TENINO — Playing its first 1A Evergreen League contest, weeks after it was originally scheduled to be played, the Tenino baseball team’s matchup against Montesano Thursday afternoon didn’t lack in runs scored.
Falling behind 14-3, the Beavers made a game of it late but couldn’t stop the Bulldogs’ offense in the slightest in a 19-16 loss in drizzly conditions at Beaver Ballpark.
“When you score 16, you’re usually winning games and it's usually in five,” Tenino coach Ryan Schlesser said after the loss.
Schlesser certainly wasn’t remiss about his batters, with the Beavers scoring 13 runs over the game’s final three innings to make it interesting, including a fifth inning grand slam from Easton Snider to stave off a run-rule loss and pull the Beavers within six.
But once again, walks and some sloppy defense led to more Monte runs in the sixth, with the Bulldogs building up a 10-run, 18-8 lead heading into the bottom half of a do-or-die inning for Tenino again.
The Beavers managed six more runs in the sixth to make the deficit somewhat manageable, and though Snider again came through in the seventh and the Beavers got the tying run at the plate, a pair of outs stranded two on base and left the Beavers walking to their dugout, looking to find some answers on the mound.
A week and a half after 14 walks led to its first loss of the season to Rochester, Tenino’s staff walked 15 more in Thursday’s loss to Montesano.
“Anytime there’s moisture we struggle to throw strikes,” Schlesser said. “And we play baseball in Western Washington so we have to get used to that. When we throw strikes we play pretty good defense, too, but when we start walking everyone it's hard to stay in it. You could kind of see we were down for a lot of the game until our bats came alive at the end.”
Cody Strawn got the start, and got through 2 2/3 innings before getting yanked in favor of Brody Noonan, who stopped the bleeding for an inning before having a hard time finding the strike zone himself in the fifth and sixth.
Strawn walked five batters with two strikeouts, and Noonan struck out seven, but walked nine in three innings of work, giving up seven runs with just three earned. Mikey Vasser closed the last inning and a third, letting one run cross with two strikeouts and two more walks.
“We need to get tougher on the mound,” Schlesser said. “We’ve been swinging it pretty well lately, we just need to continue to swing it and find a way to stop people from scoring runs.”
At the plate was a different story. Snider finished 2 for 3 with two walks drawn, seven RBIs, and three runs scored with the grand slam. Vasser smashed a homer himself, going 2 for 5 with a double as well to go along with four RBIs. Will Feltus went 3 for 5 with two runs scored and two RBIs at leadoff, and Austin Gonia went 3 for 4 with a walk drawn, a double and an RBI.
The Beavers are scheduled to play Hoquiam next week in Grays Harbor on Tuesday for a doubleheader, weather-permitting.
