By Gerardo Bolong
CONTRIBUTING WRITER

A flood of runs against the District 7 West Seattle 9-11 age Little League All-Stars by District 12 West Valley in a fearsome fourth inning led to a 13-3 WV win on the 10-run mercy rule on Tues., July 17.

The loss removed the Westsiders from further participation in the 2018 Washington state tournament.

“The first three innings, we played well,” said WSLL manager Otis Moore. “Then, West Valley just hit the ball hard and we didn’t do enough to stay in it. It was an honor to manage them this week. In was a special moment in their lives and mine.”
Locked in a 3-3 tie after three and one half innings, home team District 12 opened up with heavy artillery against the battling West Seattle baseball boys.

Dylan Nelson led off the fourth with a single followed by Landon Birley’s single that included a throwing error to score a run. Connor Speer’s run-scoring ground posted another tally. From this point, West Valley went on to post 10 runs on five hits to bring the game to a screeching halt on the mercy rule.

Until then, the game featured three and one half innings of closely contested play.
Visiting West Seattle lead off batter Jesse LaBella sliced a double down the left field line. Sandwiched between two strikeouts, Reece Holmes was hit by a pitch. Cam Fitterer was also hit by a pitch with two outs to load the bases. A subsequent wild pitch gave the Westsiders a 1-0 lead, but District 7 was unable to follow up with more scoring in the frame.
Luca Faletto capped a three-run West Valley uprising with his RBI single to left field and WV led 3-1.

Although the District 12 representatives kept the pressure on with runners in scoring position every inning and were seemingly one hit away from big time scoring, the Westsiders temporarily stayed with their foes in the second inning.

Lead off batter Caden Ross singled before advancing to second base on a wild pitch. With one out, Jesse LaBella's ground ball was misplayed. Cody Buehring doubled home a run followed by a Reece Holmes RBI ground out that tied the score at 3-3 leading into the game deciding action.

Although the battle was lost for WS, the experience had its positive aspects.
“I loved the experience,” said La Bella. “It was so fun being here. I had s great time here even though we lost. We still stood up. I had a blast.”