For six of its seven innings, Game 2 of the WPBL Championship Series was dominated by the San Francisco Firebells. In those six frames, the first three and the last three, the Firebells outscored the Queens 7-1, the lone Los Angeles run coming on a one-out solo home run by catcher Maggie Foxx in the top of the second. In four of those innings, including the second, the Queens sent just four batters to the plate. Unfortunately for the Firebells, in the one inning that the Queens managed to string enough hits together to push across a run, San Francisco just couldn’t stop the bleeding.
The story of Game 2 is thus almost entirely about the top of the fourth inning. Everything the Firebells did well in this game — starting pitcher Jill Albayati limiting the Queens to just that solo homer by Foxx over the first three frames despite her tender hamstring; first baseman Andréanne Leblanc and catcher Sam Gutierrez, the latter making her first start since Aug. 30, both going 4-for-4 with three RBI; righty reliever Ela Day-Bédard holding the Queens scoreless in the fifth and six; and Leblanc wiggling out of a bases loaded jam to pitch a scoreless top of the seventh — was eclipsed by all the of the things that went wrong in that one half inning.
Knowing that Albayati had tweaked her hamstring in Game 1, Firebells manager Matt Williams, with his team ahead 4-1 entering the inning, was ready to make a quick move to his bullpen in the top of the fourth. No sooner had Queens shortstop Caitlin Eynon and first baseman Sarah Edwards opened the inning with a pair of singles to put runners on first and second than Williams had righty Peyton Coria warming in the bullpen.
Foxx followed by drawing a five-pitch walk to load the bases. Albayati’s 1-1 pitch to right fielder Amira Hondras then sailed to the backstop, allowing Eynon to score, but the pitch was so wild that it hit hard off the wall behind home and bounced right back to Gutierrez to keep the score at 4-2. Hondras then singled on Albayati’s next pitch to drive in Edwards, and Williams brought in Coria to protect was was now a one-run lead.
On Coria’s first pitch to Diana Ibarra, who got the start in left field because usual left fielder Isabella Villarreall started on the mound, Hondras stole second. Ibarra then worked a full-count walk to reload the bases. Coria then got ninth-place hitter Mo’ne Davis to hit a weak grounder to the right of the mound but flubbed the play, failing to get an out while the tying run scored. That would prove to be just the first of three Firebells errors in the inning.
Next up was Queens second baseman Ayuri Shimano, who hit an opposite-field grand slam in Game 3 of LA’s semifinal series against the New York Heights. Through the team’s interpreter, Shimano told reporters after the game that, in order to take the pressure off in this moment, “instead of putting expectations on myself, I intentionally chose not to expect anything of myself.”
Coria’s first pitch to Shimano was way outside. The second was up and over the outside half of the plate, and Shimano did what she had done against New York, shooting it over the left-field wall for a game-altering, opposite-field grand slam.
That made it 8-4 Queens. LA had already scored seven runs in the inning and had yet to make an out. Coria had thrown just 11 pitches, but Williams already had fellow righty Ela Day-Bédard warming in the bullpen.
With the bases clear, Queens captain Ashton Lansdell worked a full count against Coria, then grounded to third, but Firebells third baseman Ayaka Yamamoto’s throw to first dove into the dirt, and Leblanc was unable to scoop it, allowing Lansdell to reach safely on the E5.
Coria finally got an out when Yamamoto made a truer throw on designated hitter Jamie Mackay’s subsequent grounder to third, but Coria then walked Eynon, batting for the second time in the inning, and got the hook from Williams. Coria faced six batters and got three of them to hit would-be groundouts, but the Firebells’ fielders, Coria included, were only able to convert one of those grounders into an out.
It took Day-Bédard just one pitch to get the second out, a fly out to left by Edwards. However, catcher Gutierrez let left fielder Jua Park’s throw home to freeze Lansdell, who had stolen second and moved to third on Mackay’s grounder, roll between her legs, prompting Lansdell to race home for yet another run and sending Eynon to second.
Foxx then hit Day-Bédard’s second pitch of the inning for an RBI single plating Eynon, and Hondras hit the third for a high-arching RBI double to the right-center-field gap that allowed Foxx, taking off on contact with two outs, to score all the way from first base. That was the Queens’ 10th run of the inning, making it 11-4 Los Angeles.
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Two batters later, the inning finally came to an end on a batter’s interference call when Davis stumbled onto the plate after a swing and miss, getting in the way of Gutierrez’s throw to check on Hondras at third base. To say the damage was done would be an understatement.
Day-Bédard and Leblanc would hold the Queens there, and the Firebells would scratch out three more runs over the next two innings, but those 10 runs in the top of the fourth would prove insurmountable. The Queens won 11-7.
The question now is if the Queens’ 2-0 lead in this series will prove similarly insurmountable. Williams pointed out after the game that his team won three games in a row against the Queens early in the regular season (not only that, they outscored LA 35-8 in those three games). That is what they’ll have to do now to avoid falling short of their goal of the WPBL’s first championship. The Queens, meanwhile, need to win just one of the next three games to complete the upset and claim that title for themselves.
The Championship Series will resume Saturday night 7 p.m. ET, with the Queens as the home team for the next two games, if necessary. Michelle Roche, now fully rested after her heavy workload in the semifinals, will start Game 3 for LA. The Firebells will choose between lefties Liz Gilder and Niki Eckert, both also well rested heading into Saturday.
Injury updates
Firebells manager Matt Williams told reporters that righty reliever Rosi del Castillo dislocated her right kneecap in Game 1, adding, “it popped back in, but anytime that that happens there’s real damage to the ligament that holds it in place. We don’t anticipate her being back for the rest of the series.”
Williams also told reporters that, in Wednesday’s Game 1, Jill Albayati, who started that game at third base and this one on the mound, “got a little bit of a tweak” in her already injured hamstring, “so we had to cut [her start] short tonight, but she should be good. She’s not 100% by any stretch, but she’ll be ready to play. … It’s not bad, but it’s there.” Williams said Albayati was limited to 65 pitches in this game; she threw 59.
Shortstop Joely Leguizamon, who was hit in the face with a throw on Wednesday, played Thursday’s game with what Williams described as “a really nice black eye.” Williams said he submited his lineup late to make sure Leguizamon was seeing the ball well prior to the game, which she was. She went 1-for-3 in the game.
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Notes
The Queens’ starting pitching choices for the first two games of the series — teenagers Amira Hondras (18) and Isabella Villarreal (19), both of whom had pitched only in relief prior to this series — have been surprising. They started in place of expected starting pitchers, veterans Jamie Mackay and Ayami Sato. (Sato threw 98 pitches over four innings in Game 2 before giving way to closer Meggie Meidlinger).
Young explained his thinking to reporters after Game 2. “The reason behind that is I wanted the young ones to start,” Young said. “I didn’t want them to get into a position where we’re in the the fifth and sixth inning, and it’s a tie score in a big game, and that situation, that moment could have been too big. … I want the more experienced pitchers to be in those moments.”
Despite the Queens’ wins, the plan didn’t work perfectly. Hondras gave up a grand slam in her second inning of work in Game 1 and got the hook, and Villarreal allowed two runs in two innings in Game 2. Sato followed Villarreal and allowed five runs in four innings. It only appears to have worked because Jamie Mackay came up huge in Game 1 (she told ESPN’s AJ Andrews prior to Game 2 that she entered Game 1 expecting to pitch just two innings; Mackay instead threw the final 5 2/3), and the lineup did its job, coming from behind in Game 1 and exploding for that 10-run inning in Game 2.
Despite limited playing time, outfielder Diana Ibarra has reached base eight times since being acquired by the Queens, but she is still looking for her first hit with LA. She has walked six times and been hit by a pitch twice as a Queen, including two walks and a hit-by-pitch in Game 2.
The Firebells have scored 13 runs in the first two games of this series and have done it without any help from their best hitter. Kelsie Whitmore is 0-for-8 on the series and hasn’t so much as advanced a runner thus far. The Queens did make two excellent fielding plays on hard-hit balls by Whitmore in Game 1, but one worries that she might be pressing, particularly given that she struck out swinging in her last two at-bats in Game 2. It will be interesting to see if Friday’s off day can help her reset at the plate.
