Beaver Valley Tyke baseball team finished the season with a record of 6 wins and 8 losses. The Tyke division ended with a double-elimination year-end league tournament hosted by Wasaga Beach August 6th through 8th.
Beaver Valley whose team is composed of an even mix of players from Meaford and Thornbury was matched against Stayner 2 based on regular season rankings, for their first game on Friday.
Although Beaver Valley had won both regular season games against this team, the final score in each game had been only a one run difference so the team was ready for a close game.
Jackson Nicholls, Cole Dinsmore, Tyler O’Donnell and Dylan Rear benefited, as pitchers, from the home plate umpires’ very generous strike zone. However, when in the batters box, players failed to take the generous strike zone into account and therefore, the only Beaver Valley players with hits were Delaney Campbell and Tanner Grexton who both had two hits in two at-bats in the game, with Tanner pounding a double to right field in the second inning to bat in a run.
Round one games had a 1 hour and 15 minute time limit which only allowed for four played innings. Beaver Valley suffered their first loss in the tournament as Stayner 2 batters were eager in the batters box and recorded eight hits in the game and were able to capitalize on base runners for a final score of 9-3. Beaver Valley runs were scored by Delaney, Jackson and Heather Harvey.
The team headed back to Wasaga Beach for a second game on Saturday at noon. The opponent for game two was Stayner 1. In very evenly matched games, Beaver Valley Tykes had split regular season match-ups with Stayner 1. Game two pitchers were Jon Rear, Delaney Campbell, Briana Pendleton and Tyler Hawken.
With the same home plate umpire, Beaver Valley players were reminded prior to the game, and constantly throughout the game, that a large strike zone was beneficial for our young, developing pitchers and that players in the batters box should be swinging the bat at any hittable pitches. Cole, Delaney, Tyler O’Donnell, Tanner and Dylan had hits with Delaney batting two hits for two at-bats in the game.
Some exciting moments in the game included Delaney striking out three consecutive batters in the top of the second inning, Dylan clobbering a ball in the bottom of the second inning to score two runs on a triple and then stealing home plate on the next pitch thrown, to put BV ahead by two runs, and Tyler O’Donnell hammering a double to centre field to bat in two runs in the bottom of the third inning.
Beaver Valley was behind by one run to start the fourth inning. Stayner 1 aggressively advanced runners in the top of the fourth inning to score two additional runs.
Unfortunately, with a three run deficit, Beaver Valley was not able to rally, for any additional runs, in the last home team bat. Runs were scored by Briana, Cole, Delaney, Tanner, Elias Andersen, and Dylan. With the 9-6 loss in game two, the team was eliminated from the tournament.
With many new aspects of baseball in the Tyke division, specifically the introduction of pitching and stealing, this was a development year for many players.
Coaches Stacey, Colin and Dave are to be commended for helping these young players to learn and implement some new baseball rules and plays, to improve their baseball skills, to meet new friends and become an essential part of a team and, most importantly, to have fun playing baseball.
The team would like to extend thanks to Andrea, Bob, Carrie, Danielle, Julie, Karen, Kelly, Kim, Paula, Scott, Sharon, Sonya and Theresa for helping with the score-keeping, pitch count recording, base coaching and ‘dugout controlling’ throughout the season and at the tournaments. Thanks also to Ron & Cindy Lennox for the considerable time and efforts that they constantly put forth to ensure that the Beaver Valley baseball program is organized, fun and enjoyable.
