Portland Rockets win Fort Wayne Federation Championship over July 4th Weekend.  Sweep Fort Wayne to go 4-0 in the Tournament.

Good Morning Baseball fans, it's a beautiful day in Portland.

For when the one great scorer come to mark against your name, he asks not if you won or lost, but did you beat Fort Wayne!  Winner Winner Chicken Dinner!!!!

Rockets blast off July with 4 tournament wins in Fort Wayne over the weekend. Your winner and champion Portland Rockets take the Fort Wayne Federation Tournament. Portland, the only team to go unscathed, took on all comers from Fort Wayne and made trips on Friday, Saturday and Sunday to Carrington Field. But, as often is the case despite the distance factor, we had more players, more fans, and more runs. And oh, I love it when our fans get on those umpires so we don't have to!!!

Rockets won Friday night behind the 2-hit pitching of Dan Bollenbacher. Final was 5-4 over the Fort Wayne Cubs. Last at bat heroics by Michael Ingram (Richmond) with a 2-out, bases loaded walk off single. Rockets win Saturday on a one-hitter by Bill Geeslin through 6 innings, Tyler Mills finished up, and final was 2-1 over Shady Nook. A walk off suicide play by Chris Tillery scored Bryce Cook with the winning run. What an exciting play when it works and it worked again Sunday with John Clawson executing. Sure makes a coach look good and is demoralizing to the opposition.  Don't tell anyone but if Heath Williams is on second with a man at third, we are working on a secret play to score 2 runs in one squeeze bunt.

Saturday night the Rockets defeated LaMargarita 7-2. Will Walters, Derek Mounsey, Tyler Palmer all on the mound. We got three hits from Chris Tillery (not big in stature, but big on heart, hustle, and smarts), two hits by Michael Ingram sealed the deal!

This sets the stage for championship Sunday! What a Rocket turnout! Of course, Don and Marilyn Maloy were there and Rocket fans and cameras flashing all over! Baseball on July 4th, how American is that! I am proud to be on the Portland team. They lined up for a team photo reserved for champions, and five people were lined up to take their picture.

On Sunday, we led 2-0 through 6 innings before Shady Nook touched Mills and Mounsey for four runs. Singles by Muhlenkamp and Thomas McCowan scored one run. Tyler Palmer was the winning pitcher and held them in the 7th inning. Then Rockets had a two-run rally in the 7th, winning run scored on a wild pitch to Bryan Brudi. Justin Morero scored the last run in the last at bat in three of the four games. Exciting, but excruciating for this old timer!

Tyler Mills goes into the 6th and manned up in 95 degree heat, 95 pitches (ironically), giving up 2 runs, 3 hits, 4 walks. Tyler Palmer in relief gets the win in his second day of work. This Rocket Team adds Bryan Brudi from Churubusco, who just got back from Australia. Bullet Brudi makes this team solid along with Ingram, Isenberg, and Tillery in the outfield, the return of Justin Moerero in the infield -- hey, they have won 5 out of our last 6 games to go 10-10 in the season.  Remember last year we started slow, 9-8 when Josh Ludy joined us on June 27.

On the weekend, Heath Williams led the offense with 5 hits, 4 hits by Tillery and Muhlenkamp.  Rocket all-tourney selections are Bollenbacher, Geeslin, Williams and Tillery.  Hey Mom...where are we going to put this championship trophy? I know, we will put it on display at Crossroads Credit Union...They have a big night planned on July 14 at our park.

This just in...the fireworks show at the Fairgrounds had championship kudos to all!

Rockets play at 6:30 pm Wednesday at Canterbury High School in Fort Wayne against the Fort Wayne Cubs. Then, we will be home on Thursday night.

Rockets champions of Fort Wayne Tournament 4-0 on weekend, mission accomplished...Portland Champions has a nice ring to it!

This is Randy Miller pg 14