Coaches AJ Bilslend and Howie Brewer told their Blair Junior Legion baseball team they were impressed.
The Post 154 Bears played well June 30 during the Eastern Nebraska Baseball League (ENBL) Tournament at Elkhorn Mount Michael. They lost 4-1 to Hickman — finishing 1-2 in the tourney — but had performed at an acceptable level going into bracket play of a more important tournament that starts today — the Class B Area 3 Tournament back at Mount Michael.
“We just have to bring it every game. Bring intensity,” Blair pitcher Lee Chavez-Lara said. “Even the players who aren't playing, they've got to bring it.”
The right-hander was optimistic about the Bears' late-season progress.
“I think we're going to bounce back and make a run at districts,” he said.
Post 154 officially closed its regular season last Saturday and Sunday at Vets Field, but showed what it could do in a tournament setting against Hickman. The Bears trailed 1-0 after four innings, tied it up at 1-all in the fifth and, finally, lost the lead again during the top of the seventh frame. Miscues they'd avoided for most of the game cost them late.
“We're going to make mistakes,” Chavez-Lara said. “We're all human. We've just got to fix it and move on.”
Wyatt Fletcher scored the tying run during the fifth inning, filling in as his pitcher's courtesy runner. Chavez-Lara reached on a hard hit through the Hickman third baseman's legs before Nelson Kosch helped Fletcher home on a swing into another throwing error.
During the next half inning, Chavez-Lara continued a dominant showing on the mound, collecting his fourth-, fifth- and sixth-straight strikeouts to send the game into the bottom of the sixth inning at 1-1. The pitcher said he struggled early in the game, but bounced back after some words with his coach, Bilslend.
“It just stuck with me,” Chavez-Lara said. “He said, 'It's just a game. Be yourself and have fun.'”
The ENBL teams played scoreless baseball in the sixth frame, but Hickman scored three runs in the seventh to win. After a hard-hit bouncer to first base to lead off, Post 105 earned its next base runner on an infield pop fly that hit the dirt as the Bears scrambled for it.
The next Hickman batter hit a triple to the right field fence, scoring a 3-1 lead his squad would push to three runs by the time Blair next stepped up to the plate. Kosch, Peyton Briggs and Joe Rodriguez — who was replaced on the basepath by Carter Saylor — loaded the bases, but a strikeout ended their comeback efforts short.
Juniors play 2 final regular season games
Between the ENBL and Area tournaments, the Blair Juniors played two more regular season games.
First, the Bears lost to the Millard Sox Black 7-2 Saturday at Vets Field. They fell behind 2-0 early, but evened the score at 2-all in the bottom of the fifth frame on Thomas Chikos' RBI triple, which plated Truman Stanley.
From there, though, Millard kept Post 154 in check.
Then, on Tuesday, Omaha Central dominated the Bears at Vets Field, 16-1. The game lasted five innings before a military appreciation ceremony a day after the Fourth of July.
