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Bulls win, Reynolds keeps his hair |
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Written by Dylan Purcell
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Sunday, June 14 2009, 11:43 PM |
Adam Reynolds was determined to finish the game, giving the bullpen a rest after a four-game homestand which hadn’t been kind to the Lethbridge Bulls. With the crowd at Spitz Stadium Sunday afternoon hoping to see a Western Major Baseball League win for the home side after three days and three losses, Reynolds delivered.
He emerged, 149 pitches later, with an 11-6 win over the Medicine Hat Mavericks and the knowledge that he’ll have plenty of time to rest his weary arm as the team heads out on a nine-game road trip.
“I’m a little tired,” said Reynolds after the game. “But we needed a win and I didn’t want coach to have to go to the ‘’pen when I was feeling good enough to go all the way.
“The boys were hitting well and playing well behind me, so the least I can do is go out and finish the game.”
He allowed nine hits and struck out eight batters in the effort, which head coach Scott Rhodes called “just what we needed” after the team dropped the previous three games of the homestand.
“He didn’t want to come out and he’s not pitching again until Sunday, so he’s going to get a big rest and he’s probably not feeling too bad after getting the win,” said Rhodes, whose team improves to 5-6 on the season. “It was probably a few more pitches than I’d like to send a guy out there for but he’s a young guy and he deserved to stick it out.”
Reynolds also gets to keep his hair. The right-handed pitcher from Guelph, Ont. is an assistant coach with the American Legion A Fort Macleod Royals. He bet his troops out there they couldn’t win six games in a row and put his locks on the line.
The Royals obviously responded, but they fell one game short in their effort.
“We needed to sweep the weekend and took three out of four,” said Royals coach Brad Dersch. “But the kids played well enough, maybe he’ll still cut it.”
“It’s summer, it won’t be so bad if I cut it,” laughed Reynolds. “I wanted to do something to fire them up and maybe it worked.”
Reynolds was backed by several strong performances at the plate by the Bulls. They chased Medicine hat starter Bradon Geib one out into the second inning, and were stifled by Katlin Nunweiler until he lost the strike zone and started walking batters.
The Bulls finally pulled out some clutch hitting and scored seven runs in the bottom of the seventh inning. A Jesse Sawyer single and Zach Rhodes offering to the wall in right field accounted for four of the RBIs in the inning and the Bulls cruised from there.
Sawyer had a strong game, finishing 3-for-4 with a stolen base and three RBIs while Dustin Bissonnette was 2-for-4 with a pair of RBIs and a stolen base. Joel Blake also managed a pair of hits.
“The guys have always hit well for me,” said Reynolds. “All I’ve got to do is keep them in the game, throw strikes. That’s what it comes down to. If I’m throwing strikes, it doesn’t matter if they get a few runs. The boys’ll get their hits and score enough runs for us to win.”
Now the team heads out on a road trip that will see them play nine games in nine days.
“I think it’s going to be a real chance to get some wins and get together,” said Rhodes. “I know as coaches, we’re not looking at it as a negative. We’ve played well on the road and it’s good to be out there as a team and working together.”
“We’re not going to be trying to impress anybody,” said Reynolds. “We haven’t put the big homestand together so we’re definitely looking at winning six of those nine games and coming back here well above .500.”
NOTES — Nunweiler took the loss, although his replacement, Jeff Burke, couldn’t throw strikes, either. . . . Brandon Anhorn, who finished the game for the Mavericks, and Nunweiler are both Prairie Baseball Academy products. . . . The Fort Macleod Royals are 5-2 in American Legion league play this year, no doubt thanks to their 3-1 weekend spurred on by the thought of relieving their pitching coach of his coiffe. . . . Medicine Hat falls to 3-6 with the loss and are in last place in the WMBL’s West Division. The Bulls are just above them in third place.
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