NALB 2006 World Championship Series - Game 5

K. Fields
2007-10-26T21:08:49-04:00
Baseball

The Stade Maples went into Game 5 one win away from a World Championship. They wanted to win it at home and avoid going back to Brooklyn for a sixth or seventh game. For the Brooklyn Knights, it was do or die. They faced the prospect of elimination for the first time in their club's history. The game was a rematch between the Game 1 starters, Dave Hambright and Wally Pemberton. Hambright lost to Pemberton in the opener but looked to atone for the loss and force a Game 6. The Knights tweaked their sputtering lineup a bit. Facing a left-handed starter, they would normally start Jeromy Bezanson in center field. However, Bezanson was hitting an anemic 1 for 11 (.091) in the playoffs so Gary Mccreery was named the center fielder.

The Knights knew they had to score early to quiet the raucous Maples' fans. They did just that. Second-baseman Dick Moran led off the game with a solo home run. Gary Mccreery followed that with a triple. Yale Burns singled to score Mccreery and Brooklyn had an early 2-0 lead. The Maples got things going in the second with a triple of their own, courtesy of Allen Mcmullin. Topper Blefary hit an RBI single and the score was 2-1. In the third inning, Ariel Cadore doubled to tie the game for the Maples.

The walks started to pile up for Pemberton as he had trouble finding the strike zone at times. Both starting pitchers kept working their way into and out of jams. In the top of the fifth, Dan Kelley tagged up and tried to score from third on a fly ball to right field. The ball wasn't hit quite deep enough, however, and he was thrown out at the plate. In the bottom of the sixth inning, Hambright was in trouble with men on second and third and nobody out. The Knights brought the infield in and got two ground balls that kept the runners from scoring. Hambright followed that up with a strikeout to get out of the inning.

Stade sent Bert Smith to the mound for the seventh inning. He had control problems and walked Dan Kelley on four straight pitches. After a wild pitch, the Maples decided to intentionally walk Hooks Goetz. A single by Ted Pollet and a sacrifice fly by Kid Detherage put the Knights ahead 3-2. Dave Hambright completed seven solid innings of work and was pulled for a pinch hitter. John Coleman came on to pitch for Brooklyn in the eighth inning. He promptly gave up a game-tying 447 foot solo homer to Travis Araoz, the first batter he faced. Rob Muncy pitched the ninth inning for the Maples and looked overpowering as he struck out the first two batters. As thoughts started to turn to possible extra innings, Yale Burns blasted the first pitch deep into the left-field stands. The Knights had a 4-3 lead heading into the bottom of the ninth and sent the NALB's all-time saves leader, Jeff Ramirez, to close out the game. Behind Ramirez were the best fielders that the Knights had to offer with Sterling Little and Markus Branson going into the game as defensive substitutions. Power-hitting Paul Lyons pinch hit to lead off the ninth and grounded out. Maples' fans were on their feet as Gene Anson kept their hopes alive with a line-drive double. Ramirez tried to be too fine with his pitches and ended up walking Jimmy Gomez. He came back strong to strike out Shane Buckley. It was two men on, two men out, as Ted Rambo came to the plate. He was 0 for 4 on the day and fell behind in the count as he took a first pitch strike. Rambo was sitting on the fastball and got what he wanted on the next pitch. He lifted the ball deep to left. Kid Detherage raced after it but it was over the wall.

Stade won the game and the World Championship Series!

Final score: Stade 6, Brooklyn 4