RICHMOND — A few errors in a high school baseball game can be costly. Ten errors is nothing short of deadly.
Richmond forced East-West conference foe Rangeley to learn that the hard way on Thursday, when the Bobcats capitalized on the mistakes and drove in 14 runs en route to a dominant 10-run mercy-rule win in six innings.
“Put the ball in the play,” Richmond coach Ryan Gardner said of his team’s offensive performance. “Went up there and attacked the baseball and put the ball in play. You put the ball in play, make things happen.”
Brendan Emmons of Richmond (6-4) made Rangeley (5-4) pay early, when he doubled into the right-center field gap and made way for Curtis Anderson in the bottom of the first inning. Anderson, with two outs, popped a routine fly ball into center field that dropped on the grass and allowed Emmons to score the game’s first run.
Then, in the bottom of the third inning, the Bobcats rallied with two outs again. Zach Small started off the frame with a single that eventually turned into a run after Anderson reached second on another error in the next at-bat. Brady Johnson, Nate Kendrick, Nate Vintinner and Dan Stewart then reeled off four RBI singles in a row to make the score 5-1.
“You don’t want to give them five outs,” Rangeley coach Jeffrey LaRochelle said. “Because it’s going to be five runs. We earned the runs against them, so we need to make them earn.”
Ricky Thompson scored a pair of runs for Rangeley in the third and fifth inning, but the home side was just getting started. Lakers’ starter Kyle LaRochelle was pulled after 60 pitches and four innings of work on the mound, and Bo Beaulieu was in for a rude awakening as his replacement.
After striking out the first batter he faced and earning a quick second out, a wild pitch hit Stewart and sparked another two-out rally. Mitchell Couturier, Matt Rines and Emmons all reached base on errors and all eventually scored for Richmond. Small earned another walk before Anderson doubled him home and scored on the fourth error of the inning himself.
The two-out, six-run rally came mere minutes after Rangeley had scored a pair of runs in the top of the fifth and made the score 6-4. Richmond used a formula of first-pitch swinging, singling and base running to increase the damage and multiply the runs.
“See if we can get in scoring position, and then we’re going,” Gardner said. “If there’s two outs, we’re going to try and score every single time. They’re going to have to make a good throw.”
“Our whole thing is, because we make the mistake defensively, they change how they run bases,” LaRochelle said. “If it’s a close game, everyone’s playing that hit. You play it differently when it’s a one-run game.”
In all, the Bobcats stole second base 11 times and sprayed six RBI singles. Anderson led the way from the cleanup spot, going 4-for-4 with a two-RBI double in the decisive fifth inning.
“I tried to just jump on the first pitch,” Anderson said. “I hit really well.”
On the mound, Small went the distance, throwing 99 pitches and striking out four in six innings. Both of his walks came just before final outs of the inning and two of the runs he gave up were unearned.
“He really could have self destructed, but he didn’t today,” Gardner said of Small. “He gutted it out. Things didn’t go well that inning, but he knew his stuff was good, so he got through that.”
Emmons ended the day with three hits and two RBIs for Richmond, while Stewart reached base three times and scored twice. Thompson reached first in all three of his at bats for Rangeley, with Zack Clark driving in a pair of runs and LaRochelle scoring on a wild pitch.
The two teams will meet again in Rangeley on May 27, 4 p.m.
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