Bees struggle to win in Peoria even with a 1st inning lead...

Being the Dad of a baseball prospect can be a little like riding a rollercoaster. There are plenty of highs and lows associated with the experience. Nights before my son has the starting pitcher's role are usually full of tossing and turning mixed in with a few winks of sleep. I really don't know when this started but I think it was his second year of high school baseball. This only seems to happen when he pitches. When he played a position during his amatuer career, between pitching starts, I never lost a wink of sleep over the anticipation of his performance, or his team.

Thank goodness he has accepted the highs and lows involved with the game and simply goes about his business one pitch at a time. There is more to winning baseball games than a pitcher simply throwing strikes and trying to make good pitches. Team members need to play catch to avoid unearned runs and hit the ball to score runs for a fighting chance to win at any level of baseball.

The 3rd pitching start for John Lamb of the 2010 season against the Peoria Chiefs, the Class A affiliate of the Chicago Cubs, went relatively smooth for the first three innings. After clearly picking off the Chiefs short-stop, Logan Watkins, in the 4th inning the play concluded with a throwing error by first baseman, Joey Lewis, allowing Watkins to stay a second base. Following a couple of hits in the inning the Chiefs managed to score three unearned runs and forcing John to leave the game in the bottom of the 5th inning, due to pitch count.

The ball went to the bullpen to try and hold the score, but instead allowed even more runs with the final tally being a 10-3 loss for the Burlington Bees, the Class A affiliate of the Kansas City Royals organization.

John Lamb finished his day of work spreading out 5 hits, 0 HR, 1 HBP, 2 BB, 4 SO, 3 runs without giving up an earned run over four innings and lowering his ERA for the year to 0.71. Again, it takes more than pitching to win ball games in professional baseball. Still proud as can be of my 19-year-old son living his dream.

Well, at least I should sleep well for the next 4 nights until John's next scheduled start on April 23, at the Burlington Bees home field in Burlington, IA.

-  - - James Lamb
 
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