CHATHAM, Mass. — For 26 years, Falmouth has had consistent leadership. With manager Jeff Trundy in charge, the Commodores never needed to make a change. He won three Cape Cod Baseball League (CCBL) Manager of the Year awards and totaled 530 career wins.

But with Trundy passing away in December, Falmouth was put in an unfamiliar spot. It needed a new skipper for the first time since 1999. Its choice? Twelve-year MLB catcher Jarrod Saltalamacchia.

Saltalamacchia is no stranger to the area. He won the 2013 World Series with the Boston Red Sox and served as an assistant coach for the CCBL’s Bourne Braves for the last three years. Now, he wants to make his mark in Falmouth.

Saturday’s season opener at Chatham was the first chance to do so. And the Commodores did just that. Falmouth blanked the Anglers, 1-0, backed by strong pitching performances by Kaden Echeman and Conner Linn, who notched 15 of Falmouth’s 17 strikeouts. Falmouth was held to just two hits, but a fifth-inning RBI single from Justin Osterhouse ultimately handed it the victory.

“Getting that first one right away is a great feeling, especially when it's kind of a pitchers' duel and just trying to battle at the plate,” Osterhouse said postgame.

Similar to Falmouth (1-0), Chatham (0-1) entered the season with a first-year manager. Former Anglers pitching coach and MLB veteran Dennis Cook assumed the role after Jeremy Sheetinger resigned last season. Cook reeled in a strong crop of players, including top-100 MLB Draft prospect Henry Ford and Mississippi State third baseman Ace Reese to match Falmouth’s top hitters in Osterhouse and Kent Schmidt.

Despite both teams’ talent, the game started as a pitchers' duel between Chatham’s JT Quinn and Falmouth’s Echeman. Neither allowed a hit until a Ford leadoff double in the fourth. Both displayed their strikeout potential, with Quinn racking up 10 and Echeman totaling eight in the game.

Quinn entered the Cape off a strong junior season with the Bulldogs, where he posted a 2.75 ERA in 17 appearances. And Sunday, he was dominant, giving up just one run through five innings by establishing his fastball up in the zone, Osterhouse said.

That started in the top of the first, with Quinn producing a 1-2-3 inning, inducing two soft groundouts to second. The second and third were no different, as he worked around a leadoff two-base error in the second and produced a clean frame in the third.

But Echeman, who recently transferred to Kentucky after a strong campaign with Northern Kentucky, matched Quinn. He started hot by striking out six batters in the first three innings, including freezing Ford on the inside corner in the first.

”Overall, I thought it was pretty good,” Echeman said about his start postgame. “Obviously eight strikeouts over four innings, (I) couldn't ask for too much more.”

Through the first four frames, the game still sat scoreless after Echeman worked past Ford’s double and Isaiah Lane’s walk in the fourth. The question was which pitcher would crack first. Despite his stellar first four frames, it was Quinn.

And the culprit was Osterhouse. The recent Alabama commit starred at Purdue Fort Wayne the last two years, posting a .339/.441/.625 slashline. Osterhouse said with Quinn constantly throwing pitches up out of the zone, he waited to strike on a lower pitch. He got one in the fifth and blooped a single over third to score John Smith III from second, putting Falmouth ahead, 1-0.

“Everything that was up was going to be out of the zone,” Osterhouse said. “So seeing everything down, trying not to swing at it. And then (I) came in, and I didn't put a great swing on it, but made it work.”

Osterhouse’s hit was all Falmouth needed. Though its offense never pushed across another run, it didn’t need to. Its pitchers shut the door.

After Falmouth took the lead, Echeman turned the ball over to his former Northern Kentucky teammate, Linn, while Chatham opted for Charlie Foster (Mississippi State).

Linn entered the contest after making just four appearances in 2025, when he put up a 10.13 ERA. But he was locked in Saturday, seamlessly swapping for Echeman to keep Chatham off the board entering the eighth inning. Echeman said postgame it was great to see his teammate succeeding.

“Just being happy for other people's success, (that’s) something we preach a lot, especially with the culture and the program (at Northern Kentucky),” Echeman said. “So it's really good to see somebody like my teammate right there just go out there and do really good.”

Though on the other side, with the Anglers’ bats quiet, Foster kept them within striking distance. Using his over-the-top delivery, he tallied six strikeouts and allowed just one hit through four innings to build off a sub-two ERA as a freshman with MSU.

But could Falmouth hold on down the stretch? With Linn dealing, Saltalamacchia stuck with him in the eighth. And he delivered again. He struck out the side, including getting Ford swinging. Other than his double in the fourth, Falmouth easily dealt with Ford on Saturday, despite his lofty totals of 28 homers and 115 RBIs with Virginia the last two years.

And the Anglers continued to flounder in the ninth. The 'Dores’ first-year skipper trusted Rhode Island’s Joe Sabbath to finish the job, and he came through. Though it wasn’t pretty, the victory marked Saltalamacchia’s first with the Commodores, kick-starting a new era in Falmouth with a bang.

Noah Nussbaum is the beat reporter for the Falmouth Commodores. You can read all of his articles on the Commodores here.