Every baseball team wants to be playing its best as the postseason nears, and both Berryhill Post 165 and Gladwin Post 171 seem to be clicking at just the right time.
Heading into this weekend’s American Legion Baseball Zone 4 tournament at Northwood University, Berryhill is entering the postseason with momentum after having won the Petoskey Invitational this past weekend.
“It’s an exciting time of the year, definitely,” Berryhill manager Dan Cronkright said of the postseason. “ … I think we’ve got a few things to work out, but we’re starting to get there, so we’ll see how it goes.”
The zone tournament will begin with Mount Pleasant Post 110 facing Boyne City Post 228 in a noon winners’ bracket semifinal on Friday, followed by Berryhill vs. Gladwin in the other winners’ bracket semifinal at 3 p.m., and then the losers of those two games squaring off in an elimination game at 6 p.m.
The winners’ bracket final will be Saturday at noon, the losers’ bracket final will be Saturday at 3 p.m., and the championship game will be Saturday at 6 p.m. The if-necessary game would be on Sunday at a time to be determined.
Following the zone tournament, both teams likely will compete in the ALB state tournament in Mount Pleasant the following weekend. Then, from Aug. 3-7, Berryhill will host the Great Lakes Region tournament back at Northwood. As the host team, Post 165 will receive an automatic berth in the regional, while Post 171 also has a very good chance of qualifying.
State champions from Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin will be among the teams competing in the regional.
“It’s going to be an exciting three weeks, for sure,” said Gladwin manager Terry Brokoff. “ … It’s always good if you can make it to the regional and play state champions from a bunch of other states. That’s always significant and great.”
Like Berryhill, Gladwin is entering the postseason with plenty of momentum, having won both the Ultimate Strike Zone tournament and the Great Lakes Bay Classic tournament in the Tri-Cities area over the past couple of weekends after finishing a disappointing 2-2 in pool play and failing to advance at the Gabby Mills tourney.
“We haven’t been walking people lately, like we did at the Berryhill tournament,” noted Brokoff, whose team also won its first two tournaments of the summer. “In both games that we lost at the Gabby Mills, we walked people, and it seemed like all but one of them ended up scoring. We didn’t pitch well in those two games.”
While Brokoff is pleased with how his pitching staff has come along, so is Cronkright, whose top hurlers include Midland High’s Lane Kloha, Dow High alum Trent Johnson, Bullock Creek’s Andrew Young, Alma alum D.J. Thompson, and Bay City John Glenn’s Brody Krzysiak.
“We’re pitching well, definitely. Our defense has been OK, and our offense has been steady, but pitching is one thing we’ve done quite well lately,” Cronkright said.
Cronkright added that Midland High alum Braylen Laverty, Dow’s Zack Parker, and Clare alum Al Warner have been his most consistent hitters this summer, while noting that getting Dow alum Logan McCoy, a standout hitter and infielder, and John Glenn alum Tanner Sonntag, a pitcher/infielder, back from injury over the past couple of weeks has only made Berryhill stronger.
Meanwhile, Brokoff said that his top pitchers have been Freeland alum Alex Duley, Essexville Garber’s Max Fellows, Garber alum Colin Sackrider, and Saginaw Heritage alum Quin Konuszewski, while Bullock Creek alum Carter Campau, Gladwin’s Lucas Mead, Standish-Sterling alum Cole Prout, and Garber alum Micah Irrer have been his hottest hitters lately.
“We’ve hit the ball well, and the whole lineup is batting well,” noted Brokoff, whose team has gone 10-1 over the past two weekends. “When we’ve gotten down in any games lately, we’ve been able to come back and win them, except for one game.”
Looking ahead to the Great Lakes Region tournament at Northwood, Cronkright said he will enjoy experiencing that festive environment again.
“I think it’s an honor to play in the postseason, but it’s also an honor to host the regional in your hometown. It’s a neat thing to have Midland be able to host it and to be able to let people see the quality of baseball that the American Legion has in the Midwest,” Cronkright said.
“ … It’s almost like a carnival or something like that, but it’s based around a baseball tournament,” he added of the electric atmosphere at regionals. “It is exciting, and it is fun.”
Brokoff, who took Post 171 to a regional for the first time ever in 2019, said he would love to experience that feeling again – this time, much closer to home.
“I know we play good baseball around our zone, and we just want to keep that up and do the best we can and represent the state of Michigan well if we happen to get there (to the regional),” he said.
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July 18, 2022 at 11:42PM
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'Exciting time of year': Berryhill hosting zone, regional tourneys - Midland Daily News
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