COMPTON — Brett Vertigan did his job, but the rest of the Santa Barbara Foresters couldn’t back him up in a 4-2 loss to the last-place Urban Youth Academy Barons on Friday night.
Vertigan, who sat out the entire season for UCSB after hernia surgery, went 4-for-4 with two runs, a double and a stolen base in the leadoff spot. The rest of the team struck out 14 times, however.
“Their pitchers were doing a great job mixing up pitches. I thought we fought hard, but we just couldn’t get enough to go together,” said Vertigan., who also made a nice catch in centerfield early in the game.
Santa Barbara (13-4, 9-4 California Collegiate League) took an early lead after Vertigan and Shane Kroker began the game with back-to-back singles. Kroker stole second with Vertigan at third, and the pickoff throw sailed into the outfield, allowing Vertigan to score.
The Barons (5-13 CCL) responded with a two-RBI single by catcher Trevor Penny in the second. Foresters outfielder Blake Brown hit a triple off the wall in center with two outs in the fifth and was waved home to try and tie the game with an inside-the-park home run. He was thrown out at the plate on a great throw, however, to end the inning.
“We had watched that outfielder in warm-ups, and he didn’t have that kind of arm during ins-and-outs,” said manager Bill Pintard. “We struck out way too much tonight. We have to be defiant.”
The Barons fell a homer short of the cycle in the fifth to tack on their final two runs, with a Foresters error proving costly. Vertigan scored on an RBI double by Michael Ratterree in the top of the sixth.
Lance Roenicke tripled with two outs in the ninth, but Santa Barbara’s comeback fell short.
Vertigan, the team’s offensive leader to this point in the season, was a Baron last summer.
“We’re not surprised by anything he does. We saw him last summer. He’s a great kid and a good, scrappy ballplayer,” said Pintard.
Santa Barbara hosts the Barons at 5 p.m. Saturday at Caesar Uyesaka Stadium. The game will be broadcast live on AM 990 KTMS and sbforesters.org.
