In the second game of Thursday’s doubleheader between the Peninsula Oilers and Anchorage Bucs, the Alaska Baseball League’s new policy of sudden death baseball was used for the first time.
If a game is tied after the regulation number of innings, another regular inning is played.
If the game is still tied, the home team chooses to play defense or offense and a runner is put on first base with no outs. The batting order picks up right where it left off.
If the offensive team scores, the offensive team wins and the defensive team has no chance to reply. If the offensive team doesn’t score, the defensive team wins.
The ABL follows leagues like the MLB Draft League, Frontier League of Professional Baseball and Appalachian League in implementing various forms of sudden death baseball. Those three leagues went to the format in 2022.
In the Thursday game, the Oilers elected to play defense. A throwing error put a runner on second with one out, then a bases loaded walk with two outs gave the Bucs a 6-5 victory.
Following Friday’s game, Oilers head coach Larry McCann and Bucs assistant coach Bishop Griggs offered different perspectives on sudden death.
McCann doesn’t like the format and said he did not vote for it.
“Let’s just play baseball,” McCann said. “Let’s play baseball until 1 in the morning. That’s not baseball to me.”
McCann also said he is not a fan of the Major League Baseball method of putting a runner on second base for each extra inning played.
Even after the loss, McCann said he thinks defense is the way to go.
Griggs said he enjoyed the new format.
“I think it’s fun for the game,” he said. “I just don’t want to be as nervous as I was last night about it, to be honest.
“It was pretty crazy. It was pretty wild. I think it will be a good deal here.”
Griggs said he’s not sure yet whether offense or defense is the way to go because the format is so new.
“Everyone’s going to question what you did because there’s no right answer for it,” he said.
Griggs is the pitching coach. He said the rule does help him control the load on his staff in a league that is for the development of college players.
The sudden death game was the second game of a doubleheader, meaning there was already 14 innings of pitching guaranteed.
“We don’t have to worry about a seven- or eight-inning game that all of a sudden turns into 14 or 15 innings,” Griggs said. “We can still use pitchers and not burn them out, and still have them come back relatively soon.”
The pitching argument is not persuasive for McCann.
“We play 40 games,” McCann said of the league schedule. “Forty games is a short summer season. We have so many days off, we should be fine.
“I do understand the concern for the health of the kids, though.”
Ujimori makes quick recovery
Ryson Ujimori, a second baseman, left the second game of Thursday’s doubleheader with an injury sustained while fielding.
“He’s kind of day to day,” McCann said. “He’s OK. He said it’s an injury he’s had in the past. We taped him up and he was ready to go, but I just wanted to give him another day off.”
Mystery umpire conference explained
In the top of the second inning Friday, McCann went out with two outs and none on to talk to the home plate umpire.
It resulted in a conference between the three umpires, a conversation with the Bucs bench, then another conversation between McCann and the umpires.
McCann said he went out to request that the umpires get some kids in the batting cage to stop hitting because it was causing a distraction.
The Oilers head coach said the ump misinterpreted his request, and thought McCann was requesting that the Bucs stop chirping at Oilers players.
McCann went back out to clarify with the umpires that he was talking about the batting cage.
Woo makes big leagues
Bryan Woo earned the 2019 ABL Prospect of the Year while pitching for the Oilers.
Woo is now pitching for the Seattle Mariners. He is 1-1 with a 5.09 ERA in 17.2 innings pitched. He has struck out 25.
Thursday, Woo picked up his first big league win. Pitching on the road against the New York Yankees, he went 5 1-3 scoreless innings, giving up just two hits and three walks while striking out five.
