Charles W. Flanagan High School Baseball

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 "There's No Place Like the Neighborhood"

On a day where the Falcons could of easily been distracted and overlooked their opponent because of their matchup with West Broward on Friday, they stayed focused and took care of business in a 6 inning shortened game.

The offensive was lead by Andres Visbal. He went 3-4 with a walk, a 2 run HR and had 4 RBI's on the day. Rick Sanchez went 3-3 with 3 RBI and a walk, and Oscar Rodriguez had 3 hits as well.

The Falcons jumped on the Gators early with 3 in the top of 1st. Visbal lead off with a BB, Andres Sanchez following that up with a BB of his own. Rick Sanchez started the scoring off with a 2 RBI single to drive both Visbal and Andres Sanchez in for a 2-0 lead. Daniel Oliveri came up with an RBI single to drive in Rick Sanchez to make the score 3-0. In the 2nd, Oscar Rodriguez started everything off with a 1 out double down the left line. Visbal then stepped up and drove a fastball over the right field fencefor a 5-0 lead. Andres Sanchez then doubled off the left field fence and Rick Sanchez proceeded to increase the lead to 6-0 with another RBI single. In the 5th, Benito Santiago started the inning with a walk and a stolen base. Oscar Rodriguez singled and Visbal came up with an RBI single. Two sacrifice fly's later by AJ Munoz and Andres Sanchez and the score was at 10-1. With 1 out in the 6th, Rafael Betances singled. Visbal capped the scoring off for the day with another RBI single that made the score 11-1.

Gentry Fortuno improved to 3-0 and seemed to have everything under control on the hill. He limited the Gators to just 3 hits and 1 unearned run, while striking out 5 in 5 innings. Jose Mesa came in to pitch the 6th and got 2 strikeouts to close out the game. 

The Falcons (6-1, 4-0) will travel to West Broward (7-0, 4-0) for a 1st place showdown. Game time is 3:45. 

The JV hosted the Jaguers this past Saturday and got served a loss in the first game of a doubleheader.

In Game 1, the young Falcons looked sluggish and didn't get much done offensively. Alejandro Garcia pitched 6 innings giving up 4 earned runs in the 6-2 loss. Andres Rios was a bright light for the offense. Rios went 3-3 with a triple and a run scored. David Sarmiento added 2 hits of his own as well.

In Game 2, the bats came alive and the Falcons were able to bounce back to come out on top 13-3.  Peter Guarner started the game and pitched 5 innings earning the win in a game that ended early due to the mercy rule. Andres Rios was the offensive star again going 3-3, HBP and scoring 4 runs. He ended the day 6-6 with 5 runs scored and a HBP. David Sarmiento didn't want to be outdone and went 2-3 with 2 RBI and scored 2 runs.Sarmiento ended his day 4-6 with 2 RBI and scored 2 runs. Ryan Dodge went 2-2, 2 BB's and 3 RBI.

The Young Falcons (5-2) will host Everglades in a midweek contest on Wednesday at 6:30.

On a night when the Falcons weren't doing much offensively it wouldn't take much more than 1 run to win with Jose Mesa Jr. on the hill. Mesa helped the Falcons improve to 3-0 in the District with a No-Hit performance.

Mesa (3-0) was simply unhittable, striking out 18 hitters out of the possible 21 he faced in the District matchup. He topped out at 93 mph multiple times and sat at 89-91 mph all night long. Only 3 balls were even put in play by the Lightning on the night. 2 fly outs  to left and the 3rd would cost Mesa the perfect game. With 1 out in the 7th, another pop up was hit to shallow left field. Shortstop Andres Sanchez went hard to get to it and seemed as though he made the catch until the ball fell from his glove. Although Mesa didn't get the perfect game he did keep the no-hitter and showed just how good he can be. Mesa helped his own cause when he doubled into right center his first at bat. David Sarmiento came in to run for Mesa and ended up scoring on the RBI single by Ismael Reyes.

On the offensive side Rick Sanchez stole any show there was with a 2-3, 2 RBI performance. Sanchez also hit a solo homerun in the botom of the 6th to pad the lead and make it 5-0 going into the 7th inning. AJ Munoz, Ismael Reyes and Oscar Rodriguez all had 1 hit and 1 RBI.

The Falcons (5-1, 3-0) will travel to Everglades for a 3:45 District game on Tuesday.

Joel Carranza enters his 1st season as a part of the Flanagan coaching staff. He serves as the catching coach and one of the assistant coaches on JV. Flanagan is Coach Carranza's first coaching job after graduating from Flanagan in 2007. Joel was a member of the 2004 Flanagan Baseball team that made it to the Regional Final and the team in 2007 that made it to the Final Four. In 2007 Carranza was 3rd team All-American, 2nd team All-State and Broward County's Player of the Year. Joel had a 25 game hitting streak that lasted the entire regular season in 2007. Coach Carranza was drafted after his senior year by the Tampa Bay Rays. He decided to go to college where in 2008 he went to Broward College where he played his 1st year of collegiate baseball.  In 2011 Carranza signed a professional contract to go play Independent Baseball for the Rudoso Osos where he spent last year. At the end of Carranza's 2011 season he was signed by the Alpine Cowboys where he will be playing his 2012 season as the starting catcher.