{"id":145,"date":"2015-02-17T03:37:15","date_gmt":"2015-02-17T03:37:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/?p=145"},"modified":"2015-04-17T03:48:47","modified_gmt":"2015-04-17T03:48:47","slug":"baseball-returns-with-a-bang","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/2015\/02\/17\/baseball-returns-with-a-bang\/","title":{"rendered":"Baseball returns with a bang"},"content":{"rendered":"

Published in The Crow’s Nest\u00a0February\u00a02015<\/em><\/p>\n

Following the clink from his bat, Dominick DiPasquale\u2019s teammates lined up to slap fives after he rounded the bases and returned to home plate.<\/p>\n

In what was the first of two games on their spring-season opening day, the USF St. Petersburg baseball club defeated Florida State University 3-2 Saturday afternoon, thanks to DiPasquale\u2019s home-run blast in the fourth inning.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt felt great,\u201d DiPasquale said. \u201cIt just came off the bat and I knew it was gone.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although he reached first base on his next at bat, DiPasquale\u2019s home run was the most significant hit of the day, just in front of senior Jody Odom Jr.\u2019s base-clearing hit in the third inning.<\/p>\n

Cully Wilson and Jeremy Berger each reached first base safely and had a stolen base, which put the base runners in scoring position prior to Odom\u2019s go-ahead hit.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think we just got a pretty good team this year,\u201d Odom said. \u201cWe feed off each other, so if one guy gets on base we\u2019re just gonna keep stringing them together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jordan Rubin, the team\u2019s usual catcher, switched to pitcher for Game 1 to give the lineup more flexibility. He pitched 4.2 innings, allowing just one run. Rubin was replaced behind home plate by Justin hand, who had never played catcher before.<\/p>\n

It was Rubin\u2019s first game back after returning from a torn ACL suffered during the fall season.<\/p>\n

Odom relieved Rubin in the fifth inning. Allowing only two hits for the rest of the game, Odom helped the Bulls close out the game with a victory.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe came back, we persevered,\u201d Berger said. \u201cJody Odom, lights out as always.\u201d<\/p>\n

Because their roster is depleted compared to the prior season, the team made pitching changes prior to the first game due to having to play three games in two days.<\/p>\n

In Game 2, senior pitcher Jason Smith was the first of three to pitch for the Bulls as they lost 3-1, failing to carry the momentum late into the day.<\/p>\n

Rubin returned as catcher, allowing Hand to have a productive role as a hitter and relief pitcher.<\/p>\n

Hand reached base safely in three of his four plate appearances, after going 0-for-3 in the prior game.<\/p>\n

After taking Smith out of the game, FSU put a string of hits together against pitcher Zack Mellin in the fourth and fifth inning, accompanied by a few fielding errors from the Bulls.<\/p>\n

The Bulls recorded eight hits, but failed to capitalize with runners in scoring position.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe FSU team is one of the best teams we\u2019ve played,\u201d Berger said. \u201cSo, I\u2019m proud of everyone.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Published in The Crow’s Nest\u00a0February\u00a02015 Following the clink from his bat, Dominick DiPasquale\u2019s teammates lined up to slap fives after he rounded the bases and returned to home plate. In what was the first of two games on their spring-season opening day, the USF St. Petersburg baseball club defeated Florida State University 3-2 Saturday afternoon, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-145","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-uncategorized","7":"czr-hentry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=145"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":160,"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/145\/revisions\/160"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=145"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=145"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/digifolio.me\/andrewcaplan\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=145"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}