By Rick Assad
In four of the five innings, the Burbank High baseball team scored in a Pacific League game against visiting Pasadena on Tuesday afternoon.
Even though the visitors also scored in four of the frames, the number of runs were greater and the end result was a 16-6 mercy-rule victory.
Bob Hart is the longtime Burbank head coach and while he didn’t care for the final result, he stands by his team and feels certain it will play better.
“It was very disappointing. We felt like we were starting to turn the corner a little bit,” he said. “Ultimately, I preach to the boys about internal evaluation and that goes for coaches as well.”
Hart also added: “We will try to do a better job and hopefully they will follow our lead,” he stated.
It was knotted at 1-1 after one inning as Burbank senior Ryland Le Clair’s solo homer to right center in the first inning tied it at 1-1, offsetting a single by Pasadena’s Dylan Derosier, who had an infield single, stole second base, took third base on a passed ball and scored on an infield single by Maximus Reynolds (two hits).
Burbank sophomore Luka Kuiper, who singled to left field in the fourth inning, delivered a two-run single to right field tat and saw the hosts lead 3-1 after two innings.
Pasadena sent nine batters to the plate and tallied four runs on two hits in the third inning that included a two-run single to left field by Ryan Chen (two hits) and a sacrifice fly to center field by Reese Kim (two doubles and a single).
Burbank (1-5-1 and 1-1-1 in league) trimmed the deficit to 5-4 in the bottom of the third.
But an eight-run, eight-hit assault followed in the fourth as Pasadena (2-6 and 1-2 in league) pulled ahead 13-4.
In that frame, 13 batters went to the plate and 10 reached base by a hit or a walk.
Kim had an RBI double to left center and Aaron Martinez added a two-run double to left field.
Bruno Pierandozzi contributed a two-run double to left center, Derosier (two singles and two doubles) tossed in a two-run double to left field and Kim had a run-scoring single up the middle.
Burbank, which had seven hits, scored two runs in the fourth to get within 13-6 as senior Tomas Angel had a run-tallying single to center field.
Pasadena, which knocked out 13 hits, added three runs in the fifth inning as eight hitters went to the.plate.
Pierandozzi walked with the bases loaded for a run, Derosier added a sacrifice fly and Kim had a run-scoring double.
Junior Ezekiel Canto had a single in the second inning and a base hit in the fourth inning for Burbank.
Junior Casey Peters was the starting pitcher for Burbank and lasted two and one-third innings while allowing three hits, striking out one and walking three.
Junior Carter Williamson yielded nine hits and fanned two and walked three across one and two-third innings.
Angel faced three batters and walked all three without getting an out and Kris Haddad surrendered one hit while striking out one, walking one and hitting one batter over one inning.
Pierandozzi whiffed seven, walked two and surrendered eight hits over five innings.
