Archive for August, 2011

The 2012 New York Penn League All-Star Game will be head at Eastwood Field.  The game will take place sometime in mid-August once the NYPL sets its official schedules in the Fall of 2011.

The format of the game is the same as the Major League Baseball level, pitting a team of American League All-Stars against a team of National League All-Stars.  This will mark the first time that the All-Star game will be played in the greater Youngstown-Warren area.

Managers, trainers, players, and scouts have all ranted about the facilities.  Last season Asdrubal Cabrera did a rehab stint in Niles and was very complimentary of the park, saying it was ‘a beautiful place to play’.  This is really a nice coupe for the Scrappers.  Congratulations Jordan Taylor and staff on the great news!

For more information, please contact the Mahoning Valley Scrappers front offices at (330) 505-0000.

In the main event of the Lights Out Production boxing card, Campbell’s Jake ‘The Bull’ Giuriceo (left) squared off against Ramesis Gil.  Giuriceo had a slow first round but dictated the tempo for the duration of the bout and rode that momentum to his 13th victory against zero losses.

In the first round, Gil hit Giuriceo with a couple of solid shots in the early going.  Giuriceo showed no ill-effects of the shots he was taking and by the end of the round, he landed a nifty combination of his own.  However, I would award the first round to Gil.

Rounds two and three saw some serious leather exchanges between the two fighters.  It was an even round, one that makes me happy that I am not a judge.  I would say crowd reaction on the evenness was enough to give Giuriceo the rounds.

Giuriceo had his best round of the fight in the fourth when he staggered Gil with a combination.  Giuriceo caught fewer punches in the fourth than he had in any of the previous rounds and landed more than he probably had in the first three rounds combined.  Big round for The Bull.

In the fifth round, Giuriceo continued connecting and notched another round.  In the sixth, The Bull hurt Gil in a neutral corner with a spectacular flurry of punches.  Gil spent much of the sixth round running rather than engaging.  Giuriceo was ahead at least four rounds to two.

In the eighth and final round, Giuriceo was in a good position.  Gil’s corner had to be telling him he needed to knock Giuriceo out to win. Giuriceo showed good poise, knowing that he was fighting with a lead.  He was not hasty to get in and punch.  He did enough to maintain his lead in that final round.

The judges scored the fight 77-75, 78-74, and 78-74, for the winner by unanimous decision, Jake Giuriceo.

“I felt better than usual in the ring.  I thought I landed more punches even though I caught a few”, commented Giuriceo. “He did a lot of running in the late rounds, he went southpaw for a couple of rounds, and it was a great experience against a very tough opponent.”

When asked if there are conflicts between Frank Duarte and Keith Burnside as co-trainers, Giuriceo gave a good answer.  “There are obviously conflicts sometimes.  It is the best of both worlds though, and I am blessed to have two great guys helping me.  They can disagree, but it works itself out.  We stick to what works best.”

Giuriceo improved to 13-0-1 with 3 KO’s.  Gil fell to 6-3-4 and has nothing to be ashamed of, he took all Giuriceo had to offer tonight.

*Photos Courtesy of Ron Stevens

Miguel ‘Silky Smooth’ Gonzalez (right) and Tyrone ‘Fists of Fury’ Harris (left) hooked it up at Cene Park in a 135-pound scheduled eight rounder.  Gonzalez brought quite a following from Cleveland and was the fan favorite from the onset.  He did little to hurt his popularity in this fight

In the opening round, the 135-pounders brought a much faster pace than the heavyweight dominated card provided to this point.  Harris did more catching than throwing and Gonzalez was the more active fighter landing a fair percentage of his punches.  Give Gonzalez round one.

In the second round, Gonzalez continued to pressure Harris with a pesky jab.  Harris threw more punches than he had in the first round, but unfortunately, he still caught more than he threw, two rounds to none, Gonzalez.  The third and fourth rounds saw Gonzalez connect several jabs on Harris.  Harris was able to land some shots and the southpaw was hitting Gonzalez, but Silky Smooth was putting together some nifty three and four-punch combinations to hold an edge.

Silky Smooth kept the pressure on through the middle rounds.  Harris was catching shots to the head and then shaking his head like the punches had no effect, which the welts and swelling on his face, proved that they must have some impact.  Harris started scoring big in the seventh round.  While the two fighters were clinched, Gonzalez punched as the ref was separating the fighters.  harris took exception and started swinging wildly and angrily.  One of his haymakers connected sending Gonzalez to his left knee.  The referee scored it a knockdown, and suddenly, this fight was close.

Gonzalez poured it on in the eighth round trying to make up for the points he lost one round earlier on the knockdown.  The judges thought Gonzalez was more dominant than I did.  One judge scored it 78-73, and the other two were at 77-74, in a unanimous decision for the winer, Miguel ‘Silky Smooth’ Gonzalez, who improved to 19-2 with the hard fought win.

*Photos by Ron Stevens

Austintown’s own Chris Koval (right) got back into a boxing ring for the first time in over a year.  Koval faced James Porter of Terre Haute, Indiana in a scheduled four-round heavyweight contest.

Koval came away with the decision.  One judge scored it a 38-38 draw, the other two scored it 39-37 for Koval.  “It was a tough fight, and I am glad I got the work”, remarked Koval.  “It wasn’t pretty, but it is what it is – a win.  I have been off for over a year and shook some cobwebs off, I am a lot lighter than I was a year ago.  That helped me in one sense, but I only had three days of sparring.”

Koval, donning ‘Bill’s Place’ trunks came in looking physically fit compared to his last couple of fights.  The first round was pretty even as both fighters had their moments on offense.  Porter started strong and ended strong, and Koval dominated the middle.

In the second round, Koval, aka Special K, established a jab and took control of the pace.  Porter put together a couple of nice flurries but Koval did a little more to win the round.

Koval displayed good ring generalship in the third as he worked from the middle-out.  Porter spent a lot of the round circling Koval.  Both fighters landed good punches in the round with Koval’s biggest shot of the fight, a short left hook landing, but not hurting Porter.  Give the close round to Koval.

In the fourth and final round,  Koval landed some shots and to Porter’s credit, he kept throwing as well.  It was a good pace for two heavyweights and both fighters maintained it.

* Photos Courtesy of Ron Stevens

The boxing card at Cene Park got off to a thunderous start.  Aaron Dufour squared off against Derrick Evans in a scheduled four-round 175-pound match.  Unfortunately, Evans only needed one round to make quick work of Dufour.

The fighters exchanged for the first minute of the first round and then Evans caught Dufour knocking him down.  Dufour got back up fairly quick.  As soon as the ref said ‘fight’, Dufour was floored with a hook and stayed down for six seconds of the ref’s count.  At that point, Dufour’s eyes were woozy and the ref really should have considered stopping this one.  He let it go.  (See above picture).

At the 1:37 mark of the first round, Dufour was knocked through the ropes and stayed down for a minute or so.

“I trained hard and didn’t come here to lose”, remarked Evans after the impressive win that hoists his record to 2-0 with both wins coming by knockout.  Dufour dropped to 2-2 with the loss.

The second fight of the evening was a Heavyweight contest pitting Jason Massie (left) of Cleveland against Mujaheed Moore (right) of Shaker Heights, geographic proximity.  Massie came in with a perfect 6-0 record and Moore came in with a losing record but a lot of heart.

Massie snuck away with a unanimous decision to run his record to 7-0.  With the loss, Moore fell to 4-6.  Massie did just enough to win a hard-fought contest where both heavyweights were gasping in the third round, typical of the weight class.

The first round was Moore’s best as he caught Massie with some big rights.  From the second round on, both fighters looked tire but Massie stayed busier.  Most of the third and fourth rounds were spent with the boxers heads on their opponents shoulder and punches thrown blindly.  Moore did bleed a little, but neither fighter was really hurt the entire fight.

After a one hour and fifteen minute delay, boxing resumed. Nicolai ‘The Mountain Man’ Firtha (above) of Akron faced off against Ross’The Boss’ Thompson.  Firtha is managed by local, Pat Nelson.

In the first round, Firtha didn’t land a punch until after the one minute mark.  Thompson landed a couple of shots to the head and one to the body.  By the end of the round, Firtha was throwing more and landing a couple, but Thompson won the round.

In the second round, there was more talking and jawing between the fighters than fighting.  Firtha opened it up a bit and hit some clean body shots when he had Thompson pinned on the ropes.  At the very end of the round, Firtha hit Thompson and sent him to the canvas.  Thompson argued it was a slip and a ten minute delay ensued with everything from protests to Bernie Profant to Thompson’s corner throwing in the towel, to the fight seemingly over, to starting again.

In the third and fourth rounds, Firtha , not Thompson, was the boss.  Firtha used about a six inch height advantage to bully Thompson around almost every clinch.  Firtha was the aggressor and Thompson was a little too choosy about when he should let his hands fly.  At this point, I had Firtha ahead three rounds to one.

The fifth and sixth rounds found Thompson resting with his back on the ropes for the majority of each round trying to counterpunch.  That did not go so well as ‘The Boss’ was having a rough day at the office.

When it went to the scorecards, Firtha was declared the winner by a unanimously lopsided decision and improved to 20-8.  Thompson fell to 27-16 with the loss.

*Photos Courtesy of Ron Stevens

Coach Eric Wolford and his staff are going to have to really take a deep look at a few things as a result of the first scrimmage held Saturday morning.  Wolford said he will have a depth chart in place on Monday and that he has a good idea of who his 60 top guys are.  The cog that got jammed was the offense on Saturday.

This past offseason, Wolford said he was recruiting heavier on the defensive side of the ball for depth and guys who have the ability to finish a game.  Last season, YSU had consecutive weeks of nightmares, losing games that they were winning with less than two minutes remaining.  It wasn’t just a couple of times either, but rather almost every week in the last seven games.

The most obvious improvement to the 2011 version of Wolford’s tenure is the defensive front.  The ones, or first string, had trouble running the ball and protecting whatever quarterback was taking the snaps.  Don’t get me wrong, there were some offensive sparks in the scrimmage, but mostly through the air.  The offense averaged 422 yards per game last season and has it’s quarterback and running game back.  On Saturday, either the defensive unit played over its’ head or the offense underachieved.  There was not much of a running attack through the first 100 plays.

For Wolford, it is a Catch 22 situation.  Is the defense that good?  Was the offense that bad?  Was it a combination of both?  However he analyzes things, he will know that offensively, there is much to do before the Michigan State opener.  One of the concerns this week was offensive line depth.  The five starters are solid.  However, there is a drop off after that of unproven raw talent that needs to step up.  Zach Larson going down for the year didn’t help much.  In fact, Wolford has moved Zach Conlan from defense to offense to try to plug that leak before it gets out of control.

One of the brightest spots was the touchdown catch that Pat White hauled in from Kurt Hess covering about 40 yards.  White made a nice catch in the back right corner of the end zone.  Another bright spot was a lack of dropped balls by receivers.  Coach Andre Coleman has been working hard to try to prevent something that started during Spring practice from spilling over into Fall camp.

Dannie Williams won his seventh straight fight in impressive fashion on ESPN Friday Night Fights.  Antonio Cervantes took a Williams right to his chin at the 1:05 mark of the fourth round.  Referee Steve Smoger stopped the fight immediately, and Williams continued his escalation in raising his record to 19-1.

Williams knocked  Cervantes down in the first round and seemed in control the entire fight.  “I need to get national exposure so people can see what I am all about”, exclaimed Williams.  He got some love from ESPN and with this good showing, expect bigger things for Jack Loew‘s fighter.

When Williams caught Cervantes with the knockout punch, he knew it.  Once Cervantes hit the canvas, Williams smiled, and immediately realized that he landed the big one, he knew this fight was over.  Williams showed concern for his fallen opponent for a bittersweet minute before Cervantes got to his feet in a display of good sportsmanship.

Williams, a National Golden Gloves Champion in 2004, has handled his moderate success and seems poised to be on bigger cards very soon.  Coming off of a mediocre decision over Oscar Cuero in July, Williams stayed active and kept training for Cervantes knowing that the television exposure to a national audience would bolster his career.  This performance will definitely enhance that notion.

The Mahoning Valley Scrappers welcomed a tough Brooklyn Cyclones team to Eastwood Field.  Unfortunately for the Scrappers, they came out on the wrong side of a 10-6 verdict.  The Scrappers were hurt by some very good Brooklyn hitting in the early innings and never gained enough footing in the loss, surrendering four of the runs on wild pitches that went to the backstop.

In the first inning, the Scrappers raced out to a 1-0 lead.  Bryson Myles and Tony Wolters hit identical singles up the middle.  Coach David Wallace, always a risk taker on the bags, pulled off a double steal.  Jake Lowery then hit a fielders choice that got Wolters home for the early lead, which marked the only time the Scrappers would be ahead.

Brooklyn rebounded and rattled off six unanswered runs and took a 6-1 lead by the time they were done batting in the sixth.  The Cyclones got two of the runs when runners on third base advanced home on wild pitches.  Richard Lucas had the big shot in the fifth with a two-run double.  Brooklyn would also score their eighth run on a wild pitch.

The Scrappers clawed back into the game in the bottom of the sixth inning.  Alex Lavisky had a two-run double that broke the offensive struggles for the home team.  Todd Hankins also knocked in a run with a sacrifice fly.  Brooklyn avoided further damage and held a 6-4 lead going into the last third of the game.

The fun stuff started happening in the sixth inning.  Celebrating my birthday at Eastwood Field doesn’t bother me one bit, in fact, I welcome the atmosphere. Scott Hansen, someone who I can call a friend, runs the line portion of the scoreboard and knew it was my birthday.  Hansen told the people doing the birthday stuff and they put Paneech from Paneech dot com on the scoreboard, wishing me a Happy Birthday.  Hansen and I always buy $5 worth of 50/50 tickets every home game.  Going into Friday, we were 0-114.  We happened to hit.  1-115.  Rob Schmidt was sick of saying my name.

Scrappers starter Mason Radeke only went two innings throwing just under 50 pitches.  Harold Guerrero took the loss in relief.  Nate Striz uncorked four wild pitches and didn’t finish the eighth inning.  Will Krasne relieved Striz to finish things up for Mahoning Valley.

Brooklyn got a decent start out of Carlos Vazquez, who picked up the win for the Cyclones.  Frank Viola, a World Series MVP for the Twins in 1987, is the Cyclones pitching coach.

Hankins (above) finished the game 1-3 with two RBI’s and a stolen base.  Tony Wolters chipped in with a pair of hits, as did Bryson Myles and Lavisky.  Jerrud Sabourin also collected a pair of knocks for the Scrappers.

The Scrappers (32-23) and Cyclones (31-24) go at it again for two more games on Saturday and Sunday.  On Monday, the league takes two days off for the annual All-Star Break.  The All-Star Game will be played in Lowell, home of the Spinners.  Wolters and Myles join Jordan Smith and Danny Jimenez as NY Penn League All-Stars.

“I was really happy with Bryson Myles tonight”, said Wallace.  “He continues to find ways to get on base and has had some really good at-bats.  I am also happy with Jerrud Sabourin, he had a couple of big hits but worked deep into the count a couple of times and put the bat on the ball.”

On Saturday night, Ramesis Gil and Jake Giuriceo will lock horns at Cene Park.  Giuriceo, pictured above with Frank Duarte, will be looking to run his record to 13-0.  Gil is no putz. He has lost to two fighters with combined records of 29-0.  He also scored a first round KO over a 7-1 fighter and has been tough.

Giuriceo is on the brink of national attention.  He won last month in a slugfest at the Covelli Centre and looks to be in line, results of this fight pending, for a step up the ladder and a potential championship match in October on another Lights Out Productions card.

Gil talked about his trip to Youngstown.  “I am here to fight ‘The Bull’. I am the bullfighter. I feel really good and have been training hard for a good fight, I want to make a statement and show the people what I can do.”

Giuriceo also feels good.  After intensive training and sparring in California under the watchful eye of Duarte, The Bull is ready to charge forward in his career.  Should be a good fight and a decent undercard to lead into this Main Event.

Cefalde spoke about potential weather hazards.  “If it rains, the entire ring will be covered by a giant tent and the perimeter will stay dry.  It is going to happen nd we might have a slight delay, but you can bet that everything is in place.  Two days ago, it was 70 percent, today I heard 40 percent and it wasn’t supposed to start until later Saturday night, who knows?  Either way, we are ready.”

Youngstown State got its first taste of bad news on Thursday when Coach Eric Wolford announced that Zach Larson (#56, above), a returning letterman from 2010, would probably be redshirted after an injury that would cause him to miss the bulk of the 2011 season.

“Larson will probably be redshirted which hurts because he was having a really good camp, and was working hard”, remarked Wolford.  “He was playing some center for us and we will probably redshirt him and get him back for the next three years. Unfortunately, it is a part of the game this time of the year when you are hitting and tackling at full speed and have to expect some fallout.  We moved [Zach] Conlan over there and I addressed in preseason that the depth of the offensive line had me worried a little bit, we tried to address some other needs first.”

Wolford admitted that no depth chart exists, not until Monday.  ” We haven’t posted a depth chart yet.  We are just out there running around right now.  We will have a better idea with a depth chart after Saturday’s scrimmage. We [coaching staff] will go over everything in detail on Sunday and post it on Monday.  I have a pretty good idea of who the 60 guys are, but we will officially post something on Monday.”