Burke County Post 21 rightfielder Alex McGee slammed two home runs to account for four RBIs on Friday at Shuey Field against Caldwell County Post 29, but a six-run sixth inning, in which three bases loaded walks were issued by Post 21 pitching, was too much for the home team to overcome in Post 29's 8-6 victory.
Burke's Justin O'dear threw five innings of one-hit ball, only allowing a fourth inning run to pace the early action in Area IV West Legion play.
The home team scored four lead off runs in the bottom of the first inning with Tyler Hopkins' double and score on Brent Rowe's RBI groundout, and McGee's three-run blast scoring Donnie Hughes, O'dear and McGee to get Burke the early 4-0 command.
Burke did not score again until McGee's solo shot in the bottom of the eighth inning made it 8-5 in favor of Caldwell, with a disastrous sixth inning giving the visitors from Post 29 the middle inning momentum.
With O'dear tiring and giving up a double to Caldwell's David Evans and single to opposing pitcher Tyler Bumgarner, Coach Ron Swink brought reliever Logan Cook to put out the fire with no outs in the top of the sixth inning. Instead, Cook could not find his control, and an infield hit loaded the bases and three straight base on balls saw Caldwell still without an out when second reliever Mason Webb finally got the rally stopped. But by then the scoreboard showed Post 29 on top 7 to 4.
Webb threw three effective innings, and Lucas Clarke added a perfect ninth for Post 21, but even with two late runs for the home team, the deficit was too much. The final score remained 8-6, in favor of Caldwell County.
Caldwell starter Bumgarner tossed eight innings of 10-strikeout ball, allowing five runs on seven hits to pick up the win. Caldwell reliever Spencer Greer struck out two more Burke batters in the bottom of the ninth, but Post 21 pitch hitter Vance Stilley picked up a RBI single and the winning run was at the plate when the final out was made by Burke County. Burke pitchers also struck out a respectable eight Caldwell batters, but the most obvious statistic that plagued Burke pitching was 10 walks issued by the Post 21 staff. Five of the batters who received free passes ended up scoring for Caldwell.
Burke out hit Caldwell by nine to seven, with McGee's two homers, Hughes’ three singles, and Hopkins' leadoff double big for Burke County. Caldwell was paced by two hits each by Evans and Bumgarner, while leadoff man Bryson Bowman walked three times and scored twice.
Burke Coach Ron Swink added a few comments after the narrow loss, saying " We had a great start tonight with Justin's pitching, and Tyler's double getting us on the board early. Then Alex's three run shot put us up 4-0. Then we just quit scoring until too late in the game. We had several early opportunities to add to our early lead, but could not get the job done at the plate. When O'dear tired out and Cook had control problems, we kept playing but still could not get the few key hits to get us back. We did score two late runs and had a chance in the final inning, but again the keys tonight were too many free passes by our pitching staff, and the missed opportunities on offense."
Burke moves to 4-7 in the Area IV West race and 5-7 overall.
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