A 10-Inning Masterpiece

As the season of 2016 began, we were unsure what type of team we had. The team had lost several seniors from the Class of 2015 and several young guys were going to have much bigger roles in this season. Ultimately, our line-up included 5 seniors, 1 junior, 1 sophomore and 2 freshmen. From this group we had 3 returning starters.

A big positive for us was that we had two senior pitchers to count on for the major games and innings, Spencer Owen and Jake Reid. As we went through the season, these two players provided excellent pitching and leadership, as they both were position players also.

On April 28, 2016, we went to Scecina for a Conference game. Up to this point, our team record was 4-3. We had beaten Speedway but lost to Ritter, Triton Central and Chatard. Other schools we defeated were Edinburgh, Morristown and Southwestern. Our starter for the game against Scecina was Jake Reid. In his previous start versus Ritter, he had not been his best and undoubtedly, he was ready to go. As I recall, it was a pretty nice day — that turned out to be important as the game was to go 10 innings!

We did not score in the 1st inning. In Scecina’s half of the inning, their lead-off hitter singled. The #2 hitter also singled and both runners advanced on an error in the outfield, runners on 2nd and 3rd with no outs. The third hitter grounded out to Pat Kem at shortstop but the runner scored from 3rd base. Jake struck out the next two hitters to end the inning. Scecina led 1-0. We tied the score in the top in the third inning. Pat Kem led off with a single. Spencer Owen then hit a ball back at the pitcher who threw to 2nd base for the force out but Spencer beat the throw to first to avoid the double play. A very important hustle play by Spencer. Jake then doubled to drive in Spencer and tie the game. To summarize, innings 4 through 9 saw no runs by either team. We did not have any serious opportunities as we had only 3 hits, two of them by Jake. Jake continued to pitch very well. He did get out of a bases loaded jam in the 5th inning. It seemed Jake might be tiring as he walked the clean up hitter on four pitches and then hit the #5 hitter to load the bases. Jake regained his focus and struck out the sixth hitter to end the inning.

Earlier in the game the home plate umpire had made some calls that were shaky in my opinion, plus he did not have a very nice attitude. I got further upset when during the game there was a foul ball and he did not give the new ball to our catcher to throw to Jake, but did it himself. He threw it about halfway to Jake and made Jake walk down to get it. If he would have apologized to Jake, I probably would have let it go. But I was not happy as the action went along with the attitude he had already demonstrated. So, I decided to take another tact. At the beginning of the 6th inning I stopped and asked the umpire a question that I believed to be harmless and might lead to a better situation. I am sure I asked the umpire if there had been a time with the rules where for a hitter, the hand was part of the bat. I asked because the batter Jake had hit was on the hand on a partial swing. Not a strike, a hit batter! I thought I asked in a conversational manner, non-threatening. The umpire responded in a sarcastic way that was not appropriate. I remember waiting a couple of seconds as I was stunned by his tone. Before I walked to the third base coaching box, I said to him: “I don’t think you’re getting my vote.” He did not say anything and I went on my way. I was almost to the coaching box when he got my attention and ejected me. Apparently he had been calling to me but was calling me “Mike” so I did not know he was talking to me. I was shocked to have been ejected. I have to say I was not happy. This umpire was new to me and there was no reason to throw me out of the game in my opinion, but coaches have no appeal process and I was gone.

As the game went on, my absence had no impact on Jake’s pitching. Coach Riensche took over and managed things well. Jake had no trouble through 8 innings. In the bottom of the eighth, the lead-offhitter did hit a ball to the gap in left centerfield but Matthew Alter made a diving catch to save a double or more (I am told!). In the bottom of the ninth, Jake struck out the #8 hitter but the ninth hitter singled. The lead-off hitter doubled to put runners on 2nd and third with one out. Not sure how, but our catcher, Noah Wood, threw out the runner on 3rd for the second out. Jake got the 3rd out on a pop out to Noah.

So, after 9 innings, Jake was still going strong. There was no pitch count rule yet so Jake could pitch one more inning as at the time a pitcher could pitch 10 innings every three days. Interestingly, the Scecina pitcher, Sean Murphy, also had pitched 9 innings. A real pitcher’s duel.

The top of the 10th was very interesting. I did not see it but will relate what happened. Pat Kem led off and grounded out to the secondbaseman. Spencer Owen singled. Jake then hit his 2nd double and his 4th hit of the game. With one out, runners were on 2nd and 3rd . This is where the fun begins.

Scecina’s head coach, Dave Gandolph, tried to pull a fast one. The Hidden Ball Trick. He had the thirdbaseman keep the ball. The pitcher acted like he was getting ready to pitch, Spencer stepped off of thirdbase and was tagged out. Scecina thought they had pulled one over on us. But, the pitcher had stepped on the mound without the ball which is against the rules. The umpires ruled the play a balk. Spencer scored and Jake went to third. From what I heard, Coach Gandolph put up a great argument and made quite a scene. He was not ejected. Hmm. Matthew then doubled to drive in Jake with the third run.

In the bottom of the 10th, Jake gave up a 2-out single but got the third out on a line drive back at him. Quite a win. Jake had an outstanding game. Ten innings pitched. One walk. 13 strike outs. One run on 10 hits. Jake threw 134 pitches over the 10 innings. Recently he said something to me about throwing so many pitches but I reminded him that I was not involved in that situation. He must have told Coach Riensche that he was good to go! In his next start, Jake beat Park Tudor 8-2 and had 126 pitches. Certainly we would not have allowed him to have that many pitches if we had seen anything that looked unusual. Plus, Jake was a great competitor and if he made up his mind to do something, that was what he was going to do.

Jake certainly pitched one of the best games in Lutheran Baseball history. Remember, he also had 4 hits including 2 doubles, scored one run and had one RBI. What a day for Jake and Lutheran Baseball.