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Franchise pillars Cleveland Brownlee and Byron Reichstein have been year-to-year for a while now.
The absences of star pitcher Owen Boon and veteran infielder Keith Kandel, who stopped playing this season, were magnified after London was ravaged by key injuries down the stretch. The shorthanded Majors fell in a 3-0 Intercounty Baseball League second-round sweep to the Barrie Baycats after an 8-2 Game 3 loss Monday.
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There is a good chance the roster could undergo dramatic changes before next summer.
“Last year was more the finishing off of the (2021 and ‘22) championship team,” London co-owner and manager Roop Chanderdat said. “We ran it back last year. I’m so proud of what we did this year. We had a lot of injuries but we found a way to win a lot of games. This league is a grind and I think the days of 10-plus years of playing are done.”
The third-place Majors overcame their injury woes to win their opening-round series against Hamilton, but couldn’t recover in time to put a dent in Barrie. They were left to muse what might have been with a healthier roster.
“It’s been tough,” Chanderdat said. “Looking back, if you have everyone in there, that doesn’t mean you beat them, but you’re going to compete. I think the fans saw we played hard. We never quit. We’ve been plug-and-play for two months.
“No sour grapes. It was a fun team to coach and you had to use whatever you had and try to maximize that.”
London lost shortstop Tommy Reyes-Cruz around the all-star break due to personal reasons. His replacement, Ty Mosher, got hurt and couldn’t finish the Barrie series. Neither could heavy-hitting Starling Joseph, while import pitcher Jose Arias didn’t throw a single pitch in the playoffs because of arm woes.
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Centrefielder Drew Lawrence and Champ Garner, who filled in at that position in a pinch, played intermittently throughout the post-season.
“We didn’t have a centrefielder for most of the past two months,” Chanderdat said. “We started a junior pitcher (Alex Springer of the London Juniors) in Game 3. You’re in Games 2 and 3 and you’re seeing your imports sitting on the bench. You’re not going to win many games with a Star Joseph sitting on the bench.
“I give him credit. He was really banged up and played through a lot this year.”
The 40-year-old Brownlee struck out eight times in 16 at bats in the playoffs after hitting a career-low .195 in the regular season. Reichstein, in his 12th season, hit .212 in the summer and .167 in seven playoff games.
Neither has revealed their future plans, but they have been mainstays in the Majors lineup for a long time.
OBA ROUNDUP: Every Labour Day weekend, a ton of provincial baseball championship titles are decided. In St. Thomas Monday, the spirit of the Ontario Baseball Association finals was captured perfectly as the hometown Cardinals 16U squad beat the Tecumseh Rangers 17-7 in the ‘A’ final at a packed Emslie Field. “We reached out to all the teams in the community to come (to the game) and it really energized the guys,” Cards head coach Ryan Morrison said. “There were probably 500 people there and that’s huge to have that support at a 16U OBA game. Every big play, hearing the place erupt felt like we were at Rogers Centre.” Mason Beechey had three singles in four at bats for the winners . . . Other local hardball champs include Wyoming (senior AA over New Lowell), Dresden (senior C over Essex), Stratford (22U B over Simcoe), Port Lambton (18U C over Listowel), Chatham (13U A over North London), Delaware (13U C over Listowel), Dorchester (12U A over Kanata), Mitchell (11U C over Grimsby), London West (10U AA over Niagara Falls), Stratford (10U B), North London (9U A over Pickering), Woodstock (9U B over Leamington) and Dorchester (9U C over Delaware).
rpyette@postmedia.com
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