Season ends for Rockets

KANKAKEE, Ill. — The Portland Rockets’ season has come to an end.
A trio of fielding errors and inopportune strikeouts led to a 6-4 defeat to the Michigan City Lakers in the losers’ bracket of the National Amateur Baseball Federation regional tournament at Kankakee Community College.
“We usually have a high baseball IQ,” said Portland manager Randy Miller, whose team finished 20-8. “We extended their inning and gave them more thrust. We can’t have five-out innings.”
With a 2-1 lead in the top half of the fourth inning, Michigan City — it eventually won the championship with a 15-3 victory against the Joliet Dirtbags in the title game — padded its lead thanks to the first of three mishaps by the Rockets. Following a leadoff triple, the Lakers scored a run on an error by Alex Delk.
In the fifth, another error led to three Michigan City runs for a 6-1 lead.
Portland responded in the bottom half of the frame, however, with three runs. Brandon Reamon drove in Jay County High School graduate Thomas McCowan on an RBI double, Justin Marrero knocked in Dalton Tinsley on a sacrifice and later scored on an RBI single from former Patriot Mitch Waters.
Playing as the home team and trailing 6-4, Portland had a chance to tie the game and, perhaps, even earn a walkoff victory.
Marrero drew a leadoff walk and remained on first as Delk and Waters both popped out. Bill Geeslin — he, Reamon and Tinsley each had a pair of hits for Portland — was hit by a pitch to give Portland two on with two outs.
South Adams product Collin Affolder went down on a called third strike to end the game.
“We never did really find our mojo,” Miller said.
Portland took a brief 1-0 lead in the bottom of the second inning with one out, but back-to-back strikeouts ended the frame for the second consecutive inning.
Michigan City nabbed a 2-1 lead in the top of the third thanks to a single, an RBI triple and a sacrifice fly to right field.
The Lakers never trailed again.
Muncie native Tyler Reynolds took the loss for Portland, surrendering four hits and striking out two in four innings of work. He allowed three earned runs.
Despite returning to Portland without a berth in the NABF World Series, Miller said he was pleased with the season and is already looking to the future.
“We have a good group,” said Miller, whose team had 25 games postponed or canceled this season. “They all said they’re coming back. We’re going to have another good team.
“This season was a little tougher than I thought it was going to be.”