The 2010 Jacksonville MABL All Star Game and Home Run Derby took place at
Forrest High School on July 17th, 2010. It turned out to be a nice dry day
for the game, however the heat was almost overbearing with temperatures
approching 100 degrees by mid-day.
Home Run Derby
The events began early in the morning with the Home Run Derby at 10:00 am.
There were 19 participants in this year's derby, including a late entry by last
year's champion,
Omar Ortiz. In round one, the players were given 10
"outs". Anthing not a home run, is considered an "out". The first
round started off strong with
Andy Royalty of the Tigers hitting 5 home runs as
the first participant. A few batters later,
Eric Smith of the Red Sox
pounded 6 balls over the fence before attaining his 10th out. A newcomer
to the league and the derby,
Tim Baginski of
the Braves smashed 7 homers in the first round
for an easy pass to round two. The real star of round one though, was Phil
Nover. Nover hit 12 bombs in the first round, almost double
the next best contender... and he did it with only seven outs! Even though
Nover was an early entrant, we assured him that there would be no problem
getting into the second round with 12 homers.
The top half of the entrants moved on to the second round. As the first
round was coming to an end, it was becoming clear that three homers was going to
be the minimum to get into the top half. A few players who had not
tallied this mark, decided to put in another $10 to try again. One of
these players was
Sean Stevens, who failed to hit any home runs in his first
attempt. In his second set of 10 outs, Stevens, who was representing the
Baysox, was able to push the
required three over the fence to get him into round two.
Round two of the event allowed each contender only five outs. With half as
many players and half as many outs, this round was considerably faster than the
first round. It also lacked the excitement, as the top score in this round
was just two home runs. Three people hit this mark: Royalty,
Chris Frank
of the Red Sox, and Stevens. This pushed these three into the final round
and assured us that there would be a new champion this year, as Ortiz hit only
one in the second round after hitting three in the first.
The final round began with Royalty. Unfortunately, Royalty had used up his
home runs in the previous rounds and was unable to knock one out of the yard
during his five outs. Next up was Frank, who had put four over the fence
in round one. Frank powered two homers out of the park to take the final
round lead with one contender remaining. That last contender was Sean
Stevens. Stevens, who had used that second attempt in the first round,
pounded two homers with just two outs, three to go. The next hit fell
short of the fence, but the next pitch was right where Stevens wanted it, and he
blasted it over the left field wall to win the derby.
Congratulations to Sean Stevens of the Baysox for becoming the 2010 Jacksonville
MABL Home Run Derby Champion.
All Star Game
After a brief warmup period, the 2010 All Star Game was set to get underway at
Forrest High School. The National League team was coached by Vic Miller of
the Cruisers, while the American League team was coached by John Rosette of the
defending champion Vikings. Both coaches were tasked with getting enough
playing time for all the representing players and also putting together a
competitive roster. This task was especially challenging due to the fact
that most teams had games the next day, some of those being double headers.
This made finding good pitching difficult.
The game was a complete change of pace from last year's all star game.
Last year saw balls flying over the fence from both dugouts. This year's
game turned into an epic pitching duel. That American League team used
three pitchers in the game,
Howie Frank of the Red Sox;
Jody Finch of the
Vikings; and Finch's teammate
Chris Walker. The three worked together to
hold the National League to just two hits and one run in nine innings.
Both hits and the run were givin up by Finch during his four innings of work.
The trio also combined for eleven strikeouts, the biggest contributor being
Finch (7).
On the other end of the pitching duel was the Jacksonville Athletics'
Chris
Holt, who came into the All Star Game with 13 inning pitched and only giving up
four hits and no earned runs. Holt was nothing short of dominant from the
mound. He pitched all nine innings for the National League, striking out
the American League batters an incredible 15 times. He struck out seven in
a row from the 4th-6th inning. Despite Holt's strike out dominance, he
gave up 5 runs (2 earned) on 7 hits in the nine inning game.
The MVP of the All Star Game was
Omar Ortiz of the Vikings, who also won the award last season. Ortiz went 2-4
with a double and an RBI, which came in the 1st inning after Chris Walker
reached on an error and stole second base. Ortiz also had a nice sliding
catch in left field in the second inning while the National League was
threatening with two men on and one out.
Tyler Holly of the Dolphins also
had an outstanding game, going 2-2 and stole two bases for the American League.