BASEBALL: Back-to-back gems for Bleckley’s Boatright, WACO’s May keep West Laurens flustered at plate

West Laurens had little luck against a couple of region 2-High A’s top hurlers as it dropped back-to-back non-region games in the throes of a nasty hitting slump this past week. 

After a bit of early success at the plate, the Raiders were shut down by Walker Boatright and Bleckley County over the back half of an 8-4 loss Wednesday at home. 

Fortunes worsened Thursday in Sandersville as Washington County’s Mack May held them to just one hit in another complete-gamer, this time for a 2-0 shutout, to get the Golden Hawks their third-straight victory and hand West Laurens its third frustrating loss in four games. 

The Raiders, between blowout region wins over Westside of Augusta (by a combined score of 33-0) the week prior, wound up on the wrong side of the latest breakout by Morgan County’s potent lineup, which homered twice to overpower them 14-3 in six innings March 11. 

They’ll have four games next week to work out their offensive woes ahead of a keystone region series with Harlem, as a Monday pickup at GMC leads into a first of two with 4-AAA rival Howard Tuesday, then a rematch with Bleckley in Cochran Wednesday night. 

Bright spots during the five-game stretch were mostly concentrated to the Westside wins, 16-0 in Augusta March 10 and 17-0 back in Dexter last Friday. West Laurens had no trouble running up a combined hit total of 19 against a set of three Patriot pitchers, two of whom appeared in both games, in the seven innings that made up the series. 

Grant Baker drove in a total of four runs over the set of games to extend his season-long streak of hits (which got to a 15th game before Thursday’s loss at WACO) and a more recent string of consecutive games with an RBI (likewise ending after a sixth in a row Wednesday).

Tripp Mascaro was 2-for-4 in game 1, while Nathan Hester (2-for-2 with an RBI), Buck Shepherd (2-for-2 with four driven in) and J.J. Giles (2-for-2 with two RBIs) logged multi-hit efforts in the finale. 

Mascaro struck out four in as many one-hit innings to get the win Tuesday. Westside was also held to a single hit by Cohen Cardwell, who struck out one on Friday. 

Morgan County’s main mashers mashed, leaving the yard with two of their four extra-base hits out of a total 13 in Wednesday’s visit to Dexter.

Both big flies (out of seven the Bulldogs hit in four wins over the course of the week) keyed a powerful start that got them out to an early lead of 7-0 in the first two innings. 

Caylem Richardson, after blasting two homers in the third and final inning of a 15-0 win over Westside Macon the night before, took one into the right field trees for a grand slam in the first. Troy signee Hudson Reed hit his seventh of the year on a solo shot to open up the second. 

West Laurens, despite nine hits of its own, wouldn’t be able to put much of a dent in the big number as it scratched out a pair in the third inning (when Giles and J.D. Hogan scored on the same Richardson wild pitch to briefly make it a five-run game) and one more on Baker’s second hit in the bottom of the fifth. 

Morgan County – a favorite of many to win the AA state championship – would put up seven more runs in the last three innings to bring the run rule into effect.

Raider starter Kolby Clark didn’t have his command early, and was lifted after eight batters came to the plate in the first. Freshman Brycen Milton took over, picked off a man and struck out four as he fired 85 pitches in a little more than five innings to get the game to the sixth. Gunner Coleman took over to get the last two outs. 

Hits weren’t at a shortage. West Laurens had nine of them with Hogan, Baker and Cardwell contributing two apiece. But Reed, a triple from the cycle, went 4-for-5 with two RBIs to ensure Morgan County kept a firm upper hand.

Gavin Hunt, Drew Ainslie and Richardson also had two hits apiece for the ‘Dogs. 

Boatright took a big bite out of the Raiders’ confidence at the plate with seven strikeouts in seven efficient, fast-paced innings this past Wednesday. 

Though his outing finished better than it started, the senior’s command and assurance on the mound was unshakeable once he got a feel for the strike zone, and a lead on the scoreboard after Bleckley broke in front for the first time with its three runs in the sixth inning. 

West Laurens couldn’t get a feel for his hard-to-square fastball or curve after picking up two each of its four hits – and three of its four runs – in the first and third. 

Baker drove home Hogan, after a leadoff lob that he stretched into a double, for the opening run, and had one of the two singles that set the table for a second and third two frames later on the RBI of Cardwell, and a wild pitch.

But Bleckley, which Clark held to a single Jay Johnson hit in the same timespan, would ultimately get things going at the plate, and reverse the momentum entirely by pounding out nine of its 10 hits from the fourth inning on. 

The Royals also scored eight of the last nine runs as Clark (with three strikeouts, plus one walk and four hits given up in a bounce-back) gave way to Coleman in the sixth. 

A passed ball scored their first run to begin chipping away in the fourth. They tied it with two more in the fifth on an RBI single by Boatright and a sacrifice fly by Brody Fleming. 

The Raiders answered to re-take the lead, capitalizing on two errors and a hit batter to take a 4-3 lead in the bottom half, but Bleckley responded with five unanswered in the last two innings. Then Boatright became unhittable… picking up four of his seven strikeouts in the process of setting down the sixth and seventh-inning West Laurens sides in order.

In the sixth, the Royals loaded them up on Johnson’s leadoff double, then a walk and bunt single before a passed ball tied the score back at 4 each. Then Caleb Foskey came through with a game-swinging double to put Bleckley on top 6-4. 

In the seventh, Fleming and Johnson reached on singles, and both scored as Noah Woodard ripped another double up the right field line for two more RBIs. 

Johnson was 3-for-4 and Woodard 2-for-4. Baker had West’s only two-hit night. 

J.J. Giles’ single in the third inning was the Raiders’ only hit against May, who struck out nine in a second-straight opposing gemstone Thursday on his home mound. Just one other man – Baker drawing a walk in the first – reached base against the senior who’d get the side 1-2-3 in the other five innings. 

Offense was just as scant for WACO, which mustered only four base hits against West’s two-man staff, and only scored thanks to two bases-loaded walks in a hitless second inning against Milton, who struck out five but yielded six free passes in his two-inning start.

Cardwell came on in relief starting with the third, and pitched around the home team’s three remaining hits to keep the 2-0 score where it was. 

He’d punch out the final two Hawks to strand a couple of runners after a heated start to the bottom of the sixth inning, with a bang-bang out call that was overturned by umpires. 

May had been seemingly tagged on the shoulder by Clark, who recovered from a throw that brought him away from the bag, before reaching first as he legged out a grounder to short.

But the home plate official, who had roundly denied West Laurens head coach Parker Gordon the opportunity to appeal on a nearly identical play ruled an out in the top half of the inning, was suddenly more receptive as WACO’s Kevin Mobley came across the infield urging his partner to request a second opinion. 

The group, sure enough, needed only seconds after getting together to deem May safe on the play, bringing Gordon out of the dugout with reasonable indignation that quickly got him ejected.

Cardwell would lose Justice Lester on a walk in the next at-bat, but bounced back after his catcher Baker secured the foul pop-up of Jack Hilliard on a sacrifice bunt attempt to turn the tide back in the Raiders’ direction. He punched out both Colton Brown and Ty Mobley to end the inning.

Nevertheless, May squelched the sudden surge of momentum with two flyouts and a looking strikeout in the top of the seventh to finish the night on a streak of 14-straight outs.