Southern Section Baseball Playoffs : Slow-Pitcher, Fast-Pitcher Routine Defeats Estancia

Saugus High School Coach Doug Worley did his homework.

Estancia, Saugus’ opponent Friday, had reached the quarterfinals of the Southern Section 3-A baseball playoffs by virtue of late-inning rallies. Twice the Eagles trailed entering the sixth inning and both times they came back to win.

So Worley aligned his pitching plan accordingly. Scott Warr, a left-handed off-speed pitcher, started and left after four innings with a two-run lead. Then came the heat, Roger Salkeld, whose fastball has been clocked in 90s.

Salkeld allowed only two ground-ball singles and struck out seven batters in the final three innings as the Centurions advanced to the semifinals with an 8-2 victory at Estancia.

“In their first two games, it seemed like Estancia had been able to get the hang of those pitchers,” Worley said. “We wanted to keep them off-balance, so we showed them two different types of pitchers today. The plan was to throw Warr four innings and Salkeld three.”

At first, it didn’t appear that Warr (8-2) would hold up his part of the plan. After being handed a 4-0 lead in the top of the first, Warr barely survived the bottom of the inning. His first 10 pitches were balls and the second strike he threw was hit into right by Sean Nichols for a run-scoring single.

But Warr settled down after the first and allowed only two more hits before turning things over to Salkeld.

Salkeld, who is 11-0 with an 0.55 earned-run average, struck out the first two batters he faced. He gave up an infield single to Rob Nye, followed by ground-ball single to right field by Sean Nichols.

He then struck out Bill Gomez to end the threat and breezed through the final two innings. Although his fastball never reached the 90 mile-per-hour level, it was consistently between 85 and 87, according to scouts in attendance.

“We knew we were going to see him, so we knew we were going to have to get our runs early,” Estancia Coach Ken Millard said. “If we could get ahead of them, we had a chance.”

The Eagles got two in the first, but by that point they were already behind. The Centurions (21-4-2) scored four in the first off loser Gabe Javage (10-2).

With runners on first and third and one out, J.B. Johnson singled to center to give Saugus a 1-0 lead. After a walk to Warr, Salkeld, who started at first base, grounded to shortstop Nye, but the Eagles were unable to turn the double play and the Centurions had a 2-0 lead.

Javage walked Trevor Rice to load the bases and then threw away a pick-off attempt which allowed two more runs to score.

The Eagles (21-6) scored two in the bottom of the inning on a single by Nye and a sacrifice fly by Gomez.

The Centurions scored four runs in the top of the seventh, three on a home run by George Lopata, to take an 8-2 lead.

And by then, the game was in good hands . . . Salkeld’s.