Top Gun Cary Game 2: 919 Nationals 12, Blue Sox 4

Tournament schedule makers are well aware that you should never, ever give the Nationals a break in-between pool play games. When the Nats have time to kill, shenanigans like this ensue:

No, I have absolutely no idea what they're doing. Clearly a lot of forethought went into it, because the weight distribution with Chace on top and Asher on the bottom is pure genius.

After the two-hour break, play resumed with a matchup against the Blue Sox, a rematch of the Myrtle Beach title game. In that game, 919 used runs in every inning to eventually pile up a 10-run margin. This time, however, they did it largely with one big inning, as an eight-run bottom of the second brought the Nats back from an early 3-0 deficit and sent them on the way to a 12-4 win in a game shortened to five innings by the run rule.

The offense, as usual, will get most of the attention. Playing with just ten hitters in the order, and only nine two-armed hitters in the order, 919 had nine different players reach base and nine different players score a run. This time, though, it wasn't really the booming bats that pushed runs across. In fact, the Nationals had just four hits in the game, with the biggest blow a bases-clearing triple from Gavin. But Blue Sox pitchers walked nine, plus threw four wild pitches, and patient Nat hitters took advantage.

The unsung storyline of Saturday's pool play will be the 919 defense, which committed just one error in ten innings. That included solid work from the Nationals catchers, who combined allowed just three stolen bases in the ten innings of play, an impressive total in 10U baseball (for comparison, the Nationals stole a dozen bases on the day).

Following the win, Coach Bruce gave a speech that involved something about breaking (no one was quite sure following the speech if he said "breaking" or "drinking," because either really would've made sense) a bottle of wine, and then the team hustled off to Coach Bruce's house, where the realtor in charge of his listing cringed at the thoughts of what the ramifications might be of multiple hours with the 919 team on the loose in the home. This shot was taken late on Saturday night as Coach Bruce consoled Jennifer.

Bracket play begins Saturday at a time TBD.

Game 2 Nationals scoring plays

Second inning

Andrew worked a one-out walk and stole second. He tagged up and went to third on Joey's fly ball, meaning 919 had a runner on third with two outs and none in. That's when the excitement began. And by "excitement," I mean four walks in a row, as Elias, Asher, Chace and Brady all drew walks, forcing in Andrew. Eli scored on a wild pitch. Bryce lined an RBI single, plating Asher. Chace scored on a wild pitch. With the bases loaded, Gavin ripped a shot to deep left-center that either went under the fence or against the fence, depending on whether you were playing left field or center field. The end result: all three runners scored, and Gavin was awarded home on the very rare "interference by the center fielder" call.

Score after two innings: 919 Nationals 8, Blue Sox 3

Third inning

With one out, Joey and Elias walked. Asher hammered an RBI single and took second when the ball was misplayed in center. Brady collected a two-out, two-run single.

Score after two innings: 919 Nationals 11, Blue Sox 3

Fourth inning

JT drew a leadoff walk, went to second on a wild pitch, and scored on Gavin's shot through the left side of the infield.

Score after three and a half innings: 919 Nationals 12, Blue Sox 3

Pitching Performances

Ben never allowed the ball out of the infield in the first.

Bryce worked two very good innings, including a 1-2-3 third.

Gavin closed it out with two innings of one-hit pitching. 

Game 2 Web Gems

• Bryce made a nice play to hustle over from his pitcher position and grab a pop fly on the third base line in the third.
• Elias made a very solid play against the leadoff man in the fifth. The hitter smacked what could've been a double in the gap, but Eli cut it off in right-center and held him to a single.

Game 2 line score	1	2	3	4	5	6	R	H
Blue Sox	1	2	0	0	1	X	4	3
919 Nationals	0	8	3	1	X	X	12	4

Top Gun Cary Game 1: 919 Nationals 8, OC Crushers 0

This is the kind of game when it’s good to sit in the dugout so that you have something to blog about. The 8-0 win on Saturday morning over the Orange Country Crushers at Thomas Brooks Park wasn’t especially eventful. The main storyline was once again the 919 pitching, as three hurlers combined on a one-hitter and walked just one. Only two Crushers hitters reached as far as second base.

That meant some of the in-game entertainment had to come from the always-entertaining 9- and 10-year olds. Like, for example, this exchange as they watched a new Crushers pitcher warm up in the middle innings:

Gavin: “This guy is the exact same as the last pitcher, except faster.”

Andrew: “So he’s not the same at all.”

Gavin: “Well, right.”

That’s your 919 Nationals, folks.

Game 1 Nationals scoring plays

First inning

Bryce drew a leadoff walk and stole second and third. Elias walked and stole second. Gavin ripped a two-run single to left.

Score after one inning: 919 Nationals 2, Crushers 0

Second inning

Joey led off with a single and stole second. A fielder’s choice moved him to third. Ben walked and stole second. Chace cracked a two-run single and took third on some defensive adventures combined with hard running. Bryce singled in Chace, then stole second and third. Elias walked and stole second. Gavin’s shot to third scored Bryce, and then Elias scored on a wild pitch.

Score after two innings: 919 Nationals 7, Crushers 0

Third inning

Chace ripped a one-out single. Bryce singled, and then Chace scored on a wild pitch.

Score after three and a half innings: 919 Nationals 8, Crushers 0

Pitching Performances

Joey threw a hitless first two innings.

JT was perfect in the third and fourth.

Ben finished it up with a scoreless fifth.

Game 1 Web Gems

•  Playing first base, Asher sprinted over near the fence to make a nice play on a pop foul in the first.
• Elias made a good aggressive play by fielding a spinning ground ball in front of the first base bag in the third to make sure he got it before it went foul.
• Ben ended the game with a textbook example of Coach Kevin’s favorite drill, PFP, as he bounced off the mound, fielded a grounder and made a good flip to Elias at first.

Game 1 line score	1	2	3	4	5	6	R	H
OC Crushers	0	0	0	0	0	X	0	1
919 Nationals	2	5	1	0	X	X	8	7

Top Gun World Series Qualifier Championship: 919 Nationals 10U 5, Mavericks 11U 2

Let’s just all admit right now that in no possible way is this blog entry going to convey the insanity that occurred at the ECAP on field 5 between the hours of 1 and 3 p.m. on Sunday afternoon.

The ultimate outcome was that the 10U 919 Nationals earned the 11U tournament title with a 5-2 win over the Mavericks. But that really would be like saying Sunni Sky is a place you can get cold food.

For the second straight game, the Nationals had to play from behind. The hot-hitting Mavericks, who had outscored the competition 36-7 in their first three games of the tournament, plated two runs in the bottom of the first.

But then…nothing. The 919 pitchers handcuffed the Mavericks and allowed just one baserunner—one baserunner!—after the second inning. That baserunner was promptly picked off first base, meaning the Mavericks sent the minimum number of hitters to the plate in the final four innings. Oh, and did we mention that Nationals pitchers did not walk any batters in the six-inning game and walked just one in the 12 innings of bracket play?

In other words, the Mavericks might have been feeling a little frustrated by the terrific work they were seeing on the mound. That eventually boiled over in an eventful fourth inning. To fully appreciate this inning, you have to understand that Chace was playing with a neon green cast on his left hand. That’s very important—it was neon green and had been neon green for the entire day.

Suddenly, however, it was determined that the green cast was “distracting,” and need to be wrapped in order to avoid Chace being called out. Coach Fred just happened to have a wrap on his bionic knee, proving once and for all that you can find pretty much anything in the 919 rooting section at any given time. Luckily, it was able to cover up that dastardly neon green cast, which was far more distracting than the calm earth tones of the bats generally used in the 10U and 11U world these days.

Once Chace was wrapped, he just so happened to be coming to the plate with the bases loaded, with the Nats holding a 3-2 lead. He took the first pitch for a strike, then took a couple of balls. With the count even at 2-2, he fouled off a pair of pitches, leading the careful observer to believe he just might be getting the measure of the Mavericks pitcher. And indeed he was, as the one-handedlollygagger laced a two-run single that provided some very welcome breathing room.

The 15 minutes following Chace’s hit are probably not going to go into the Personal Maturity Highlight Reel of very many adults who were in and around field 5. The only possible positive is that no one got called a “huckleberry” this time, although a few other creative words were used. The most composed and mature individuals on hand turned out to be the dozen 9- and 10-year-olds wearing the navy 919 uniforms. They barely blinked, and proceeded to play two more flawless defensive innings on the way to the title.

The Nationals celebrated playing up for an 11U title with a championship selfie:

Championship Nationals scoring plays

Third inning

Asher singled and moved to second on Joey's walk. Ben’s shot to third wasn’t picked up cleanly, scoring Asher with the first 919 run of the day.

Score after two and a half innings: Mavericks 2, 919 Nationals 1

Fourth inning

Lawson coaxed a leadoff walk and moved to second on a wild pitch. Gavin reached on a ball past third. Lawson and Gavin pulled off a double steal. Banks worked a one-out walk that loaded the bases, and then a balk scored Lawson. With two outs, Gavin sprinted home on a throwing error by the catcher and scored on a fantastic slide around the tag.

Score after three and a half innings: 919 Nationals 3, Mavericks 2

Fifth inning

Asher led off with a single. Joey walked. Ben went through third once again to load the bases, and then Chace turned in the at-bat of the fall so far this year with a one-handed two-run single.

Score after four and a half innings: 919 Nationals 5, Mavericks 2

Pitching Performances

Elias started and worked through the dangerous top of the order.

Gavin cruised through 2.1 innings and allowed just one runner into scoring position.

Asher threw a hitless 1.2 innings.

Lawson closed it with a perfect sixth.

Championship Web Gems

• While pitching in the second, Gavin raced over and made a running catch of a pop fly near the first-base line.
• Nice scoop by Banks—on a weekend when 919 first basemen made a habit of making great pick-ups—of a low throw against the leadoff man in the third. Banks also made a nice short hop snag in the fifth.
• While playing catcher, Ben threw behind a runner at first in the fourth. The runner broke for second, but Banks quickly relayed the throw to Lawson, who tagged him for the second out.
• Great job by Andrew backing up his teammate in the outfield in the fifth. With two outs and nobody on, he backed up Eli and then threw a dart to Gavin covering second to retire the overeager runner who was trying to take an extra base.

·       

Championship line score	1	2	3	4	5	6	R	H
919 Nationals	0	0	1	2	2	0	5	7
Mavericks 11U	2	0	0	0	0	0	2	5

Top Gun World Series Qualifier Semifinals: 919 Nationals 10U 4, NSA Warhawks 11U 3

As a group, the team currently known as the 10U 919 Nationals have done quite a bit. They’ve won three state titles, a pair of southeast regional titles, and so many Top Gun championships that I’ve lost count. That’s not bragging—it’s just to give you some context on this next statement.

After 919 took a 4-3 walk-off win over the NSA Warhawks in Sunday’s semifinals of the Top Gun 11U tournament in Goldsboro, Coach Sean gathered the players and coaches down the left field line. “That,” he told the group, “was one of the best.”

And it was. The game was a rematch of Saturday’s pool play game, but was a much better played affair. It also featured one of the weirdest stats in 919 history, as the Nats were outhit 11-2, yet somehow found a way to win the game. The Warhawk starter was actually spinning a no-hitter through four innings, and of the four 919 runs, two scored on ground outs, one came across on a passed ball, and the final heart-pounding run crossed the plate when Gavin legged out an infield single in the bottom of the sixth. And stop me if this sounds familiar: three of the four runs in the game scored with two outs, meaning nine of the last 11 Nat runs have scored with two down.

The second-seeded Nationals combined the opportunistic offense with great pitching. Under the direction of Coach Kevin, 919 pitchers walked just one in six innings, while NSA walked six and hit another. Minimizing the baserunners (and occasionally just casually picking them off when they reached) meant that even when the Warhawks smacked a hit, it didn’t lead to a big inning.

The win moved the 919 “little kids” into the 11U championship game against the top-seeded Mavericks...a blog suitably recapping that game will probably need to be in eight installments with a video component on the Lifetime Network.

Semifinal Nationals scoring plays

First inning

Bryce walked, stole second and third, and scored on a fielder’s choice from Gavin.

Score after one inning: 919 Nationals 1, Warhawks 0

Fifth inning

Banks led off with a single and took second when the pitcher made a throwing error on a pickoff move. He went to third on a wild pitch. Andrew walked and stole second. JT drove in Banks with a fielder’s choice, and then Andrew scored on a passed ball.

Score after two innings: 919 Nationals 3, Warhawks 3

Sixth inning

Bryce drew a two-out walk. He went to second on a wild pitch and stole third. After Lawson walked and stole second, Gavin slapped it to shortstop and hustled it out, setting off a suitably enthusiastic walk-off mob on the field.

Score after six innings: 919 Nationals 4, Warhawks 3

Pitching Performances

Banks started and went three terrific innings.

Bryce threw over an inning and buzzed through the middle of the order.

Asher closed it out with two scoreless innings.

Semifinal Web Gems

• Lefties continued to demonstrate some ridiculous pickoff moves, as Banks picked off the leadoff man in the first. Brady came up to receive the throw and fired to Bryce to get the out at second.
• Chace “The One-Armed Bandit” came up throwing on a would-be single to right in the second and threw a laser to Brady at first to get the out.
• Chalk up another pickoff for Banks in the third, but by now that is more routine than web gem-worthy.
• And yet another roundabout pickoff in the fifth. This time Asher was pitching with runners on the corners. He went with the pickoff move to first, where somehow the obviously wise runner made it back in time. But Brady had other plans, and came up throwing from first to get the runner breaking from third. Brady tossed to Joey covering the plate, who made the tag to get the out.

Semifinal line score	1	2	3	4	5	6	R	H
NSA Warhawks	0	1	0	1	1	0	3	11
919 Nationals	1	0	0	0	2	1	4	2