Drakes batter Vallejo to enter all-star break Marysville opens second half Tuesday at Martinez Sturgeon

With another battering of a 20-spot on an opponent, the Marysville Drakes independent baseball team moved to 17-17 at the all-star break with 16 games left in the regular season beginning Tuesday.

The first-half finale was a successful one, as the Drakes scored 20 times – for their fifth 20-run performance of the year – en route to a 23-3 win over Vallejo Saturday night at Bryant Field in Marysville.

All of Marysville’s 20 or more run performances have come against Vallejo or Dublin, the Pacific Division’s two bottom

teams through the first half.

Marysville sits in sixth place in the eight-team Pacific Division – 8.5 games out of first and less than two out of the top-4.

Marysville field manager Bill Rogan said the top-4 in the Pacific and top-4 in the Mountain make the Pecos League playoffs in a one versus four and two against three best-of-three series format in each division through both rounds of divisional play. After that is decided, the Pacific champ will face the Mountain winner in a Pecos League World Championship Series, Rogan said.

Rogan feels the Drakes are on the cusp of the postseason, but need a strong finish with at least 10 – but realistically 12 or 13 – to solidify a playoff berth.

“I think we can do it, these guys are focused, finally,” Rogan said. “We lost our focus a little bit. We also had a ton of injuries. Erik Mitchell is out for the year, Earl (Johnson) broke his wrist and hasn’t been able to swing a bat, but he is pitching now.”

Marysville is turning the corner as a playoff club, as evidenced by a ninerun bottom of the first Saturday night against Vallejo. The team was helped by four first-inning fielding errors, including a pair of dropped fly balls, to get the jump on the Seaweed (7-25). Neal Boudreau made Vallejo pay for the lack of defense with a three-run blast – one of a number of Marysville home runs – to cap the first-inning scoring.

Marysville pushed one more across in the second and four in the bottom of the third to extend the advantage to 14-0. Joseph Starick, one of the first-half bright spots and a Pecos League all-star in his first year, slapped a run-scoring single through the left side to help push it to 14 runs through 3. Tomas Moreno, another Drake with multiple hits, dropped in a double during the Drakes four-run third inning.

A 14-0 lead was more than enough for Oroville native and former Yubasutter Gold Sox Earl Johnson. The lanky righty silenced Vallejo for six innings on 10 strikeouts to earn his first win of the season.

“Fantastic,” said Rogan, on the Drakes’ Saturday night starter. “He is pumping the strike zone. He has good stuff and he’s not afraid to throw strikes. He was brilliant tonight.”

Marysville is at Martinez (18-15) Tuesday to open the second half before returning home Wednesday to take on Pacific leader San Rafael (25-7) at 6:35 p.m. at Bryant Field in Marysville.

For more information, including ticket prices, visit http://www. marysvilledrakes.com.