River Dogs fall in World Series opener
File photo Columbia Basin third baseman Dominic Signorelli walked twice in two at-bats in the River Dogs’ 10-0 loss to Mobile, Ala., in their opening game on Sunday at the Senior Babe Ruth League World Series in Jamestown, N.Y.
JAMESTOWN, NY — There’s always a number. The box score is full of them, but there’s always one number that tells the tale.
That number in the Columbia Basin River Dogs 10-0 loss to Mobile, Ala., Sunday morning in their Senior Babe Ruth League World Series opener at Russell E. Diethrick Jr. Park in Jamestown, NY, was seven.
The Pacific Northwest region champions left seven runners on base. True, the Alabama pitching staff combined for a two-hitter, but you don’t strand seven runners at this level and survive. Rawdogs starter Reece Ewing went 5 innings, surrendering two hits and striking out 11.
“Reece Ewing was excellent today,” said Rawdogs manager Tony Hendrix via Twitter. “His breaking stuff was great. His fastball was in and out. He had total control.”
Hendrix and Boruff are not strangers. Alabama has won the World Series championship four times since 2010 and road is always through Columbia Basin. The River Dogs beat Alabama to win the national championship in 2015. The Rawdogs returned the favor in 2016, beating Columbia Basin in the title game at Johnson-O’Brien Stadium in Ephrata.
“They were better than we were today, that’s for sure,” said River Dogs manager Randy Boruff in a telephone interview. “We had a runner on second base in the first inning and they made a nice play to stop us from scoring. It might have made a difference if we had scored early.”
The 2018 River Dog squad is a combination of the two Columbia Basin teams that advanced to the semifinals of the World Series last year, so they have the moxie to adjust moving forward.
“We have Mid Atlantic (on Monday). They’re a decent club. They’re not in the same category as the Rawdogs. But everybody’s pretty good or they wouldn’t be here,” Boruff said. “We’re capable of winning the next three games to second place in our pool and we’ll be just fine going into the bracket.”
Assistant coach Greco Signorelli, who managed the White team last year, agreed. They ran into an Alabama team that’s scored 10 runs in apiece in the first two games of the tournament. Other than giving up eight runs in the sixth inning, Columbia Basin held its own.
“The lefty they threw at us today was pretty good, but it should have been a 1-0 game,” Signorelli said in a telephone interview. “We had guys in position to score and just didn’t get the hits when we needed them. The score really didn’t really reflect the ballgame. We were right there through the first five innings before things got away from us.”
Alabama took a 1-0 lead into the sixth inning, before things unraveled. Duncan Favor, the right-hander from East Wenatchee, had a strong outing going, but he plunked a batter, gave up a walk, then a hit and threw a wild pitch, before Boruff went to the bullpen. Alabama exploited the River Dogs bullpen to finish up top half of the sixth with eight runs.
“We had our chances. But it doesn’t matter if it was 3-nothing or 10-nothing. We’ll see what we’re made of,” Boruff said. “They whole goal is to get to Saturday night and I have no doubt we can do it.”
Cody Goodwin and Josh Williams had a hit apiece for the River Dogs. Dominic Signorelli, a Washington 4A all-state and USA Today all-Washington selection who hit two out to 417 centerfield in centerfield during the home run derby, walked twice.
Brewster left-hander Quincy Vassar will get the start on Monday against Williamsport, Penn., the Mid Atlantic region champions. The game is scheduled to start at 11:30 a.m. PST.