MONTIGNY-LE-BRETONNEUX – Given the circumstances, it makes sense that most of the D1 baseball league took the weekend off last week. After all, Sunday was May 1st, International Workers’ Day!
But as they say, for every rule, there’s always an exception, and in this case, the exception took place outside of Paris at Stade Jean Maréchal in Montigny-Le-Bretonneux.
That’s where the Montigny Cougars, 3-1 heading into the weekend, hosted the Metz Cometz, who, for various reasons, hadn’t played a single game this season yet.
Allan Bellen-Fagnoni and Gabriel Do Carmo (#7) are both Brazilian (Credit: Corentin Bougon)
If I had known what an odyssey it would be to reach Montigny-Le-Bretonneux, where the RER wasn’t, unbeknownst to me, operational at that hour, I might have also opted for a weekend off.
But that, of course, would have meant missing out on all the action – including a WILD performance by Venezuelan pitcher Yorfrank López – and not enjoying another Opening Day under the spring sun, where a delighted crowd gathered to cheer on a particularly promising Cougars team.
Winners of their last three games, the home side picked up where they left off last weekend against Paris UC, controlling the game defensively and scoring more than enough runs to get the job done.
In the opening match, Montigny’s lineup scored two runs against D1 newcomer Patrick Jordan, a former pitcher from the University of Maine. Jordan walked three batters before allowing a single to catcher Jonathan Jaspe, a former Toronto Blue Jays prospect from Venezuela.
Control issues again cost Jordan in the second inning, as he walked four more but limited the Cougars to just one run. To his credit, however, the Bostonian kept his cool and stayed in the game, striking out five and allowing five runs over seven innings.
That was, unfortunately for the Cometz, more than Montigny needed thanks to an absolutely dominant performance by pitcher López, now in his fourth D1 season. The former Detroit Tigers prospect pitched all nine innings, allowing just two hits and striking out 17.
Talk about going to work!
The Cougars ultimately won the game 8-0. Jaspe, Maxime Nutte, and Brazilian rookie Allan Bellen-Fagnoni, who all recorded two hits, stood out on the offensive side.
With the win, López moves to 2-0. The Venezuelan has a 0.00 ERA, and he’s now second in the league for strikeouts with 24.
The player he’s chasing in that category is his teammate and fellow Venezuelan Robinson Maestre (28 K), the starting pitcher in Sunday afternoon’s game.
Maestre ultimately had a solid outing, with 10 strikeouts over five innings, but unlike the first game, the Cometz finally managed to generate some offense.
They scored two runs in the third inning thanks to a double by veteran Victorien Roze, an error that allowed American rookie Markus Melendez to reach base, and a single by another D1 newcomer, Trevor Rogers.
The Metz pitcher Samuel Granoff, meanwhile, made the Montigny batters scratch their heads. The former University of San Francisco pitcher allowed two hits in the second inning but kept the Cougars scoreless for three innings.
Victorien Roze hit a double and scored a run (Credit: Le Baseblog)
But in the bottom of the fourth inning, the wheels suddenly came off for Granoff and the Cometz. Montigny exploded for eight runs, forcing Metz to dip into their shallow relief pitching pool.
Jaspe and Bellen-Fagnoni again recorded two hits each in the game, as did Montigny’s designated hitter, Tom Mayeux.
With four hits on the day, Bellen-Fagnoni now has eight this season, one behind his Argentine teammate Agustín Tissera, who has nine and is tied for the league lead with Théo Lakmeche (La Rochelle), Héctor Velasquez (Sénart), and Fabian Kovacs (Montpellier).
Trevor Rogers was solid in relief (Credit: Le Baseblog)
A bright spot for the Cometz was the play of first baseman Rogers, a Californian who entered as a relief pitcher in the fifth inning and, over four innings of work, kept the Cougars scoreless while limiting them to just two hits.
With these two wins, Montigny moves to 5-1 on the season, taking sole possession of first place in Group A standings ahead of the defending D1 champions, the Rouen Huskies (3-1). They’ll play again at home next Sunday (May 8th) against the Savigny Lions (2-2).
The Cometz (0-2) should also play next weekend, against the Huskies, in Metz. They’ll face Savigny the following weekend.
Benjamin Witte
Photo Credits: Corentin Bougon, Maxence Esteban, and Le Baseblog
