Whitten flips lid, Wellborn
- Updated: March 20, 2015
UPDATED: Piedmont senior dominant in Bulldogs’ area opener
Piedmont pitcher Peyton Whitten checks to see just what is going on with his hat. Everytime he threw a pitch in the early innings Tuesday at Wellborn the cap kept flying off his head.
Piedmont pitcher Peyton Whitten retrieves his cap after throwing another pitch against Wellborn. (Special photo)
By Al Muskewitz
East Alabama Sports Today
WELLBORN — Somewhere between the second and third innings Tuesday Peyton Whitten found a cap that fit, but he never stopped throwing strikes.
After every pitch the Piedmont right-hander threw in the first two innings of his five-inning 11-1 area win over Wellborn, his follow through included picking his cap off the ground.
It was a bit distracting, but it also told a lot about his effectiveness.
“When his hat’s falling off you know he’s on,” Bulldogs coach James Blanchard said. “When his hat’s coming off, he’s throwing strikes.”
Whitten definitely was on his game in this one. He threw 57 pitches in five innings, gave up three hits and struck out eight. He struck out the side in two innings.
“He’s about where he needs to be right now,” Blanchard said. “I think he’s throwing a little bit harder than he was this time last year. He was on today.”
Whitten never has found a cap that has fitted him well. He wears the smallest one he can find as it is and still has to wear an elastic headband similar to those sleeve garters worn by dealers at the casinos, but the invention came apart during this game and he simply was too involved to attach it again.
Finally tired of constantly retrieving his cap from the ground, he got a tackier headband from his father and that did the trick. With the exception of the last pitch on his inning-ending strikeout in the fourth, the cap relatively stayed put.
“It happens all the time,” Whitten said. “If I don’t wear a headband it’s coming off, no matter what. I’ve tried getting haircuts; it doesn’t work. I have a weird-shaped head, I guess.
“It’s very annoying. Sometimes I can’t see where I’m throwing the ball and it just messes me up sometimes.”
If you think it’s a pain for the pitcher, imagine being a hitter with all that going on. It’s tough enough trying to catch a piece of a pitch coming at you in the upper 80s/lower 90s, then with the flying hat there’s something else to challenge your focus.
T.J. Salers didn’t seem to have much trouble with it. He had two of the Panthers’ three hits, one of which drove in their only run in the fourth inning.
“It didn’t really bother me, but some guys in the dugout mentioned it,” Wellborn senior Landon Machristie said. “They were making jokes about his hair – slick hair, put some grease in it or something.
“I guess it did effect us, because he gave up one run the whole game. Something he was did was right.”
The Bulldogs (5-4) gave him a 1-0 lead in the first and never trailed. They broke the game open with an eight-run fourth.
Bayley Blanchard had three hits in the game and Easton Kirk had two. Whitten, batting leadoff, was on base all four times he came to the plate.
That, too, was as good a sign as the cap flying off Whitten’s head.
“We hadn’t been hitting the ball good at all and I thought we hit it good today,” Blanchard said. “Our big hitter’s out (Payton Young), but everybody just stepped up today and hit the ball.”
In an effort to beat more bad weather, the teams will conclude their series with a doubleheader today in Piedmont. The Bulldogs are expected to throw Taylor Hayes in the opener and Bayley Blanchard in the nightcap.
Piedmont 11, Wellborn 1
Piedmont 102 80 – 11 9 0
Wellborn 000 10 – 1 3 2
PEYTON WHITTEN and Easton Kirk; ETHAN BEADLES, T.J. Salers (4) and Jacob Shears. 2B: Kirk (P). 3B: Bayley Blanchard (P); Brandt Denham (W). WP: Whitten. LP: Beadles.
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