The Record Newspapers - Hometown News For Orange County, Texas

Joey Encalade

Hometown Baseball

TheRecordLive

Wow, what a crazy week this has been in Orange County baseball!

In District 20-4A, the LC-M Bears split a pair of games. They lost to PN-G, and beat Livingston to stay on top of the standings. The Pirates also split their games by beating Central, and losing to PN-G.

In District 21-3A, the Orangefield Bobcats had a nice week by beating WO-S and Hampshire-Fannett. The Mustangs split two games; they lost to Orangefield, but won their first district game against Bridge City. Bridge City had a rough week because they lost both to Silsbee and WO-S.

A nice battle took place in West Orange between the Mustangs and Orangefield Bobcats. Both teams were playing to see who would get their first district win. The Bobcats came out on top 3-2. There were two fine pitching performances by Orangefield’s Quinton Evans, and West Orange’s Jacoy Finney. They both hurled complete games. In the loss, Finney gave up eight hits, walked two, and struck out six. Evans gave up six hits, walked two, and struck out nine.

No scoring took place in the game until the fourth inning. Austin Scales, Jake Best, and Parker James had three consecutive singles. Luke Johnson drew a RBI walk that scored Scales for the first run of the game. Westin Crain then hit a sac fly that scored Best. The Mustangs looked like they would score a run in the third inning, but a nice throw from right fielder Parker James gunned down James Thomas when he was trying to score on a fly ball from Zane Anderson.

The Stangs did scratch back in the fourth; Jordan Darnall led off with a double, advanced to third on Finney ground out, and then scored on Daniel Woodson’s single. Orangefield would score an insurance run in the fifth. Evans hit a single, stole second, and scored on Jonathon DeRamus’ single. The Mustangs pulled within one in the sixth after Woodson’s third single of the game. The single kept him

perfect at the plate, and he scored on Chaz York’s triple. West Orange had another hit in the game, an infield single by James Thomas in the fifth inning. Scales and James both contributed with another hit each. Scales with a single, and James with a double; Jacob Brown added a bunt single in the third.

The Bridge City Cardinals lost a tough one to the Silsbee Tigers 8-6. The Cardinals fought back in the seventh inning with a two run homerun by Mitchel Hubbard, but the Tigers were able to hold on for the win. The Cardinals scored one run in the second, two in the third, one in the fifth and two in the seventh.

The Cardinals collected seven hits in the game; two were from Matt Menard, a double and a single. Cameron Dishon had a triple, and Dylan Mulhollan had a double. Brandon Simoneaux and Zach Smith each hit singles. Forrest Zoch recorded the loss while pitching into the fifth inning. He gave up five hits, walked seven, and struck out four. Hayden Guidry relieved Zoch in the fifth, and pitched into the sixth inning. Guidry gave up one hit, struck out one, and allowed two walks, one being intentional.

Zane Anderson stepped up his game in a must win for the West-Orange Stark Mustangs as they gave the Bridge City Cardinal their second district loss in a row. Anderson pitched a complete game, while giving up six hits, walking two, and striking out six on his way to a 4-2 victory. Anderson’s defense played a solid game behind him.

In the sixth inning Bridge City’s Preston Pitman reached first on a walk, and went to second on a sac bunt from Zach Smith, but was thrown out by a nice throw from center fielder Darius Mitchell when he tried to reach third on a fly ball from Dylan Mulhollan. The Cardinals scored the first run of the game. Cameron Dishon reached on an error, stole second, went to third on the throwing error from the catcher, and then scored on a ground ball error off the bat of Mitchel Hubbard.

The Mustangs responded with two runs in the second. Jacoy Finney led off with a double, and scored on Cash McCarson’s double. Daniel Woodson had a ground out that advanced McCarson to third. A squeeze situation that looked as if it would backfire turned out good for the Stangs. Chaz York attempted the squeeze, but did not execute the bunt. McCarson turned to get back to third, when he found the ball going past him to left field, which allowed him to score easily.

The Cardinals tied the game in the fourth with four consecutive singles. Forrest Zoch led off

with a single, but was picked off first by Anderson. Hubbard hit his first of two singles, followed by Matt Menard and Preston Pitman’s singles. Zach Smith hit into a fielder choice that allowed Hubbard to score, bringing our score to 2-2 through four innings.

The Mustangs took the lead for good in the seventh. With two outs, Mitchell drew a walk, followed by Anderson’s second single of the game. Jordan Darnall drew a walk to load the bases, and Finney hit a clutch two run scoring single to put the Mustangs in front 4-2. Anderson put the Cardinals down in order in the bottom of the inning to seal the win. The only other hit in the game was a single from Brandon Simoneaux in the fifth inning. Jacob Lemoine pitched five innings; he gave up three hits, walked four, and struck out five. Hayden Guidry relieved Lemoine after one batter in the sixth, and gave up two hits, two walks, and struck out three.

Jonathon DeRamus and the Orangefield Bobcats jumped all over the Hampshire-Fannett Longhorns to the tone of 16-3 strumming. DeRamus was a triple away from the cycle, instead he hit two homeruns, a double, and a single, while collecting five RBI’s. The Longhorns jumped on the board first with one run in the first inning, and they scored two more in the third off of pitcher Jakob Brown. Brown went the distance; he allowed five hits to accompany his five strikeouts on his way to the victory.

The Bobcats smashed thirteen hits in the contest, and were led by DeRamus and Austin Scales, who were both perfect for the night, going four for four. The Bobcats scored three in the first inning, with DeRamus’ first long ball being the first run. Scales hit his first single, went to second, on Parker James’ first hit, a single, and they both moved over ninety feet on a pass ball. Luke Johnson hit a ground ball to third that the third basemen could not handle, and plated Scales and James.

The Cats used a ten run third inning to put the game out of reach.

In the third inning DeRamus led off with his second long ball of the game.

Scales scored on a double from Parker James after he got on with a single.

Johnson then scored James with a single.

Braxton Smith stepped in and hit a double scoring Johnson.

Eric Truncale drew a walk, and Brown loaded the bases with a catcher interference call.

Quinton Evans received an RBI the hard way by getting hit by a pitch.

DeRamus and Scales then both hit run scoring singles.

Jake Best got to first on an error from the third baseman that allowed another run to score.

Speedy Logan Moss went to second to pinch run for Scales.

Johnson and Smith drew free passes allowing Moss to trot in for the last run of the third inning.

The Bobcats put their three final runs on the board in the fourth inning. Brown was hit by a pitch, and Evans drew a walk. DeRamus and Scales were at it again, getting RBI hits. DeRamus with a double, and Scales received two RBI’s with a single. Jake Best also had a single in the fourth frame.

Fueled by a nice pitching performance from PN-G’s Austin Stone, and a grand slam off the bat of Collin Gizzi, the Indians gave the LC-M Bears their first district loss. The Bears scored in the first, third, and fourth innings. The Bears had six hits against Stone, led by James Swan with two hits, a double and a single. Kevin Adams had a home run, and Ryan Carline had a double. Hunter Gonzalez and Zach Drouillard each had a single. Carline took the lost in the pitching department while giving up seven hits, walking three, and striking out four. PN-G scored in the first, second, and sixth innings, with the long ball coming in the second inning. The final score was 7-4.

The Bears bounced back with an 8-4 victory over the Livingston Lions. They used three two run long balls to aid the victory. Ryan Waddell, Zach Drouillard, and Hunter Gonzalez did the honors. Gonzalez was perfect at the plate going three for three with a walk, a double, and a single that added to his homerun. Kevin Adams, James Swan, and Jonathan Allen contributed with two hits each, all being singles. Scott Vaughan, Alex Blem, and Ryan Carline also had singles in the contest. Kody Smith and Reid Fults took care of the pitching. Smith gave up two hits, walked five and struck out eight. Fults gave up three hits, walked two, hit one batter, and struck out three.

The Vidor Pirates easily took care of Central 10-0. Vincent Armstrong, Curtis Watkins, and Paul Fregia took care of the pitching duties. The Pirates had only two hits against PN-G in a 2-0 loss. PN-G scored the only runs in the game in the fifth inning, aided by errors from the Pirates. Another nice pitching performance by Hunter Hagler recorded the loss. He only gave up thee hits, walked one, hit one batter, and impressively struck out ten.

District standing through today:

Dist. 20 4A Dist. 21 3A

Team W L Team W L

LCM 5 - 1 Silsbee 3 - 0

Nederland 5 - 1 Orangefield 2 - 1

Livingston 4 - 2 HF 2 - 1

Lumberton 3 - 3 West Orange-Stark 1 - 2

Vidor 3 - 3 Bridge City 1 - 2

PN-G 3 - 3 HJ 0 - 3

Ozen 1 - 5

Central 0 - 6

This week: LC-M travels to Nederland Tuesday for the battle for first place, and then will travel to Lumberton Friday. Vidor was scheduled to travel to Livingston Tuesday, and will make the trip to Nederland Friday. Orangefield had Hardin-Jefferson Tuesday, and will skip across the bayou Friday to face Bridge City. Bridge City had a game scheduled with Hampshire-Fannett Tuesday, and will host Orangefield Friday.

See the upcoming editions of The Record newspapers for the best photos and more in our Hometown Baseball article. See you at the park!