The Fresno City College baseball team dominated Chabot College 14-6 to win the series against the Pirates in dominant fashion on Saturday, Feb. 8. The win pushed Fresno’s record to 5-1 in their young season and allowed them to get acclimated with the depth of talent on their roster. 

Unlike FCC, Chabot has stumbled into their season, going winless in their first six games before taking on the Rams. 

“Chabot is traditionally a great program,” said Rams’ head coach Ron Scott. “They played Santa Rosa, Sacramento and now they’ve played us. So, to me they’ve played three of the best teams in Northern California, and that’s why they’re 0-8 now.”

The undefeated Santa Rosa Junior College and Sacramento City College baseball programs are responsible for Chabot’s first five losses. After taking game one by a score of 9-6, FCC looked to put the Pirates away in game two.

The Rams started freshman lefthander Marcelo Saldana against Chabot. Saldana was working his fastball in all corners of the strike zone, pairing it with his wicked breaking ball to hold the Pirate’s lineup to three hits and seven strikeouts through five and one-third scoreless innings.

While Saldana shut it down from the mound, the lineup was firing on all cylinders. 

The Rams lineup was held at bay until the third inning, when freshman outfielder J.D. Ortiz opened the scoring with an RBI triple. He later scored to make it a 2-0 game, but the Rams kept moving down the chain.

The bottom of the fourth started with a flurry when freshman outfielder Cole Brincefield knocked a base hit. Then the Rams got to work, following it up with another single before Brincefield came all the way around to score on a fielder’s choice. Freshman catcher James Bell hit a ringing double to plate two more runs before the inning ended.

The Rams continued knocking around the Pirates, scoring four runs in the fifth and four more by the end of the sixth, moving the score to a comfortable 14-0.

Surprisingly, no hits from FCC’s lineup ever cleared the fence.

“We just tried to put the ball in play and put pressure on them. We just tried to do the little things to win, and for the most part I think we did that,” said Scott.

With a padded lead, the Rams pulled Saldana at 75 pitches to work out their other arms. This looked like a questionable decision after freshman pitchers Alec Flores and Hanes Hunter allowed a combined six runs in the seventh inning alone. 

Despite the blemish, Scott is sure the Rams finished as winners.

“They threw a good pitcher, one of their better ones today, and I thought we played a perfect baseball game for six innings,” said Scott. “We pitched well, we played good defense, we had really good hits and we bunted well.”

The Rams took on Hartnell College on Tuesday Feb. 11, beating the Panthers 6-0. They will wrap up the series on Wednesday before hosting Sacramento at home on Friday, Feb. 14 at 6 p.m.