March 24

Thursday afternoon at McCaskey for the first official game of baseball season. Several years ago a new concession pavilion was built at the main entrance to the football stadium, the baseball field (which is immediately next to the stadium) was repositioned to make room for it. The second floor of the building serves as the PA booth for baseball and it is an excellent vantage point for viewing the game. When they built the pavilion and installed a PA system for baseball various faculty members handled the job because it was something I couldn't have readily committed to at the time. I did one game in 2014 and two games in '15 when the regular guy was unavailable, when Jon Mitchell told me the job was open and asked if I was interested I was glad to sign on. It's only eleven games and it's not the pros but it's BASEBALL in an environment where THE GAME is the thing and for me it's a refreshing change. The game on this day was a non-league contest (the first of four on the schedule), Reading High was the opponent. RHS scored three runs in the second inning, in the bottom of the third JPM infielder Jeffrey Acevedo was hit by the pitch and eventually scored on a groundout by catcher Michael Abrew. In the fourth the Red Tornado made it 3-2, infielder Luis Padilla was hit by the pitch, advanced to third on a double from fellow infielder Chris Rosario and scored on a sac fly by outfielder Jon Dombach. RHS extended the lead to 5-2 in the fifth but JPM battled back in their half of the innng. Acevedo singled, Abrew walked and they both scored on a two-run single by outfielder Oscar Surillo. That was as close as JPM would come, RHS got two in the sixth and one more in the seventh to put it away at 8-4. Devin Ashba was the starting pitcher for JPM working five innings and taking the loss, Daleuri Contraras finished it in relief. The boys are off until Wednesday the 30th when Northern Lebanon comes in for another non-league game. Take care, thanks for reading.