Gladstone Indians Beat Rain Storm, Blue Storm

GLADSTONE----It was like playing baseball inside a giant bowl of mashed potatoes.

The Gladstone Indians and Ishpeming Blue Storm played two scoreless innings in a Mid Pen League American Legion game Tuesday night at Don Olsen Field. And then, the rains came. And the downpour was so heavy that the infield quickly turned to mud.

The rain stopped almost as quickly as it came, but the field, especially the pitcher's mound, was wrecked. But the two teams decided to keep playing, and after a 25-minute delay and a bunch of dirt being thrown on the mound and home plate, the Indians managed to slip past the Blue Storm, 4-0, to improve to 10-1 on the season.

Gladstone relief pitcher Colin O'Neal deals with muddy cleats.

"I was just like a mud hole out there," Gladstone pitcher Blake Ballard said. "You'd step, and you'd just sink right down. Couldn't even get your footing. The dirt did not help one bit. It was still terrible."

"He struggled there after the rain," Gladstone Manager Jim Groleau said. "We did the best we could to fix it (the mound) up. And of course, the elements were the same for both teams."

Gladstone got just two base hits: a lead-off single by Matt Weyers in the third inning, and a one-out single by Cody Frazer in the fifth inning.

The team seemed to be stuck in the mud (so to speak) all night long.

"We didn't get any practice because we got drenched yesterday," Groleau said. "Coach (Rob) Hardwick and I talked about how teams play after having a few days off with no practice. And it showed. We weren't taking good swings, swinging at balls in the sand."

"It was ugly," he added.

Blake Ballard Interview.

The Indians were able to take advantage of Ishpeming mistakes to push across single runs in each of the final four innings to earn the victory.

That came after Ballard struggled with the elements, but worked out of a big jam.

Ishpeming first baseman Kirk Guckenberg with the stretch.

In the third inning, after the rain delay, Ballard walked two batters and gave up a hit to Gunnar Meyer. The bases were loaded with no outs, and Ballard was struggling to deal with all of the mud in his cleats. But he got Josh Richards to hit into a force play, struck out Kirk Guckenberg, and then got Sawyer Fisher to ground out. It was still 0-0.

"Fraz (catcher, Cody) started calling fastballs because my curveball wasn't going so well," Ballard said. "That was a a scary inning."

"For us to have bases loaded jam with nobody out and not give up a run, that was a huge a big lift for us," Jim Groleau said. "It was huge for Blake to work through it."

Gladstone broke the tie in the bottom of the third inning when Weyers singled, went to second on a wild pitch, went to third on a groundout, and scored on a Frazer grounder that was missplayed at third base for an error.

In the fourth inning, two more errors and an intentional walk to Weyers loaded the bases for the Indians. Christian Groleau's sacrafice fly made it 2-0.

Ishpeming got a leadoff single from Jake Richards to start the fifth inning, but Meyer hit into a 6-4-3 double play turned nicely by Jake Pearson at short and Paul Tomaszewski at second. Then, in the bottom of the fifth, Gladstone scored another run as Tomaszewski was hit by a pitch and eventually scored on a groundout by Pearson.

Paul Tomaszewski leads off of second base.

The final run came in the sixth inning on a Tomaszewski sacrafice fly.

"Sometimes, you've got to go to 'small ball' when the power isn't there," Jim Groleau said. "We weren't getting line drives, so we had to scratch out runs wherever we could."

Ballard pitched the first five innings to get the win. He allowed three hits and three walks, striking out four batters.

Colin O'Neal pitched the final two innings for the Indians, allowing one baserunner (a walk), and striking out three batters.

Ishpeming (1-4) got good pitching from Richards, who threw four innings and allowed two runs (both unearned) on one hit. Jarrett Davidson pitched the final two innings, and gave up two runs (one earned) on one base hit.

Gladstone travels to Escanaba for a game against the Eskymo high school team on Wednesday. Game time is at 6:00 at Al Ness Field. The game is being broadcast live on WCHT-AM (600), and on the Internet at www.rrnsports.com.

Click the thumbnails in the ARTICLE HIGHLIGHTS box at the top of this page to see even more pictures, taken by Kym Frazer.