As fears of the Coronavirus leaves the fate of MHSAA spring athletics in limbo, Stringer made good on what might be its last baseball game for the foreseeable future.
Behind a 16 strikeout performance from sophomore Jackson Parker on the mound, Stringer defeated Clarkdale 3-2 Friday night in the Stringer Spring Break Tournament finale.
"I loved the effort from our team," said Stringer baseball coach Wade Weathers. "I gave them three days off, yet they've been up here at the tournament working their tails off to get the field ready till midnight last night. And I have some tired kids, but they do it because they take pride in this place.
"To come out here and give an effort like they did, especially with what Parker did on the mound and doing just enough at the plate to survive a late rally is what makes up championship [style teams] that helped us last year. I'm starting to see that it's ingrained in these kids."
Parker threw five and one-third innings of no-hit baseball, striking out 16 of the 25 Clarkdale batters he faced. The sophomore southpaw tossed five three-up, three-down frames.
"He was dominating," Weathers said of Parker. "He controlled the strike zone. He gave up a couple of walks, but he commanded his fastball, and his curveball was really good when [Clarkdale] would foul his fastball off. There weren't any hard-hit balls for our defense to make plays on. When you can get a pitcher like him to strike out as many as he did while staying under his pitch count is a dream as a coach to have."
Clarkdale blew Parker’s would-be no-hitter in the top frame of the sixth on an infield single. The Bulldogs pulled within one run of the Red Devils in the inning on two runs.
Despite the rally by Clarkdale, Stringer hung on for the win. Parker delivered a huge strikeout to end the inning as the tying run laid in wait on third.
"People think we lost a lot of guys from last year's team," said Weathers. "But we didn't. We returned a lot of people. Those guys have been in pressure situations, and it doesn't seem to phase us. We almost gave in tonight, but we had enough mental toughness to overcome."
Stringer took an early 1-0 lead in the third, scoring on a throwing error by Clarkdale. Two Red Devil runs crossed home plate in the fifth. Shortly after a leadoff walk by Colby Garrett, and a Parker single to left field, Evan Hoilfield laid down a bunt leading to a run scored on a Clarkdale throwing error. Jackson Parker followed with an RBI in Stringer's next at-bat on a deep fly ball to left-center field.
“We’re not the most talented team,” said Weathers, “but we find ways to get runs across. I’m sure people hate that I bunt kids so much, but that’s who we are and what we do. When we get guys on first or second, we bunt the baseball because we know how much pressure that puts on us, so we want to apply pressure to the other team. Tonight, it paid off for us. We scored a few runs because of our ability to play a little small ball.”
Jackson Parker led Stringer with two singles. Jack Parker, Evan Holifield, and Lance Jenkins had a solo hits apiece.
Stringer improves to 5-3, while Clarkdale falls to 8-3.
