2026 Summer League Results- Week 1

tnb50baseball
17 hours ago
3 min read

4/29/26- Phillies 8 - Grays 6

Opening Night of the 2026 TNB 50+ season featured a rematch of last year’s final game, with the Dorian Grays, in their spiffy new jerseys, hoping to exact revenge upon the Phillies for last year’s loss. Alas, it was not to be, as the Champs held on -barely- for a thrilling 8-6 victory at the Beachgrounds.

The Phillies started Ken Sloat, recovering from off-season shoulder surgery, with the Grays countering with Chris “Nacho” Bernacki. Grays’ leadoff hitter Dave Rist smacked a single to LF, stole 2B, advanced on a groundout, then scored on Jay “Supe” Sadowski’s RBI single for a 1-0 lead. However, the Phillies took advantage of some Nacho wildness to plate 3 in their half of the first. With 1 out, Paul “Gris” Griswold and newest Phil Steve Youngberg both drew walks. Following a single by Colin “Hos” Hosley, Gris scored on a wild pitch, then after walking Phils’ rookie Matt Witek, Sloat walked and John “Kruk” Fogerty was hit by a pitch for a pair of runs. Steve Cole relieved Nacho and ended the inning.

Sloat pitched a scoreless 2nd, with LF Miguel Ringler making a nifty catch on a ball over his head off the bat of Nacho to end the inning. In the bottom of the 2nd, LF Matt Kostek countered with a fine running shoestring catch of a ball hit by Ron Totten to start off a 1-2-3 inning for Cole.

Hos relieved Sloat and pitched a scoreless 3rd while his team pushed their lead to 4-1. Micah Winston led off the home half with a single to LF, and running on the pitch, went all the way to 3B when Gris’s grounder was bobbled by 3B, who then threw to 1B wildly, allowing Winston to race home.

In the top of the 4th, the Grays pulled to within 1. Cole led off with a drive to the left-center gap that Winston nicely cut off to hold him to a single. Supe then singled, and a pair of infield errors by the Phils allowed the 2 of them to score. However, Hos retired the last 2 batters, with Gris firing home on a groundout to nail Dave Whitehead at the plate for the 2nd out. The Phils roared back with a 3-spot in the bottom of the 4th. Witek led off with a walk and with 1 out, Paul “Kap” Kaplan and Totten reached on errors with Witek scoring on the latter. Ringler then brought Kap home with an RBI groundout and Totten slid home on a passed ball for a 7-3 lead.

Hos stranded a couple of runners in the top of the 5th while his teammates added another when Youngberg singled and came around to score on a knock by Witek.

The Grays battled back in the top of the 6th. Steve Cole and Powers sandwiched singles around an out and then John “Ski” Malikowski singled in a run. Tim Tremblay followed with a blast to deep LF, but Ringler raced back and made a leaping snow-cone catch to turn a sure double into a sac fly. The home team then went down quietly – for an 8-5 score after 6.

In the top of the 7th with vanishing daylight, the Phils hoped for a quick end to the game…but the Grays had other ideas. Speedy Kostek legged out an infield hit and after a pair of force-outs and a pair of walks (including 1 on an epic at-bat by Ken Hartwright, who fouled off about half a dozen pitches), the game appeared to be over on an easy force-out to 2B, but the ball was dropped and a run scored. With the tying run on 2B, Hosley induced yet another grounder, which was nicely corralled by John “JW” Wills at 2B who from his knees flipped the ball to Andy “AK” Klepacki to force the runner at second and end the game.

Our fans got their money’s worth.