Not Quite Enough

Slippery Rock 2, Chillicothe 1

The Chillicothe Paints came off a great win the other day, going up against the foes who have been taking them on and have handling them just fine. The Slippery Rock Sliders deserve credit for what they have done against the Eastern Division leading Paints. They have done quite a good job of executing their gameplan against the Paints in many of the meetings that the two teams have had. Starting pitcher for the Sliders, Cory Mazzoni, was on a roll for some parts of the game. He had even recorded a string of consecutive strikeouts. Overall, Mazzoni managed to record 8 strikeouts against Chillicothe's offense.

On the flip side, Paints starter Rex Ingham did a fairly good job on the mound in this game. The good news was that he didn't give up many runs. He only gave up a pair of runs while giving up 9 hits and a walk. Also, he did quite well when it came to striking out batters. He struck out 4 batters in 6 innings pitched, but unfortunately, the two-run homerun shot that he gave up early in the game proved to be the difference maker in this ballgame. Ingham held his own and he did what he had to do if you take away the homerun he gave up. He kept the Paints in the ballgame, and that's important.

For the offense, DH Kyle Galbraith had a double. Third baseman Zach Leonard had an RBI single. Catcher Brandon White had a double. Second baseman Tim Krofcheck had an infield single. Not much was going on for the Paints, though. It was pretty hard for the Paints to get to Cory Mazzoni because there may have been a slight lack of patience at the plate. I saw a lot of first pitch swings during at-bats.

I know that players can be a bit jumpy and anxious when it comes to getting those bats out there, but you have to find the right pitch. Sometimes, finding the right pitch requires a batter to wait just a little bit. Take into account that the pitcher dealing from the mound may still be fairly fresh. You could tire him out a little bit first and then dig in for that hit. Oh well. It just happens, and you just have to deal with the situations you make for yourself. The team did a good job in some areas of this game, but the production wasn't enough to keep up with the Sliders.

I don't know what it is, but whenever we play any team from the state of Pennsylvania, and it doesn't matter where in that state teams come from, the Paints always seem to have some sort of problem against the Pennsylvania teams. Case and point, the Washington Wild Things used to always dominate the Paints in many facets of the Frontier League game. Hopefully, we don't continued that trend with the Slippery Rock Sliders or with the Butler Blue Sox, because I don't want this case of deja vu happening all over again.

The Paints hit the road, and they will travel to Dubois County to face the Dubois County Bombers tomorrow night.