The lack of a thread being started until the 5th inning tells you about the lack of enthusiasm among the Tide faithful. On to the game. Trailing 1-0 in the 4th, with 2 on and 2 out, Bramblett gets a fly ball to left that should end the inning - except the left fielder dropped the ball allowing 2 runs to score. USC 3-0.
Top of the 5th, USC runner on 2nd, a sac bunt turns into a bunt single and although we have three fielders in the vicinity of home, none of them cover the plate and the runner from 2nd never stops and scores, 4-0. Our guys do not have their heads in this game - fielding errors and mental errors.
We decided to go as my best friend and his family have never seen a game at The Joe so I took them tonight (take in mind I live in Talladega and they live in Sylacauga so it's a haul for either of us). Their first game was the CCC in Montgomery and of course I told them an SEC game with #1's pitching would be 1000x better.
I think Gaspard made a huge mistake pulling Ray Castillo. Yes it was 2nd and 3rd with 2 out and Ray was kind of wild like normal (NEVER would have though he'd have 17IP before tonight) but I thought he had the hitters off balance. His only mistake was hanging a curveball early on that hit the wall. It was like he had zero trust in Ray and I swear to God I told my best friend I didn't like this move, that I would have left him in. My friend says of course maybe he wanted this new guy (#32) in to maybe get a ground ball out because he knew I said Ray could be wild sometimes. Well sure enough #32 give us the last 2 runs that cost us. Yes Ray got the loss, but only because the runners on 2nd and 3rd were his.
The fly ball was on Keith Holcombe. He batted leadoff tonight and went 2 for 4 I think and played LF. On that play, the SS kept coming back and kept coming back after you hear Holcombe call it right away. As the ball got closer the SS never stopped and almost ran into Holcombe and I think that caused Holcombe to flinch because it looked like the SS wasn't going to stop. Not making excuses of course, but that ball was way out of SS territory and was any LF's ball any day of the week. But Holcombe also went 2 for 4, had to snag 2 doubles hit off the wall to keep USCe to doubles so he played his tail off that didn't bother me.
Haynie had a nasty throw to 3rd to get us out of a jam early on too.
The play that killed us is the one edwd58 said with the bunt. Bramblett was frustrated from pitching out of a few jams and we had some rough calls to end up with 2nd and 3rd with no outs I think. Everyone there knew the bunt was coming because USCe was doing it almost all night in moving runners over. Well Haynie fields it as he and Bramblett meet (Haynie should have fielded it I agree) and he throws to 1st who was safe by the way) so the guy at 3rd scores on the play. Well the guy at 2nd gets to 3rd and pretty much doesn't stop because Haynie AND Bramblett are watching 1st with their mouths open. So while that happens he pretty much scores. Backbreaker.
Did anyone watch it? We sat past the dugout on the 3rd base side and we had a ball hit down the 1st base line that the idiot goober of a ump called it foul and the fans went nuts. Was that ball fair or foul? Like I say we could tell it was close but had NO SHOT at seeing it. Also he made a horrible call (we thought) on the double play that our 3rd baseman booted but our SS backed him up and turned it. We thought he was out live so you never know.
Well now it will be hard to take one from USCe as I thought this was our best chance. I did see improvement in our hitters making contact tonight. We hit their starter who was no scrub pretty hard all night but a lot was right at someone. Sometimes that is how it goes.
And I know Salem eventually scored but Andy Phillips was a FOOL for stopping Salem at 3rd!
Everyone around us (we were feet from him) including ourselves were giving him crap for stopping him. The throw to the cut off man was just coming in from RF and it was a one hop that seemed to be bubbled and the 1B didn't get a strong throw in either. The crowd went nuts on that and Andy acted like it was Georgie's fault. Very frustrating!
