St. Viator beats Warren
St. Viator coach Mike Manno huddled his baseball players after their 6-2 win over host Warren on Saturday and finished by giving “welcome to the varsity” props to pitcher Tim McElroy.
The left-hander’s “welcome to the varsity” moment might have come in the fourth inning of the nonconference game that saw St. Viator improve to 5-3 while dropping Warren to 6-4.
Not that McElroy had time to relish the moment or contemplate it.
A line drive off the bat of Warren junior Alex Letto hit McElroy on the lower palm of his glove hand, ricocheted and hit his neck, knocking the 6-foot-5 junior to the ground. McElroy alertly fielded the ball and threw to first base, but the umpire ruled that Letto beat the throw.
“It’s a split second. It just happens,” McElroy said. “I just had to react. I saw the ball on the ground and tried throwing it. It was a little late, though. It was close. I just threw and put my head down.”
While McElroy was being attended to on the mound, Letto took the opportunity during the stoppage in play to jog over and see if the Lions’ pitcher was OK.
“I was just hoping he wasn’t hurt,” Letto said. “I felt bad.”
St. Viator felt inspired after McElroy stayed in the game and showed the composure of a veteran — and not a player making just his second varsity start.
Letto’s infield single loaded the bases with none out and Warren trying to chop into a 4-0 deficit. Ryan Kennedy followed with a sharp RBI single into left field, but McElroy beared down. He got a foul popout to first and then back-to-back strikeouts.
“Damage control, baby!” a St. Viator player yelled to McElroy as he hustled into the dugout.
“That was the inning that we could have done something big,” Letto said.
McElroy left the game after throwing an even 100 pitches in 5 innings of work, with St. Viator leading 4-1. He allowed only 4 singles, while striking out seven and walking five, and the run he allowed was unearned.
“Fastball was going good,” McElroy said. “I was just throwing hard and got guys on a couple of curveballs. The curveball came together toward the end.”
McElroy had taken a no-decision against Palatine in his first varsity start, throwing “about 65 pitches in 2 innings,” Viator coach Mike Manno said.
“He really battled (against Warren),” Manno said. “We know he’s got the potential to be very good.”
St. Viator got off to a good start en route to snapping Warren’s four-game winning streak. Blue Devils starter Cal Haley hit Nick Prazuch to start the game. Brian Wilhite (2-for-4) followed with a seeing-eye single to right, and when Cory Kay’s perfectly placed bunt stopped on the chalk line about halfway to third, St. Viator had the bases loaded with none out.
“I leave it up to him (whether to bunt) because he’s our (No.) 3 hitter,” Manno said of Kay, who was 2-for-2 with 2 walks. “We don’t really sacrifice (bunt). It’s pretty much (if you bunt), bunt for a base hit.”
Haley walked Chris Myjak to force in the game’s first run. Cosimo Cannella then lifted a routine flyball that fell untouched among the center fielder, right fielder and second baseman for an RBI single. Joe Ferrante’s RBI fielder’s choice made it 3-0, and Kole Luthringshausen capped the 4-run first with a run-scoring single.
“I thought we executed pretty well in the beginning,” Manno said. “Things that we haven’t been doing very well we did well.”
Shane Fitzmaurice pitched the final 2 innings for St. Viator, allowing an unearned run that Haley drove in with a fielder’s choice.
“We didn’t come out to play,” said the Valparaiso-bound Kennedy, who had 1 of Warren’s 5 hits. “It looked like we were dead a little bit. We were just taking bad swings at pitches that were up. The ump’s zone was a little crazy, but we got to adjust to it, and we didn’t do that.”