Baseball

Dim Dawg debut

Sullivan West struggles against Port Jervis in non-league opener; Dawgs will be strong contenders in ‘08

By RICHARD A. ROSS

JEFFERSONVILLE, NY — Confucius says, “A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step.” For Sullivan West (0-1), the first step of its 2008 baseball campaign was more akin to a trip, as it stumbled and fell behind early on its way to a shut out loss of 10-0 by Port Jervis (1-1). The Bulldogs never seemed to get on track.

With only a pair of scrimmages under its belt, Sullivan West’s lackluster opener could be chalked up to early-season kinks, first-game nerves or a combination of both. But Port Jervis’ fine play was the overriding factor.

First games of the season, especially non-league outings, are good times to iron out those kinks before the rough-and-tumble league games arrive with all due seriousness and hefty consequences for post-season hopes.

Those days will be here soon with the coming week Division IV series against nemesis John S. Burke Catholic. The good news is two-fold. The Dawgs hold home-field advantage in the best-of-three series with only one game slated for Burke’s “homer dome,” where every pop up has home run written across the baseball’s seams.

The other piece of uplifting information is that Sullivan West, though struggling in most facets of its game against Port Jervis, showed signs of prowess that are bound to quickly coalesce for coach Kurt Scheibe Jr. and his experienced and talented squad.

Starting pitcher junior Logan Grishaber provided a solid outing in his season debut but was victimized by several fielding miscues, a spate of timely hits by the Raiders and, ultimately, by his team’s lack of hitting.

When the Bulldogs did get runners on, they failed to capitalize against Port hurler Jason Ropke, who went the distance for the shutout. Ropke needed precious few pitches to dispatch the Bulldogs through the first two innings. The Dawgs loaded the bases in the bottom of the third with two out, but a grounder to short by Mark Tesseyman stranded Jesse Fadis, Grishaber and Jim Moloney to end the inning.

Ropke was on his way toward putting down an impressive line in the scorebox. He allowed only four hits while striking out seven and walking three.

The Bulldogs pitching line wasn’t quite as sweet. Grishaber went four innings and allowed 10 hits and was charged with eight runs. The southpaw struck out four and walked two. Jim Moloney came on in relief and yielded one hit in two innings. He struck out one and walked one. Kevin Lapardo pitched the final two innings and gave up two runs on two hits in his varsity debut.

Prior to its third-inning opportunity, Sullivan West was trailing 5-0. The Raiders got two runs in the first inning on an RBI from Nick Moscotiello and a sac-fly from Dan Nicolette.

Port added a run in the second when a wild pitch led to a RBI from Brian Waltke to make it 3-0. That lead expanded to five in the top of the third, resulting from an E-6 and a dropped ball on a prior tag-out attempt at the plate after center fielder Jim Moloney’s fine throw from the outfield was relayed to catcher Gaston Owen.

Three runs in the fourth made it 8-0 with RBI from Dominick Zingaro, Nicolette and Moscatiello. The final two runs crossed the plate in the top of the seventh on RBI from Ropke and Waltke.

Ropke went four for five at the plate to help his cause. Moscatiello and Nicolette went two for four. Grishaber went two for four, banging out 50 percent of Sullivan West’s meager opening-day offense.

Port Jervis had lost to Wallenpaupack the previous day, so the win against Sullivan West was sweet but not sweet enough for coach Tim Leonard. “We need to get a lot better. We missed some signs out there today.” Leonard credited Ropke with a good start. “We stretched him out a bit today but he did well,” he said.

Sullivan West coach Kurt Scheibe credited Ropke as well. “He kept us off balance, changed speeds on us and once he got that early lead he stayed ahead of batters and kept the ball down.” Scheibe said his team wasn’t selective and didn’t work to build up Ropke’s pitch count.

Sullivan West was slated to scrimmage Roscoe on April 8 before heading to Chester on April 10. Port Jervis hosted Liberty on April 10 and will host Fallsburg on April 14.

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