not called a homer. Jobe wound up with a two-run single on what was nearly a grand slam.
Nevertheless, an out later, Butler came through with an RBI single to make it 3-0. Dylan Pritchett, making his Senior Legion debut as the designated hitter, fouled off a trio of two-strike deliveries and took a well-earned walk to fill the bags again. B.J. Ellis followed with a shot just inside the bag at third for a two-run single that made it 5-0.
In the second, Cluck retired Sawyer but walked Mayall again. He was pulled in favor of Joey Davis who proceeded to walk Jobe. The duo moved up on a wild pitch and when Brennan Bullock hit a bouncer to second, Mayall scored to make it 6-0.
Meanwhile, right-hander Ben Wells was retiring the first seven Kerwins batters. The Sportsmen got on the board in the third when Davis doubled took third on a wild pitch and scored on a sacrifice fly by Henry.
After Davis continued to quiet the Sox bats in the top of the fourth, Kerwins put together a six-run fourth aided by five walks as Wells began to struggle to find the zone. Thomas Biocic led off the inning with a double to left-center. He took third on a wild pitch as Cluck walked. Ramsey followed with a shot off of Wells’ midsection that scored a run to make it 6-2. Gamely, Wells continued but Pippin shot a single up the middle to plate a run then Davis chopped one over the mound for an RBI single. Walks to Miller and Henry forced in two more tallies and brought a pitching change. Jobe got the second out of the inning but then issued RBI walks to Cameron Young and Biocic as Kerwins took a 7-6 lead.
It was an anomalous inning during which the Sportsmen came up with half of their eight hits in the game and Bryant pitchers issued five of the seven walks Kerwins had in the game.
And the lead didn’t last long. In the top of the fifth, Benning, who entered the game at second when Jobe came to the mound, slapped the first of his three singles, Ellis bunted him to second and, after Justin Blankenship singled, Garrett knocked him in with a base hit to right. Sawyer’s bouncer to the right side chased home Blankenship and, when the ball was booted, Bryant had runners at the corners and one out. Mayall followed with a fly to left that looked deep enough for a sacrifice fly only to have Cluck, now in left, fire a strike to the plate to nab him and end the inning.
Jobe worked a 1-2-3 inning in the home half, apparently returning order to the game. And the Sox added on in the top of the sixth. Jobe, who was on base six times in the game (two hits and four walks), drew a free pass to lead off. Bullock beat out an infield hit and, an out later, Benning bounced a single past Biocic and third to drive in Jobe. And when the late throw to the plate got past Henry, the catcher, Bullock hustled to third and Benning took second.
Davis gave way to Gilliam at that point. Ellis greeted him with a bouncer to short that got Bullock home, making it 10-7.
Kerwins rallied again in the bottom of the inning. Miller singled but was forced out on a grounder to short by Henry. John Koch was hit by a pitch and Young laced a double to drive in a run. Biocic was hit by a pitch to load the bases and Cluck walked to force in a run — the fifth RBI walk for the Sportsmen.
Blankenship, who had closed Bryant’s 16-5 win over Paragould the previous afternoon, was called on again at that point and, with the bases loaded, struck out Ramsey and got Pippin to pop to Benning, preserving a 10-9 lead.
The top of the seventh looked promising for Bryant when Sawyer bashed his third hit of the game, a gap shot for a double. Mayall then lined a single to center. Sawyer rounded third and headed home only to have Koch gun him down at the plate with an eye-popping throw from center. Three pitches later, however, Jobe blasted a drive to the base of the fence in left-center that got Mayall all the way home to make it 11-9.
Blankenship struck out the first two he faced in the bottom of the inning and got Henry to fly to center to end the inning then set the Sportsmen down in order in the eighth as well, setting the stage for the ninth inning dramatics.
Meanwhile, Gilliam was in the process of setting down seven in a row before he issued the walk to Mayall to start the Sox’ game-winning uprising in the top of the 10th.
“I never got nervous,” Harrison related. “You know, if we play good we’ll win. If we don’t, we won’t. It seemed like we walked like 400 people tonight. I think they had 11 runs on eight hits or something. We didn’t play good and we won. Maybe it’s our year.”
BRYANT 12, FORT SMITH 11
Senior American Legion State Tournament
Black Sox ab r h bi Kerwins ab r h bi
Blankenship, rf-p 5 1 1 0 Henry, c 4 1 0 2
Garrett, cf 6 1 2 1 Koch, cf 5 1 0 0
Sawyer, ss-1b-p 6 1 3 1 Young, ss 5 0 1 2
Mayall, 3b 3 4 1 0 Biocic, lf-3b 4 1 1 1
Jobe, 2b-p-ss 2 2 2 3 Cluck, p-lf 3 2 0 1
Bullock, lf 6 1 2 1 Ramsey, 2b 4 2 1 1
Butler, 1b-rf 6 1 1 1 Pippin, rf 5 1 1 3
Pritchett, dh 1 0 0 0 J.Davis, 3b-p 3 2 2 0
Benning, 2b 4 1 3 2 Gilliam, p 1 0 0 0
Ellis, c 4 0 1 3 Miller, 1b 4 1 1 1
Wells, p 0 0 0 0
Totals 43 12 16 12 Totals 38 11 8 11
Bryant 510 022 100 1 — 12
Fort Smith 001 602 002 0 — 11
E—Ramsey, Cluck, Mayall. DP—Fort Smith Kerwins 1. LOB—Bryant 12, Fort Smith Kerwins 8. 2B—J.Davis, Biocic, Young, Sawyer, Jobe, Pippin. SB—Miller, Butler. S—Ellis, Gilliam. SF—Henry.
Pitching ip r er h bb so
Bryant
Wells 3.1 7 7 5 3 3
Jobe 2 2 2 2 3 0
Blankenship 2.2 1 0 0 0 3
Sawyer (W) 2 1 1 1 1 1
Fort Smith Kerwins
Cluck 1.1 6 6 5 4 1
J.Davis 4 4 3 7 4 5
Gilliam (L) 4.2 2 2 4 2 4
Blankenship faced one batter in the ninth.
HBP—Koch, Biocic (by Jobe). WP—Cluck, Wells, J.Davis 4.
David Shewmaker
Rob,
Thanks for the article and update on the tournament. Nicely done.
I look forward to returning to this web site for local sports updates. It is better that the newspaper.
David Shewmaker