Last Saturday evening when the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs welcomed the Staten Island FerryHawks for the middle game of a brief, three-game homestand the hosts were able to provide plenty of offensive fireworks through nine innings then also after the contest in typical Fourth of July fashion.
Southern Maryland (42-22) had clinched the Atlantic League South Division first half title before embarking on its three-game stint with the FerryHawks, who were never in contention for the ALPB North Division title. In fact, Staten Island (10-55) not only finished last in the North, the FerryHawks went 1-31 on the road and were outscored by nearly six runs per game.
On Saturday night the game actually began 100 minutes belatedly as inclement weather in the area threatened to put an early end to the holiday festivities.
Once the contest began only various intermittent showers, and brilliant flashes of lightning providing the backdrop, arrived but hardly dampened the enthusiasm of the reported 4,116 fans on hand.
Southern Maryland promptly scored an unearned run in the first, two more in the fourth and two more in the fifth before sealing the verdict with three more unearned runs in the bottom of the eighth en route to an 8-1 victory.
Blue Crabs starting pitcher Kyle Verbitsky limited the FerryHawks to one run, a solo homer by Blake Rutherford, before departing in the sixth.
“I think the main thing that disappointed me about tonight was the walks,” said Verbitsky, who yielded five free passes in his outing. “I was lucky my teammate played some great defense behind me to bail me out. [Center fielder] Paolini made a great diving catch in shallow center to save a couple of runs at least. But that’s the culture of this team. Everyone goes out there looking to make plays.”
One night earlier, Southern Maryland actually spotted Staten Island an early 1-0 lead on a solo homer from Nick Decker before the Blue Crabs responded with nine unanswered runs en route to a 12-3 victory. Southern Maryland scored four runs in the second, four more in the fourth, single runs in the fifth and seventh and then two more in the eighth to cap another lopsided victory.
Southern Maryland batters collected 14 hits on the evening, three from leadoff batter Stephen Paolini and Ryan McCarthy and two each from Brody Fahr and Exequiel Pagan. All three of Paolini’s base hits were doubles, while McCarthy also had one double and scored five runs. Blue Crabs starting pitcher JP Massey limited the FerryHawks to one run in six innings to earn the win.
This weekend the Blue Crabs will conclude a six-game road series at the Lancaster Stormers then return home for six games (July 14-19) against the Charleston Dirty Birds.
By virtue of winning the first half division title, Southern Maryland has already secured a spot in the Atlantic League playoffs beginning in late September.
“One of primary goals was to make the playoffs this year and winning the first half of the season guarantees us now that we’ll be playing in the postseason,” said Southern Maryland first-year coach Brett Jodie. “Our pitching and our defense have been outstanding all season and we’ve got a number of guys who have been swinging the bats well all season. We have also had several guys signed [to major league teams] which is really the ultimate goal for these guys here.”