Socorro Baseball Team Falls

By Nicky Romero

SOCORRO – The Socorro Warrior baseball post-season came to quick end on Friday, May 7, as it fell 20-9 in five innings to Ruidoso in the first round of the 2010 NM State Baseball Championship.
Socorro, the 3-3A district runner-ups, ended the season 14-13 overall and 7-2 in district play.
Coach Alan Edmonson said, “It's definitely not the way you want to go down. But you got to tip your hat to Ruidoso. They played a great game. They're heck of a lot better team than a number ten team. It was a tough draw for us. We didn't make the plays and they did.”
Senior Charlie Savedra was the starting pitcher for Socorro. Savedra got off to a slow start in the first inning. Ruidoso scored three runs in the first, with a walk, a triple, a single, and an error for an unearned run. Savedra settled down in the second inning with two strikeouts and a groundout to the shortstop.
Ruidoso tacked on five more runs in the third for an 8-0 lead.
Socorro finally scored one run in its part of the third. Ibrahim Maiga and Irving Gomez were both walked. Michael Chavez hit a ground ball to the shortstop who threw to first for an error and scored Maiga.
Justus Jaramillo was then hit by a pitch to load up the bases, with the Warriors' big hitter Savedra coming up to bat. Ruidoso decided to make a pitching change giving the ball to junior Kayle Frierson. On the first pitch from Frierson, Savedra powered the ball high over the center field fence for a grand slam to narrow the deficit to 8-5.
Savedra said, “It was good. I struck out the first time up. I was hoping I would get a hit and just swung hard on a fastball and it went over.”
Socorro narrowed the margin to 8-6 in the fourth. Jonathan DiBartolomeo ran to second base on a dropped ball by the left fielder. Gomez later hit a single and got credit for the RBI.
The Warriors ran into trouble in a long fifth inning. Ruidoso scored 11 runs for an insurmountable 20-9 lead. Savedra and relief pitcher Michael Chavez were able to get two outs and only allowed one run to start this inning. One of the outs came on a circus catch by left fielder Freddy Martinez.
Getting the third out in the inning proved to be the trick for Socorro. A Ruidoso player hit a grounder to the shortstop who threw to second. The ball was dropped by the second baseman, which should have been the third out. Instead, Ruidoso lined up nine more batters this inning and put the game out of reach. Ruidoso's Jacob Vazquez added to the damage with a three-run homer.
Socorro scored three more runs in their fifth. It wasn't enough runs to extend the game and ended up losing by the ten run rule.
“We made an error with two outs,” Edmonson said. We gave them an opportunity to stay up there and keep hitting. Once you do that, it seems that nothing goes your way. I think they got an infield single. They hit a couple of balls off the end of the bat that our pitchers made some good pitches on. We turn around and walk some guys. We hit a guy. All of a sudden they're getting a lot more base runners.”

Socorro Baseball Team Falls