Greenwood baseball edges Whiteland in wild affair

Greenwood rallied for two runs in the bottom of a controversial seventh to beat Whiteland 5-4 in baseball at home on Tuesday.

The Woodmen, who trailed 4-0 after the first two innings, began chipping away at the lead with a run in the fourth and two more in the sixth. In the seventh, Greenwood scored the tying run on an RBI single by T.J. Bass then pushed the winner across when Jordan Martin scored on an error.

“I told the boys that you have to keep playing hard, put the ball in play and execute and things happen. Tonight it did,” Greenwood coach Andy Bass said. “We needed that win, especially after that last one (on Friday).”

The seventh inning wasn’t without its fireworks. Ben Sobieray led off the inning for Greenwood with a single and was seemingly picked off first base. But Sobieray collided with Whiteland second baseman Luke Helton on his way to second, popping the ball loose and allowing him to reach the bag safely.

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Whiteland coach Scott Sherry protested the call and waited patiently while the two umpires discussed the play. But he lost his composure when the runner was ruled safe and after a few loud words, he was ejected.

“I thought (the runner) led with his shoulder and used his forearm to dislodge the ball. We had a similar incident on the first-base line earlier and I lost my cool. I probably shouldn’t have,” said Sherry. “But I was trying to protect my players from things I didn’t think needed to happen.”

Greenwood (2-4, 2-3 Mid-State) used the momentum of the play to finish off the game. Martin followed Sobieray with a walk and T.J. Bass singled in Sobieray with the tying run. Martin ended up on third on the play and scored when a pickoff throw went wide.

Whiteland (4-3, 2-1) took advantage of early control problems by Greenwood starter Martin to score all four of its runs in the first two innings. Martin walked five over that span while allowing only two hits and trailed 4-0.

But he settled down to keep the Warriors at bay from there, walking only one more batter and allowing one more hit before giving way to reliever Oliver Rau in the sixth. Rau (1-2) struck out four and gave up two hits over the final two innings to get the win.

“He didn’t want to come out, but it’s still early in the season and it’s cool and we didn’t want to run up his pitch count,” coach Bass said. “Oliver came in a did a great job. Jordy had trouble hitting his spots early, but as the game wore on he got stronger.”

Helton, Whiteland’s starter, ended up striking out 10 and giving up one earned run while walking four in six innings.

After their strong start, the Warriors had just six baserunners over the final five innings, something that Sherry noted.

“Our kids came out with a great approach and did what we wanted to do, but unfortunately we didn’t follow up on it,” Sherry said. “About midway through the game we just started doing our own thing.”

T.J. Bass went 2 for 2 with an RBI while Jake Houbt and Rau added hits for the Woodmen. Chase Bennett and Helton had two hits each for the Warriors and Iyan Pelfree had an RBI triple in the first.