U.S. West, Southwest teams pick up victories Mendoza hurls complete game for San Antonio

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BANGOR – Ricky Mendoza doesn’t strike an overwhelming physical presence on the mound.

But the left-hander from the Greater Helotes National Little League in San Antonio, Texas, does present a formidable pitching presence, as was on display Monday during Day 2 of the Senior League Baseball World Series at Mansfield Stadium.

Mendoza needed just 72 pitches to earn a complete-game 2-1 victory over Latin America champion Maracaibo, Venezuela, with 53 going for strikes.

On a day when the strike zone was large – neither he nor Maracaibo right-hander Victor Galue issued a walk – Mendoza found a home on the inside corner of the plate, leaving the Venezuelan hitters to jump away from called strikes and the U.S. Southwest champions to improve their Pool B record to 2-0.

“What I saw today with Ricky and the Venezuelans was that they didn’t like the inside-corner pitchers,” said San Antonio manager Paul Noland. “So our pitcher and catcher [Damon Ayon] caught on to that right away. We threw a lot of inside-corner pitches and they seemed to be tap dancing out there.”

Mendoza was backed by a near-flawless defensive performance – the team’s only error was the result of interfering with a baserunner during a seventh-inning rundown.

“I knew the Latin America team was a pretty good hitting team,” said Mendoza, who struck out five while limiting Maracaibo to five singles. “I just tried to throw strikes, and to get them to hit the ball to my defense so they could make the outs.”

Center fielder Austin Cunningham was a defensive catalyst, using both his arm and legs to rob Maracaibo of scoring chances.

First he gunned down Francisco Mendez out at third base in the first inning after picking up an overthrow while Mendez was stealing second.

“I was just doing my job out there and I just came up throwing as hard as I could,” said Cunningham. “When I first threw it I thought it was going to hit him in the helmet, and I went ‘Oh, no, it’s going to bounce off him and he’s going to score.’ But it ended up getting right past him, it was awesome.”

That was one of three Maracaibo baserunners cut down on the basepaths in the first three innings, as Mendoza picked off Carlos Salazar at first base in the second and Ayon cut down Rider Gonzalez trying to steal in the third.

Then in the fifth, Cunningham robbed Galue of extra bases, racing back in straightaway center and leaping to make an outstretched one-handed grab.

“At first I kind of took a step forward,” he said. “Then I was like ‘Oh, oh,’ so I started running back and figured I’d better get my jumping shoes on and went up and got it.”

San Antonio needed all the pitching and defense it could muster, because Galue was just as effective as Mendoza. The Maracaibo ace scattered seven hits in a 92-pitch performance (68 for strikes), while striking out 10 and hitting a batter.

The Latin America champs (0-1) gave Galue a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the third. Renzo Urdaneta hit a leadoff single, and Rober Gomez sacrificed special pinch-runner Mendez to second before Mendez scored on Rider Gonzalez’s two-out single.

San Antonio capitalized on Maracaibo’s only two errors to take the lead in the fifth Ayon was hit by a pitch, and Jose Zapata reached on an error by shortstop David Rincon. Nathaniel Muhleman singled home Ayon to tie the game, but Galue then struck out the next two batters before Zapata scored the go-ahead run as Mendoza reached on an error by Gonzalez at second base.

U.S. SOUTHWEST 2, LATIN AMERICA 1

(Monday afternoon)

San Antonio, Texas (2-0) Maracaibo, Venezuela (0-1)

Player AB R H BI Player AB R H BI

Zapata 3b-2b 2 0 0 0 K. Soto lf 1 0 0

Coronado 2b 2 1 0 0 R.Gonzalez lf-2b 2 1

Muhleman lf 4 0 2 1 Franco 1b 1 0 0

Cunningham cf 4 0 1 0 E. Gonzalez 1b 2 0

Navarro 1b 2 0 0 0 Silva 2b 1 0 0

Treiber 1b 1 0 0 0 Mendez rf-lf 2 1 0

Mendoza p 3 0 1 0 Salazar cf 3 0 0

Martinez rf 1 0 0 0 Galue p 3 0 0 0

Saathoff 3b 2 0 0 0 Prado c 2 0 0 0

Noland 2b-ss 3 0 1 0 Urdaneta 3b-ss 2 0 0

Nichols ss 1 0 1 0 Gomez rf-lf 0 0 0

Hanson rf 2 0 0 0 E. Soto rf 1 0 0

Ayon c 2 1 1 0 Rincon ss 1 0 0

J. Gonzalez 3b 1 0 0 0

Totals 29 2 7 1 Totals 22 1 5 1

U.S. Southwest 000 020 0 ? 2

Latin America 001 000 0 ? 1

E?Noland; R. Gonzalez, Rincon; LOB?U.S. Southwest 7, Latin America 1; 2B?Noland, Mendoza; S?Gomez; SB?Muhleman, Ayon; Mendez

U.S. Southwest IP H R ER BB SO

Mendoza (W, 1-0) 7 5 1 1 0 5

Latin America IP H R ER BB SO

Galue (L, 0-1) 7 7 2 1 0 10

HBP?Ayon (by Galue); T?1:43; ATT?300