Baseball: Another Magallon masterpiece for Paramount

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Junior pitcher Eddie Magallon was accurate with every one of his throws, with the exception of two: When he gave up a three-run home run to Sonny Burgueno in the second inning and when he failed to empty a water cooler on his coach.

Paramount, behind another strong performance from Magallon (8-1), clinched its second consecutive San Gabriel Valley League title with a 5-3 victory over Gahr, winners of 23 league titles during the last four decades.

After demonstrating great command of his stuff during a complete-game masterpiece in which he retired the last 13 batters he faced, Magallon, holding a medium-sized water cooler, sneaked behind Paramount Coach Cameron Chinn while he was being interviewed. Magallon missed, however, spilling all of the cooler’s contents onto the grass and not onto Chinn’s back.

Other than that, Magallon rarely missed with his throws, striking out 10 (seven of the last 12 outs were Ks) and allowing only four hits, none in the final four innings.

‘He definitely got it going as the game went on,’ Chinn said. ‘He got a good feel for his changeup -- he had a lot of guys fishing for that ball -- and began to spot his fastball more. And our defense made some great plays also.’

After giving up his second walk of the game in the third inning, Magallon gave up a single to put runners on second and first with one out. But his next pitch resulted in an inning-ending double play. After that Magallon didn’t allow anyone to reach base.

Magallon also contributed on offense. With two outs in the first, Magallon started a six-hit, four-run rally with a bloop single to left. Gahr’s starting pitcher Chirs Devenski settled down after that and combined with reliever Frank Gutierez to hold Paramount to only two hits the rest of the game. One of those hits, however, was a leadoff triple by catcher Eric Miranda in the seventh. Miranda scored on a sacrifice fly by Juan Becerra.

-- Jaime Cardenas