Well-armed
- Updated: June 18, 2022
Atlanta Crackers send nine pitchers to the mound to keep Monsters winless at home
Saturday’s SBL Games
Atlanta Crackers 14, Choccolocco 5
Brookhaven 3, Alpharetta 2
Gainesville 9. Atlanta Blues 6
Waleska 13, Columbus 3
By Al Muskewitz
East Alabama Sports Today
OXFORD, Ala. – Look on the scoreboard out in right center field and it’ll show the Choccolocco Monsters didn’t have nearly as many errors as the Atlanta Crackers did Saturday night. Not all errors wind up in the box score, but as the Monsters can tell you, they’re just as damaging.
The Monsters were charged with only two errors on this night and they did climb back into the game late, but the early walks and free extra bases, fielding miscues and multiple base-running blunders that have plagued them through the first 10 games all conspired to keep them down again.
The Crackers, the best hitting team in the Sunbelt Baseball League, scored three runs in the first inning and nine pitchers held the Monsters back until their own bats erupted again in the ninth inning to score a 14-5 victory at Choccolocco Park.
“Our skills are getting much better; we’re handling the bat better,” Monsters manager Steve Gillispie said. “I don’t know how many times we struck out, I don’t think it was many (five), so that has improved because we had high numbers early on.
“The offense is getting better; our baseball skills are getting back in baseball shape. We’ve got to do a better job of playing the game because skills will only take you so far. Fourteen hits and four errors to only produce five runs, it changes the game. We didn’t take advantage of opportunities; that’s playing the game. We got opportunities because our skills are better.”
To their credit, the Monsters, who have three come-from-behind wins this season, pounded out a season-high 14 hits and battled back from deficits of 5-1 and 6-3 to make it a one-run game in the eighth inning with the tying run at the plate.
But they also ran themselves out of some potentially big innings with at least five base-running mistakes in the first seven innings while they were trying to mount a comeback. In addition, their pitchers walked seven and hit four and seven of those runners scored.
“The frustration comes from 35 years of being in it and teaching things a certain way and only having these kids for a month that they may have been taught a different way or may not have been taught or never been addressed,” Gillispie said. “We can talk about it and we have bullet points we bring up after each game, that’s the frustration. There’s a high level of expectation for the way we play the game to match the skill level.”
“We’re a good team,” outfielder and extra hitter Arty Leger said. “We’ve just got to put everything together and then we’ll be in good shape. I think we’re the best team in the league if we clean everything up.”
For the second night in a row the Monsters fell behind 3-0 before they batted, but unlike Friday night they didn’t match it. Starter Brock Hill looked like he was going to get out of the first with a zero when catcher Jackson Sweatt gunned Wyatt Castoe trying to steal for the second out, but the Crackers loaded the bases with a walk, single and hit batsman, and then Jamari Brooks walked to bring in the first run of the game.
Kendall Wade then hit a ball to the left side of the infield. Third baseman Dom Scavone initially backed up on the ball, then mishandled it and two more runs scored. It was judiciously scored a hit, saving the Monsters their league-leading 26th error of the season.
They didn’t avoid that error the next inning and it loaded the bases with none out. The Monsters looked like they were going to get out of this one, too, but the Crackers scored another run when Scott Campbell beat Brant Deerman’s flip to second trying to get a force, making it 4-0.
The Crackers loaded the bases in the first, second and fourth innings and scored every time. They were 2-for-5 with the bases loaded through the first four innings.
The Monsters got on the board in the second when Sweatt delivered their third straight two-out single of the inning, scoring Nate Shipley from second.
The Crackers got loose in the field in the fourth, making four errors, two on one play early in the inning. Leger made them pay with a two-run single to center to make it 5-3.
Shipley went 3-for-4 and reached base all four times he batted. Brennan McCullough also had three hits. Leger had two hits and three RBIs, and Sweatt had two hits. Shipley and Leger drove in the runs in the eighth that made it 6-5.
Shipley came to the Monsters as a pitcher, but developed tendonitis in his throwing elbow. He texted Gillispie after Friday’s game with a reminder he’d “been a hitter all my life” and was looking for a chance to help the team win. He delivered.
“It feels good; I knew I could do it,” Shipley said. “I just have to take the opportunities I get and run with it.”
Leger, who hasn’t played organized ball in more than three years, came to the ballpark with a new look and it helped him break out of a slump. He had been 1-for-13 this season and hitless in his previous 11 at-bats, but he shaved his signature beard overnight and singled in each of his first two at bats.
“My beard grows pretty fast, so it’s been about two months that I had the caveman look,” Leger said. “Been in a little slump, try something out. I think the ‘stache is here to stay.”
Crackers manager Kevin Meistickle has 16 pitchers on his roster and used 15 of them in the series. The nine he used Saturday to keep the Monsters winless at home were a season-high, eclipsing their eight in a win over Gainesville Wednesday. They have used at least seven pitchers in six of their last seven games.
Without a game Monday going forward, Meistickle handed the ball to starter Ramsey David, Harry Cain, Jacob Autry, Davis Williams, winner Ben Koch, Carter Davies, Cason Rich, Ryan Whitener and closer Ryan Suppa.
He would have been content to give each of them one inning, but Suppa came on in the eighth after the Monsters closed to within 6-5 and secured a four-out save with four strikeouts. The right-hander from Columbus State has yet to give up a hit or earned run over nine appearances this season (9 2/3 innings).
“We’ve been doing this ever since the pitch count and since I knew we had to carry 16 pitchers we’ve been doing it and it’s been working,” Meistickle said. “At the same time you get everybody thinking they’re involved with the team; nobody’s left out. I love hitting, I’m not a fool, but I’ll tell you, give me regular hitters who’ll do what you tell them to do, but if you have that pitching, you’ll be in every game.”
The Crackers broke it open in the ninth, sending 12 batters to the plate and scoring eight runs. Wade had a two-run single and Campbell drilled a two-run triple to highlight the outburst. They scored 13 runs in the ninth inning of the two-game series.
The Monsters have given up 16 runs in the ninth inning of their last three games – three in the walk-off loss at Alpharetta, five Friday night and eight Saturday – and 19 in the last two innings of those games.
“We’re going to win at some point, hopefully,” Shipley said. “We just have that one inning. I feel like if we played a seven-inning game we’d win all the games we’ve played so far. The pitching’s struggled in the late innings holding the game for us. The first seven innings we look like a baseball team.”
Atl. Crackers 310 110 008 — 14 14 5
Choccolocco 010 200 020 — 5 14 2
WP: Ben Koch (1-0). LP: Brock Hill (0-3). 2B: Scott Campbell (AC). 3B: Scott Campbell (AC). HR: Colson Lawrence (AC).
Sunbelt Baseball League standings
| EAST DIVISION | W | L | PCT. | GB |
| Waleska Wild Things | 6 | 2 | .750 | 0.5 |
| Gainesville GolDiggers | 8 | 3 | .727 | — |
| Alpharetta Aviators | 3 | 8 | .300 | 5 |
| CENTRAL DIVISION | ||||
| Atlanta Crackers | 7 | 4 | .636 | — |
| Brookhaven Bucks | 5 | 4 | .556 | 1 |
| Atlanta Blues | 5 | 7 | .417 | 2.5 |
| WEST DIVISION | ||||
| Columbus Chatt-a-Hoots | 5 | 5 | .500 | — |
| Gwinnett Astros | 3 | 5 | .375 | 1 |
| Choccolocco Monsters | 3 | 7 | .300 | 2 |
Monday’s Games
Alpharetta at Brookhaven, 5:35 p.m.
Choccolocco at Gwinnett, 6:05 p.m.
Columbus at Atlanta Blues, 6:05 p.m.
Gainesville at Waleska, 6:05 p.m.
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