The White Sox moved to 1-2 on the young season with a thrilling 6-7 loss to the Culver City Marina Little League Giants on Sunday afternoon. Like their first loss of the season to the Yankees, the White Sox spotted their opponent a couple of unearned runs to start the game. With the loss, the White Sox fall two games behind the park leading Yankees.
Navari Julius started his second consecutive game on the bump for the Sox. He made easy work of the Giants in the top of the first inning; striking out the side on 14 pitches. The Sox also went quietly in the bottom of the first inning as Giant's pitcher, Carlos I., retired the first 3 White Sox batters.
Things went south for the White Sox in the top of the second as a combination of a single, a bad throw, a bobbled ball, and a double allowed the Giants put 2 runs on the board. Alonzo Billips hustled to a hard hit ball the hit the top of the fence in left field to hold the batter to a double. Navari persevered to close the inning with 3 more strikeouts bringing his total for the game to 6. That would close the book on Navari who went 2 innings, with 6 strikeout, 0 walks, 2 hits, and 2 unearned runs.
The White Sox bats remained silent in the bottom of the second inning as they could only muster one walk in the half inning.
Malik Cole made his debut on the mound for the White Sox in the top of the 3rd inning. The Giants scratched out a run on a walk, a single and a double. Malik settled in to record a strike-out for the first out of the inning. Pitching with bases loaded and one out, Malik was able to get the Giant's number 7 hitter to ground into the White Sox's first double play of the year. Grant Craddolph fielded a sharply hit ground ball up the middle, raced to second base for the force out, and fired to Lawrence Gilliam on first to complete the double play and squelch the Giants' rally. <Cue the Sports Center music> "Da Da Da….Da Da Da".
The White Sox mounted a threat in the bottom of the 3rd inning with a lead off walk by Lawrence. Cashion London laid down a perfect sacrifice bunt to move Lawrence into scoring position but the Giant's were able to close out the inning with a strong play by their hard hitting 6'1 third baseman, Matthew.
At the end of 3, the Giants, led 3-0.
Malik stayed on the mound in the top of the fourth and delivered a scoreless inning. Cash assisted by snagging a deep fly ball to center field for out number 1. Malik collected his second strike out of the game for out number 2, and Shane Early handled a pop fly to second base to end the inning. That would end Malik's appearance on the mound with 2 innings pitched, 2 strikeouts, 1 walk, 1 hit batter, 2 hits and 1 earned run.
The White Sox found their bats in the bottom of the fourth inning with an exciting 2 out rally. Shane got the rally started with a single up to middle and advanced to second and third on a Giants error and a wild pitch. Nathan Moore stepped to the plate and collected the first hit and RBI of his Majors career with a sizzling comebacker to the mound that bounced off the pitchers shin to score Shane. Robert Togia drew a walk to keep the rally going. With runners at first and third, Lawrence lifted a 1-0 outside fastball to shallow right field to score Shane, collecting his first hit and RBI of the season. With Jordan Strong at the plate, Robert was able to score on a wild pitch to tie the game at 3 apiece. Lawrence was thrown out attempting to take third base on the play to end the inning.
Cashion London took the hill for the White Sox to start the fourth inning. The Giants found their stroke in the inning and struck for 4 runs on 2 walks, a triple, 2 singles, and an error in judgment. Cash recorded out one in the inning with a strike out. Navari threw out a runner attempting to steal second base for out number 2, throwing to Grant who handled the throw on a short hop. Shane, who relived Cash in the inning, recorded out 3 with a strike out.
The White Sox attempted to mount another 2 out rally in the bottom of the fifth with Malik getting things started with a solid single up the middle but Giants closer, Guero, turned to an assortment of off-speed pitches to close out the rally.
At the end of 5, the Giants led 7-3.
Shane stayed on the mound for the Sox on the top of the 6th inning. Out one was recorded by Cash throwing to Lawrence on a ground ball to the whole at second base. After allowing a single, Shane battled back to record out 2 with a strikeout. Nathan quickly got the ball back in after a single to left to prevent a run from scoring. Out 3 was recorded by Grant throwing to Lawrence on a hard ground ball to shortstop.
Needing 4 runs to tie, Coach Barry gathered the team during the inning change for a quick pep talk. "Runs!!!" was shouted by all as the White Sox put on their rally caps. Navari got the ball rolling with a lead off walk. Shane followed with a hard ball to the whole to earn an infield single and move Navari to third base. Dathan Bailey sent a shot to the second baseman that was mishandled to reach first and score Navari. Robert collected and RBI on a comebacker to the mound to score Shane and move Dathan to third base. Lawrence went the other way with a pitch to collect his second RBI of the game with a ground out to first base; scoring Dathan in the process to make the score 7-6. Alonzo, who earlier had a 9 pitch at-bat, just got under one to fly out to the second baseman to end the game.
The Sox showed a lot of resolve to fight back in the game. In the end, the loss can be attributed to a couple of defensive lapses and a lack of early hitting. As evident by two one-run losses this year, this team is on the verge of great things and will be well seasoned for close games at the end of the season.
You can find the game summary here as well as by clicking the score column on the team schedule.
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Ladera Little League White Sox
