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Sports

Ferndale Baseball Season Finally Gets Going

After eight straight cancellations, the Eagles return to the diamond with three wins over the weekend.

The Ferndale varsity baseball team just wanted to play some baseball this month. Unfortunately, the weather didn't let that happen. 

The Eagles opened the year on , but after that they didn’t play for 16 days. Rain, cold temperatures and even a tornado warning forced eight straight games to be postponed.

Over the weekend Ferndale was eager to get back onto the field. And the Eagles (3-1; 1-1 Oakland Activities Association White) played that way. They won at Pontiac 16-5 on Friday and then swept a doubleheader against Detroit Martin Luther King (4-2, 21-5) on Saturday.

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This year, Ferndale is going with three starting pitchers – Josh Allen, Ryan Humphreys and Noah Reiter – and all three of them picked up their first wins of the season.

Allen pitched four innings on Friday for the win, Humphreys gave up on six hits in a complete game against M.L.K. on Saturday morning and then Reiter finished the weekend off allowing only two runs while striking out seven in six innings in the second game of the doubleheader.

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“We think with our three starting pitchers that we have, that’s probably deeper than most teams in the league, except for Berkley,” assistant coach Mike Hand said.

Hand said that depth is extremely important going into May with all the games that Ferndale needs to make up. Not many teams throw three starters regularly and the coach thinks it will be advantage for the Eagles.

“The month of May is just going to be packed for us,” Hand said. “The game we had rained out against Southfield got turned into double header, the game we got rained out against Oak Park was turned into doubleheader and the game that got rained out against Hazel Park – we play them on a Monday and Tuesday now. The schedule is going to be jammed packed in the second half with league games.”

Eagles hitters didn’t look too rusty in the three games, either. Allen led the way with at least two hits in all three games. The senior had three RBIs and scored eight runs in the three games. 

But Hand said it would take time for the hitters to really get comfortable. The game against Pontiac was supposed to have been Ferndale’s 10th game; instead it was only their second.

Also, the weather forced most of the Eagles practices to take place inside for most of April.

“The kids didn’t see a lot of live pitching,” Hand said. “We can throw to them in the gym, do soft toss and hit off a tee, but they aren’t seeing 80 MPH fastballs or (a) curveball. But I think everyone in the metro area is on the same page, kind of in the same situation (with the weather).”

One thing is for sure: The Eagles hitters will get to see a lot of live pitching over the next three weeks. Ferndale has two games this week - they play Berkley on Wednesday at home (4:30 p.m.) and then Lathrup on Friday (4:30 p.m.). Then things start to get really busy with the Eagles playing five games each of the next two weeks.

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