First League: Bučovice will join Technika in Promotion League
First League continued on Saturday. Especially the double header in Bučovice was to decide whether Pelikans or SaBaT get to play in Promotion League.
Technika Brno – Klasik Frýdek-Místek 19-1 (6 inn.)
Klasik Frýdek-Místek – Technika Brno 2-12 (7 inn.)
Both team knew how they stood in regards to Promotion League before the weekend. The games itself showed why home team will try to get back to Extraliga while visitors will remain in the First League. Technika manged to score 19 runs in the first game, five of which were thanks to two HR from Matěj Brabec.
Second game was going a bit better for the visitors, when score showed 2-2 after three innings. However, Frýdek-Místek didn’t score more against Bastidas Miguelangel and Radek Burian. On the other hand, home team continued to score, notably adding two HR, this team from Matěj Menšík. Technika assured the first place in First League with the wins. Frýdek-Místek will end up fifth in the league.
Pelikans Bučovice – Hippos Brno 4-2
Hippos Brno – Pelikans Bučovice 9-13
Bučovice knew that if they were to win both games in the double header, they would get a chance to fight for Extraliga spot. And they managed to do just that, even if the wins didn’t come easy to them. First game was narrow, Bučovice had to wait till the fifth inning to take the lead, but they kept it till the end afterwards.
In the second game Bučovice got in front in the first inning, scoring two times against Timothy Whitehead. Home starter Leonardo Paredez allowed first runs scored in the third inning. We had to wait till the fifth to see more offense, however. First, Bučovice scored five runs, but Hippos responded with three.
An interesting situation happened at the end of the game. In the seventh inning Paredez and Lukáš Řehůřek swapped the positions, Řehůřek playing in the left field till then. However, Řehůřek got under the pressure from his opponent in the eight inning, who loaded the bases and scored two runs. In this situation, Paredez returned back on the mound and Lukáš Řehůřek returned to the left field. The original starter finished the game and he lead Bučovice to 13-9 win, which advanced them to Promotion League.
Bučovice will play in Promotion League for the second year in a row and they will join Technika Brno, who were certain to fight for Extraliga sport a week earlier. On the other hand SaBaT, who entered the season looking promising, didn’t have a good second half. Skokani and Klasik, two teams with players with Extraliga experience, also didn’t advance.
