Holden Goodman, playing second, wasn't about to let that happen. He snagged that ball out of midair. Despite having a cannonball fired right at him, Sires kept his head focussed on the play, got to first for an "easy" put out of Ferguson to end the threat and maintain a 6-0 lead.
That was the kind of night the Franklin Little League All-stars were going to have.
On the day, Franklin was as solid in the field as they were with their bats.
They didn't.
It looked like they were about to go quietly with first two-batters going down. But then life. Suddenly they had runners on every base.
Sires was in relief and in a little bit of trouble. He threw a wild pitch that made it passed Tanner Hefferman to the backstop. Clarion's Brady Clinger saw an opportunity to get one of those runs back and dashed toward home. Sires alertly also dashed to home plate from the mound. Hefferman corralled the ball from the short backstop, tossed to Sires in plenty of time to nab the sliding Clarion player to end the contest 11-0.
""We had a little problem last week in a scrimmage amongst ourselves. We had a lot of kids taking called third strikes," he said. "I wanted to make sure we didn't have that tonight, I don't think we had (a strikeout)(strikeout) tonight which is great, it's a testament to the kids hard work, they listen, its a great team."
"We decided we were going to give out awards, not necessarily to the kid that did the best, but to the kid that steps up when they might be struggling. We call it the BAGUBA."

He explained it's an acronym that his wrestling coach used in high school that stands for "Brutally Agressive Guy Uninhibited By Adversity."
"It is about the player who maybe struck out three times, but gets up to bat with two guys on and drills one to the outfield," Goodman explained.
BAGUBA.
"There was no individual, it was a complete team effort."
"I don't really see a hole, It's a solid team from start to finish. There is no individualism on the team, we preach that pretty heavy - one guy ain't gonna win it - it's gotta be a team effort."
Action resumes Monday for all teams, but they are awaiting times and locations. Oil City will play Cranberry. Franklin will play the Butler v. ACV/SOCAL winner. Titusville will face Knox in the loser's bracket and Clarion awaits the Butler v. ACV/SOCAL loser. New Bethlem awaits the winner of the Knox v. Titusville game. View more photos at: https://sayerrich.zenfolio.com/p735548083 |