Brewster fell to Chatham 5-4 on Friday after a collection of missed opportunities and small mistakes. The offense did its part, but the Whitecaps (3-3) left themselves too much to clean up. Whether through outfield misreads, bad baserunning jumps or tough at-bats gone awry, Brewster dug its own grave.
The Anglers (2-4) opened cold after a 17-run outburst Thursday against Cotuit. Three scoreless innings left Chatham searching, but the home squad broke through in the fourth, exploiting a botched play and turning it into three runs to tie the game.
“The two errors on the board didn’t cost us anything,” manager Jamie Shevchik said. “The miscues, the outs that should have been made, is what ultimately cost us a little bit here tonight.”
Jay Abernathy missed a potential pickoff play, a mistake that did not affect the final score. Other mistakes were not as kind.
A fly ball into right looked catchable in the fourth inning. Right fielder Cash Strayer, in his first game with Brewster this season, ranged back, got turned around and just missed the ball near the wall.
One run scored easily.
Abernathy set up as the cutoff man and relayed the throw home. His toss from shallow right caromed off line, allowing a second run to score.
The throw skipped past catcher Jacob Lee and into the Chatham dugout, scoring the third run of the play. All three runs felt avoidable at one point or another.
The defensive breakdown reflected a larger lack of urgency from the Whitecaps. After Chatham’s three-run fourth, Brewster never found the situational swing or small-ball answer it needed. In the seventh inning, a one-out Terrence Kiel II triple put the go-ahead run just 90 feet away. Kiel stayed stranded at third, unable to advance.
The question: Why not a safety squeeze?
“Yeah, it crossed my mind,” Shevchik said. “I actually thought about pinch-hitting a little bit, too. We had two righties on the bench, but, you know, part of this whole process is letting kids fail. … Here’s the good thing about being a coach: You don’t make that mistake again.”
Kiel’s stranded triple marked a missed opportunity, but Brewster’s offense still did enough to put itself in position to win. Friday in Chatham marked Brewster’s second multi-homer game of the season, and Lee’s third home run moved him into the Cape Cod Baseball League home run lead. Designated hitter Owen Jenkins scored twice after doubling and drawing a walk. A few more hits could have put enough pressure back on Chatham to cover the defensive mistakes.
“Four zeros in a row, kind of fell asleep in the middle to the back portion of the game, so I think it’s just staying on the gas,” Lee said. “Adjusting to [Josh Swink] is something we need to do.”
Swink struck out four through three innings of play, enough to get out of the tough innings where Brewster did add pressure. Strayer launched his first hit of the season out to right field in the top of the ninth, watching it bounce off the fielder's glove and over the fence for a home run. The long ball cut the Anglers' lead to one, too little, too late for a comeback.
The Whitecaps play Orleans at Stony Brook on June 20 at 4:30 p.m. Watch the Whitecaps broadcast or follow the game via Instagram (@brewsterwhitecaps) or X (@BrewsterCaps).
Matt Ford-Wellman can be reached at mfordwellman.media@gmail.com or on X @MattFW_4.
