Liam Cruz, second from left, celebrates his game-winning HR with his Wow Factor teammates.
By Rich Bevensee
Neither ballplayer considers himself a home run hitter, but Alexander Stirr and Liam Cruz took turns on Wednesday proving they are indeed capable of the longball.
With no time left on the Diamond Nation game clock, Stirr led off the top of the fifth inning by launching his first homer of the summer to give his Baseball U PA 17U Select team a one-run lead.
In the bottom of the fifth, Cruz took his turn stepping into the spotlight.
With one out and one on, Cruz walloped a 1-1 pitch high into the left field netting for a walk-off, two-run home run to give Wow Factor NE National 16U White an improbable 6-5 victory in the Super 17 Invitational on Wednesday afternoon at ‘The Nation’ in Flemington.
“I didn’t even look up,” said Cruz, a 15-year-old who hasn’t hit a homer since playing 12U. “I thought it was a fly ball until I was halfway down the line and I saw him (the left fielder) backing up and I thought, ‘Oh wow, it’s getting out of here.’”
This tournament is a Showcase Series Qualifier without playoffs. The top five teams receive a bid for the Top 25 Showcase Series in August.
Cruz’s moonshot gave Wow Factor its first win of the week. Earlier the Paramus-based club lost to Combat, 14-0, and to the Lower Bucks Minutemen, 8-6.
Here’s Liam Cruz’ home run swing which gave Wow Factor a 6-5 win.
The loss was Baseball U’s first of the week. Earlier they defeated the Lower Bucks Minutemen, 8-0, and the NJ Rising Rebels, 13-1.
Wow Factor was limited to nine players Wednesday because many players on the roster are underclassmen who had to take final exams. Cruz is a rising junior at Kellenberg Memorial in Uniondale, Long Island, who played catcher and second base with the junior varsity team this spring. He was batting ninth for Wow Factor.
He came up to bat after Patrick Simer walked to lead off the bottom of the fifth and Bryce Ferguson flew out to right.
“The pitch was middle-in and I just stayed inside the ball and pulled it left,” Cruz said. “Outside is not my spot, man. Anything inside or middle. Honestly I was looking to stay up the middle, getting something to hit and hitting it hard. I was not even thinking about the home run, just about hitting it hard.”
“The game’s not over ‘til the last out. As long as I put something in the gap or a groundball, I was going to do anything to move him over.”
Cruz said that on his train ride home, the first phone call about his dramatic homer and first walk-off hit in a year will be to his father, Frank Cruz.
“He’ll probably be like, ‘Oh, was the pitcher that bad?’” Cruz said.
Stirr, a rising senior at Pocono Mountain East in Swiftwater, Pa., and a Bloomsburg commit, was denied hero status at Diamond Nation – at least for a day – but his Baseball U teammates know he will supply plenty of offense this summer. As a junior at Pocono Mountain East, Stirr batted .469 with two homers and a .766 slugging percentage.
For his performance this spring the Pocono Record named Stirr its Hitter of the Year.
“It felt good to finally get one here,” Stirr said. “My brother Logan (who played four years for East Stroudsburg) hit plenty of them when he played here.”
Alexander Stirr is pumped after giving Baseball U a one-run lead with a HR in the top of the 5th.
Stirr, who finished the game 3-for-3 with two RBI and two runs scored, didn’t rule out hitting more homers because he feels he has enough power. He just won’t go up to the plate looking for one.
“I’m not really surprised because I’m pretty strong,” Stirr said. “I just have to find the pitch and drive it well.”
Baseball U, trailing by a run in the top of the fourth, tied the game at 4-4 when Ryan Pacitti, batting last in a 10-man lineup, hit a grounds-rule, RBI double to drive in Ben Rogish. Wow Factor righty Bryce Ferguson was able to halt the damage after that, getting a groundout and two strikeouts to end the inning.
Baseball U came back from a 3-1 deficit to tie the game in the top of the third when Stirr had an RBI single to drive in Lucas Angst and Kellen Kroski drilled a two-out double down the left field line to score Stirr.
Wow Factor broke that tie in the bottom of the third when Bryce Ferguson coaxed a walk with the bases loaded.
It was a good day for anyone named Cruz on the Wow Factor roster. Jendry Cruz went 2-for-2 with a walk and two runs scored. Elias Cruz was also 2-for-2 with a walk. Simer had a sacrifice fly in the first inning.
Simer pitched the first 1⅓ innings and yielded one run on two hits and one walk with one strikeout. Ferguson handled the final 3⅔ innings and surrendered four runs on four hits and six walks with three strikeouts.
For Baseball U, Lucas Angst walked twice and scored twice. Pacitti and Kroski each had an RBI double, and Damian Glackin drove in a run with a sacrifice fly.
Damian Budhai pitched the first inning and gave up three runs on two hits and one walk with two strikeouts. Will Fells threw 2⅔ innings in relief and surrendered one run on two hits and five walks with three strikeouts. Glackin pitched two-thirds of an inning and gave up two runs on one hit with one strikeout.