Jays fall to Dodgers in Bolton

July 20, 2016 · 0 Comments

By Bill Rea

Forget the fourth inning, and it was a pretty even and entertaining match last Wednesday night between the Bolton Dodgers and the Aurora Jays in Bolton.

But the fourth did happen, and it resulted in the 6-2 final for the Dodgers.

“We had decent pitching, we had decent defence and we had hard-hit balls that they made decent plays on,” was the way coach Rob Wilson summed up the evening at the end.

Nathan Robinson was solid on the mound for the Jays for the first three innings, allowing just two hits, although he had a bit of a problem with hitting batters with pitches. Three reached first that way. Devon Wu came on in relief in the fifth.

The Jays were first to score when centre fielder Stephan Vallee crossed the plate after the Dodgers allowed three base hits in a row to him, first baseman Chris Rettie and third baseman Brad Crosby, but the Dodgers were quick to tie things up in their end of the frame. Designated hitter Nick Taconga led off with a single, and his fleetness of foot enabled him to get to third when second baseman Luke Ratcliffe advanced him with a sacrifice bunt. First baseman Michael Gemmiti got him home on a double.

Bolton took command in their end of the fourth. Dodgers’ coach Andrew English, who was playing third base, got on when he was hit by a pitch, and centre fielder Shawn Hansen advanced him and reached base with a bunt that stayed on the fair side of the third-base line. Left fielder Shaun Bijai advanced both runners with a sacrifice bunt of his own, and Ratcliffe got the pair home on a single. Ratcliffe was able to get to third when he started to steal as catcher Jon Bloomfield connected for a single, and Gemmiti was able to get them both home with a double.

The Dodgers added their sixth run in the fifth when right fielder Marlon Young opened with a double, and then Taconga got him home on a bases-loaded single.

Aurora was able to get their final run in the sixth when short stop Ted Beadle crossed the plate after opening the frame with a single. Catcher Chris Fafalios and left fielder Kyle Handley both contributed base hits, and right fielder Kyle Picken got Beadle home by hitting into a bases-loaded double play with no outs.

“We haven’t played poorly,” Wilson observed. “We need to fix that extra gear (going into the playoffs).”

The only real problem in the game came when the lights at the North Hill Park diamond went out just as the teams were going into the top of the fifth, and they stayed out about 15 minutes, but Wilson said it didn’t negatively impact his guys.