The game initially went underway with a 3-man instead of a 4-man umpiring crew.
Winfried Berkvens, the scheduled Home Plate Umpire was in a long traffic jam of some 1½ hrs. and therefore could not be at the site in time.
It was then decided to move 1B Umpire René Ras to call balls and strikes, while Roy van de Wateringen moved from third to first base.
Henri van Heijningen, who was to be the 2B Umpire, started at third base.
Berkvens arrived in the second inning and he joined his crewmates in the top of the third inning with one out and a runner on first base.
Berkvens officiated at third base, while Van Heijningen moved to his original assignment at second base.
...Kenny Berkenbosch hit a decisive 3-run homerun...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
The game was a match-up of two lefthanded starters.
Jim Ploeger (Amsterdam Pirates) and Diegomar Markwell (Neptunus) took the mound, as they had done in the first game.
Both starters got some nice support from their defense.
In the first inning, Ploeger walked lead-off hitter Coco Johnson, who then stole second base.
But with one out, he was eliminated in a double play when short stop Sharlon Schoop caught a live hit by Dwayne Kemp.
In the second inning, leftfielder Roelie Henrique caught a lead-off line drive hit by Gianison Boekhoudt.
In the third, Ploeger gave up an one-single to Benjamin Dille, but followed with two strikeouts.
Markwell began his first at bat with two strikeouts, then gave up a single to Denzel Richardson, but a flyout ended the at bat.
Markwell pitched himself out of a jam in the second inning.
He gave up back-to-back singles to Kenny Berkenbosch and Rashid Gerard.
Next, he made a fielding error on a bunt by Max Clarijs, but managed to get the ball at first base.
There, a very close call followed, but Clarijs was called out, giving him a sacrifice bunt.
With runners now on second and third base, two flytouts ended the at bat, which could have been very productive.
In the third inning, Markwell walked lead-off hitter Gilmer Lampe, but this time, it was the Neptunus-defense that turned a double play on a grounder by Sharlon Schoop.
In the fourth, Markwell gave up a 2-out single to Rashid Gerard, but he stranded again.
In the top of the fifth inning, Neptunus opened the score, but it also started to drizzle somewhat.
It had starten to darken with heavy clouds from the third inning on.
Dudley Leonora led off with a double and moved on a grounder by Shaldimar Daantji, then scored the first run on a single by Quintin De Cuba.
Hereafter, Benjamin Dille also singled, but then, it started to rain heavily and the game was interrupted, while lightning also became visible at that moment.
...There was a 72-minute rain-delay in the top of the 5th inning...
(© Photo: Marco Stoovelaar) |
Weather predictions showed that the rain and lightning would leave the area in about an hour.
The rain stopped some 26 minutes later.
While there was still lightning going on, some players came back on the field to loosen up again.
This of course can be very dangerous with lightning still going on.
At that moment, it was decided to prolong the delay at least 20 more minutes until the sky would have been cleared of lightning.
That didn't happen and so, another 20-minute delay was added.
In the meantime, there were some talks going on between the umpires, represenatatives of the two clubs and the league whether or not to resume the game with regard to the time of the evening.
As the game would restart arround 9:45 PM, not only almost five more innings needed to be played, but in case of a tie, extra innings would follow.
It was decided to resume the game tonight and continue playing until there was a decision.
When a game is halted during the Holland Series, it will be picked up from the moment it was stopped, whether or not it is a regulation game at that moment.
Would the game not have restarted tonight, it was to be completed on Wednesday-evening starting with the situation in the top of the fith inning in which it was stopped.
But in the end, the game resumed at 9:46 PM.
From there, while six runs were scored from that moment, only one hour and 22 minutes were needed to complete the game.
When the game resumed, Mike Groen took over the pitching for Pirates and he did an outstanding job.
Groen began with a wild pitch, then walked Greg Muller that loaded the bases.
Coco Johnson followed with a sacrifice fly that brought in De Cuba and gave Neptunus a 2-0 lead.
A grounder ended the inning and Neptunus left runners behind on second and third base.
...Winning pitcher Mike Groen...
...14 consecutive outs...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
Starting with the sacrifice fly, Mike Groen retired the next 14 batters in a row.
After Muller had walked, Neptunus would not reach base again in the remainder of the game!
Included in these 4 2/3 inning were a nice catch by rightfielder Denzel Richardson on a line drive by Gianison Boekhoudt in the sixth inning, which initially appeared to have homerun-distance but stayed in the field.
In the seventh, centerfielder Gilmer Lampe made a nice running catch on a line drive by Quintin De Cuba.
And in the eighth, there was a great defensive play by third baseman Rashid Gerard on a hard grounder by Stijn van der Meer.
With a 2-0 lead in the bottom of the fifth after the rain-delay, Misja Harcksen took over the Neptunus-pitching, but he ran into problems.
He gave up a single to Delano Selassa, but he was forced out on a grounder by Roelie Henrique.
The latter stole second base, then advanced when the throw from catcher Gianison Boekhoudt ended up in centerfield.
Moments later, Henrique scored on a wild pitch from Harcksen.
Next, the bases got loaded when Gilmer Lampe singled and both Sharlon Schoop and Denzel Richardson walked.
That led to another pitching change, as Kevin Kelly took over.
The first two pitches Kelly threw became memorable.
With the bases loaded, he faced Kalian Sams.
On Kelly's first pitch, Sams hit a hard grounder back to the mound.
At the moment of contact, the bat of Sams broke with the top half following the ball towards the mound.
Kelly appeared to move his body to field the ball, but instead was hit hard on his leg by the bat and immediately fell down.
Short stop Stijn van der Meer then fielded the ball and eliminated Sams at first base, while Lampe scored the tying run.
A 4-minute injury delay followed with Kelly being attended by the Amsterdam-trainer.
After some warm-up pitches, Kelly stayed in the game.
With runners on second and third base, he now faced Kenny Berkenbosch.
His first pitch also was hit hard by Berkenbosch, who hit a line drive down the line in deep leftfield for a 3-run homerun that gave Pirates a 5-2 lead.
Hereafter, Kelly got an inning-ending grounder from Rashid Gerard, but the game had turned around.
As Kelly's leg had started to stiffen up, he didn't return in the sixth inning.
Brendan Schoemaker took over, did fine and threw the final three innings for Neptunus.
In the bottom of the sixth, Neptunus-leftfielder Coco Johnson made a nice catch on a pop-fly in leftfield near the foul-line, then first baseman Dudley Leonora made a nice play on a throw in the ground by short stop Stijn van der Meer on a grounder by Delano Selassa.
With two outs in the sixth, Schoemaker walked Roelie Henrique, who then stole second base, but was left behind.
After having retired the side in the seventh, Schoemaker gave up a double to Max Clarijs in the eighth, but he also stranded.
In the top of the ninth, Mike Groen retired the side in his fourth consecutive inning to end the game.
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Amsterdam Pirates turns Game 4 Holland Series vs. Neptunus around after long rain-delay
AMSTERDAM (Neth.) -
L&D Amsterdam Pirates trailed 1-0 in the top of the fifth inning of Game 4 of the Holland Series against Curaçao Neptunus on Tuesday-evening (August 27) when a heavy rain-shower interrupted the match-up.
The rain stopped after some 25 minutes, but as there still was a lot of lightning in the area, the resuming of the game was postponed twice.
After a delay of more than one hour, the game resumed, Neptunus added a run.
Moments later, Pirates had a productive fifth at bat, scored five runs, hightlighted by a 3-run homerun by Kenny Berkenbosch and went on to win 5-2.
With the win, Amsterdam Pirates avoided a sweep, as Neptunus had won the first three games of the best-of-seven.
And with that, it forced at least a fifth game, which will be played coming Thursday-evening in Rotterdam.
Game 4, best-of-seven Holland Series.