A Defensive Disaster

In the 2010 NCAA Baseball Super Regional in Gainesville, Florida, the Miami Hurricanes battled their bitter rivals, the Florida Gators. The Florida Gators manhandled the Miami Hurricanes in game 1 of a three game series. Florida's ace Alex Panteliodis threw a complete game and held the Canes to just 2 runs. It was a must win situation in game 2 for the Hurricanes to continue their playoff hopes. Being down all game, Canes center fielder Nathan Melendres hit a 3 run blast in the top of the 8th inning to put the Canes up 3 to 2 and gave the Canes their first lead of the series. All the Canes needed to do was pitch and play defense, they were unable to obtain such a simple second nature task. Prior to the 9th and final inning of game 2, the Canes defense made 4 errors which is unexceptable in such a crucial situation (Keep that in mind). The Miami Hurricanes manager Jim Morris called for their experienced lights out closer Daniel Miranda to close out the deal and get his team to a CWS(College World Series) deciding game 3. Miranda needed two outs to record to seal the deal in game 2. He made some great pitches and got himself a "double play ball." Third baseman Michael Broad mishandled the ground ball and the Canes were not able to record a single out. Miranda beared down and got a clutch strikeout on the Gators hottest hitter Brian Johnson. All they needed was 1 more out to force a game 3 to see who was moving on to the CWS. Miranda threw a great change up low and away and got pinch hitter Nolan Fontana to roll a groundball to shortstop Stephen Perez. Perez fielded it cleanly and just made a god awful throw to first base which first baseman Scott Lawson could not handle. All I was thinking was take your time, you have time to make a good strong throw. He flat out choked. He tried to will and guide the ball to 1st instead of just throwing it. Eventually, the Canes got out of the inning and in the 10th inning, yet another defensive blunder occured. A high shallow fly ball was hit to right field and right fielder Pelaez just dropped the ball. He didn't even touch it. That run came on to score and it was over. The Hurricanes finsihed the game with 7 errors. Are you kidding me!!!! You cannot be serious!!!! A flippin high school team can play better defense. My grandma can catch a pop up for god sakes. This is almost too painful to blog about but you just cannot expect to win a game when you get only 3 hits and make 7 errors. What an embarassment.