TUMWATER — By Tumwater's standards, Thursday’s performance against Steilacoom was far from satisfactory. The T-Birds committed seven errors in the field, leading to four unearned runs for the Sentinels.
A barrage of early runs and some clutch pitching were enough for Tumwater to overcome those fielding woes, though, as the Thunderbirds were able to hold on to top Steilacoom 8-5.
“(Winning) is the good part,” Tumwater coach Lyle Overbay said with a smile. “They were not very aggressive defensively … Even if you play hard and go after the ball and make an error, I’ll go for that. But when you’re kinda just playing tentative and you don’t want to be a part of it, that’s the part where we gotta grow up.
“I think it’s just a matter of getting that bulldog type mentality, going after it and doing that,” he continued. “They gotta flip that switch.”
Liam Gustafson came up with the biggest outs of the game, getting out of a pair of bases-loaded jams.
In the fifth, Steilacoom had scored three runs and had the potential go-ahead run at the plate, and Gustafson had issued three straight walks. Overbay took a mound visit, and Gustafson responded by striking out the next batter in three pitches.
“He just told me to reset,” Gustafson said. “He knew I was overthinking everything, which I tend to do. Once he gave me a few seconds to collect myself, I got back in there and realized, I’m gonna do it. From there, I just struck him out and we did what we had to do.”
After the first three batters reached to open the sixth, Gustafson got out of it again. He got a popup, a strikeout, and a flyout to strand all three runners and keep the Tumwater lead at three.
“Those are big moments,” Overybay said. “It’s good to see that, because we’re learning. Can he handle that big moment, or do we need to get somebody? So that’s good for us to see.”
The T-Birds were able to withstand the Steilacoom rally in part because of a few early rallies of their own.
In Tumwater’s first at-bat of the game, Peyton Davis was hit by a pitch in an 0-2 count, and he later came around to score on a Jimmy Womach double. Womach also scored later in the inning on a first-and-third play.
“Those things spark things,” Overbay said. “We did some things to try to create a little bit of chaos … Our at-bats were really good today. Just their approach and taking advantage of what we got.”
With the bases loaded in the second inning, Gustafson was hit by a pitch, but the umpire ruled he leaned into it, extending the at-bat. Moments later, he drilled a two-run single to left, and both he and the other runner ahead of him scored when the catcher made an errant throw trying to throw him out.
In the fourth, Davis hit an RBI single, and Gustafson hit an RBI triple.
“Once we start getting rolling, we are on fire,” Gustafson said. “Once we get a few hits, the energy goes insane, and everybody just starts hitting and hitting and hitting.”
Gustafson finished with two hits and three runs batted in, while Womach and Davis’s RBIs stood as Tumwater’s other two. Kade Acker and Wyatt Chase also picked up hits.
Jimmy Womach pitched three scoreless innings to start the game, striking out five, and Luke Overbay pitched a scoreless seventh to close it out.
The T-Birds have now won five games in a row, and they’ll look to make it six in a row against Capital on Friday. It’ll be a revenge game of sorts for Tumwater, which lost to Capital in last season’s opener, and it’ll take place under the bright lights of Cheney Stadium in Tacoma.
Lyle Overbay has coached in games at Cheney over the past few seasons, and he also played there himself when he was with the Tucson Sidewinders, the former Triple-A affiliate of the Arizona Diamondbacks.
“It’s a pretty cool thing to do,” Lyle Overbay said. “I always look forward to it. These guys look forward to it …It’s one of the best Triple-A ballparks in the country, and so they’re very fortunate to be able to do that. It’s a pretty cool deal.”
