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Sports

Berkley Boys Varsity Baseball Wins 8-0 Over Ferndale

Bears Pitcher Conor Reid allows only five base runners in dominant performance to open season.

The boys varsity baseball team was perfect in the Oakland Activities Association South last season. On Wednesday, they picked up right where they left off.

The Bears and their starting pitcher Conor Reid looked like they were in midseason form in an 8-0 win over Ferndale in their season opener.

How good was Reid (1-0)? The Eagles only hit one ball out of the infield in seven innings. The senior pitched a complete game shut out, allowing only one hit. He struck out nine and didn’t walk a single batter.

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“He came out hitting the strike zone,” Berkley coach Jordan Gruppen said. “He didn’t walk anybody and that’s the key. That’s something we’ve been working on and he kept the ball down in the zone. He only gave up one hit and a couple of hard ground balls.”

The only trouble for Reid came in the sixth. Taylor Morrissey misplayed a ground ball hit by Matt Callahan at third base and then Reid hit the next batter Noah Reiter. Keith Waldrop advanced the runners to second and third with a ground-out.

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Reid didn’t waste any time getting out of the jam. He forced Josh Allen to hit a little dribbler back up the middle. Reid fielded it himself and tossed it to first to end the inning.

“Their pitcher was outstanding,” Ferndale coach John Sibula said.

The Bears offense wasn’t too bad either. They gave Reid all the run support he needed with seven runs in the bottom of the third. Ferndale made two mistakes to set the Bears big inning up.

The third opened with Ferndale’s starter Reiter forcing Pat Dooley to fly out to right field. Reiter then struck out Ian Kobernick, but Ferndale’s catcher Justin Hammerle couldn’t hold on to the ball. Berkley’s speedy leadoff hitter made it to first on the dropped third strike.

The next batter Mark Meisner should have been the third out when he flied out to right. 

The Eagles had a second chance at getting Kobernick out when he ran to0 far off the bag without tagging on Meisner’s fly ball. Ferndale right fielder Ryan Humphreys didn’t make an accurate throw and Kobernick was safe.

“One inning, two mistakes, it cost us,” Sibula said.  “The dropped third that allowed the runner to get to first and then when our right fielder tried to make it to second and couldn’t, it hurt us.”

Brendan Tomaszewski came up to bat with Kobernick on second and hit an RBI double.

Reiter then walked the bases loaded and Berkley blew the game wide open. Nick Bauer hit a two-run double and then Brad Burke cleared the bases with a three-run home run that just made it over the centerfield fence.

“He’s (Burke) been working on swing really good, he stayed on that one and let it fly,” Gruppen said. “It was good to see.”

The Bears won’t have much time to celebrate the win. They have a double-header Thursday against Lahser at home (4:30 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.).

Notes – Kobernick finished the game with three steals. Berkley had five hits in the game compared to Ferndale’s one. Morrissey was the only player to score twice for the Bears, he scored the team’s run in the fifth inning. 

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