Imagine a heavyweight boxing fight with the title on the line. One fighter gets the first punch, then the second one responds. The two go punch for punch until one fighter lands a knockout blow and earns the victory. That is an apt way to describe Cotuit and Brewster’s game Saturday, in which a seventh inning home run from Jamie Laskofski (North Carolina) served as the final punch that gave Cotuit a 7-4 loss.
The Kettleers got the jump on the Whitecaps, scoring two runs in the opening frame. A single from Jesse Di Maggio (Dallas Baptist) scored J.J. Moran (Stanford). Immediately after, Di Maggio tried stealing and when Laskofski dropped the throw, Jake Hanley (Georgia) ran in from third to double the lead.
But Brewster refused to let the game get out of hand. After Holden Pantier (Georgia Tech) singled he then stole second. The following pitch got past Di Maggio at the plate, and Pantier took advantage of his blind spot to go all the way from second to home. Cotuit would not relent their advantage yet though, scoring a third run when Hanley hit a deep sacrifice fly to score Ryan Tyranski (Cincinnati).
Aside from the offense, the first half of the game saw two pitchers square off toe-to-toe as well. Former Kettleer Payton Manca (Florida State) toed the rubber for Brewster and allowed just one earned run through 3.2 innings. That being said, Cotuit did force Manca to concede just his second earned run in 19.1 innings of work. For the Kettleers, Grady Bivens (Eckerd) got the start and threw the longest appearance of any Cotuit arm. He lasted 5.1 innings and also allowed just one earned run.
“When I first got told I was coming up here, I told myself I was going to empty the tank,” Bivens said. “I told Coach I wanted to go all out today and I’m glad he let me.”
Despite the fight going the Kettleers’ way for the first half of the game, the Whitecaps had a few big punches left up their sleeve. A couple of free passes put two runners on for Brewster, and they cut the score back to 3-2 on a throwing error from Dawson Park (LSU) on an attempted double play. After Bivens was pulled, Tyler Finkbeiner (Michigan) was roughed up for the tying run after allowing three consecutive singles.
Then came the knockout punch. Finkbeiner and Laskofski went toe-to-toe in a six-pitch at-bat that saw the count rise to full. Finkbeiner tried to get the strikeout on a low fastball, but Laskofski deposited it well over the wall in right field. Cotuit, like a fighter who just got socked with a left hook, believed it could come back but never really had the power to.
Granted, hope existed for a brief period of time when the Kettleers got one run in the bottom half of the seventh inning. This came when Chase Kroberger (Alabama) scored on a Moran groundout. But, the offense soon fell as dormant as a knocked-out boxer and never had the oomph to charge back into the game.
After a three-game win streak, this loss reminds Cotuit of problems that have existed all season. The Kettleers committed multiple errors that led to Whitecaps runs. Six passed balls and wild pitches enabled Brewster to get loose on the basepaths, furthering the damage of their six stolen bases. The Cotuit bats struggled to generate a big inning that put the game out of reach. Late-game walks put a dagger into what hope remained. The season is long, and games like this are inevitable, but they are unfortunate nonetheless.
“The first six innings we played really good baseball,” Coach Rob Cooper said. “We just fell into some bad habits and let the game get away from us in the later innings. We just have to go 1-0 tomorrow and get over it.”
The Kettleers are back in action tomorrow when they hit the road to take on the Hyannis Harbor Hawks. First pitch at McKeon Park is slated for six p.m. EDT, and the projected starting pitcher for Cotuit is Tyler Brashear (Eckerd).
