Nerius Tamosiunas and George Braeger were the stars of the Bristol Badgers 5-0 victory over the Bournemouth Bears at the weekend. The Bristol team fought back, after losing the first game of their BBF AAA double header 5-2, to shut out their south coast rivals in game 2.
Tamousinas pitched a complete game shutout over seven innings, giving up just eight hits. He was well supported by some excellent fielding. Braeger went three for three at the plate, scoring one run and driving in another. Mattia Papini kept up his good start to the season with two hits and two runs.
The first game was tight but the Badgers were unable to make an impression against Jose Lopez, the Bears pitcher. Shortstop Papini was the most successful Badgers’ hitter with two hits in the defeat.
“This was the best baseball we have played this season,” said Rhodri Theaker, the Badgers’ player-manager. “We tightened up our game, particularly in the field. Shutting out the Bears is going to be difficult and its a real credit to the all round team performance that we achieved it.”
At Farnham Park, Bristol Bobcats got their BBF Women’s League underway against Belles Baseball and London Mayhem. Despite going down 10-7 to the Mayhem and 13-9 to the Belles, there were plenty of performances to be optimistic about for the rest of the campaign as Denise Grant, Shani Yang, Niamh Cogley-Rock and Rachel Tam all had multi-hit days, scoring 11 runs between them.
The Bobcats fielding was also tight with just three errors over the two games.
“Overall it was an encouraging performance against two of the strongest teams in the league and the team is looking forward to the next round of matches,” said Bobcats’ manager Carlson Charles.
Next up:
Next weekend, the Bristol Bats open their BBF AA schedule with a home game against Bracknell Inferno, last year’s BBF national single A champions.
Also at Somerdale, the Brunels welcome Weston Jets, while the Buccaneers travel to Somerset to take on the Wessex Division leaders, the Taunton Muskets.
The Badgers have the weekend off.
Featured image: Left fielder George Braeger was one of the stars of the Badgers shutout victory.