By Bruce Karnick

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The worst aspect of spring sports is the oftencondensed schedule due to weather cancellations. This year has been exceptionally tough for the high school teams due to the weather jumping from winter to summer, completely eliminating spring. The Raiders baseball team had played the wild and wacky game at South St. Paul on May 6, winning 2010. They were scheduled to play Simley on May 9, that was postponed, giving the boys five days off from games. May 11 was a doubleheader at Tartan. May 13, the Raiders played host to Mahtomedi for their second doubleheader in three days. That was followed up by another doubleheader on May 16 at St. Thomas Academy and then the makeup game for Simley on May 17, at Hill Murray on May 18 and home at Veterans Park on May 20 against Burnsville. Add them up, that is nine games in nine days, with four games in a threeday span and five in five.

To say that the schedule is grueling right now is an understatement, it’s borderline ridiculous, and it makes for a very difficult time managing pitchers’ arms. The Rules for the MSHSL are in place to protect the young pitchers.

Pitch count rest days chart as follows: 130 requires zero days of rest.

3150 requires one day of rest.

5175 requires two days of rest.

76105 requires three days of rest.

The maximum a pitcher can throw in one day is 105 pitches to live batters, and the pitcher is allowed to finish the batter if they reach the limit. Days of rest are measured in calendar days, not 24hour periods. That means if the 50th pitch is thrown at 11:59 p.m. on Wednesday, they could not pitch until Friday. If the same 50th pitch is thrown at 12:01 a.m. on Thursday, they could not pitch until Saturday.

Against Tartan, Hastings threw Alex Hendrickson, Aaron Vandehoef and Eddie Peine for game one. Hastings took a 10 lead in the first, but Tartan came back and scored two in the second. Hastings put up two in the third to go up 32. Vandehoef came in for the fourth and that is when Tartan’s bats really started to pop. Tartan scored seven in the top of the fourth and took a 93 lead.

The Raiders were not done scoring nine runs in the bottom of the fourth to take the lead back, 129. With Hastings taking the lead back, Vandehoef became the pitcher of record. Peine took over in the fifth inning and allowed only one run the remainder of the game while Hastings added five more to win, 1710.

Offensively for Hastings: 2B Tanner Anslement; Evan Nelson; Connor Stoffel; Mitch Iliff, HR Connor Stoffel; Eddie Peine; Alex Hendrickson, RBI Tanner Anslement 2; Evan Nelson; Jackson Schaffer 2; Gavin Odman; Connor Stoffel 4; Eddie Peine; Mitch Iliff; Alex Hendrickson 2.

Game two Peine started on the mound for two innings, and Jack Seleski finished the game. Hastings took the early 20 lead in the first half inning of the game, Tartan scored one in the bottom of the first then one in the bottom of the second to tie it 22. Hastings added one in the third, but Tartan added three to go up 53. The fifth inning Hastings took the lead for good scoring three, to go up and eventually win, 65 Stoffel had another home run in game two and he was joined by Iliff. They were both responsible for the only earned runs scored in the game as well, Stoffel logging his solo home run, and Iliff logging three RBIs.

Mahtomedi came to Hastings for the second doubleheader of the week for the Raiders. Unfortunately, Hastings lost both games. Game one, 124 and game two 113. Evan Nelson hit his first ever varsity home run during the first Mahtomedi game.

The remaining games for the Raiders: Wednesday, May 18 at HillMurray and Friday, May 20 against Burnsville at Veterans Park in Hastings, both at 4:30 p.m. Then the Raiders finish out their regular season on Wednesday, May 25 against Northfield under the lights at Veterans Park at 7 p.m for Senior Night.