EXL: Draci and Hroši have two wins

Extraliga season continued with the second play day of the season. Unfortunately, Saturday was also marked with inclement weather.

Draci Brno – Eagles Praha 13-3 (8 inn.)

After the Friday loss, Eagles wanted to get one back to have a chance for the series win. And they didn’t start bad. New name on the mound for Draci Brno, Gillian Wernet, allowed Prague team to get a quick start after first two batters got a single, with Martin Červenka blasting a homerun afterwards.

However, Wernet found his rhythm afterwards, throwing 7 innings, where he only allowed one hit to Eagles. Prague pitcher, unfortunately, didn’t get the same opportunity. Raymond Watt had troubles with his control and Draci managed to grab a number of walks against him. Runners then scored not after hits, but due to wild pitches. Draci leveled the scored with no outs, and Vladimír Chlup decided to pull his pitcher. Without much of a stretching, it was up to young Albert Pražák to hold the tide. Youngster allowed three more runs in the first inning, giving Draci the lead.

An inning later came an unfortunate moment, when Pražák hit Eugene Helder with a pitch. Helder had to be substituted and Jakub Winkler got to play instead of him. Winkler was a part of another monstrous inning, as Draci scored five more runs and built a comfortable lead. In the end Draci took a dominant win after eight innings and the win in the series.

Sokol Hluboká – Technika Brno 11-3

It was the visitors who took the first lead at Hluboká. Technika scored two runs in the second inning, also thanks to an error of the home catcher Matěj Vlach. However, Matěj Vlach managed to make up for his mistake as he became the best batter of the game, having 3 hits, 3 walks and 4 RBI.

The game started as it was snowing slightly, however, the weather only worsened as the time went on. With more snow came more runs of the home team, who managed to come back and won 11-3. Unfortunately, the bad weather meant the second game of the double header had to be postponed.

Hroši Brno – Třebíč Nuclears 9-1 and 5-3

Both teams started the first game with foreign pitchers, home team with John Kennedy and visitors with Orlando Romero. The home pitcher came on top, as he managed to hold Nuclears batters back. Till the sixth innings, he only allowed one run and dished out 8 strikeouts. Furthermore he also didn’t walk anyone. It was the main difference between he and Romero, who walked 8 batters, thanks to which Hroši scored three times in five innings.

Romero then walked three batters in the sixth inning, which meant the end of the game for him and Tadeáš Kalčev took up his spot. New pitcher wasn’t able to stop the home batters who scored 4 runs on him. Hroši were able to keep the lead and took a comfortable win.

The second game was much closer. We could see a nice pitching duel as well. Home Lukáš Ercoli threw 6 innings in his first game for Hroši, allowing only one run. There were, however, two more runs scored, which came after defensive errors. Třebíč fielded Ryan Johnson who remained on the mound even longer. He was able to keep the game tied at 3-3 before the bottom half of the seventh inning, however, Petr Čech then gave Hroši the lead after a two run homerun. The best closer of the last two season, Kellen Croce, was then sent to wrap up the game. The win seemed anything but certain when the visitors loaded the bases in the seventh inning, with only one out. With Miroslav Křivánek at bat, home team managed to get out of the jam after they played a double play and Hroši got to celebrate an excellent start of the season.