Announcement
(REVISED) The South Florida Beach Bums overwhelmed the New York Thunderdogs 8-0 to win the NABA's Citrus Classic Wood Bat tournament at the Santaluces Complex on Monday, January 18.
Mike Terroni, who pitched twenty innings over two days, blanked the Thunderdogs on five hits, going the distance to earn the tournament's Most Valuable Player Award. After escaping a bases loaded situation in the first inning, Terroni was practically untouchable the rest of the way. Terroni kept the Thunderdogs hitting the ball on the ground or harmless fly balls to give the Palm Beach League based team the championship. Terroni is a member of the NY/NJ White Sox of the Rockland/Westchester, NY Adult League and was recruited for the tournament by the Beach Bums.
Terroni had plenty of offensive support as his teammates pounded out 15 hits, including seven doubles and a triple. Centerfielder Jimmy Efre, banged out a triple and two doubles. Jason Bryan had two doubles and drove in two runs. Matt Keenan cranked out three hits, including a double. His two run single with the bases loaded in the first inning put the Beach Bums ahead to stay. Danny LaPerna had a double and single, Dave Salley two singles, and Rob Wiley a double. Will Mucha and shortstop Joe Torre each had a hit, with Torre lashing an RBi single. Torre played flawlessly at shortstop and earned the Gold Glove award. He had four assists and two putouts and started a double play.
The Beach Bums played outstanding defensive baseball and committed no errors. Efre also played a fine game in center, snagging five fly balls. Matt Barad had two hits, Dino Mazzota, Vic Gaines and John Huerta one apiece for the Thunderdogs, who finished 3-0 in pool play before losing in the title game. The Thunderdogs had defeated the Beach Bums 7-3 in eleven innings on Saturday, the opening day of the tournament.
At the beginning of the day, it looked like the Beach Bums might not make the championship game. They trailed 5-1 against the East Coast Titans as they started the completion of a game suspended on Sunday by torrential rains. They allowed two more runs to trail by six going to the sixth inning. They rallied for six runs to tie, fell behind 9-7 going to the bottom of the 9th, then scored three runs to win it 10-9 and advance to the final. James Schroeder's triple scored two to make it 9-9, then Torre lashed a single to left for the walkoff victory.
Another Palm Beach League team, the Pirates, didn't fare as well, losing all three of their games in the tournament. However, they were playing without their two best pitchers, Jason Plocek and Damon Gammons. Several league players hooked up with tournament teams as pool players. The Pirates hope to clinch the regular season title this Sunday when they visit the Tigers in a 9:30AM game on Sataluces' Field #2. .The Bucs need one more win or one more Rangers' loss to take the division regular season championship.
The Rangers opted to play in another tournament in the Orlando area and failed to win one of their three pool games, but did manage a tie.
Check out the complete tournament scoreboard on the NABA national web site at www.dugout.org.
