DAIRYLAND LEAGUE BASEBALL - One rough inning dooms Whittlesey in opener

Logan Baumgartner and Darren Leonhard both homered, but those solo shots weren’t enough to cover a five-run second inning that carried the host Marshfield Chaparrals to a 6-3 win over Whittlesey in Dairyland League baseball action Sunday at Jack Hackman Field.

The Reds, playing in their league opener after a May 18 game with Merrill was called off, scored first with a run in the top of the second inning, but the bottom half of the inning was a bit of a disaster with three errors contributing to Marshfield’s big inning.

Starting pitcher Logan Homolka pitched into the ninth inning for Marshfield, who improved to 2-1 in the Dairyland’s Large Division standings. He allowed all three earned runs and seven hits. He struck out nine and walked two.

Whittlesey outhit the Chaparrals 8-6. Spike Alexander went seven innings for the Reds. He struck out six, walked one and hit two. Only two of the six runs charged to him were earned.

Leonhard went three for four to lead Whittlesey’s offense. He drove in the second-inning run, singling in Brent Mueller, who had singled and moved to second on Ben Meyer’s infield hit.

Colten Schillinger led off the bottom of the second with an infield hit. Ben Dietsche reached on an error and Shawn O’Connell singled in Schillinger with the tying run. Back-to-back errors led to two runs and Coli DeBoer doubled in two more to give Marshfield a 5-1 lead.

Baumgartner homered in the top of the fourth, but Schillinger answered with a solo shot that bounced off the top of the leftfield fence in the fifth.

Whittlesey had some chances in the late innings. The Reds got a walk from Meyer and a single from Leonhard to lead off the seventh, but couldn’t get anything more. With two outs in the eighth, Baumgartner singled and Mueller reached on an error but Homolka struck out Meyer to end the threat.

Leonhard ended Homolka’s outing by yanking a leadoff solo homer over the fence in right. Reliever Cole Hediger got two outs before Nick Meyer reached on an infield hit and Alexander walked to bring up Cade Alexander as the tying run. Hediger got him to line out to DeBoer at second to end the game.

Cade Alexander threw a scoreless eighth with two strikeouts. Baumgartner went two for four at the plate. Schillinger was three for for for Marshfield, while DeBoer was two for five.

Whittlesey does not have a league game this weekend. The Reds will play at Everest at 7 p.m. on Friday, June 6 and then host the Merchants Sunday, June 8 at 1:30 p.m.