Senior outfielder Sam Westendorf has taken on blogging duties this year for the UP baseball team, and he'll be checking in from time-to-time throughout the season. Make sure to bookmark portlandpilots.com/baseballblog and follow Sam and the Pilots all season long.
ENTRY #4
Thursday, April 4, 2012
Hello Pilot Fans, Chet Thompson here. I am filling in for Sam Westendorf on this blog entry due to an unfortunate accident that resulted in Sam getting a concussion. It all occurred on Friday during our first game against Santa Clara. The top of the first inning ended as Cody Lenahan was stranded on base. As he was coming into the dugout to get his glove and hat, Sam was running out to right field for defense. Cody and Sam didn’t see each other which led to Sam colliding his head into Cody’s chest. As the two guys were down for a couple minutes, Cody was able to keep playing but Sam had to come out of the game. The next day, due to constant headaches and nausea, Sam had to go to the hospital where he was given new drugs to help him feel better. Since Sam is still on medication for his headaches and isn’t feeling like his old self, I am writing this blog on his behalf.
Getting back to the summary of last weekend, Friday started off strong. We opened up the series against Santa Clara with Kyle Kraus on the mound. Once again, Kyle had a stellar performance where he allowed no earned runs in 8.1 innings, allowing Owen Jones to come in and rack up another save. On the offensive side, freshman Caleb Whalen came up big as he went 3 for 4 with another home run. The ending result was a 3 to 1 victory for your Pilots!
On Saturday, freshman Travis Radke took the mound and threw a nearly perfect six innings; only giving up 1 hit and 2 walks with no runs. Kody Watts came in for two innings and Owen relieved him in the ninth to pick up another save. With dominant pitching, Santa Clara was scoreless after nine innings. In a defensive/pitching game, we were able to scrap some runs together as Caleb Whalen and Beau Fraser got RBIs.
Going on to Sunday, with a chance to sweep the Broncos, both teams came out fighting. Chris Johnson started on the mound and threw for five innings, where Brandon Snyder relieved him. Both pitchers kept the game in hand, giving the offense a chance to win. After a slow start, the offense began putting runs on the board in the sixth after Colin Sowers hit a home run down left field. Not to mention that this home run was Colin’s first career collegiate hit! Once the offense picked up, the game was 5 to 4 going into the top of the ninth (Santa Clara leading). We didn’t go down without a fight as Brian Frattali singled with one out keeping the inning going. Unfortunately we couldn’t piece more hits together to tie up the game and the Broncos won. However, we did leave winning the series!
In other non-competition related news, the University of Portland athletics put on a talent show last week called “Pilots Got Talent”. This was a time where the different sports teams create some sort of talent show skit and perform in front of the student body. While being in season, it is difficult for the baseball team to create skits or performances due to the traveling, practices, and games, so we waited until the last minute to come up with an idea. Within hours before the talent show was to start, several of the players got together and decided to do a rain-delay skit. If you haven’t seen what this is, go onto YouTube and look up “baseball rain delay”. There are several videos of teams jousting, squatting one another, etc. The idea was to show antics that can happen when a game is cancelled due to rain. One of the funniest antics performed was out of Zack McCoy and Colin Sowers. They decided to be upside-down players. To do this they placed their socks on their hands, pants over their heads, jerseys on their legs, and batting gloves on their feet. It may be hard to picture, but it got the whole crowd roaring with laughter. Even with all the last minute practicing, we were not able to claim the trophy. Unfortunately, men’s tennis got first place, but we did come in second.
Coming up this weekend will be a great series against San Francisco. The schedule is two games on Thursday and one on Saturday. Come out and support your Pilots, rain or shine.
I hope I have done alright filling in for Sam and catching you up on the past week of events. I will be looking forward to seeing all of you there for the series against Dons.
As Sam would say, “Stay g'ed up from the feet up”,
Chet Thompson a.k.a. Chetowski
PREVIOUS ENTRIES
• Entry #1 (Feb. 1, 2012)
• Entry #2 (Feb. 21, 2012)
• Entry #3 (March 13, 2012)
