Time to start another streak. After ending 2021 with a team-record 21-game winning streak, the Foresters started 2022 with a 5-4 loss to the MLB Academy Barons on the road. Down 5-2 late, Santa Barbara’s late, eighth-inning rally fell a run short.
The evening started on a promising note, as the first three Foresters reached base to start the game. Rylan Charles walked and Will Pendergrass singled. Kevin Bazzell drove in the first ’Sters run of the summer with a single, and a Griffin Everitt fielder’s choice brought in the second.
Foresters starter Robert Cranz battled his control, striking out five, but walking a pair and allowing four hits in 3.1 innings; two of those hits led to single runs for the Barons in the first and second to tie the game 2-2.
The big inning was the fourth, when the Foresters got two hits and a walk, but could not score. The Barons responded by taking the lead 4-2 with two runs of their own in the bottom of the inning, thanks to three hits, a walk, and a sac fly. Cranz was chased and pitcher Peyton Cole (pictured), a returner from 2021, took over. He shut down the Barons, but Matthew Magre helped the Barons to an insurance run in the seventh on a bases-loaded walk.
That set up the dramatic eighth. Pendergrass walked and Bazzell doubled him in, scoring himself soon after on an Everitt sac fly. But that was it for the Foresters.
The Foresters open their home season on Friday with a 6 pm game vs. the Conejo Oaks. The 2021 championship banner will be on display. The game can also be heard on AM 1290 KZSB.
