Paints win the 5-game stretch

Chillicothe 4, North Coast 1

In a span of about a week, the Chillicothe Paints and the North Coast Knights have played each other five times, and through the first four games of this stretch, the two teams were evenly matched, winning two games a piece. In this fifth game between the two Ohio ball clubs of the Prospect League, the Paints came out on top by winning at their brief return to the Pipe Yard in Lorain, Ohio. The flow of this game was simply solid, and it doesn't matter what level this is on, this was the type of game that anyone would enjoy.

For the Paints and the Knights, the pitching performances combined were pretty outstanding, to put it mildly. Both sides had things going on the mound for a great chunk of the game. Thankfully for baseball fans in southern Ohio, the pitching for the Paints was in rythym for a bit longer than the Knights. Credit that to starting pitcher Clayton Schulz. Schulz, who recently celebrated his 19th birthday on the 7th of June, was very stellar on the mound for the visitingt team. How stellar was he for this game? Schulz managed to pitch 5 innings of a no-hitter until having it broken up due to a play that probably should've been ruled an error, and not as a base hit.

Schulz did go through bumps in the road still. He pitched 8 innings deep in his start, giving up just one run on two hits allowed, giving up four walks and beaning two batters, which in reality was the same batter. Schulz couldn't avoid beaning Knights infielder Ethan Santora for whatever reason, but neither hit-by-pitch was intentional. Throw in just a wild pitch, and that's all that was off for Schulz, but again, he was as solid as you would want him to be for a start. He recorded three strikeouts.

On the other side, Knights pitcher Dillon Tabar did an equally impressive job coming in relief. Tabar would pitch 6 innings of relief, and he really did shut down the Paints offense. He did a great job of making things happen on the mound. He only gave up two hits while striking out two in the process. He didn't give up a single run, hence his effectiveness against Chillicothe's offense.

Another Knight of note would have to be shortstop Kirk Singer, who has been a splendid find for the northern Ohio club. So far, he has been quite amazing defensively at least, flashing the glove at the most important times in a ballgame. Tight defensive plays have been made by Singer, who is even impressing me, even though I'm a Paints fan. You gotta give credit to the guy. He's doing what he can to make plays, and he's progressing so far. You always have to tip your cap to hard workers, no matter what team they're on.

As for the scoring, the Knights only mustered one run, as mentioned before, against Schulz. Meanwhile, the Chillicothe Paints got to work immediately with the scoring of runs. Through the first run of the lineup already, they managed to get four doubles in. In the first inning, left fielder Cory Maguire and DH Andrew Marshall had back-to-back doubles to score the first run of the game. First baseman Matt Abro had a double. Catcher Brandon White had an RBI single. Tim Krofcheck had a double. Cory Maguire would have the only other hits the Paints, as he added two singles to his early double, resulting in an impressive three-hit game for him.

The Paints will travel to Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania to play a game at Jack Critchfield Park against the Sliders. Game time is at 7:05 PM.

I want to make a brief comment about the odd looking schedule that we have for this season. Since there are only 11 teams in the Prospect League's first season, that means the schedule has to be altered a bit to compliment the teams. I have wondered about the schedule going into thsi year knowing the landscape of the lague. Having an odd number of teams makes some things difficult, with the schedule being the main suspect of those problems. This is nothing to worry about, though. I have a hunch that the odd schedule will only be for this year that we have an oddball kind of schedule. For a league starting up, considering the circumstances, the Prospect League has done such a solid job, in reality.