PCBL Bombers win Back to Back Cal-Cup Championships!! The MABL Cal-Cup was held up in the San Francisco Bay Area this year. The Championship Game featured two PCBL teams and was won by the Bombers 4-2 over the Barracudas. Jeff Penwarden and Nolan Wyatt have put together a strong tournament team winning the Cal Cup Championship two years in a row. Tournament MVP Eric Orue pitched all nine innings in the Championship Game after pitching a complete nine inning game the day before. The Bombers tournament teams are traditionally made up of several players from a variety of PCBL teams. This year however we went to the Cal-Cup with our regular league team. Before the tourney in Oakland began we felt we might be a little short on pitching, bringing only 3 regular starters. We ended up pitching 4 of 5 complete games. Jeff Cookson got us off to a solid start with a dominant performance against the Tri-Valley Yankees. When the team heard that they would receive an engraved Rawlings pro-line wood bat for every homerun they hit we ended up with 6 bombs in the opener led by Eric "ShowTime" Orue with 3, Jarrod Penwarden, Mike Jaramillo and Jason McClure with 1 apiece. We win 19 - 0 behind Jeff's and Jason's fine pitching. The Bay Area Rockies fell to an 11 - 5 score led again by Showtime's pitching and solid hitting by Paul Gomez and Brian Sperling with 3 hits apiece. In the 3rd game of pool play we went up against the San Jose All-stars who brought two of the better pitchers we saw in the tournament but again we hung tough and pulled out a big 11 - 6 score with starting pitcher Paul Gomez throwing a complete game. Adrien Torres hit a homerun, Cookie went 3 for 5, John Wenzel and Sticks Sperling had 2 doubles apiece. In the first round of the playoffs we faced the Bay Area Rockies once again, but they had the misfortune of having to face Cookie this time and he shut them down by a 7 - 1 score. Sticks came up big again with 3 hits and Jaramillo and Weasel were clutch with 2 RBI doubles. We can hardly believe it but we're in the championship game! However, we have to face the always tough PCBL Cudas. Now James and Eric always put a very talented and gutsy group on the field and we knew it was going to take everything we had to match up with them. We also knew they had been able to save RV for the big one. We countered with Orue who had pitched the great second game for us the day before (not to mention a sprained thumb on his pitching hand). The Cudas jumped out to a 1 - 0 lead after the first and it stayed that way until the 5th when we were able to pull out 2 runs of our own to take the lead. In the 8th, RV came in to pinch-hit and took Eric's second pitch out of the park to tie. In the bottom half of the inning we came back with two more of our own on timely hitting by Jaramillo (2-4), Jay-rod and Pablo Gomez. We were only 3 outs away from the championship trophy! Big "E" answered the challenge with a 1-2-3 inning to close it out for us and take home the Bombers MVP honors!!
I'd like congratulate James, Eric, Dirk and the Cudas on their success in I'd also like to thank Mike and Wendy Prothoroe and their entire staff for their hospitality. They treated us to a first rate tournament with all the trimmings. Everything was fantastic including the delicious bar-b-que, nice hotel and great giveaways. Everyone was polite and treated us first class including the umpires who all called great games. Once again, thanks to all! Manager, PCBL Bombers |
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