Baseball: Laguna Beach drops Newport

Joseph Boo

LAGUNA NIGUEL - It’s an old baseball quote from the 19th century,

but King Kelly’s mantra is still relevant. “Hit it where they ain’t.”

The Newport Beach 9-10 “A” All-Stars Little League baseball team was

in the “ain’t” mode as Laguna Beach found the promised land in

Wednesday’s District 55 All-Stars tournament game at Chapparosa Park. Two

bloop singles started a Laguna Beach rally that led to a 7-4 victory.

The loss sends Newport into tonight’s loser’s bracket against San

Clemente’s “B” team, at 5 p.m.

“They had a lot of bloop singles that fell in,” NBLL manager Van

Holland said, “while we hit the ball right at them. The ball just didn’t

drop our way.”

Laguna Beach led off with two consecutive infield singles by Keegan

Valaika and Nick Witte in the bottom of the first, and both of them

scored to give Laguna Beach a 2-1 lead.

Newport took a 1-0 lead in the first from a break of its own. Andy

Rovzar hit a towering fly to center field. Valaika almost made a nice

sliding catch, but the ball popped in and out of his glove. Rovzar made

it to second base with a double, and he scored on two wild pitches.

Newport retook the lead in the second with three runs, thanks to three

Laguna Beach errors. Thomas Dialynas led off with a single, the only hit

in the inning. When the center fielder couldn’t field the ball cleanly,

Dialynas went to second, and he later scored on two wild pitches.

Dialynas went 3 for 3 at the plate, all singles.

Newport’s next two hitters, Kevin Holland and Carlo Valdes, walked.

Holland scored on a groundout by Patrick Marin-Finn, and Valdes came home

on an error by the second baseman to give his team a 4-2 lead.

Laguna responded with five runs in the second, made possible by five

singles. Laguna’s first four batters reached base to account for one run.

Two of them reached on bloop singles.

After a fielder’s choice scored another Laguna runner, Kevin Bulk

delivered a big two-run single. Austin Hyden followed up with an RBI

single to give Laguna a 7-4 lead.

The runs stopped flowing after the second. Newport starter Blaine

Neilsen easily retired Laguna in the third, and Dialynas pitched two

scoreless innings of relief, getting out of a bases loaded jam in the

fourth with two strikeouts.

But Newport could not take advantage of its opportunities. In the

fourth, Marin-Finn ended up on third with one out because of a costly

throwing error by Laguna’s third baseman. But Laguna pitcher Bulk got out

of that situation.

Newport had runners on first and second with two outs in the fifth,

but no runs came from that inning.

“We hit the ball well and kept the game close,” Holland said. “But as

I said, the ball just didn’t fall our way.”