Too many freebies

FORT RECOVERY — The Indians hung right with the Bulldogs most of the game, but just gave away too many free opportunities.

After tying the game up in the bottom of the fourth inning, the Fort Recovery High School baseball team surrendered three unearned runs to give the Celina Bulldogs a 4-1 lead that would go the distance in Monday’s season opener.

“We were really competitive for five innings,” FRHS coach Kevin Eyink said. “We gave too many free bases and then one error kind of took the wind out of us. I think that’s the story of the game, too many freebies on our end.”

The Indians (0-1) entered the top of the fifth in a 1-1 tie with the Bulldogs (1-0). Their pitcher, Alex Dues, had already thrown 72 pitches and was nearing his limit for the day. Eyink planned for Caden Grisez to relieve Dues, but the junior didn’t get the opportunity to get in the bullpen because he was due up in the order during Fort Recovery’s half inning off the field.

The Indians’ skipper decided to let Dues stay out on the mound to start the inning. Max Baumstark led off the inning with a single through the right side before Zander Jones flew out to right field. Dues then walked Caleb Stephenson before Eyink went to Grisez.

Reece Evers made a basket catch in foul ground off of the right field line to record the second out. Grisez then induced a ground ball to shortstop that took a bad hop and ricocheted off of Dues to allow one run to score, and a second on a throwing error afterward.

The final run scored off of a Brodee Schulte-Arnold base hit up the middle.

“Dues was really starting to pitch well, but he was getting a bit higher than what we wanted,” Eyink said. “Caden was up to bat, we just went with (Dues) to start the inning.

“I’m okay with how it went. We trust him. He had that one bad inning but then he kind of settled in.”

Eyink was referencing the first inning, where Dues surrendered a walk to Nick Steinbrunner to lead off before a stolen base, a balk and a base hit from Brady Steinbrunner drove the run in. The senior threw 32 pitches in the inning, giving up only one earned run on two hits, a walk and a hit-by-pitch.

In total, Dues gave up three runs — two of which were unearned — four hits, four walks and two hit-by-pitches over 4.1 innings in the loss.

On the other side, Brady Steinbrunner limited the Indians’ opportunities, pitching six innings in which he only gave up two hits, one earned run and four walks to earn the win. He rarely gave up solid contact, as FRHS hitters only got ahold of three balls including hits from Riggs Tobe and Reece Wendel.

Caden Homan had the only other solid contact on a lineout to centerfield.

“The key was Brady was around the zone all day,” Celina coach Dave Maurer said. “The zone was just a little on the tight side today and he still filled it up. He was just keeping them off balance by throwing them strikes.”

Luke Maxwell finished off the seventh inning for the Bulldogs, only giving up a walk to Caden Homan while getting soft contact for three outs and the save.

The Indians’ sole run came in the fourth inning. Wendel led off the inning with a hot shot down the line that first baseman Stephenson had to dive to knock down. He still managed to reach base and was awarded a hit to break Brady Steinbrunner’s no-hitter.

Troy Homan followed Wendel with a sacrifice bunt that advanced Wendel all the way to third base.

Grisez pushed the run home with a groundout to shortstop.

“Reece reached base and that’s why we have Troy there and Caden next,” Eyink said. “It just worked out perfectly. That’s how we want that to go… it was just really well executed by them and we need to get more of that.”