Great relief pitching sets up Gleed’s walk-off in victory over Bourne

By Brian Melanson

Looking to secure their first back-to-back victories since July 24th, the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox were back home for their second straight game to take on the Bourne Braves. In what has become commonplace at Red Wilson Field, the Red Sox won their third game via a walk-off as they took down the Braves 4-3.

After Y-D’s Landon Beidelschies struck out the side to start the extra frame, the Red Sox looked to the middle of their lineup to secure them the win.

With Zander Darby acting as the ghost runner on second, a wild pitch advanced him to third to put the winning run within 90 feet of victory. After Nathan Archer was hit by a pitch that Bourne argued hit the knob of his bat, up stepped Dub Gleed.

Gleed is no stranger to the big at-bats as of late. A week ago against Brewster, the University of California Irvine infielder smashed his first home run of the season which ended up being the winning score.

Gleed skied the first pitch he saw to center field, deep enough that allowed Darby to tag for home and win Y-D their third walk-off of the season. 

“It felt good,” Gleed humbly said of his late heroics. “I was trying to do it on the first pitch that I could do something with and that happened to be the first pitch of the at-bat… Just try to hit something deep in the air and get him in.”

The Red Sox held the Braves scoreless in the last three innings en route to the win behind great pitching from Matt Fernandez and Beidelschies.

“We have really good pitching that kept us in the game,” manager Scott Pickler said. “Fernandez came in and gave us four great innings and then Beidelchies did a great job closing that game out throwing strikes that came up really big in the ninth and tenth.”

Finnegan Wall was on the mound for his fourth start and worked flawlessly. The University of California Irvine product retired the side in the first two innings, racking up four strikeouts in the early window.

The Red Sox picked up steam to start the bottom of the third. Fresh off of a national championship with LSU, Brady Neal capitalized on his first start of the season by launching his first home run deep over the right-center field wall as Y-D took a 1-0 lead.

Bourne’s Johnathan Vastine responded quickly in the fourth with a leadoff triple. The ensuing batter popped out to Enzo Apodaca in shallow right. Vastine tagged and jogged about 30 feet home before beginning to return to third. 

However, the throw from Apodaca got away from Neal at home as Vastine doubled back and scored to tie the game. Apodaca was charged with an error, the first of two for the Red Sox.

After hitting Caden Bostine with a pitch, Wall locked down, dealing back-to-back strikeouts to prevent possible further damage..

With runners for Bourne on first and third with one out, a would-be inning-ending double play was negated when a bad throw to first base got away from Gleed. The inning continued and Gage Harrelson scored from third as the Braves took their first lead off of the Red Sox’s second error.

After working efficiently through five innings, Wall’s day was finished after Fernandez came into relief. He finished his outing with six strikeouts and three hits allowed with just one of the runs being charged to him. 

After working a scoreless sixth, the Braves struck back an inning later. With two outs and Nu’u Contrades on second, Hugh Pinkney lined the ball out into shallow right field. Casey Cook attempted a diving catch that was just out of his reach for Pinkney’s second hit of the game. Going off of contact, Contrades scored and Bourne extended their lead to 3-1.

As they have done often this season, Y-D began their late-game comeback in the bottom of the seventh. After a Cook leadoff double and a Will King single, RJ Austin lined a single into shallow center field that scored Cook. A wild pitch moved both King and Austin into scoring position, but a strikeout and fly-out ended their hopes for the inning.

Still down a run going into the bottom of the eighth, the Red Sox looked to Hunter Hines to deliver another clutch performance. Instead, he worked a walk and was pinch run for by Archer.

After stealing second and advancing to third on a wild pitch, the Bourne infield was in, protecting against a squeeze. With one out, Brady Day roped a bloop single into shallow left-center that scored Archer and tied the game.

Pickler turned to the bullpen to start the ninth as Beidelschies was called in to shut down the Braves. He worked phenomenally in his outing, inducing a double play to start before issuing a strikeout to end the half-inning.

With the Red Sox unable to walk the game off in the ninth, Beidelschies returned in the tenth and struck out the side with three swing-and-miss strikeouts before Gleed’s walk-off.