Baseball Fever In The Bronx

If he's superstitious, Clinton junior left fielder Anyonel Ramos may want to hold onto his manager’s jersey after his performance in Wednesday’s 4-2 win over Bronx rival Taft.
Ramos drove in the game-winning run in the top of the seventh, smacked a pair of doubles and also scored a run in the top of the first, all while wearing the uniform of Clinton manager Dennis D’Alessandro. Ramos came to the club late after missing tryouts in March of last year. But on the recommendation of his teammates, he was granted a private tryout back in January.
Showing up in street clothes, Ramos wowed everyone with his speed and fielding and won the starting job in left. So while he has a position and a growing legend as a clutch player, he doesn’t yet have a uniform because the school wasn’t able to order his jersey in time. It should be arriving any day now, according to D’Alessandro.
“I don’t have any problem wearing this but it will be nice to have my own jersey,” Ramos said through a translator, teammate Joel Cabrera.
Ramos was supposed to play on the Clinton JV last year but the season was scrapped when the school couldn’t find a coach, and since the varsity was filled with seniors, Ramos didn’t play at all.
But Clinton (2-1) has found a gem in Ramos, whose groundout drove in junior shortstop Oscar Matias from third to give the Governors a 3-2 lead in the top of the seventh.
A batter later, Gerlin Hernandez’s hard liner down the third base line drove in Marc Perez from third to make it 4-2.
First basemen turned closer Johann Ortiz Franco forced Taft’s Francisco Paulino to ground out to second to end the game with a runner on third.
Franco entered the game with one out in the bottom of the sixth without even warming up and induced a groundout before striking out Taft (2-1) pinch-hitter Paris Giddins with a runner on second to get out of the jam.
Clinton starter Eliu Baez struck out 11 over 51/3 innings, scattering five hits, walking three and giving up two earned runs. He was removed after throwing 104 pitches because of the league restriction on pitch counts.
“Since Eliu Baez did really well pitching the whole game, I had to come through,” said Ortiz Franco, who stuck out two batters and allowed one hit in 12/3 innings. “He got into a little jam and I had to do what I did to help.


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