LA ROCHELLE – In France’s top-tier baseball league, where one team – Rouen’s Huskies – has claimed six straight titles and 14 of the last 15, true parity is far from being achieved.
Over halfway through the regular season, two teams are still winless, and two others seem incapable of genuinely competing.
But there’s genuine intrigue – in both groups – among the league’s top teams, as evidenced by Sunday’s results in La Rochelle, where the Boucaniers hosted Montpellier’s Barracudas, and in Montigny-le-Bretonneux, where the Cougars faced the red-hot Huskies.
In La Rochelle, the Barracudas – tied with Sénart Templiers for first place in Group B heading into the weekend – brought some surprises. Their leadoff hitter, Paolo Brossier, finally returned from the U.S., where he just finished another season with Middle Georgia State University, as did two-way player Pontiac Ismail, who attends Cochise College in Arizona.
An even bigger surprise was the return of power pitcher Yoan Antonac, who played for Montpellier as a teen before being drafted by the Philadelphia Phillies, and with his arrival, the already stacked Barracudas look even more dangerous.
That was certainly the impression in their opening match against the Boucaniers, who are trying to keep pace in the pool and had split earlier in the season with the Barracudas and Templiers.
Starting pitcher Kevin Canelón delivered another impressive performance on the mound, allowing just four hits and two runs (unearned) in six innings to secure his fifth win of the season.
The offense also showed up. Brossier paid immediate dividends, collecting three hits in the game. Luís Delogu also went 3-for-3, as did Ariel Soriano, who hit his first home run of the season and drove in four runs but unfortunately got injured late in the game.
With 14 hits in total, the Barracudas secured a lopsided 12-2 victory. But as was the case when the two teams met on opening day in Montpellier, La Rochelle refused to go quietly into the night and fought back in the afternoon match to split the results.
In that game, Boucaniers’ starting pitcher Wilce Nieves from Venezuela struck out 11 and allowed four runs in six and two-thirds innings of work. And at the plate, La Rochelle stayed focused, scoring two runs off Owen Ozanich, two more off Pontiac, who came in relief in the sixth inning, and two more off Kenjiro Sugiura, to secure a 6-4 win and improve their record to 5-3.
Sénart sweeps
With the loss, the Barracudas drop to 7-3 and fall to second place in the pool behind the Templiers (8-2), who traveled to the French Riviera this weekend and, as expected, secured two easy wins over Nice Cavigal, who now sit at 0-10 this season.
In the first match, ace Shane Priest threw seven shutout innings, allowing just four hits and striking out nine. At the plate, outfielder/pitcher Jose Paula led the charge with two of Sénart’s 10 hits. The Templiers won the game 9-0.
Sénart’s hitters also produced in the afternoon match, scoring 12 runs, but on only six hits, including two by their leadoff hitter, Alex Perdomo. Paula, who pitched three innings in relief, earned the win after the Templiers pushed their lead to 11 runs and secured the victory (12-1) after seven innings due to the mercy rule.
Like cats and dogs
Meanwhile, on the other side of the country, the Huskies – winners of their last six games – brought their talents to Montigny, where the Cougars, 6-2 heading into the weekend, have had a solid season in their own right.
Montigny beat the Huskies in their very first match of the season and were eager to repeat the feat on Sunday. But in the first match, a classic pitcher’s duel between Rouen’s Quentin Moulin and Robinson Maestre, that chance slipped away in extra innings.
Maestre was brilliant, allowing just three hits and striking out 10 in 10 innings of work. But in the 11th inning, against reliever Antoine Rault, the Huskies finally broke through, scoring two runs to secure a narrow 2-1 victory.
Yet, the Cougars had proven a point: that they could truly challenge the perennial champions, and in the afternoon match, they showed it once again.
The Huskies managed three runs on six hits, including two by Hugo Blondel. Montigny, however, did them one better, collecting three hits but scoring four runs, including the game-winner – on a RBI single by Kilian Besoli – in the bottom of the ninth to exact revenge.
Hit parade
Rouen remains atop Group A with an 8-2 record. But the Cougars, at 7-3, are right behind them. In third place in the pool are the Savigny Lions (5-3), who had the weekend off. Behind them are two teams – Metz Cometz and Paris UC – who have truly struggled this year.
Neither had won a game before the weekend, but facing off Sunday – in a battle of the cellar dwellers – at least one was guaranteed to finally enter the win column.
Those honors, it turned out, would go to the Cometz, who not only won the first match but did so in explosive fashion, scoring 17 runs on 24 hits, including eight by imported American players Markus Melendez and Trevor Rogers (four hits each).
Metz also won the afternoon match, but in this case by a much narrower margin. Melendez continued to shine, collecting three hits in the game. Clément Noblet also went 3-for-3, and in total, the team managed to score eight runs, one more than Paris UC, who scored seven runs on 10 hits, including two by Douglas Rodríguez.
With the sweep, Metz moves to 2-6 on the season. Paris UC falls to 0-8, but may have a chance to exact revenge when the two teams meet again next weekend.
Benjamin Witte
Photo credits: Hiep Images
