By Lucas Armstrong
“All good things must come to an end,” as errors and bullpen struggles snapped the Foresters’ longest winning streak of the season at 11 games. The ’Sters fell on the road to the Arroyo Seco Saints, 8–4.
The Foresters lost despite a strong outing from starter Ty Wiest. Wiest pitched five full innings, allowing one unearned run and striking out four. Wiest worked out of a two-on, one-out jam in the fifth before exiting with a 1-0 lead. But Santa Barbara couldn’t hold the lead. A late comeback tied the game, but then the Saints came marching back in.
Down 4-2 in the eighth, Santa Barbara tied the game on a Josh Jung double followed by a Luke Ritter homer. “That was huge; good at-bats fire teams up. [Luke’s homer] brought us right back in the ballgame,” said Pintard.
But after that, a late-game bullpen collapse doomed the Sters.
The Foresters struck first in the third thanks to Jung’s two-RBI single that scored right fielder Austin Todd and catcher Zach Humphreys. This was just the beginning for Jung, who got two more hits including that leadoff double in the eighth, which came at the end of a grueling eight-pitch at bat. Jung finished the game 3-4 with two RBI and one run.
Foresters pitcher Colton Follet took over for Wiest in the sixth and struggled, allowing three runs, two of them earned, in just 1.3 IP. Follett walked the first batter of the inning, Brennan Mckenzie. After that, back-to-back to back hits by Saints hitters gave them a 4-2 lead.
Santa Barbara struggled on the defensive side of the ball, committing four errors, each one resulting in a run for the Saints. One of these was a “defensive obstruction” call on Hank Loforte for a collision with runner Brandon Shearer. As a result, Loforte was forced to leave the game due to injury.
“Loforte had to come out just because of concussion protocol, but he’s fine,” said manager Bill Pintard.
With the game tied, the Foresters’ bullpen and defensive struggles continued in the bottom of the eighth as the Saints tacked on four more runs to take a 8-4 lead that they held on to.
Santa Barbara falls to 27-10 snapping their 11-game winning streak but looks to get back on track on Wednesday night in San Luis Obispo. The live broadcast on AM 1290 and newspress.com starts at 5:50 pm.
