DANVILLE, Calif. — After scoring just three runs over the weekend in San Luis Obispo and getting shutout for 16 consecutive innings, the Walnut Creek Crawdads needed an opportunity to get their bats going again. Luckily, they didn’t have to wait long. 

Monday evening, after a night of sleeping in their own beds and a day of eating home-cooked food, the Crawdads arrived at Monte Vista High School for a rare non-CCL matchup against the California Tigers. It was a new day and a new opportunity that the offense took advantage of. Unfortunately, the pitching and defense squandered the bats bouncing back.

Walnut Creek (15-12, 14-9 CCL) exploded for 11 runs on 11 hits — their most in either category since June 29 — but the defense committed three errors, and the pitching staff struggled, leading to the California Tigers putting up 12 runs and defeating the Crawdads. The loss won’t show up in the standings as it’s a non-CCL game, but it makes four games in a row that the Crawdads have lost. The team has shown repeatedly that they can be great, but right now they need to get back to a higher standard. The journey to get there starts with accountability. 

“We know as a group that we can swing it, especially if we’re swinging at good pitches,” Crawdads left fielder Casey Leavitt-McGee said. “I think pitching and defense is part of the game. I’ll take part for my error in left, that definitely changed the game. At the end of the day, everyone’s just got to look in the mirror and come tomorrow ready to play.” 

The play that Leavitt-McGee is referring to occurred in the fifth inning with the game tied 2-2. With a runner on first base and no outs, Tigers center fielder Chase Christenson pulled a ball off the end of his bat into left-center field that kept carrying on Leavitt-McGee, instead of dying like he expected it to. 

Leavitt-McGee was able to reach out and get his glove on the ball, but it hit off his fingertips and fell to the ground, allowing Christenson to reach second safely and advance the runner to third. After a fielder’s choice that could have potentially been an inning-ending double play if not for the error, Tigers second baseman Dylan Drake blasted a home run over the elevated wall in center field. 

The Crawdads’ two other errors came the inning prior and helped tie the game. Catcher Conner Smith reached on an error by shortstop Jared Mettam and advanced to second on the subsequent play after second baseman Ryan Ellis forced a throw to the bag that Mettam couldn’t glove. Smith would later come around to score on a sacrifice fly. Three errors directly contributed to two opposition runs.

“When you don’t play catch, it’s essentially giving the opposition more outs,” Crawdads head coach Brant Cummings said. “It makes it tough on you, because when you commit an error, their energy or their morale rises.” 

While three errors are inexcusable, they’re far from the sole reason the Crawdads lost. Left-handed reliever JoJo Zalazar was brought in specifically to eat innings Monday and help a Crawdads bullpen that’s staring down six games in seven days. Unfortunately, he could only record three outs and had seven runs tacked against him.

The other Crawdad pitchers that saw action — Left-handed starter Max Cohen, right-handed reliever Joe Coupland and left-handed reliever Bradyn Barnes — are regulars and all threw the ball well. Together, they combined for eight innings of three earned run baseball. 

Cohen’s outing in particular was impressive. It was his first start of the summer and just the second time he had gone four innings. He allowed just one earned run, five base runners and struck out three. Cohen tried to keep his mindset simple in the unusual waters, and it worked.

“It’s my ability to try to not think,” Cohen said. “I Just want to go out there (and) pitch. The more I think, the more I think about messing up. So I try to think less.

“Just filling up the strike zone, getting weak contact. That’s kind of how I’ve been going this whole summer, through weak contact.” 

In the end, Cohen’s start was wasted, but throughout the game, the offense fought to give the pitching a lead that could get a Crawdads win. 

Mettam and Ellis committed harmful errors in the fourth inning, but in the first inning, they helped score the Crawdads’ first run after Mettam singled and was moved over to third after Ellis singled and catcher Zach Justice walked. First baseman Kam Taylor hit a sacrifice fly to deep left field to score Mettam.

“We did, early in the game, have some loud line drive contact that felt good to see,” Cummings said. “Mettam hit the line drive to right, Ellis hit the ball line drive to left.” 

The lineup never gave up. Taylor worked a bases-loaded walk to break a 1-1 tie in the third. Leavitt-McGee made up for his error when he tripled with the bases loaded in the bottom of the fifth inning to give the Crawdads a 6-5 lead. Even in the ninth inning, the team was able to get within one run. Unfortunately, ending up within one run of your opponent isn’t quite the same as winning. 

What it does mean, though, is that the offense held up its end of the bargain. The position players will look to carry that momentum into the resumption of CCL play, but on the defensive side of the ball, they didn’t execute as well as they could have and the pitching hit bumps in the road. Ultimately, that was the difference maker. 

“(Pitching coach Dustin Cheyne) said we had 32 quality at-bats,” Leavitt-McGee said. “We’re working in the box. … we put up 11 runs, that’s really all you can ask. But you’ve got to pitch, you’ve got to play defense and then you’ve got to hit and we hit today, but two facets of the game we didn’t execute. That’s what burned us today.”  

By Ethan Ignatovsky