Shrewsbury Legion Baseball Falls in Regular Season Finale

The Shrewsbury American Legion Post 397 baseball squad spotted visiting Worcester Main South 341 a six-run early advantage and never recovered Friday evening, falling 7-4 at a soggy .

With the loss, Shrewsbury finishes the regular season at 11-11 in Massachusetts District 4 play. Main South improves to 6-16.

“I thought their pitcher did a good job tonight, he kept us off balance,” said Shrewsbury Coach Frank Vaccaro. “It’s very hard to fight back when you fall behind by six runs early. We were hoping he would tire, and we could get to him towards the end but the bullpen took care of business.”

Post 397 is currently seeded eighth and is among a handful of teams fighting for one of the final two playoff spots. Shrewsbury moved to the eighth seed with loss placing them in the playoffs this weekend. The date and location of the first round playoff games is still to be determined.

Picking up the loss on the hill for Shrewsbury was starter Keith Kelly, who surrendered five runs in the first inning without recording an out before being lifted and replaced with Anthony Gingerelli while Main South starting hurler John Connor earned a win.

Main South went on the attack in the opening frame. The visitors jumped out to a quick 5-0 on the strength of a four-hit first inning. South put its first eight hitters on base off Kelly and Gingerelli.

Main South added another insurance run in the top of the third when Clay Cowart deposited a one out offering over the left field fence for a solo home run and a 6-0 advantage.

Shrewsbury answered in the home half and got the run back with a two-out RBI single from Gingerelli that plated Kelly to make it 6-1. Kelly singled to left to keep the inning alive for Gingerelli’s at bat.

Following a scoreless fifth inning South scratched across an unearned run in the fifth thanks to a Shrewsbury error and also a wild pitch that chased home Tyler Sterner that made it 7-1.   

Shrewsbury tried to respond against a tired Connor in the sixth inning. Already over 100 pitches on the outing, the Main South starter headed back to the mound to start the frame. A leadoff walk to Bill Theis followed by a balk moved him into scoring position. Mike Roach grounded out to second base before Mike Fussaro walked to put runners on the corners with one out. Tom Lemon then tattooed a Connor fast ball over the left field fence for a three-run homer and pull Shrewsbury to within 7-4.

That was as close as Shrewsbury could pull despite bringing the tying run to the plate in the seventh inning off relief pitcher Brandon Radziewicz.