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It was up and down at the baseball home game of the Füssen Royal Bavarians against the Munich Caribes © Martin Bühler
Last Saturday, things got heated at the “King’s Field” in Füssen during the baseball Bundesliga home game of the Füssen Royal Bavarians (fifth place in the league table) against the third-placed Munich Caribes.
Feet – In an exciting baseball match in front of their home crowd, the Füssen Royal Bavarians in the 2nd Bundesliga Southeast Group 2 earned a well-deserved shared victory against the Munich Caribes. While Füssen narrowly won the exciting first game 9:7, the Munich team launched a late offensive and won the second game of the day 5:10.
Royal Bavarians head coach Mitch Stephan was not in a great mood on Friday evening. During the final training session on Friday, a heavy thunderstorm rolled over Füssen, and the weather forecast for Saturday was not good. In addition, players Daniel Mendelsohn, Chris Kleber and Yosuke Morishita were sick. Bad omens for the important game against the third-placed Munich Caribes.
Füssen Royal Bavarians launched offensive fireworks
To everyone’s surprise, the weather was perfect the next morning. The loss of Daniel Mendelsohn was compensated for by veteran pitcher James Starek. Starek did his job very well in his usual manner and the home team also put on a fireworks display offensively: a base hit by Silvan Zacek was immediately followed by a home run by Johannes Krumm – 2:0 Füssen.
In the third inning, Krumm and Stephan secured a 4-0 lead thanks to hits from Nicolici and Brunner. It was not until the fourth inning that the guests from Munich’s Olympic Park found a way to beat Starek and reduced the score to 4-1, and then even to 4-2 in the fifth inning. It developed into an exciting game at a high level. Füssen increased their lead to 5-1 in the fifth inning thanks to a strong Christian Brunner.
The home team does not give up
In the sixth inning, James Starek’s strength briefly failed him and the Caribes took a 7-5 lead. Substitute Mitch Stephan had to concede one more run, but was able to avoid major damage. The team showed morale in the sixth inning: instead of burying their heads in the sand, the Füssen Royal Bavarians fought their way back into the game and took the lead again 9-7 after a series of base hits, including a 2-RBI double by Klaus Nicolici.
In the last inning, Stephan left nothing to chance with three strikeouts and secured the first win in the new “Fiassa” City Connect jerseys. “We played and fought really well. That was a strong performance from the whole team. I could have changed the pitcher earlier in the sixth inning, but the offense regained the lead,” says Stephan.
Exciting pitching duel between Guarino and Gaetano
The Royals again got off to a better start in the second game of the day. Once again, it was Klaus Nicolici who took the 1-0 lead with a double. After that, the game turned into a pitching duel between Cameron Guarino from Füssen and Arturo Gaetano from Munich. And so it went into the sixth inning with the score 1-0 for Füssen.
But then the Füssen team stumbled: Guarino got tired and the Caribes immediately took advantage of their chances, with the support of the Füssen defense. The Füssen baseball player Guarino then made room on the pitcher’s mound for Philipp Kanat, but he also had problems stopping the Caribes and, to make matters worse, had to give up a 3-run home run – the new score was 1:9. “It’s happened to us a few times this year that we just can’t get out of an inning,” analyzes Stephan.
Munich wins in the seventh inning
In the seventh inning, Munich increased their lead to 1:10 due to another fielding error. But Füssen showed fighting spirit again and put everything into catching up in the last attempt at bat. However, the comeback did not quite work and the game ended 5:10 for the guests.
“In the end, it’s probably a fair division of the win. We played good baseball for 12 innings today. We lost the second game in one inning. We can definitely build on today’s performance,” said Stephan, satisfied with his team’s performance.
The next match will take place on July 6th as part of the Royal Bavarians Summer Festival with the catch-up game against Garching.
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2024-06-25 10:14:32
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