Legion double
Nazareth's Brett Kline, left, and Easton's John Spadoni, right, are headed to the Region 2 tourney with their respective NorCo Legion teams.
(Express-Times Photos)
It's tough to put the genie back in the bottle but the Northampton County American Legion Baseball League managed to do it this summer.
The league elected to go retro with wooden bats, a practice they abandoned in the late 1970s when NorCo, as well as just about every other high school, college and summer league, went to aluminum bats.
Both Nazareth and Easton, as the No. 1 and 2 teams in the Northampton County League, will bring about six weeks of wooden bat experience to Boyertown for the 40th annual Region 2 tournament beginning Saturday morning.
Nazareth (17-8-2), NorCo champs for the fourth time in the past five years and which has won 15 titles in all since the league was formed in 1934, will meet Lehigh County runner-up Salisbury (16-7) in the 1 p.m. second game of the tournament.
Easton (18-10), the Northampton County runner-up, will face Berks County champion Twin Valley in the following 4:30 p.m. third game in the double-elimination, five-day tournament that is scheduled to finish on Wednesday.
In the other two first-round games, Berks/Schuylkill League champion Oley/Topton draws Lehigh County champion North Parkland at 10 a.m. with host Boyertown opposing Bux-Mont champion Pottstown in the 7:30 p.m. nightcap.
Boyertown has won 22 Region 2 championships and the Bears will also be hosting the Pennsylvania state tournament which gets under way the following week.
Nazareth has never won the Region 2 crown but has participated in the tournament nine times either as the NorCo champion or runner-up. Nazareth's best showing came in 1997 under manager Frank Jurasits when it went 4-2 in the tourney held in Emmaus, losing to Shillington 6-1 in the championship game.
Nazareth is 14-18 in its nine appearances, going 2-2 in 2006, '09, '10 and '11.
The NorCo champs will not likely be at full strength since designated hitter Mike Garzillo, a rising sophomore at Lehigh University, will be playing for the Lehigh Valley Catz in an Atlantic Collegiate Baseball League game on Saturday and Dan Shepherd, the team's leading hitter, is reportedly heading for Detroit to appear in an American Idol audition.
But Nazareth will make do with a strong lineup that includes center fielder Anthony Gaetaniello, right fielder Tyler Pastor, catcher Brett Hallman, first baseman/pitcher Jake Carty, shortstop Tyler Snyder, third baseman Tanner Buss and second baseman Jake Suarez.
Carty (4-2) pitched a two-hit shutout against Easton in Game 1 of the NorCo championship series and Brett Kline (5-0 with a 0.90 ERA) pitched a four-hitter in Nazareth's decisive 18-1 win over Easton on Wednesday.
"Brett also went 4-0 last year with us," said Jason Brown, in his third year as Nazareth's manager. "Like most teams using wooden bats for the first time, we're not going to hit many balls over the fence, so we have to depend on small ball and the little things in order to win."
Though Easton hasn't won a NorCo title since 1968, it has been a part of four past Region 2 tournaments, either as a league runner-up or as the host team. Easton went 0-2 when the tourney was held in Quakertown in 2007, 0-2 in 2004 when Easton hosted the tourney at Hackett Park and also went 0-2 in 1992.
Easton is 1-8 all-time in the Region 2 tournament with its lone win coming against Emmaus in 1977, Easton's first appearance in the event.
Easton also relies heavily on defense and pitching. Nick Beinlich (7-2), who pitched on two days rest against Nazareth in the third and deciding game of the NorCo playoffs, will likely be on the mound at some point in Boyertown with gutsy lefthander John Spadoni (4-1) also getting a start at some point.
"We just didn't have it (in the decisive third game against Nazareth)," Easton manager Mickey Corpora said. "But we'll rebound for the regionals. Easton kids are tough."
Malin Loebsack, at shortstop, and Beinlich, at second, along with center fielder Troy Naiden and catcher Calo Stone make Easton strong up the middle defensively. Jake Lisinicchia at third, Wil Raisner in left and Ryan Amentler in right field are also tough outs in the Easton lineup.