Base runners weren’t the problem for Gompers. It was what happened after they reached base.
In the first four innings alone, the Panthers had three runners picked off at first and another thrown out trying to steal second. They mounted serious threats in the fifth and six and got the tying runs on base in the seventh, but failed to break through.
“You are not going to go out there and get the breaks from the umpires,” Gompers coach Louis Figueroa said after the 13th-seeded Panthers fell to No. 20 John Adams, 4-2, in the opening round of the PSAL Class A playoffs in Queens Wednesday afternoon. “You have to use that stick. They got to get the job down at the plate and we didn’t do it.”
His squad left seven men on base despite seven hits and six walks against Adams ace Rafael Guerrero. The Panthers got a run in the fifth on a bases-loaded wild pitch and another in the sixth on an infield single by Juan Hilario, who was 2-for-3 with a run scored. Gompers (8-9), though, stuck out 12 times. Every inning, in fact, but the fourth ended in one.
“We just didn’t get the key hits,” Figueroa said.
Adams (16-1) got on the board without one in the second thanks to three walks and a hit batter from Gompers starter Joel Garcia. The senior, who went five innings, walked four and struck out six, including the side in the second. The Spartans added a run in the third on a Ruiz double and two in the fifth thanks to a Mejia triple and a Ruiz sac fly to take a 4-1 lead.
Gompers, which finished third with quality wins over DeWitt Clinton and John F. Kennedy in Bronx A West, left two on with one out in the fifth and two on with two outs in the sixth. Thanks to two Guerrero walks, the Panthers had runners on first and second with two away in the seventh. Jeffery Valera came on in relief to strike out Polony Calzado with a curveball, a pitch that troubled Gompers throughout, to end the game and the season.
“We have the capabilities of coming back, but today just wasn’t it,” Figueroa said. “We couldn’t string a few hits back to back.”