In their Banana Ball debut, the West Liberty-Salem Tigers 10U baseball team scored an 8-2 win over visiting Elevate on a scorching Saturday afternoon at LEI Field.
Banana Ball, made popular by the Savannah Bananas, features a unique take on the traditional rules of baseball. There are no walks, no bunting, and batters can steal first base on any pitch. The goal is to win the inning to earn a point.
Elevate opened the game on fire, plating 6 runs in the top of the first to grab a 1-0 lead. The key play in the inning was a dropped foul ball by a Tiger dad who shall remain nameless to protect his identity. Any foul ball caught by fans in Banana Ball result in an out. In Jeff’s defense, it was a very sunny day and he forgot his glove at home.
The Tigers evened the score after pitcher Ozzy Anders shut out the visitors in a quick second inning. Needing just 1 run in the bottom of the inning to win a point, leadoff batter Talyn Lowe drew four balls out of the strike zone and raced around the bases on a sprint (rather than a traditional “walk”) and scored on a throwing error.
Both squads plated 2 runs in the third and 3 runs in the fourth to leave the score knotted at 1-1 until the Tigers blew the game open with a 6-run fifth inning. The Tigers tacked on 5 more runs in the sixth to take a 3-1 lead. Pitchers Elliott Deitrick and Talyn Lowe shut down the Elevate offense while the Tiger Bats came alive in the fifth and sixth innings.
WL-S entered the seventh and decisive inning, with a 3-1 lead, but in Banana Ball, all runs count as points in the final inning. Zeke Bair provided some breathing room for his Tigers with a leadoff triple to the right center field fence. After a couple of walks, a HBP and RBI singles from Benjamin Yeater and Ozzy Anders, the Tigers led 8-1 heading into Elevate’s last at-bat. After a leadoff single, Kaleb Horn induced three straight groundouts to secure the 8-2 victory.
Yeater scored 4 times to lead the Tiger offense. Anders added 3 runs and 3 RBIs. Weston Loehr scored twice and drove in a pair. Alexander Roberts was 3 for 3 with a run and an RBI. William Roberts scored 3 runs. Deitrick drove in two. Lowe scored twice. Horn was 1 for 2 with 2 runs and an RBI, and Braxton Mathews, Rowan Sadlier and Bair all scored twice.
