Pitas hand CB Extreme extreme defeat pre postseason

Plan in place for playoffs

By Than Acuff

While not the best outing for CB Extreme, there is some good news. They did secure their first win of the season in a thrilling extra innings showdown with the Hares the game prior so there was a semblance of excitement on the CB Extreme bench prior to their showdown with Pitas on Thursday, July 17 at Gothic Field.

On paper it was a bit of a mismatch as Pitas came into the game sitting in second place in the Tuesday/Thursday league with a record of 7-2 while CB Extreme was sitting in last place with a record of 1-8. 

Unfortunately for CB Extreme, what was on paper turned out to be reality as Pitas rolled to a 32-3 win utilizing the game to hone their hitting for the upcoming postseason.

For example, a couple of weeks ago Pitas was short a woman player and rather than take the automatic out, they played with eight in the field and rolled to the win powered by their bats. On Thursday, they had plenty of players to field a full squad yet still opted to play eight. My guess is to give more at bats for players with the post season approaching. But that is just a guess that was somewhat affirmed but not confirmed during the game. 

Well, it turns out that multiple trips to the plate for Pitas made for multiple runs for Pitas as CB Extreme just could not quite get things going.

The runs started early and remained often for Pitas. Mallory Zimmerman, Rhett Yarbrough and Thomas McLean did the damage for Pitas in the bottom of the first with RBI base hits with more potentially on the way had it not been for a leaping grab by CB Extreme first baseman Scott Robson to rob Drew Stitchter of a hit bound for the far reaches of Gothic’s right field.

Yarbrough, Stichter, Frank Magri and McLean then drove in more runs in the bottom of the second inning and Scott Sanders stepped to the plate with the bases loaded and the greenest of green lights to go yard. His attempt had more height than distance though and fell shy of the fence but still drove in a run and Pitas was out front 9-0.

The first two innings were just the appetizers for Pitas as the main course came in the bottom of the third inning as they proceeded to rattle off 10 more runs with a flurry of doubles. Yarbrough led off with a double and scored on a double by Emily Crooks. Stichter drove a two-run home run for good measure and then Sanders and Zimmerman combined for two more doubles to score another run. 

While Bob Marley’s song We Don’t Need No More Trouble was playing, CB Extreme may have been thinking we don’t need no more doubles, but Pitas kept on doubling capped by a two RBI triple from Heather Duryea to push five more runs across forcing the 10-run rule for a 20-0 lead.

Robson pulled off another great grab at first for CB Extreme and Pitas catcher Jill Cooper did chase down a foul ball behind the plate for some defensive highlights among all the offensive highlights. Andrew Tower finally put CB Extreme on the board in the top of the fifth inning when he turned a ground ball into a solo inside the park home run (ITPHR), or more specifically inside the infield home run, to breathe some life into the CB Extreme side.

While that would be the lone run for CB Extreme in that inning, they did find some additional pop at the plate in the top of the sixth inning to tack on a few more runs. Tyler Burchfield and Katie McRoy led off with back-to-back singles and then Jolene Dreith and Jason McRoy scored both runners with RBI singles for some positives in what was a not-so-positive CB Extreme softball experience.

But Pitas got back to flexing in the bottom of the sixth inning Cooper and McLean connected for RBI base hits, Ben Hayes cleared the bags with a three-run ITPHR followed by a couple more base hits and a three-run dinger from Stichter and a two-run ITPHR from McLean for a 32-3 lead. Of note though, Burchfield did reel in a backhand grab at shortstop to end the onslaught and Sara Reese and Tower did knock base hits in the top of the seventh inning to, once again, toss in a little positivity for CB Extreme in their 32-3 loss.