It was a perfectly magical May evening but the Lacombe Midget A Dodgers couldn’t seem to get a cut of any of that magic on Tuesday night.
The Dodgers 1 were defeated by Stettler within five innings, taking a 16-3 loss.
Head Coach Cam Suominen said although the Dodgers didn’t play their best, they have still shown promise throughout the season. “Stettler has a good team and they beat us quite handily,” he said. “I think Stettler has a very good pitcher and we couldn’t quite keep up to the ball. That was the biggest problem.”
In the first inning, with Stettler up to bat first, the Dodgers started out with a lead, which was quickly dashed out in the bottom of the second.
With three consecutive strike outs, the Dodgers didn’t bring any runs in to top up their three achieved in the first inning and much didn’t change throughout the evening. Stettler was sitting with five runs and quickly added more on.
To start out the third inning, Jonathan Thompson took to the pitchers mound, and walked the first Stettler batter.
After Stettler’s first run in, the Dodgers scored their first easy out on a direct hit. They scooped their second out on a pop fly.
At the bottom of the third, after the first Dodger struck out, Eryk Calkins took to bat and made it safely to first, closely followed by Thompson, but after a quick three out, no runs were scored.
At the top of the fourth inning, with Stettler leading with eight runs, they continued to rack up more runs with the Dodgers throwing a mix of pitches and not being able to quickly recover from some over throws.
Christine Suominen was first up to bat for the Dodgers at the bottom of the fourth.
She may have been walked to first base, but she had to work hard to get to second and third base as the Stettler players had their eyes on the fast runner. But all the effort went in vain after Stettler got three out.
At the top of the fifth, Stettler solidified their lead with 10 runs over the Dodgers’ three.
Adam Whyte gave the Dodgers something to cheer about after a swift catch out in left field. The Dodgers tried to make a comeback, looking for the perfect trio, three up, three down but it wasn’t meant to be.
At the bottom of the fifth, with Stettler up 13 runs, the game was called and the Dodgers packed up their bats.
“After five innings, if you are losing by 10, the game is over,” said Suominen.
This season, Dodgers 1 are sitting quite equally in the standings. They have one win and two losses under their belt.
Suominen has been coaching ball for nine years and has seen most of the players grow up before his eyes. This year Lacombe boasts two Midget A ball teams, Dodgers 1 and Dodgers 2.
“Most of the kids are third years,” said Suominen of the Dodgers 1, 12-man team roster. “They’ve played together for a few years and we made two teams, so we tried to split them up fairly evenly.”
Dodgers 1 have two more regular season games both against opponents Sylvan Lake. They will take to the field for their last home game before playoffs next Tuesday, May 26th at Michener Park.
The first pitch will be thrown at 6:30 p.m.
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