Post 334 opens the Rapid City Firecracker with back-to-back victories
In one of the nation’s toughest American Legion baseball tournaments, the Rapid City Post 22-sponsored Firecracker in South Dakota, the Post 334 team started out strong.
Putting behind the previous weekend’s inconsistent play in Dickinson, North Dakota, Post 334 came out to hand one of the top teams on the East Coast, West Warwick, Rhode Island, an 8-0 loss in the opening game Tuesday (July 1) morning behind the two-hit pitching of Brandon Baumgartner. Zac Sather set the tone in this game with a first-inning monstrous home run over the right field barrier into the trees beyond Rapid City’s famed Floyd Fitzgerald Stadium.
In game two, which immediately followed against one of the top teams from Wyoming, the Post 6 squad from Cheyenne, Post 334 fell behind 1-0 in the third, but came bakc to take a 2-1 lead in the sixth and a 4-1 lead in the top of the seventh. Cheyenne, however, did not die and chased Post 334 starter Cody Beam from the mound with one out and runners on first and second in the last of the seventh. Sather came on in relief, got a strikeout, but the next batter hit a high ch0pper up the middle that could not be play for a run-scoring infield single. the following batter then hit a shot to right, which was in the range of Post 334’s Carter Adams to catch for the game’s final out.
Adams, however, slipped on the play and the ball sailed over his head for a game-tying double. Sather got out of the inning with a foul pop then delivered a tie-breaking single with runners on second and third in the top of the eighth to give Post 334 a 6-4 lead. Post 334 added two more runs and closed out its first day in the week-long tournament with its second victory, 8-4…
Posted: July 1st, 2008