2008 Planetary Extreme Championship Recap: Game 5

[John]

35,720 fans – the largest crowd in Planetary Extreme Championship history – packed into the final game to be played at New Frontier Park last night.. They came to cheer on their hometown Trendsetters, hoping they could bounce back after Tuesday’s stinging loss.. The task would not be easy: New Orleans would be going up again Norberto “Pickles” Pacheco, who shut them out just 5 days ago in Game 1 of the series.. With the series heading back to Gnat Field for game 6, Wednesday’s contest essentially amounted to a must-win for the Trendsetters.. What it ended up being was a classic – without a doubt the most exciting PEC game in PEBA’s young history.

The first scoring action of the game came in the top of the 3rd and was due largely to some astute play-calling by Gnats manager Wayne Kedsch, who had taken considerable criticism for some of his decisions earlier in the series.. Jeffery Graham led off the inning with a walk.. Kedsch promptly ordered the next batter, António Romero, to lay down a sacrifice bunt.. The sacrifice was successful and immediately paid off when Jesús Márquez rapped a single over the head of the shortstop and into center for a base hit, scoring Graham from second.

Powell Clark was next up and sent a grounder to third baseman Dominic Gagné that would have been a tailor-made double play, but because Kedsch had ordered a hit-and-run Gagné had no play on Márquez at second and was forced to settle for the out at first.. With the inning extended, Anthony Pace took advantage by crushing a 1-0 pitch 409’ to right-center for a two-run homer, his third in two games.

New Orleans answered with a run of their own in the bottom half of the inning thanks to a two-out rally.. Dave Lewis got things rolling with a double down the third base line.. Jeff Cline, the Trendsetters hottest hitter in the playoffs, brought Lewis in with a single to right.. When Ernest “Sourface” Conard followed with a single of his own, it looked like the Trendsetters might have something big brewing with the dangerous Gagné coming to the plate.. Gagné lined one to center that looked like it would fall in, but CF Pace made a fine running catch that ended the inning and defused the threat.. New Orleans would close to within one of Crystal Lake in the 4th, however, when Augusto Valdéz hit his fifth home run of the playoffs, a towering sky shot that barely cleared the wall in right.

That comeback work would be undone in Crystal Lake’s half of the 6th inning.. Things got rolling when Manny López nailed a one-out, 1-1 pitch from Chandler Davis down the first base line.. It rolled deep into the outfield and bounced hard off the corner wall, fooling right fielder Cooper Scott.. By the time he caught up to the ball and got it into the infield the plodding López had made it all the way to third base, becoming the unlikely owner of the first triple of the PEC.. Davis intentionally walked Graham to set up the double play chance, but it was not to be as Romero lined one into left field for a hit.. López scored easily and Graham advanced to second.. Two batters later Graham would come around to score when Floyd Gates bobbled a Clark grounder for his first error of the series.. Gates trotted to the dugout with his head down when the inning ended.

You would think the Trendsetters would be demoralized after seeing their hard comeback work undone.. However, something had been happening as the innings passed.. New Orleans’ batters were taking Pickles deep – not out of the park (with the exception of Valdéz’s shot in the 4th), but deep in the count.. The patient Trendsetters forced Pickles to toss 18, 24, 21, 14 and 14 pitches through the first five innings, a total of 91 pitches.. That discipline had helped lay the foundation for a 6th inning rally.

Leading things off was “Sourface” Conard, who reached first on a base hit and subsequently scored on Dominic Gagné’s double that bounced off the wall in left field.. Whereas he threw 106 pitches in 7.1 innings in game 1, Pacheco tossed 99 pitches in game 5 and wasn’t able to record an out in the 6th.. Pickles was promptly yanked in favor of Merlin Peters.. The move at first paid off; Valdéz was retired on a grounder to third.. Scott kept the Trendsetters rolling with, though, with an RBI liner to right field.. Peters bounced back to strike out Leonard Martin on a check-swing 96 MPH that painted the corner.

That brought up the #9 hitter Gates, the goat in the top half of the inning.. Gates quickly fell down 0-2.. Looking to put him away, Peters came inside with a screwball.. Too far inside, in fact: Gates was plunked in the ribs and took his base, advancing Scott to second.. Perhaps still shaken by letting Gates off the hook, Peters hung an 0-1 changeup to Jorge Ruíz.. Ruíz turned on it and placed a chopper right between second and first base.. Clark looked to have a bead on it until the ball took a large hop on the final bounce and went over his glove and into the outfield.. Mark Frazier, who has played excellent defense this series, charged the ball hard and fired a strike to Graham.. The ball arrived at the plate just as Scott did but the home plate umpire wasted no time in demonstratively calling Scott safe.. New Orleans had come all the way back: the game was tied at 5.

Peters would again find trouble in the 7th.. One-out walks to Conard and Gagné forced Peters out in favor of Markus Shepherd.. Valdéz greeted the new Gnats pitcher rudely by hitting his third pitch through the infield and into right, scoring Conard.. The Trendsetters took their first lead of the game, 6-5.

The mighty Gnats didn’t win 118 games this season by capitulating when things looked down, though.. After Valdéz again frustrated Crystal Lake with a beautiful diving catch to rob López of extra bases leading off the 8th inning, Rodney McLeod came in to pitch for the Trendsetters and was welcomed with back-to-back singles by Graham and Romero.. New Orleans manager David Parks wasted no time pulling the plug on McLeod.. Armando “Vacuum” Otero was called on to clean up the mess.. Otero, who has struggled during the playoffs, started off well by striking out pinch hitter Rex Groves.. He was unable to sweep Clark under the rug, though.. The pesky leadoff hitter rapped a liner over the leaping reach of Gates at second, scoring Graham without a throw.

The score remained tied at 6 until the 11th inning, and that’s when the fireworks really went off.. New Orleans close Dave Phelps, who had come on to retire the final batter in the 10th, seemed set to cruise through the inning after two quick grounders to short.. Once again it was Anthony Pace who got things moving for the Gnats.. Pace worked a walk out of an 8-pitch at-bat that seemed to take the steam out of Phelps.. P.J. Thomas followed with a duck snort to shallow right field.. Second baseman Gates ran out and RF Scott came in, but neither man took charge and the ball fell in between them.. With Pace flying around second, Scott picked up the ball and air-mailed a throw to third base that sailed over Gagné’s head.. Thomas advance to second on the error and Pace would have scored if Phelps hadn’t been astutely backing up the play.. Frazier made the Trendsetters pay for their mistake by blooping a base hit to shallow center.. Ruíz was playing in and was able to keep Thomas at third, but Pace scored to put the Gnats up 7-6 and give them a line on a 3-2 series lead.

José “Spanky” Ortíz, who had recorded the final two outs in the Trendsetters’ half of the 10th, was left in to close out the game and secure himself a win.. Spanky had been on fire heading into the PEC, not allowing a single run since a game on August 22nd against Reno.. He was reached for a run in 2.1 innings during his long PEC appearance in game 2.

Quickly he found himself in deep trouble.. “Sourface” Conard worked a leadoff walk.. Gagné followed with a ball that dropped just fair on the left field line and rolled for a double, placing runners at second and third with nobody out.. With the Trendsetters fans roaring in anticipation of yet another amazing comeback, Spanky composed himself and retired Valdéz on a 3-2 swinging strike.. Kedsch ordered an intentional walk of Scott to set up the force at every base.. That brought Martin to the plate.. The infield came in to cut off a run at the plate on a potential ground ball, but there was no need to worry: Spanky made Martin look foolish swinging at a 95 MPH fastball up at his eyes.. A collective groan went throughout New Frontier Park.

Desi James had come in to pinch hit for Gates in the 10th and was promptly intentionally walked.. The Gnats didn’t have that luxury this time around.. James, a 9th round selection in the PEBA Inaugural Draft, just turned 22 on the 9th of this month.. He was everything the Trendsetters could have hoped for as a 20-year-old in his first pro season, amassing 18 HR and 77 RBI in 2007.. 2008 has been far less kind to him; James managed just 2 HR during a season which saw him lose his starting job once Gagné was acquired from the London Underground.

Now the youngster found himself standing at the plate feeling the 35,720 pairs of eyes filled with hope and fear boring into him.. One could forgive him for feeling a bit jumpy, and perhaps he was feeling that pressure when he took a mighty hack at the very first pitch thrown by Spanky Ortíz.. The strength of the swing belied the weak contact, but it was enough to fool Pace into taking a step back before realizing the ball was going to fall in front of him.. Conard scored easily and Gagné – the man who replaced James as a starter – lumbered around third base with the full head of steam his limited running speed would allow.. Pace’s throw was on line but took a couple of hops to reach the plate.. That was just enough of a window for Gagné to slide on the outside part of the plate and reach back with his hand to touch home before Graham could turn around and swipe him with the tag.

Pandemonium ensued as the New Orleans dugout emptied in a rush, fireworks shot into the air and fans burst into jubilant whoops and hollers.. Just a little away from where James was being mobbed at first base, Spanky Ortíz sat on the mound holding his head in his glove while the Gnats quickly disappeared from the dugout and into the visitors’ clubhouse.. Anthony Pace was one of the last to leave.. Just moments earlier he had been named the Player of the Game on the national television broadcast.. Now the new PotG was taking a ride around the infield on the arms of his teammates.. On this night, young Desi James was the Hero of New Orleans.

Game time was 4 hours, 1 minute.. The PEC will return to Gnat Field for Game 6.. Start time is 7:05 PM.. Crystal Lake will look to stave off elimination by sending José Cruz (2-1, 2.45 ERA) to the mound.. New Orleans will counter with Edward Coleman (2-0, 1.04 ERA).