Missed opportunities plague Oilers through 11 innings
With fishing frenzy in full effect on the Kenai Peninsula, tales of the big ones that got away are rampant. Add the Peninsula Oilers to that list of storytellers.
The Oilers missed big opportunities galore Sunday afternoon in dropping an Alaska Baseball League contest to Alaska Goldpanners of Fairbanks 5-4 in 11 innings.
"We keep getting ourselves in a position to take the other team out of the game early, or to win the game late," Oilers manager Damian Stambersky said. "Today, we missed out on those opportunities."
And rolled up into all those big opportunities missed was tremendous missed opportunity -- namely to move up in the ABL standings with the season quickly ticking away.
With the loss, the Oilers fell four games behind the idle Anchorage Glacier Pilots in the race for the ABL crown.
For that, the Oilers can either blame themselves or credit a stellar effort by Fairbanks relievers.
The Oilers came back to tie the game at 4 in the sixth inning. These are opportunities that were missed to win the game.
In the seventh inning, Peninsula loaded the bases with no outs. Fairbanks brought in lanky, side-arming reliever Zak Basch, who was pitching for the third time in four days.
Basch promptly got Daniel Underwood to hit a strong ground ball to shortstop Grant Rogers. Rogers tossed it home for the force out, then catcher Tyler Best whipped the ball to third to complete a rally-killing double play. Mike Cox hit into a fielder's choice to end the inning.
Basch is a happy-go-lucky type who doesn't even bother to take a lot of warmup pitches before entering the game. Even the bases-loaded, no-out situation didn't faze him.
"Not really," he said, when asked if he was nervous. "I was just throwing sinkers trying to get a hard ground ball so we could get the double play."
In the 10th inning, with the score still tied at 4, Cox and Underwood singled with one out to put runners on first and second. But Paul Richie struck out, Paul Janish walked and Chris Graziano grounded out to second.
In the 11th inning, the Oilers needed to score after Rogers' RBI single gave the Panners a 5-4 lead in the top half of the inning.
With Ryan Schroyer on in relief of Basch, Andy Schutzenhofer and Jerrod Brown walked with one out. After pinch hitter Chris Kolkhorst flew out to left field, a passed ball moved Oilers runners to sec
ond and third.
The winning run was now at second. But Cox, after working to a full count, struck out on an inside fastball.
"Our relievers, out whole pitching staff, has just been nails all year," Schroyer said. "Zak was awesome. Zak was the man. He's pitched three out of the last four days, and he still threw four innings today."
Stambersky said the Oilers will press on despite the tough loss.
"We're not going to win three or four games in a row at one time," Stambersky said. "We've got to take it one game at a time.
"These guys know that. They're the type of group that's not going to stay down."
Sunday
GOLDPANNERS 5, OILERS 4
Panners AB R H BI Oilers AB R H BI
Perez lf 5 0 0 0 Graziano lf 6 1 2 0
Robinson rf 6 0 1 0 Griffin 2b 6 0 1 0
Jennings dh 3 1 1 0 Schtznhfr 1b 3 0 2 1
Best c 4 1 1 0 Brown dh 4 1 1 0
Hofius 1b 5 1 2 1 Beale pr 0 0 0 0
Haag 2b 4 2 2 0 Underwood rf 5 1 2 0
Corona 3b 2 0 1 2 Kolkhorst ph 1 0 0 0
Rogers ss 5 0 2 2 Cox 3b 5 1 2 0
Montgomery cf 4 0 0 0 Wahlbrink cf 4 0 3 1
Kaiser ph 1 0 1 0 Richie c 5 0 0 0
Redfern cf 0 0 0 0 Janish ss 3 0 1 1
Totals 39 5 11 5 Totals 42 4 14 3
Fairbanks 100 003 000 01 --5
Peninsula 110 002 000 00 --4
DP -- Peninsula 3, Goldpanners 2. LOB -- Fairbanks 9, Peninsula 14. 2B -- Graziano, Griffin, Brown, Cox. SB -- Jennings, Underwood, Wahlbrink, Janish. CS -- Underwood. SA -- Corona, Wahlbrink. SF -- Perez.
IP H R ER BB SO
Goldpanners
Johnson 2 1-3 5 2 2 1 2
Welch 2 2-3 4 2 2 1 3
Robertson 1 3 0 0 1 2
Basch, W 4 2 0 0 3 3
Schroyer, S 1 0 0 0 2 1
Oilers
Copeland 5 2-3 6 4 4 4 0
Clark 2 1-3 2 0 0 1 1
Gorski, L 3 3 1 1 0 2
HBP -- by Copeland (Jennings); by Copeland (Jennings). WP -- Welch. PB -- Best. T -- 3:50. A -- 400.