Today Team Albany was the cat that played with their mouse too long, and allowed it to get away. Albany grabbed a 2-0 lead in the second inning on consecutive singles by Ron Lochner, Dean Little, and a 2-RBI double by Tim Brown. Ron Massaroni, meanwhile was setting the Fog City batters down in the first 3 innings allowing just one single. Then came the 4th inning. Two errors sandwiched around three singles gave the home team a "gift wrapped" 4-2 lead. Team Albany bounced right back with 2 runs in the top of the 5th inning. The first run scored when Wayne Newcomb singled in Dean Little, and the second run came when Ralph Caputo and Wayne Newcomb worked a double steal. Tied at 4 entering the bottom of the 5th inning, Fog City scratched out a run on a HBP, a stolen base, and a two out RBI single, giving them a 5-4 lead. The Albany boys rallied again in the top of the 6th inning for 3 runs. The rally started with a single by Massaroni and a double by Scott Ross, that scored Massaroni all of the way from 1st. Darrel Duncan singled Ross to third, and stole second on the first pitch. Mike Girard followed with a sacrafice fly to deep right, that gave the visitors a 6-5 lead, and moved Duncan to third. Dave Mitchell followed with another sacrifice fly, to give Albany a 7-5 lead. This is the point when Team Albany put the game away in yesterday's double header, but Fog City had other ideas. They picked up 1 run in the bottom of the 7th, and the tying run in the bottom of the eighth. The game remained tied at 7, until the bottom of the 10th inning, when, with 2 outs and nobody on, Fog City got a runner on with a two base error on a grounder to second base. That is when Fog City's lead off hitter (who was 0-4 on the day) smacked a line drive down into the right field corner, easily scoring the winning run. Team Albany is still in good shape to make the playoffs at 2-1, with 3 games remaining. Tomorrow the good guys, face a double header against the Vermont Red Sox and the Dallas Rangers. A split of the double header would punch Albany's ticket to the playoff round. A sweep of the two games would put them in a great spot to earn a first round playoff bye. Now time to rest up for tomorrow's big games.
