Jacks capture crown with 7-5 win over Bootleggers
As the Oregon Jacks celebrated their 2014 California Winter League Championship on the pitcher’s mound, it was easy to forget that this team started 0-3 just a few weeks ago. Mananger CJ Thieleke always believed his team had a chance and continually put his players in a position to succeed. A week ago, a struggling Mitch Malfitano stepped to the plate having just received advice from Thieleke to shorten up his swing. Malfitano responded with a grand slam in a decisive Jacks win that day.
With the CWL title on the line Sunday, Thieleke sent starting pitcher William Patterson to the hill on a day he didn’t have his best stuff. Struggling to keep the ball down in the strike zone, Patterson was hit hard early, but dug deep and held the damage to two runs in 3.2 innings.
The Jacks would respond with the bats in the bottom half of the 4th scoring six runs and never relinquished the lead. Bilal Kemp drove in the first two runs with his single and Jordan Drake and Vincent Difazio put the Jacks up 7-2 by the end of the inning.
Facing Jacks’ ace Max Duval, the Bootleggers did not go away quietly, cutting the deficit to 7-4 with two runs in the 6th. Hunter Ridge led off with a single and scored on Nick Latta’s double. Matt Fleishman then singled to bring in Latta and keeping the excited Sunday afternoon crowd on the edge of their seats.
The Bootleggers strung together one last rally in the 9th. Alan Cheatam hit an RBI double to close the gap to 7-5. With two outs, Jacks closer Kevin Rogers came in to relieve Duval and responded with the biggest strikeout of the season and was mobbed on the mound as the Jacks celebrated their CWL crown.
Matt Parrish earned the win for the Jacks throwing 1.1 scoreless innings of work. Jaspreet Shergill, on loan from the Canada A’s, took the loss for the Bootleggers. Rogers earned his fourth save in the CWL.
Many players on both teams will be moving on to professional baseball in the spring and the CWL extends its congratulations to each of them.
Mitchell Malfitano will be moving on to a very different journey; the active Marine will be deployed overseas shortly. Please join the CWL in wishing him a safe deployment and thanking him for serving our country.
