JC Baseball: Pirates remain perfect
Eric Wagaman spent the summer working on keeping his front foot down, but now it’s the hammer he is dropping on opponents.
The Orange Coast College sophomore first baseman was three for four with a home run and a double and drove in four runs to lead the Pirates to an 8-6 nonconference victory over visiting Cuesta on Thursday.
The win upped OCC’s record to 3-0, gave 25-year coach John Altobelli career win No. 599, and continued to bolster the confidence of the 6-foot-4, 210-pound Wagaman, whose self-image was inflated with a Player-of-the-Year performance in the Missouri, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas Collegiate Summer League after a modest freshman campaign with the Pirates.
Sophomore catcher Daniel Hawkins was two for three with one RBI and sophomore shortstop Travis Moniot was two for four with one RBI, while freshman left fielder Walker Keller was one for three with one RBI and three runs to add to the winners’ 12-hit attack.
Sophomore Oregon bounce-back Kyle Robeniol allowed two hits and one earned run in four innings of his second start, but reached his projected pitch limit and left the game, so he could come back and start again on Tuesday, Altobelli said.
Sophomore Blair Lewis, who earned his first save on Tuesday and is the projected closer, threw five relief innings to earn his first collegiate win. Lewis threw 4 2/3 innings all of last season at Pitt.
OCC’s potent offense, for which eight starters had at least one hit to lift the Pirates’ team batting average to .321 in three games, overcame five errors that led to three unearned runs for the Cougars (2-3).
Wagaman had an infield single in the first, when the Pirates left the bases loaded without scoring, then doubled in the hosts’ first run in the third.
In the fourth, Wagaman’s booming home run to left field drove in Keller, who was hit by a pitch. Wagaman’s sacrifice fly in the sixth inning broke a 6-6 tie.
“The ball looks like a beach ball to me, honestly,” said Wagaman, who is five for 11 on the season with four RBIs. Last season, he had one homer and seven RBIs in 56 at-bats and posted a .214 average.
But he hit .322 with seven homers and 46 RBIs in 199 at-bats for the Clarinda (Iowa) A’s over the summer.
“Considering I didn’t play a lot here last year, that [summer success] boosted my confidence a lot,” Wagaman said. “I did well in the fall, too. I just feel really comfortable up there and I have a lot of confidence.”
Lewis allowed two hits and, at one point, retired 11 straight. He gave up a leadoff single in the ninth and, with two outs, hit a batter to put the tying run on base. But he induced a groundout to finish the job.
“With our offense, we can come back from any deficit,” said Altobelli, whose team trailed, 3-0, and later saw a 6-3 lead vanish when three errors led to three Cuesta runs in the fifth inning. “We just needed somebody to go out [to the mound] and shut it down. Lewis did a great job. He’s a rubber-armed kid who can throw one inning, or five or six innings.”
Freshman second baseman Alex Lopez, a former football receiver at Shadow Hills High in Indio, scored OCC’s third run by stealing home on a botched squeeze attempt in the fourth inning. Lopez, breaking from third on the play, slowed as catcher Jake Ryan began moving toward him from behind the plate after Jacob White bunted through the pitch. Lopez then made a hard jab step toward the foul side of the baseline that prompted Ryan to lunge, lose his balance and fall onto all fours, leaving a pathway for Lopez to redirect his path toward the infield side of the baseline and score.
“That was impressive,” Altobelli said.
So, too, are the Pirates, who missed the playoffs for the first time since 2006 and finished 18-18 last season, after winning state titles in 2014 and 2015.
OCC will attempt to give Altobelli win No. 600 against visiting Cuesta on Friday at 2 p.m.
Nonconference
Orange Coast 8, Cuesta 6
SCORE BY INNINGS
Cuesta 030 030 000 – 6 4 1
OCC 001 502 00x – 8 12 5
Luther, Mescot (4) and Ryan; Robeniol, Eppenbach (5), Lewis (5) and Hawkins, Ceballos (9). W – Lewis, 1-0. L – Mescot, 0-1 . 2B – Silva (C), Wagaman (OCC), Moniot (OCC), White (OCC). 3B – Keller (OCC). HR – Wagaman (OCC).
Twitter: @BarryFaulkner5
