All 11 Santa Barbara Foresters played in the California Collegiate League All-Star game Wednesday night, as the North Division fell to the South 3-2 at the MLB Urban Youth Academy in Compton, Calif.
Drew Van Orden, Santa Barbara’s best starter thus far in the season, highlighted the appearances by Foresters live on Fox Sports West. Entering in the second innings, Van Orden worked a nine pitch inning that included a three-pitch strikeout.
Garrett Mattlage started the game at second base for the North and Louie Lechich opened the game in center field. Both Foresters came up in the bottom of the first, but each struck out. Mattlage, from Texas State, and Lechich, from the University of San Diego, came up again in the fourth inning, flying out and grounding out respectively.
Three other Forester pitchers made appearances as well, Patrick Weigel in the fourth, Tejay Antone in the seventh and Parker French in the eighth.
Weigel, the right-hander from Pacific, hit the first batter he faced and walked another. With men on second and third and one out, he recorded a strikeout and a groundout to escape the inning unscathed.
Texas Christian’s Antone struck out the first man he faced in the seventh, finishing with two total in his short appearance for the North. The right-hander’s only blemish was a full-count walk to the second batter of the inning.
French took the mound in the eighth, along with Ryan O’Hearn at first base and Jerry McClanahan behind the plate.
The Texas righty hit the first batter and allowed a double to the second. A miscue on a sacrifice bunt allowed one to score and another came home later in the inning thanks to an RBI groundout. French would finish up his appearance with a strikeout to end the inning.
After Mattlage and Lechich left the game following their second at-bats, the Foresters waited until the bottom of the eighth to make plate appearances.
Ben Johnson led off the inning with an infield single, the first of four straight Foresters to come to the plate. After Joey Epperson took a walk, McClanahan grounded into a double play with the North trailing 3-0 to end a potential threat.
O’Hearn’s only at-bat resulted in a blooper to center field that appeared to be falling in to score Johnson, but the MLB Academy’s Trent Zaks made his second diving catch of the game to rob the first baseman of a RBI single.
In the bottom of the ninth, Colt Atwood singled cleanly to finish the Foresters’ day and eventually scored on a throwing error by the South’s catcher to score the second and final run of the day for the North.
Combined, Forester hitters finished 2-for-8 with a walk and a run scored. The pitchers combined for four innings pitched and two runs allowed, with five strikeouts, two hit batters, a walk and a double.
