Grand Salami
Sennet played a double-header today.
In the morning he subbed for the Bronco-league Mariners (10-11 year old age bracket). Their coach is the father of one of his teammates on the Twins, Owen. They were short three players so Sennet, Owen, and Henry (Twins’ coach’s son) subbed for them. Sennet was a bit intimidated by the older pitchers. He got walked once, and struck out his other times at bat, but he wasn’t too upset because of how fast they threw. Only Henry got a hit out of the three subs. Sennet played a couple innings at outfield and three innings at third base. He scooped up a sharp ground ball which he whipped to first to get an out. The Mariners ended up losing, but it was a close game and they had fun.
Here he is walking, stealing, and then later playing third – keeping the runner honest.
Then the Twins played at 4pm. They played against the Mustang Mariners (9-10 age bracket – same as Twins). The Mustang Mariners are coached by two of Sennet’s select team coaches – Jordan, who coaches for both Radiator and Rainiers, and Jon who coaches for Rainiers. And they have two players from Radiator and two from Rainiers on their team. They are undefeated, with a 4-0-1 record (one tie).
Per the Twins modus operandi, they fell behind early and had to play catch-up. Sennet played first base for the first three innings and catcher for the last three innings. Owen pitched the first two innings, Luke the middle two innings, and Henry the last two. Sennet had struck out once and flied out once. He also took a foul ball right on the bicep when he was catcher, which almost took him out of the game – he was crying and rolling on the ground holding his arm. He worked himself through the pain and the umpire asked him if he wanted to stay in the game or come out, and he said he wanted to stay in the game. We overheard a couple of his teammates in the dugout say, “Oh my god, he’s going to keep catching?” We were behind the whole game, and by the top of the 6th inning the score was 10- 7, Mariners.
The Mariners were home team, so if we didn’t score enough to tie, the game would be over. We got a couple hits and a walk, along with some strike outs, to have the bases loaded with two outs and Sennet came up to bat. He got some balls, some fouls, and some swinging strikes to get the count to 3-2. Then he smacked a fly ball to right field past the outfielder. All three baserunners scored to even the score of the game, and the catcher began to walk towards the pitcher, leaving home plate undefended, so Sennet – being Sennet – sprinted home, for a grand slam home run. As they say in the majors, “Get out mustard and rye bread, grandma – it’s a grand salami!!” Twins up 11-10. The next batter struck out, so we went to the bottom of the 6th.
The Mariners got a couple hits and a walk and scored the a run to tie the game. We got one out. They had a runner on second, and our coach decided to intentionally walk the next two hitters to load the bases – hoping to get a double play to end the game in a tie. The next batter got a base hit to score the winning run. Game over. Very strange way to lose a game. I hadn’t seen or heard of that strategy at this level. Can make sense in the majors, when it’s not unusual to get a double play. At this level it’s very uncommon to get a double play. And I never want to be that parent, that questions the coach, but we could hear even the players on the other team in their dugout saying, “Why isn’t Sennet pitching?”
The Twins chalked up their second loss, but Sennet had a grand slam, so even though he really wanted the win, he was pretty happy with his game. I was coaching first base when he hit the slam, so we don’t have it on video.
Here he is catching:
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