Bisbee captures 2A championship
Bisbee scored a run in the first inning with a squeeze bunt.
The Pumas then bunted three straight times in the second inning, scoring two more runs.
Starter Jose Mendez worked out of jams in the third and fourth innings, and No. 3-seed Bisbee stunned topseed Phoenix Christian 7-2 Saturday night at Tempe Diablo Stadium for the school's first 2A state baseball title since 2008.
Todd Hammett coached at Bisbee in 2001 and 2008 when they won state championships. He stepped away after COVID wiped out the 2020 season.
After the team won only six games in 2021, players and many community members asked him to come back. He did, and now three seniors, led by Mendez, carried the Pumas to the championship before many Bisbee fans who made the trip to Tempe Saturday.
There is a lot of pride in Bisbee baseball, where the team plays in what it bills as the oldest multi-sport park in the United States at Warren Ballpark, which opened in 1909.
"I stopped coaching for one year," Hammett said. "The year after COVID. My son graduated. The team struggled really bad. The kids came to me, the town, wanted me to come back. The seniors we have this year, only three of them stayed that were freshmen (in 2021).
"For these seniors to stick it out and to buy into this program, buy into what I was asking them to do, like tonight, play small ball, give yourselves up, do that kind of thing. The seniors bought in first. They brought the rest of the guys with them. You never know if it's going to pay off. But tonight I can say it paid off."
Patience paid off for Mendez, who had lost his No. 1 spot in the rotation with early-season struggles. He came into the game with a 5-5 record and an ERA under 3.00. But he pitched brilliantly in the first round of the 2A playoffs, a 6-2 win over Veritas Prep.
On Saturday, he pitched the first 6 1/3 innings, before giving way to Sebastian Lopez, who finished it up, striking out the final batter to set off a celebration.
"I'm crying because of all of the excitement," Mendez said. "In the first of the season, I was struggling. But in state, the state game, I had to give it my all."
Bisbee (23-6) avenged an early-season 6-5 loss to Phoenix Christian (26-3), which had a seven-game winning streak end.
This was Bisbee's sixth state championship. Its first came in 1947.
After Horacia Olivarria tripled in the first run of the game in the top of the first, Anthony Molina executed a squeeze bunt for a hit, driving in the second run.
In the second, Bisbee, with the bottom of the order, executed base-hit bunts by Mendez, Bryan Martinez and Michael Alvarez. Leadoff man Sebastian Lopez then drove in two runs with a single.
Bisbee made it 5-0 in the third inning when Hunter Wright stole home. He was advanced to third after Martinez put down another bunt for a hit and an error.