| Troy Grundy races for first base after hitting a ball into center field. Recently, Grundy has found his comfort zone atop the pitchers mound and assisted the Helper American legion team to a victory over West last week. |
After competing for several weeks in non-stop action, the Helper American Legion baseball team was looking forward to a much needed rest.
Before leaving the field for the July 4 weekend however, Helper traveled north to face the legion team, West. The squad felt that it was important to win this ball game in order to finish the first half of the legion season on a high note.
It was a competitive ball game throughout the first several innings, but by the top of the third, Helper had opened the doors wide open and took over the scoreboard. By the end of seven, Helper had defeated West, 8-0.
For much of the season, Helper has had trouble making things click. The July 2 road game made Helper look like an entirely different team as they dominated the field and turned heads along the way.
One of the problems which has continued to plague the Carbon County squad is errors. Game after game, mistakes have came between Helper and a legion victory. During last week’s game however, this all changed.
“If we just clean up our game and reduce the number of errors, we will be one of the top contenders for a region title again this year,” explained the Helper co-coach, Jeff Cisneros.
The local team came out with brooms in hand as they cleaned up their act and committed no errors against West. This along with a strong hitting appearance boosted the team to the legion win.
“Another problem which has followed us this year is hitting. We just don’t seem to hit the ball as well as we should. This is another problem we need to overcome,” explained Cisneros.
That is exactly what the squad did as they finished the game against West with eight runs on 10 hits.
Stepping up for Helper was Troy Grundy who had a successful showing at bat and on the pitchers mound.
Grundy threw a four-hitter and had eight strikeouts against the West team. At bat, he had a two-run home run to assist in the teams hitting effort.
Also making big plays for Helper was Tyler Nelson who had two doubles, an RBI and scored two runs.
Also with a double was helper legion veteran Frankie Iriart.
Chris Hatch and Landon Watson each had triples during the successful game.
With many of the team’s problems worked out, it seems as if Helper may be on the right track to finish the legion season strong.
The team was scheduled to compete in Murray on Monday and will return to their home field this Wednesday evening at 6 p.m. as they host Judge.
With most of their home games behind them, the team will prepare to take to the road throughout the month of July.
In fact, the only other home game the team will compete in will take place July 18 as Orem visits the local field.
With a full schedule ahead of them, Helper looks to build on their newly found strengths and compete for the legion title again this year.