Vigilantes Win on Ehler’s One-Hitter

Steve Ehler’s record is 3-8, and the Vigilante right-hander has it thanks to a pair of four-game losing streaks.

But in the last two games Ehler has found a split-finger fastball to complement his other pitches and it is causing a 180-degree turn in his fortunes.

Against the Chico Heat on Wednesday, Ehler looked like Roger Clemens, striking out nine and giving up only one hit in a 3-0 victory before an announced crowd of 2,975 at Saddleback College.

Ehler, the league’s pitcher of the week after holding Bend to three hits and an unearned run in the Vigilantes’ 8-2 victory on Aug. 15, flirted with a no-hitter for five innings before settling for the fifth one-hitter in the Western Baseball League history. The hit was legitimate, a solid, one-out single to center by designated hitter Levi Funderburk.

Mission Viejo improved to 16-18, five games behind first-place Sonoma County in the South Division with 11 to play. The third-place Vigilantes trail Chico by two games in the standings.

“Tonight was one of those nights,” said Ehler, who threw 114 pitches in the 2-hour 7-minute contest and became the second Vigilante pitcher this season to throw a complete game.

“I got some great defensive plays behind me, and a couple of balls they hit hard were right at people. But I had everything working. I didn’t even show the splitter until the fourth.”

Ed Quijada (6-2) was also pretty effective for Chico. In seven innings, Quijada (6-2) gave up just six hits, but two of them were bases-empty home runs, by Corey Parker in the third and Sam Taylor in the seventh. It was Taylor’s 20th homer, making him the first player in franchise history to reach that total. It was Parker’s 11th homer.

But nothing could take the spotlight away from Ehler.

“He threw the ball every place I put my glove,” said catcher Mike Cowell. “We were really on the same page.”

Mission Viejo squeezed out the only run Ehler would need in the second. Chris Briones and Sean Drinkwater opened the inning with singles, and they moved up to second and third on a tap back to the mound by Pat O’Connor. Briones then scored when Drinkwater allowed himself to get trapped in a rundown on Cowell’s grounder.