In baseball, they say doubleheaders are meant to be split. That’s what happened on Sunday, when the Thetford Blue Sox lost their second game by a score of 10-7 against the Montreal Jets, which coincided with their first loss of the year.
“We can’t win them all,” admitted coach Renaud Desjardins after this 17-point marathon.
Jets rookie pitcher William Sierra muzzled the Thetford offense by scattering three singles in the first four innings. Trailing 9-0, the Sox scrolled 12 batters to the plate in the fifth, which resulted in a six-run push. “We had a bad start, but we never gave up. It must be said that the pitcher starting on the other side was quite dominant. The guys had never seen this young pitcher who has an excellent slippery ball. His curveball was coming out two ways and he was really hard to hit,” explained the coach.
For his part, William Gault had a rather difficult first outing as a starter. In three innings, he allowed five runs, including four earned and six walks. He made no less than 93 shots during his stay on the mound. “It was the first time that he was leaving. He’s more used to throwing in relief and it’s a different approach. He made a lot of throws and we could see that fatigue was setting in. We have to work on that,” said the coach. On offense, Yannick Desbiens was the best of his team with three hits and four RBIs.
A SEVENTH VICTORY
Before suffering a first defeat, the Blue Sox had won a seventh consecutive victory earlier in the day by defeating the Saint-Jérôme Cardinals by a score of 9-2 at the Melançon stadium.
Renaud Desjardins talked about the team’s new philosophy to explain the excellent start to the season. “The guys play with pleasure and we don’t worry too much. This is the approach we have this year. In the last years, the players were a little stressed. Now, we try to make them less so, to be confident in their abilities and to have fun playing baseball instead of worrying about it. »
Jonathan Paquet pitched a full game to earn a second victory in as many decisions. “It was a good game and it went fast at the start. When guys are aggressive like that at bat, you want to hit and you want them to play defense, which allowed me to go further in the game. »
It was Neven Dominguez who was behind the plate to receive his shots for the first time. “It went well. He quickly understood the shots I liked to throw and I think we’re going to have two good receivers with Samy (Martel),” added the winning gunner.
Renaud Desjardins praised his starter. “Jonathan had his arm on fire. I talked to him the whole game to find out if his arm was ok, but he always told me everything was ok. It’s a big outing for him. Everyone played well and we made some big defensive plays when it was time, including a nice catch from Dany Paradis Giroux in the seventh who was unfortunately injured on the play.
Speaking of Dany Paradis Giroux, he drove in two runs with a single in the top of the third and the Blue Sox weren’t threatened after that. Frédéric Bolduc also put his shoulder to the wheel with a three-run homer.
The Blue Sox will host the Brock of Drummondville on Friday, on the occasion of the National Day of Quebec. They will hit the road again on Sunday where they will play another doubleheader, this time on the side of Acton Vale and Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu.
