Daily Archives: April 21, 2018

21 Apr

a developing situation

Blue Mountain and William Carey are creating a nice little rivalry in NAIA land. They’ll play the rubber game of a three-game Southern States Athletic Conference series today at Wheeler Field in Hattiesburg as they jockey for seeding positions in the upcoming league tournament. Carey won Game 1 8-2 on Friday behind the pitching of Hunter Speer (8-2), who threw a seven-inning three-hitter, and three RBIs from RBI leader David Pementel, who has 43. BMC bounced back with a 5-1 win in Game 2 as Josh Letson (6-4), Mason Woolridge and David Torres combined on a six-hitter over nine. Five different Toppers drove in a run. Both teams are trying to get their house in order as the regular season wanes. Carey (now 29-18, 13-7 SSAC) entered the series having dropped seven of 10 games in April; its ranking in the NAIA poll sank to No. 19 this week. BMC (now 26-18, 9-11) came in with a three-game win streak but had dropped five in a row prior to that. The SSAC Tournament is just around the corner, slated for May 2-5 at Montgomery, Ala., and it’s a bear. Four of the nine teams in the league were nationally ranked this week, including No. 1 Faulkner. Bobby Halford’s Crusaders marched all the way to the NAIA World Series in 2017 and had high hopes again entering 2018. They began the year ranked sixth by Collegiate Baseball. BMC, still a young program under Curt Fowler, made the league tournament for the first time last season.

21 Apr

slam the door

While the Drew Pomeranz-Kendall Graveman matchup was something of a dud, another Mississippi product provided the fireworks on Friday night at Oakland Coliseum. Mitch Moreland, the former Mississippi State standout from Amory, hit a grand slam that boosted Boston to a 7-3 win over Oakland and gave the Red Sox a 17-2 record, among the best starts in MLB history. Ole Miss alum Pomeranz, in his first start of the year for Boston, was tagged for three runs in the first inning and left in the fourth. Ex-State star Graveman lasted five-plus and was charged with the loss, falling to 0-4 with a 10.07 ERA. He surrendered a three-run bomb to Jackie Bradley Jr. in the second inning and the three runners on base when Moreland hit his sixth-inning slam were also his doing. Moreland was 0-for-2 against Graveman when he came up in the sixth but didn’t get to face the right-hander a third time. Emilio Pagan came on, and Moreland promptly crushed a high fastball into the right-field seats for the BoSox’s fifth grand slam of the season. Moreland is on an 11-for-23 tear, raising his average to .333 with two homers and 11 RBIs.

21 Apr

in other news

While Max Scherzer and Clayton Kershaw are hooking up in a marquee MLB matchup in Los Angeles tonight, there’s a Mississippi-flavored clash up the coast in Oakland that also bears watching. Boston, which has roared from the starting gate with a 16-2 record, welcomes former Ole Miss star Drew Pomeranz back from the disabled list. A 17-game winner in 2017, Pomeranz will oppose ex-Mississippi State standout Kendall Graveman, the A’s opening day starter who has struggled to a 9.87 ERA through four outings. (For the record, they did not cross paths in college.) Pomeranz, who suffered a forearm strain in spring training, made two rehab starts — one in Triple-A, the other in Double-A — and posted a 3.72 ERA over 9 2/3 innings. Graveman, who has yielded six homers this season, gets to face a scorching-hot Red Sox lineup (27 runs in three wins against the Angels) that may include State product Mitch Moreland. He has two bombs against Graveman in 12 career at-bats. P.S. JaCoby Jones, the former Richton High star, hit his first career walk-off homer — his first of 2018 — to propel Detroit to a 3-2 win in 10 innings against Kansas City today. Jones is batting .300 in 13 games.