West pitchers rock East All-Stars

The Tulare-Kings Counties East-West All-Star Game is usually a chance for some of the best hitters in the Central Valley to display their wares.

But in this year’s edition, which took place Saturday night in Exeter’s Lions Field, the spotlight belonged to the flame-throwing pitchers.

Neither team recorded a hit in the first three innings en route to a West victory by an atypical All-Star score of 3-1.

“You’ve gotta try and work around the pitching,” said East coach Ken Searcy, who led Tulare Western to an EYL championship.

Pearcy juggled four pitchers: Western’s Joey Fonseca, Exeter’s Dakota Kirkman, Tulare Union’s James Guerrero and Granite Hills’ Jason Tredway.

All four combined to allow five hits, but that was all the West needed as its five pitchers totaled nine strikeouts and four walks while giving up just four hits.

“There’s been a lot of emphasis on our pitching,” Searcy said, “but their team had just as decent pitching. (Golden West’s Blake) Gimbarti threw the ball well, (El Diamante’s Harper) White threw well.”

Kirkman got his first taste on the mound in the bottom of the fourth when both teams were still scoreless. The Exeter hurler allowed the West’s first two hits — a double by Corcoran’s Manny Madrid and another double by Golden West’s Johnny Martinez that plated Madrid for a 1-0 lead.

Kirkman nearly let things get out of hand in the following frame after loading the bases with a pair of walks and a single from Josh Laird (Mt. Whitney).

Martinez stepped up for his second at-bat, and after nearly 20 pitches and a baseline drive that would’ve proven disastrous were it not called foul, Kirkman got him to ground out. In two innings, Kirkman allowed three hits and three walks while fanning two.

Martinez, for his RBI double and a three-hit, two-strikeout stint on the mound, walked away with the game’s MVP award.

Tredway started for the East playing left field but eventually got his time at the mound in the bottom of the eighth.

“I was planning on closing anyway,” said Tredway, who played outfield his junior year at Granite Hills. “Pretty much all I’ll do when I get to college, I’ll close. It was a preview of what I’ve got.”

In his final high school game before joining Porterville College this fall, Tredway struck out his first batter with three straight pitches that elicited gasps from the crowd.

Against Lemoore’s Drew Groathouse, Tredway threw a high fastball, a slider and another fastball right down the middle that caught Groathouse looking.

The Grizzly pitcher felt he could loosen up a little with a strong line of defense behind his back, including Porterville’s tandem of Phillip Carganilla and Daniel Rueger.

“I love challenging hitters,” Tredway said. “I wanna give ‘em a fastball and see what they can do with it. We had eight guys out there that are good at defense and that’s why they’re here at the All-Star game.”

Carganilla got his 15 minutes of fame when he walked in the seventh inning and promptly stole second off a wild pitch. The Panther then stole second but when teammate Rueger popped out, there were already two outs.

Neither Panther got a hit but Monache’s Micah McCrillis drove a hard single out to right field to try and get a rally going. Unfortunately for the East, the next two East batters struck out.

“The hardest thing about this game is trying to get everybody in,” Searcy said. “You’ve gotta go by the rules of replacing starters and... sometimes you cheat a kid here and there. You don’t do it on purpose; it just happens.”

Granite’s Gabe Malandrini and Lindsay’s Angel Diaz also went hitless but both provided solid play from first base. No one felt pressure to win in front of the hundreds of friends and relatives on hand for the 49th annual game.

“It’s always a fun game to be a part of,” Searcy said. You get to meet some of the kids and you know, Porterville, Monache, Granite Hills, those guys are great guys. They’re well-coached over there and they’re a pleasure to be around.”

For the players, it was all about getting to know the enemies they had faced all their careers. Tredway, who befriended fellow PC-commits Fonseca and Chavez’s Miles Hawkins, said there’s no bad beef in the game of baseball.

“If everybody loves baseball, you’ve already got one thing in common,” he said.