Beach week proves costly for Post 16

By Ted Allen

Published: June 17, 2008

Baseball is a game where teams playing with passion will usually beat opponents who take a half-hearted approach at the plate and in the field.

With nearly half of its team at senior beach week, Lynchburg Post 16 wasn’t at full strength for Tuesday’s American Legion baseball game against Danville Post 325 at City Stadium.

But those who stayed in town may have had their minds elsewhere from the start, committing two errors that led to four Danville runs in the top of the first inning.

“It was definitely a lack of intensity early on,” Lynchburg coach Chris England said. “We looked really, really good defensively in the first game (win over Charlottesville) and the last three games, we’ve come out dead.

“There’s a lot to be said about the mentality of the game because you can come out here and go through the motions if you’re the best team on paper, but it doesn’t mean anything,” he added. “If you come out here and want to win, that’s when you start producing.”

Post 16 rallied for four runs in the third to take a 5-4 lead, but it was fleeting as Post 325 re-tied the game in the fourth and tacked on five runs in the fifth. Lynchburg battled back again, scoring three in the ninth before stranding the tying run on second and slipping to 1-3 with a 10-8 defeat.

“We showed spurts of intensity throughout the game and those two innings that we showed a little bit of life in the dugout, we actually put up seven runs in those two innings,” England said.

Danville (6-2) was missing some key players, as well, including two who are in the hospital and two others in Cancun, Mexico.

“I know that Chris is no where close to being at full strength, and neither are we,” Post 325 coach John Bailey said, noting the two hospitalized players were hurt in non-baseball related accidents — one who fractured his shoulder on a four-wheeler and another who ruptured his spleen on a dirt bike.

He was pleased with his offense’s 12-hit night, especially from the bottom of the lineup where Mark Nales was 3-for-5 and Brett Hylton and Josh Hackworth each delivered doubles.

“The kids got hits and we were able to run the bases in the fifth inning,” Bailey said of the five-run outburst when Danville batted around and got back-to-back RBI doubles into the gap in left-center from Hackworth and leadoff hitter Jeremy Revis (2-4). “But we’ve got to learn how to put games away. They had the tying runner on second base in the bottom of the ninth.”

That was Mac Ware, who went 4-for-5 with triple and four RBIs.

“Probably one of the best nights I’ve ever had, offensively at least,” the E.C. Glass graduate said. “We have a big hit right there in the last inning, I could probably have scored to tie it up.”

England was pleased with the comeback effort, considering the circumstances.

“I’m extremely satisfied with the way we hit today and the way we came back at the end,” he said. “We showed life and we showed we weren’t going to give up. We’re playing with 11 kids here, it’s hard. It’s hard sometimes to get motivated. They battled back there at the end and showed a lot of heart and I’m proud of them for that.”