What a Gentleman.
Boone Whiting, a pitcher for the Centenary College Gents, sparked the defending National Baseball Congress World Series champion Santa Barbara Foresters out of the gates Saturday with a 3-0 win over the visiting San Diego Waves at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium.
Whiting sparkled in five shutout innings, retiring the first 10 batters he faced while striking out eight and allowing just one hit before taking a come-backer off the foot and leaving the game.
“Even though he’s over at Centenary in Louisiana, we knew he could throw and that he was firm,” said manager Bill Pintard. “He shut down Texas A&M when they were a top-5 team.”
The bats were sleepy for both sides in the opener, but USC’s Vinnie St. John was wide awake, going 3-for-4 with two RBIs. He was an offensive standout last summer for Santa Barbara, hitting .307 and smacking five homers.
Many of this season’s Foresters have yet to arrive and some are still playing in the College World Series, but reigning MVP Eric Oliver of UCSB said he already sees plenty of talent in the dugout.
“I don’t know everybody yet, but it looked like our closer was pretty good and right now it seems like we have a lot of good players,” said Oliver, who will anxiously await the coming MLB Draft along with many of his teammates.
The closer he was referring to is Gonzaga’s Cody Martin, who gave up a pair of hits in the top of the ninth but picked up the save by using a lightning-rod fastball. SBCC’s Ryan Gardener also had a stellar performance despite facing just one batter. He was called upon with two outs and the tying run on third base in the seventh and notched a strikeout to keep the Waves out of the scoring column.
Also suited up for Santa Barbara was a familiar face in Richie Robnett, who has already seen what the top of the MLB Draft mountain looks like after being taken in the first round by the Oakland A’s in 2003. The big lefty slugger, who went 1-for-4 with a run scored, was released from the Chicago Cubs’ Triple-A affiliate earlier in the week and decided to suit up for the Foresters this week while awaiting a pick-up from another team.
Santa Barbara High alum and current SBCC Vaquero Zach Chavez scored the first run for the hosts, taking a pitch to the elbow to lead off the third, then advancing to second on a John DeAlba sacrifice and third on a wild pitch. The speedster then scored on a Waves error. The 1-0 score stayed put until the eighth, when St. John drove in two insurance runs on a single to left field.
A good-sized crowd came out early to see a special pre-game ceremony in which the team was presented with rings and a banner for winning their second national title in three years, something that Pintard knows not to take for granted.
“We got to hold up the championship banner, which you don’t get to do very often. Then we got to get our rings, which you don’t get to do very often, and then our guys threw a shutout — it was a pretty good day,” he said.
The second and third games of the season are set for Sunday’s doubleheader against the Waves, which will begin at 1 p.m. All the games are broadcast on AM 1490 and online at sbforesters.org.
While Vinnie did have a great year last season, Kevin Keyes led the team with 8 homers. St. John and Neil Medchill tied for second with 5.