Although it was only opening weekend for the Bonnyville Braves midget AA baseball team, the local squad looked to be in peak form following a number of blowout victories in Bonnyville this past weekend.
The Braves invoked the mercy rule in three of their four games of the local invitational, destroying rival the St. Paul Storm 17-0, clobbering the St. Albert Cardinals 14-3 and walking all over the Sherwood Park Athletics 11-1.
“We have been doing everything right,” said Braves coach Jim Church after the dismantling of Sherwood Park. “We have been playing real solid defense and the offense has been there. Everybody is contributing.”
For the first time in years Bonnyville was awarded the opportunity to host a two-day, eight-game round robin tournament to open up the season. Teams from the Edmonton area marched their way up Highway 28 to the Bonnyville baseball diamonds tucked back in the west end of town.
The host Braves stole the show in the opening game of the tournament by hitting and pitching their way to a large victory over St. Paul. Three Braves pitchers combined to toss a no-hitter in the shutdown of the rival squad.
St. Albert had the next crack at the Braves on Saturday evening, but also proved to be no match for a heavy hitting Bonnyville squad.
“We have been hitting the ball hard here at the start of the season,” said Church. “We have been hitting triples and we have been hitting balls out to the out field fence. We had one hit and roll to straight away centre, about 400 feet.”
The dominant pitching cracked in the second game with the Cardinals able to string come hits together and collect three runs. The runs against proved to be irrelevant as Bonnyville waltzed their way to an 11-run victory.
“We have been pretty lucky. We have 12 kids on our team this year and every one of them can pitch,” said longtime Brave Justin Church. “When we were up we were putting in some of our younger pitchers to get them some experience.”
Bonnyville then sent veteran pitcher Brandon Slusarski out to the mound on Sunday afternoon to face the Athletics. Slusarski cruised his was through hitless inning after hitless inning and was back by the continued slugging of the Braves lineup.
The hometown offence was also aided by the Braves dislike of standing at first base. The team was extremely aggressive on the base paths stealing second four times throughout the game, which helped put their runners in scoring position.
“My mindset is why stay on first and be a part of a potential double play,” said Church. “We are going to steal until they can throw us out and so far we haven't been thrown out this weekend.”
The Athletics only run came courtesy of a Braves fielding error and a balk, which combined to be the only blemish on Bonnyville's defense all weekend.
The midget AA Braves are two years removed from a trip to the Western Baseball Championships. The team has been extremely successful of late finishing in the top four of Tier I for the last five years, a trend coach Church hopes to continue.
“We have some really solid seniors, and if we can develop the young guys over the first couple months then we are going to be a contender for Tier I again this year,” said Church. “Everybody is contributing. Everybody is hitting the ball and that is the key, getting hits up and down the lineup.”
Justin agreed, feeling that this Braves team has the lineup and skill level to compete against the top teams in the province.
“I think we have an opportunity to succeed,” said Justin. “It doesn't matter if we peak here at the start of the season, we want to be peaking towards the end of the season. That is the goal.”
Several different season opening tournaments were held across the province this weekend. The results from this weekends games, combined with some played next weekend, will be used to determine the seeding for Tier I and II. The teams will be split up with the top eight remaining in Tier I.
