Red Sox ends slide, whips Lions

A Red Sox pitcher gets ready to throw from the mound, while his teammate stays back on defense during their first round meeting with the Lions in the Senior League division of the 2014 Saipan Little League Baseball last month at the Francisco ?Tan Ko? Palacios Ballfield. (Roselyn B. Monroyo)

The Red Sox snapped a two-game losing skid, following a 17-2 crushing of the Lions in the Senior League game in the 2014 Saipan Little League Baseball last Saturday at the Francisco “Tan Ko” Palacios Ballfield.
The Red Sox (7-2) took only five innings to beat the winless Lions (0-9) and recovered from back-to-back losses they suffered at the hands of the JPO Enforcers on March 22 and 24.

Henry Lizama led the Red Sox’s rout of the Lions, as he went 3-for-4 at the plate and scored four RBIs. The Red Sox second baseman started his impressive performance at the plate with a two-run double at the top of the first inning. In the second inning, Lizama blasted an RBI single and after failing to bat in the third, he showed up in the fourth with a one-run inside-the-park homer. A fly ball to rightfield in the fifth inning prevented Lizama from having a perfect record at the plate, but nevertheless, his consistent hitting powered the Red Sox to the easy win.

Besides Lizama’s two RBIs, the Red Sox got two more off Vincent Leon Guerrero’s RBI single and Jose Tyquengco’s RBI double for a 4-0 lead, which increased to 9-0 after two innings. The Red Sox racked up five runs in the second inning off Jhace Palacios’ two-run double, Lizama and Craig Aguon’s singles, and a passed ball.

With the Red Sox threatening a breakaway, the Lions needed some offense to stay in the game and they found a few in Kobe Tomokane and Peter Santos’ RBI singles at the bottom of the third. However, the Red Sox quickly got the two runs with Lizama’s homer at the top of the fourth and closed the inning with one more run off a passed ball for a 12-2 advantage.

The Red Sox went on to take the early win in the next inning via 10-run mercy rule, as they collected five more runs at the top of the fifth and shut down the Lions at the bottom. Leon Guerrero had a two-run double, Bradley Lieto hit an RBI single, and the Red Sox nailed two more runs off the Lions’ errors at the top of the fifth. At the bottom, pitcher Jobe Reyes struck out Tomokane and the Red Sox got the two other outs off a double play with Palacios catching a fly ball from third batter Jay Lee and then tagging out second batter Denny Jepen.

Jets 8, Fielders 1

In the second Senior League game last Saturday, the Jets allowed no earned runs to the Fielders to notch the easy win.

Nathan Camacho helped the Jets secure the victory, as he pitched five innings, gave up only three hits, and struck out six batters.

Camacho’s counterpart with the Fielders, Mike Muna, also did well in the first three innings, bagging six strikeouts, but the Jets managed to score two runs off their foe’s error in the second inning to take the lead. Muna continued to pitch for the Fielders in the fourth inning, but struggled this time, giving up a two-run single to Kiko Lizama, an RBI single to T.J. Dela Cruz, and an RBI walk to Kenji Yamagata. The Jets got another run off a sacrifice fly to stretch their lead to 7-0 after four complete innings.

At the bottom of the fifth, the Fielders finally scored with Joe Guerrero reaching home off Franco Nakamura’s booboo at the plate. However, the Fielders failed to launch a comeback against the steady defense of the Jets in the last two innings.