Pitching, defense lead the charge as Traverse City Pit Spitters open 2023 campaign with 5

Nov 13, 2023

May 30—TRAVERSE CITY — The first pitch of the Traverse City Pit Spitters' 2023 season was a strike from Aaron Forrest. That seemed to be a pattern for the 6-foot-2 righthander as he controlled the zone and helped lead the Spitters to an Opening Day victory.

Forrest, the second-year player for Traverse City, got the starting nod for the first game of the season and looked every bit the pitcher that compiled a 4-1 record with a 2.57 ERA last season. The Doane University product went pitched five strong innings as the Pit Spitters rocked the Rockford Rivets by a 5-1 final in front of more than 2,500 fans at Turtle Creek Stadium on Memorial Day Monday.

"Obviously, it's how you want (your season) to start," said Forrest, who allowed just two hits and struck out four, including two Rivets caught staring to end Rockford's fourth and fifth innings. "I was just hoping to pass the ball in the fifth or the sixth with one or two given up. That's the expectation. I set the bar pretty high last year, so just trying to keep up that workload and level of performance."

Forrest looked right at home on the mound and seemed comfortable from pitch one.

"I hid it well, then," he said. "I had a little bit of nervousness going in. I took a moment to try and calm down and just appreciate the position I'm in with the Opening Night start. Lots of fans. A lot of buzz in the stadium. I felt good. Better than I was expecting."

Pit Spitters field manager Josh Rebandt, who is back for his fifth year, said Forrest did exactly what he needed from his No. 1 pitcher.

"He was locating all of his pitches for strikes. He rarely fell behind and got action early in the count to keep our defense in it," Rebandt said. "Doing what a returner should do."

Forrest certainly benefited from some dazzling defense behind him.

Glenn Miller was a vacuum at third base, making several eye-catching web gems as the hot corner lived up to its moniker. Shortstop Camden Traficante was no slouch in the field either, stealing a few base hits from the Rivets and showing off his strong arm on a long throw across the diamond.

"Phenomenal defense," Forrest said. "G Milly at third base and Traf with the takeaways. That's just good baseball. Pitching it well. Swinging it well. Playing well behind me and the other guys who threw. Just try to keep that up for another 71 games."

The Pit Spitters got on the board first in the bottom of the second without even having to take the bat off their shoulders. Kyle Hayes, Traficante and Riley Frost all walked to load the bases, and then Hayden Jatczak made it 1-0 with an RBI base-on-balls. Brendan Guciardo hit a sacrifice fly to right field two batters later to give Traverse City a 2-0 lead.

"You want to put pressure on the defense, pressure on the opposing pitchers," Forrest said. "When you can do that, it puts them in a position where they have to make a play and they have to beat us. I think we've got a little bit of swagger. We played Pit Spitter baseball."

The Rivets cut the lead in half in the top of the third. Forrest plunked Noah Jouras, who then stole second and later advanced to third on a dropped-third strike. Rockford leadoff hitter AJ Henkle poked a sac fly to right to make it 2-1. But the defense stopped the bleeding when Traficante snagged a hard grounder to his right and threw across his body for the out to end the inning.

The Pit Spitters looked as if they'd get the run right back in their half of the frame, but Henkle fired a perfect one-hopper from right field to home plate as Colin Summer tried to score from second on a seeing-eye single from Miller.

The Spitters' defense was on display for the first two outs of the top of the fifth. Miller made his third top-10-worthy play of the night, and then a picture-perfect relay from Summerhill to Frost to Miller on Jouras' hit into the right-field corner cut the Rivets' catcher down trying to stretch his double into a triple after he hesitated rounding second.

"That's just huge. It just sets the tone," Rebandt said. "Aaron was just fired up for his defense, and when guys hear that chatter, it becomes more of an expectation of that's what we do here."

Traverse City plated one in the bottom of the fifth on an infield single by Miller that allowed an aggressive-running Blake Bean to score from second.

Nate Blaine came on in relief and threw three innings of one-hit ball with three strikeouts, one of which came in the top of the seventh after falling behind to Bradley Wilson 3-0 to lead off the inning. Miller then made another stunning play at third, cleanly picking a high bouncer on the short-hop to get Aaron Harper at first.

The Spitters took advantage of more wild Rockford pitching and walked four straight times again to drive in another run. Traverse City's fifth and final run scored on a doubleplay ball from Traficante.

Nico Saldias took care of business in the ninth and closed the door on the Rivets, striking out one and allowing a broken-bat single to left.

"Our guys did a great job on the mound. They threw strikes, attacked guys," Rebandt said. "Having a couple of returners set the tone is really important for us. Nico looked so calm out there in the ninth inning. His heart rate didn't look elevated at all."

The Pit Spitters get right back at it Tuesday and close out their very brief season-opening homestand with a 7:05 p.m. first pitch against Rockford.

"It's only day one," Rebandt said. "We've got a long way to go still."