| Jan Jorgensen prepares to bat during last year’s state tournament. Jorgensen will return to action this spring and compete for the Dinos however, an injury has the senior athlete seeing limited playing action. |
The Carbon High Dinos preseason baseball season kicks off each year with the Pizza Hut Classic which is hosted in sunny St. George each March.
This past weekend, the Dinos got into the swing of things as they competed in the annual preseason tournament.
The three day event kicked off last Thursday as the Dinos faced Grantsville in the first official game of the year.
The Dinos were full of energy and ready for the baseball action to begin. The team came out strong and easily defeated Grantsville, 10-0.
According to Dinos head coach, Lane Herrick, pitcher Mike Smith had an excellent game from the mound.
Garrett Schmitz also had a great game as he hit two homers in the preseason match up.
The Dinos moved on to compete against Union in the second game of the tourney. Everything seemed to be going right for the Carbon team who played well and dominated the field.
Jamal Lewis pitched the game and had a successful showing at the mound.
The entire Dino team hit the ball well and this lead to the team’s second win of the weekend by the final, 6-2.
The Dinos then moved on to compete against Dixie. The hitting efforts of Carbon had seemed to vanish since the previous game.
Overall, the Dinos struggled at bat and this lead the team to a 5-4 loss in 12 innings.
Junior pitcher, Troy Grundy pitched the first six innings of this ball game, but was forced to give up the pitching duties when he injured his finger.
Tommy Larsen then stepped up to try his hand at the pitching position and he did quite well for the Dino team.
In the final game of the Pizza Hut Classic, the Dinos faced Tooele who has been a strong baseball club for several years.
According to Herrick, the Carbon team just didn’t play well against the strong Tooele club. This was reflected in the final score, 10-0 which found the Dinos down and out against their opponent.
After returning home from the three day roadie, the Dinos enjoyed a few days off before hitting the road again to travel north to Springville.
The Dinos knew this would be a challenging game. After all, Springville is considered possibly the best team in the Class 4A division and is expected to be the team to beat in the division this year.
The Dinos did hit the ball well and once again, Larsen stepped up to pitch a strong game. The efforts were applauded by coach Herrick, but the Dinos fell short of a victory, 5-3.
“This is still early on in the year. We’re bound to make mistakes and this has been our first efforts as a team so far this year. I’m not worried, we will improve with time and I know we will be ready for the regular season,” commented Herrick.
Next on the Dinos roster is Spanish Fork. The Carbon team will once again hit the road to compete in this preseason game and will resume competition next weekend as they travel to Colorado to compete in the annual Montrose tournament.
The first home game the Dinos will host will not take place until the end of this month as the Emery Spartans visit Dino field, March 28.