Published: August 16, 2008 12:22 am            

Orioles secure chance for 6th title

Baltimore manager Dean Albany complained that his Youse’s Maryland Orioles were flat in eliminating Johnstown’s Delweld entry from the AAABA Tournament on Thursday night.

He had no such concerns on Friday.

Not after Baltimore blanked previously unbeaten Philadelphia 7-0 at Point Stadium on Friday night. Combine that with Friday afternoon’s 22-0 drubbing of Zanesville and the five-time defending champs outscored their opponents 29-0 on the day.

Now, Albany’s team will await the winner of today’s noon game between Philadelphia and Washington.

The championship game will be played at 7 p.m. at the Point.

Scott Swinson baffled the ABCO Phillies on Friday night, allowing only three hits and facing the minimum of 21 batters over the final seven innings.

Swinson, who was in a similar situation in leading Baltimore to the championship last year, said he didn’t feel any pressure.

“I was told right before we came up here that four out of the past five years, we’d always lose the first or second game,” he said. “It’s more games, but we get to be up here for longer, have a fun time. I mean, we’ve been here five times, I think we’re used to the pressure by now.”

Albany said that while he talked to his players about their performance in Thursday’s 4-3 win over Delweld, they weren’t about to panic.

“I think we’re 27-0 in elimination games in five years,” he said. “If you lose early in this tournament, the bracket doesn’t penalize you.”

Swinson struck out six while walking just one, and he consistently got ahead in the count against Philadelphia.

“We just ran into a buzzsaw with Baltimore’s pitcher,” acting Philadelphia manager Mike Gossner said. “He’s a good one. He just spotted up and located and did all the good things and kept us off balance all night.”

Frank Mercurio led off the top of the fourth with a single, but Swinson got Charles Kelly to ground into a double play. Swinson also hit David Angebrandt in the head with a pitch in the fifth, but Angebrandt was caught stealing and the Phillies didn’t get another base runner in the game.

“I just tried to get ahead early and keep throwing hard,” Swinson said. “I just pretty much mixed in fastball, slider, that’s about it. Keeping it outside, outside and throw a couple inside just to make them think.”

The Orioles went ahead in the third when Leon Landry, who drove in a tournament-record 10 runs in the afternoon victory, singled to score Nick Natoli.

Baltimore broke it open in the fifth inning. Back-to-back doubles by Gerard Hall and Reed Gragnani made it 2-0. Mike Celenza delivered an RBI single ahead of Patrick Long’s run-scoring triple into the right-field corner. Patrick Blair capped the big inning with a bloop single to left-center that scored Long.

Hall, Gragnani, Celenza and Blair had two hits apiece for Baltimore.

“Everyone’s swinging the bats real well right now,” Swinson said. “I’m excited for (tonight).”

Ryan Kreider took the loss, allowing five runs on eight hits in 4 1/3 innings. The Phillies, who had only allowed five runs in their first four games, got 1 2/3 scoreless innings from John Barrington before Jordan Fisher gave up a run-scoring single to Hall and a sacrifice fly to Celenza in the eighth.

“We were looking at going with two or three guys anyway,” Gossner said. “We were trying to save some staff in case we didn’t win this ballgame.”

Chris Dolan, who shut out New Orleans for 8 2/3 innings in Philadelphia’s opener, will face Washington today.

“We’re in good shape,” Gossner said. “We’ll take it inning by inning. We’ll have enough arms and we’ll see how it goes.”

        

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