By Giuseppe Palmer and Miles Eller, staff writer
Playing their first game in 2 weeks because of rain outs, the Galileo Lions baseball team dropped a non league game against John Swett High on Monday, March 20th, 5-2 . The defeat was Galileo’s closest official game of the season, as the team showed improvement from their previous games weeks ago.
The team traveled to Swett High School all the way in Crockett, CA to face the Warriors. The Lions started out strong, scoring 2 in a hot first inning thanks to Senior third baseman Mariano Suarez’s RBI. But Swett answered quickly with 2 runs of their own in the bottom of the first.
“I felt really good at the plate today. Just too bad we couldn’t keep that momentum going. It was good progress though,” said Suarez.
Galileo’s starting pitcher, freshman Julian Cook had a solid outing but tough calls went the way of Swett and he exited the game after 3 innings, when the Lions were down 3-2. Of the 3 runs Swett scored off of Cook, only 1 was earned, with the other 2 coming from fielding errors.
The Lions couldn’t get any more offense going, and Swett continued to score runs until the score reached 5-2 in the 5th inning. Galileo failed to score in their final 2 hitting innings, and lost the game.
Considering it was their first time playing a competitive game since March 6th, the team was collectively happy with their progress and performance. They have had many practices canceled due to rain, and have been forced into the weight room on several occasions instead of getting actual baseball practice.
Galileo’s home field and main practice location, Moscone Park, has been closed by SF Parks & Rec for almost 2 weeks and the team has been unable to utilize its facilities.
“It’s been really frustrating,” said senior outfielder Gio Perez. “We haven’t practiced on a baseball field in weeks and we’re missing opportunities to get better. This rain has really halted our progress as a unit and as individuals.”
In spite of the rain, the baseball team has managed to find ways to get work in. In addition to the days they’ve spent in the school weight room strengthening their bodies, they have been able to do some limited field work on Galileo’s football field. Without a real diamond or the necessary space to play baseball, however, players just can’t do all of the work they would like to do and have had to improvise. One day, the team spent an entire practice playing Wiffle Ball due to limited field space.
Misha Bruno, one of the team captains, says, “At least we’ve been able to do some work, but it just isn’t the same as being on an actual diamond. You can’t really simulate that anywhere else, so it’s impossible for us to really get all the work we need under these conditions.”
Coach Nate Cox has been working with the team captains to try and come up with unique and new ways to practice during the rain. He said that the most challenging thing for the team has been hitting, because “in order to properly work on it we need appropriate space which we don’t have access to outside of Moscone.” And because they’re one of the only large public schools who don’t have a batting cage, they’ve had to be creative with hitting work by doing things like playing Wiffle Ball and just hitting into the fence.
There were supposed to be 2 league games this week, but Wednesday’s game vs. KIPP has already been postponed and Thursday’s vs. Wallenberg is not far behind.
