Another painful loss for Cards at Colville

To some, baseball is the furthest thing from being a game of inches.

There’s 90-feet between bases, it’s 60 feet, 6 inches from the pitcher’s mound to home plate and it generally takes a minimum of a 300-foot-plus shot to hit a home run.

But for Medical Lake last week in a crucial Northeast A League game at Colville, the difference between a Cardinal victory and the eventual 6-5 walk-off win by the Crimson Hawks April 29 was mere inches.

Earlier in the season Medical Lake fell to Colville at home, leaving the bases loaded in the bottom of the seventh.

Multiple times Medical Lake was painfully that close with a fouled third strike popping out of catcher Andrew Roberts’ glove or having another foul trickle away after a sliding try.

“I think I counted 10 times we were one pitch away from that game,” head coach Austin Sharp said.

Medical Lake led 5-2 after five innings as pitcher Luke Dickey had the state-ranked Crimson Hawks on the ropes. But Colville scored three times in their half on the seventh and final inning to tie.

Sharp threw freshman A.J. Michaud back into the fire as he has done all season, either as a starter or in relief.

In extra innings Medical Lake failed to score in its half of the eighth and Colville worked magic. They led off with a double and the next batter singles so it’s runners on first and third no out.

Sharp intentionally walked the next batter to load the bases for a play or out at any base. First play, Michaud get the batter to hit a ball to third where Taylor Oliver guns down the runner at the plate.

Michaud strikes out the next batter and has two strikes on the potential third out when once again a fouled pitch skips off the catcher’s mitt.

“It just pops out his glove as he slides into the fence again, it’s like oh my God,” Sharp said. The next pitch is a single up the middle to win the game.

Against Colville, Caleb Cain, Oliver and Michaud all had two hits, one of Oliver’s a double. Michaud had two RBIs.

Coupled with a 4-2 loss to Newport where the Grizzlies broke a 2-2 tie with a pair of runs in the fifth, Medical Lake winds up in a four-way tie with Freeman, Newport and Lakeside.

Medical Lake, 4-6 NEA, 7-9 overall, played a final NEA game May 2 against Freeman at home but that likely will not affect the standings. Due to a pre-season tiebreaker drawing, the Cardinals are the fourth seed regardless in a tiebreaker.

They will play Saturday, May 6 in Colville against one of those tied teams with the winner playing the hosts and earning at least three more games in the loser out, according to Sharp.

Paul Delaney is a retired Free Press Publishing reporter and can be reached at pauldelaney53@comcast.net.