By Doug Smith
The Niagara Power hits the road Monday morning for a double-header at first-place Olean. If the journey itself follows manager Garrett Shively’s playbook, look for plenty of speeding, risky ridge-running, a few ignored stop signs and for the bus to keep on plugging even after the tank runs dry.
Splitting with Hornell in a good-bad-ugly double-header Saturday evening at Sal Maglie Stadium, the Power finished a compressed homestand with three wins out of four against the New York State Collegiate League’s two Western Division leaders.
Tyler Schweigert stole home for the tying run and Rick Hubbard pitched into superb relief by Steve Beckham in the opener, a 4-3 victory at the Wallendian pace of an hour and 56 minutes.
“But we’d really been using our bullpen heavily, and it showed,” Shively said after the nightcap, won by Hornell 14-5. Copy that. Power pitchers walked 10 and hit five.
Still, said Shively, “I’ve never been prouder of a team” after the Bolts, down 14-1, outscored Hornell 4-0 over the last two innings. “We got two runs off probably the best pitcher in the league (Dodger reliever Eric Eck) in the eighth, and still kept on plugging right to the end.”
Adam “Five-Tool” Taylor rewarded the faithful in a 300-plus crowd that stuck it out to the final out by drilling a monster two-run triple, running right through the red light at second base and sliding into third by an eyelash, foolish bravado under the circumstances. “Yeah, he gave me a look,” Taylor said of Shively after the game.
But it’s hard to put on the brakes for a skipper who’ll wreck his rotator cuff to wave in a run. Take Schweigert, stealing home in the first. With the batter faking bunt, it wasn’t even really close. “We time these things,” Shively said. “We knew the time of the windup and the time it would take Schweigert to get there. Then we just sort of walk him down the line and off he goes.”
Down 2-3 in the fourth, the Power blended big and smallball. After Seth Eller tripled (the team has more triples than doubles), Jamon Hammel swatted a no-scratch single to short and advanced on a semi-wild pitch. Ryan Jordan sacrificed him over and Taylor Sears drove a fly to right on which many a manager would have “held” with the top of the order coming up. “Go-gettum” Garrett sent Hammel away as if by starter pistol for the run that held up to the end.
After a difficult first, Hubbard got a handle on the Dodgers, at one point retiring nine in a row without a ball being hit past him. Beckham’s relief recalled the most of Mariano, seven up, six out, all of them easy.
The euphoria faded like the mist in the nightcap, as only four Power doubleplays kept it less footballish than it was. Fifty-four Dodges batted; 32 reached base. The sixth and seventh batters were hit five times and walked twice.
Rehabbing Bo Lucas, who looked fully cured in the Burlington exhibition, will start Monday’s opener with “Johnny Wholestaff” (lingo for pitching by committee) set for the second. At the season’s quarter pole, the Power has its running shoes polished.
POWER POINTS — Sears and Hammel, sharing second-base duties in Saturday’s nightcap, totaled eight assists and six putouts… Hornell executed two double plays for a total of six in the game… Taylor’s line-drive throwout of a runner at third Friday night was still the talk of the weekend… Hornell’s manager was ejected Friday night for ball-strike objections… The public-address announcer doubled on internet play-by-play Friday, perhaps a league first… Jill Sweeney and Grace Kulikowski did equal honor to the National Anthem.
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