February 3

By Lewis Rubman

Dominican Republic (2-1) 4 5 0

Colombia (0-3) 0 5 0

HATO REY, PUERTO RICO–This afternoon’s hard fought contest between the Toros del Este, champions of the Dominican League, and the Montería Vaqueros (Buckaroos) their counterparts from Colombia, was a lot closer and exciting than the final score would indicate. The totals for hits and errors gives a better idea of the tightness of the encounter than the runs total does.

Two right handers, the Dominican’s Pablo Espino and Colombia’s Randy Consuegra, held their opponent scoreless for almost six innings. Espino completed that stretch; Consuegra was replaced by a situational lefty with after five and a half frames, which may have been the start of his team’s undoing.

The slow building tensions of a pitchers’ duel exploded in the top of the seventh. Ronald Ramírez, the southpaw who closed closed down the Dominican threat in the sixth, didn’t take the mound to start the seventh. Of course, “threat” is a relative concept.

In this case, it consisted of a man on first with two outs. His right handed successor, Pedro Escobar, immediately faced a real threat and was unable to deal with it. He walked the first batter he faced, Junior Lake. Another baseball lifer, 29 year old Peter O’Brien who achieved a lifetime batting average of .209 in four years of cups of espresso, then whacked a might home run over the right field wall, and the two evenly matched teams were two runs apart. Not an insurmountable different but not an insignificant one, either.

The Toros’ impetus carried over from their pitching and hitting to their fielding. The first play of the Buckaroos’ half of the seventh was memorable. Andy Vásquez, hoping to ignite his teammates’ bats, executed a beautiful drag bunt, equidistant from the mound, the first baseman, and the second baseman. Gustavo Núñez, playing second, charged the ball, picked it up with his gloved, and shot it straight from the glove, untouched by human hands, in a sharp, straight line to O’Brien at first. O’Brien made an acrobatic grab of the ball and still managed to maintain contact with the bag long enough to get the out.

In any case, in the top of the eighth, with Carlos Díaz on the mound for the Vaqueros, Oakland prospect Jorge Mateo lined a single to center field. He advanced to third on Rubén Sosa’s line drive single, also to center. Díaz was yanked, and Anthony Vizcaya took over. He uncorked a wild pitch that allowed Mateo to score and Sosa to reach third base, known in Spanish as the waiting room before scoring on Lake’s ground out to short.

The excitement didn’t end there. Colombia fought back valiantly in the bottom of the eighth. Díaz allowed a single to Jordan Díaz and a base on balls to Brallan Pérez open the episode. Men on first and second, no outs – the perfect time for a sacrifice.

Francisco Acuña bunted, but not as well Vásquez had in the previous frame. Acuña’s attempt resulted in a pop up to Jumbo Díaz, now pitching in relief for the Toros. He threw to O’Brien at first for the out on Pérez, who had taken off for second. O’Brien then hurled a cross-diamond bullet to third baseman Diego Goris that nabbed Jordan Díaz to complete the triple play.

Espino got the win. There was no save, but Bay Area fans might find it interesting that Fernando Abad pitched a perfect top of the ninth to end the game. Pedro Escobar was charged with the loss.

Puerto Rico will take on Venezuela in about an hour and a half.