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About Oregon daily emerald. (Eugene, Or.) 1920-2012 | View Entire Issue (June 27, 2000)
Emeralds continued from page 5 it all the way through and caught it. Cooper did score on the sacri fice fly to cut the lead to one, but Peter Graham ended the rally, and game, when he struck out. Sheaffer, though, said he would take that scenario any day. “I’d like to have the tying run on base every night in the ninth in ning,” Sheaffer said. “We’d come out on top.” Perhaps the biggest positive out of Monday’s loss was the pitching of Frangil Cordero. The left hander struck out three and walked one in his five innings of work. Only one of the three runs he gave up was earned — a Kevin Covington blast in the second inning that was ruled a home run, but protested by Sheaffer who believed it to have bounced off the wall and over. “It clearly hit the front fence and I think the umpires should just let the kids play and not make ques tionable calls,” Sheaffer said. “But Cordero did a tremendous job and kept us in the game. ” The Emeralds locker room was full of solemn faces afterward, but even in a losing effort the players were acknowledged by the fans. As the players were leaving the stadium they were stopped by adoring children and signed plen ty of autographs. A child was heard telling a play er, “Last night you guys were awe some and tomorrow you will be, too. Tonight was just a bummer.” Indeed the 5-4 loss did nothing to diminish the jubilant feeling of Sunday night’s 9-3 win in front of a near sellout crowd of 5,991. In the game, the Ems batted around and got terrific pitching from Wilton Chavez, who only gave up one run, three hits and recorded six strikeouts in six in nings of solid work. Chavez was named Northwest League Pitcher of the Week as his record stands at 2-0 and ERA at a blistering 0.00. He shut down the Spokane Indians in the season opener on June 20. “It makes my job easy as a man ager when I got pitching like that,” Sheaffer said. “He pitches on emo tion and is fun to watch.” In Sunday’s win Michael Mallo ry, Sing, Kweon and Felker each had two hits for the Ems. Sing and Mallory had the most crowd pleasing hits of the night as both drove pitches over the left-field fence. “It felt nice to hear the crowd cheer like that after my hit,” said Mallory after Sunday’s win. “They get behind the team real well here and that picks us up.” Azle Malinao-Alvarez Emerald The Ems were unified on Sunday during its 9-3 home-opening win. Eugene knocked around 13 hits, including two home runs. Felker, who has made some im pressive defensive plays at first in the last couple of nights, also was singing the crowd’s praise. “Oh, it’s great,” said Felker who went 2-for-5 with a double and single on Sunday. “This is a very knowledgeable crowd and they make for a great atmosphere for Single-A baseball.” Ems second basemen Blake Blasi came down to earth a bit on Monday night after getting off to a sizzling start in the club’s first six games. Blasi noted last year’s dis appointing year for the Ems and seems eager to turn things around for the people of Eugene. “I heard we didn’t have that good a year last year and you’re never sure how the crowd is going to react to that,” said Blasi, who before Monday’s game was batting a league-leading .520. “So you want to come out and play hard and keep them all coming out and watching.” The Ems seem refreshed to fi nally be home after playing the first five games on the road — a pe riod in which they went 2-3 against the Spokane Indians. “It was good for us to get on the road and play some games togeth er,” Felker said. “But it’s even better to have a place to call our own and settle into a-nice routine.” In the course of the 76 game sea son, Emerald players and fans hope that routine turns out to be a winning routine. 008848 We bring the storage unit to you. ■s* You pack it, we pick it up and store it. ■s* We’ll deliver it when you’re ready. ■s* Perfect for the summer! 485-2115 little Caesars &LA MEDIUM PEPPERONI OR CHEESE PIZZA 1711 Willamette (next to Blockbuster) 343-3330 Classic men continued from page 5 much weight on that one competi tion. People’s careers are made and broken there.” Which is why the Pre Classic was so important to these athletes so they could compete under the national spotlight and against competition worthy of the Olympics themselves. One man who seems more than ready for the Games to begin is sprinter Maurice Greene. Greene pushed the pace in the men’s 200 meters, and won in a scintillating time of 19.93. The time would have given him the meet record, established by Johnson, but the wind reading of 2.1 was just barely over the allowable limit to be counted for record purposes. Nonetheless, Greene was satis fied and eager for the next step up the Olympic ladder. “I’m fairly pleased with the 200,” Greene said. “I wish I would have run faster, but with the wind conditions and this being my first 200 race of the season, I’m very happy.” Greene was quick to make a pre diction about possibly winning both the 100 and 200 meter dashes at the Olympics in Sydney, Aus tralia. “I will double in Sydney,” Greene said. Greene’s win on Saturday was a little anticlimactic for some be cause it wasn’t against Johnson. But the two are on track for a head to-head showdown at the Trials, and it should be a duel that lives up to the hype. Johnson, however, claims that Greene never enters his mind. “At this point in my career I don’t really focus on my competi tion,” said Johnson, who plans to defend his 200 and 400 meter gold medals that he won at the ‘96 Games. “All I can control is how fast I run, so that’s all I need to fo cus on.” While most of the focus was de servedly on the track for the better part of the day, the hammer throw attracted a huge audience with its early 11:15 a.m. start time. Lance Deal, the Eugene resident who was a silver medalist in the ‘96 Olympics, performed for the last Azle Malinao-Alvarez Emerald Stsl time in front of his hometown fans. “This is sort of the beginning of the end,” said the 38-year old Deal, who plans to retire after competing in Sydney in September. Deal picked a great way to begin his swan song as a hammer throw er. With adoring fans cheering on his every move, Deal unleashed six throws that clearly pleased the crowd. He clinched the win on his last throw when he twirled around and heaved the hammer 262 feet, 11 inches — more than 11 feet ahead of second-place finisher Stuart Rendell of Australia. “I almost teared up on that last throw,” Deal said. “I really wanted to give something to the people who stuck around to watch me.” Fellow American Kevin McMa hon was disappointed in his fourth-place finish, but pleased for Deal. “It’s tough when you know how far you can throw and it just does n’t get out there,” McMahon said. “So it’s frustrating. But I’m happy for Lance. This is a great home town farewell. It’s ideal — get the pun?” Other winners on the afternoon included Khadevis Robinson, who thrilled the onlookers with his 800 meter winning time of 1:45.90, and Coby Miller, who captured the 100 meters with a clocking of 10.00. Miller’s time established a new meet record, breaking the old record time of 10.08, set by none other than Carl Lewis. Nick Hysong captured the pole vault with a leap of 18-10 1/4, and C. J. Hunter — husband of Marion Jones — took the shot put competi tion with a distance of70-13/4,de spite fouling on four of his six at tempts. Luke Kipkosgel edged out two fellow Kenyans to take the men’s 5,000 meters (13:21.59), but it was the men’s mile that stole the show. The Bowerman Mile, named af ter legendary Oregon coach Bill Bowerman, again was a fan fa vorite. Kenyan William Chirchir (3:51.84) led eight runners who broke the hallowed four-minute barrier. Prep runner Donald Sage (4:00.29) just barely missed be coming the first prep athlete to break the mark in 33 years. “It was pretty overwhelming,” Sage said. “But I think that helped me.” Just as Saturday’s Pre Classic helped some of the world’s best get ready to take on the rest of the world later this year. . “It’s an Olympic year,” Johnson said. “That says it all.” The countdown to gold has be gun, and Eugene was lucky enough to be a part of the journey.
