Pintos improve to 9 wins against Jamestown

<p>Democrat photo/Kevin Labotka</p><p>The California Pintos defeated Jamestown April 13 in a 9-1 victory, the Pintos’ second win in as many days.</p>

Democrat photo/Kevin Labotka

The California Pintos defeated Jamestown April 13 in a 9-1 victory, the Pintos’ second win in as many days.

The California Pintos (9-2) won their second game in as many days April 13, dispatching the Jamestown Eagles (3-2) in a 9-1 victory.

After winning games in back-to-back days, Pintos head coach Steven Stock said the team was having fun and that makes baseball easier to play.

Both teams were able to get on the board in the first inning, leaving the game tied 1-1 after one inning. Jamestown had a chance to retake the lead in the top of the third inning with the bases loaded and one out in the inning, but the Pintos were able to get out of the jam without giving up a run.

Stock said getting out of that inning without forfeiting a run was huge.

“That mental approach if you never get behind, it seems that momentum helps you,” Stock said. “That’s huge when you can get out of any inning with the bases loaded, let alone with fewer than two outs and you only give up a run or none.”

In the bottom of the third inning, the Pintos loaded the bases themselves after two walks and a base hit to start the inning. Ian Peterson followed that up well, forcing in a run with a walk to give California a 2-1 lead. Jamestown was able to get the first out of the inning after the Pintos’ score, and the Eagles were able to escape the inning with a double play, keeping it a 2-1 game.

Jamestown was unable to get anything going in the top of the fourth inning. In contrast, the bottom half of the inning saw the Pintos crack the Eagles’ defense and add four runs to make it a 6-1 game. The scoring started thanks to a Tagen Higgins one-out double that brought home a run to make it 3-1. Later in the inning, Higgins scored on a sacrifice fly by Lucas Ash that made it 4-1. The Pintos would add two more runs in the inning to make it 6-1.

Stock said the team made some adjustments at the plate after the first few innings, which led to them having success later on.

“We stayed back, (Jamestown’s) pitcher, credit to him was throwing a lot of off speed stuff but was not throwing for strikes, and we were helping him by swinging at him and not staying back,” Stock said. “Once we made those adjustments and made him throw the ball over the plate, then we got good pitches to hit and that led to runs.”

Jamestown was able to get runners on the corners with one out in the top of the fifth inning, but the Eagles were unable to get any runs across. California added three more runs in the bottom of the inning to make it 9-1. Ash drove in two more runs as the Pintos had runners in scoring position with two outs in the inning to make it 8-1. The Pintos scored once more to make it 9-1 before the end of the inning.

Both the sixth and seventh innings were quiet for both teams as the game ended.

The Pintos scored their nine runs on eight hits and had no errors in the game. Jamestown scored its one hit on one run and had two errors in the game.

For California, Trevor Myers and Ash led the team with two hits each. Ash led the Pintos with four RBIs and Peterson added two RBIs for California. For Jamestown, Shayne Harlan led the team with one RBI in the game. Cole Higgins led the Eagles with the team’s sole hit in the game.

California’s next game is at 5 p.m. against Linn during the California and Versailles Tournament April 23-24. Jamestown’s next game is at 5 p.m. April 26 at Higbee.