By Matt Weiner (@MattWeiner20) – BSB Beat Reporter
There are a plethora of ways to describe the situation Joey Cammarata found himself in on Saturday night.
Do or die, sink or swim, feast or famine, kill or be killed.
It’s dealers choice for how you wish to label a bases-loaded, one-out scenario with the Spartans up 4-1 in the sixth inning against Omaha.
It was Cammarata’s SJSU debut and his first appearance on the mound in nearly two years, as he is one of five transfers from Washington State.
Dealing with a stride leg that wanted to fly open and land in the Omaha dugout against his will, he immediately ran into command issues, walking the first two hitters.
Bound by bones, tendons and muscles, Cammarata is in an arranged marriage where his stride leg prefers to hook left causing him to fall off target.
“I got into the game, got amped up and just went back to old habits,” Cammarata said.
As he battled back getting a pop up for the first out and a strikeout for the next, his emotions were relatively bridled.
Relatively bridled became hysterically unbridled when he struck out Omaha’s Cam Frederick looking to end the frame. All the sudden he was transported to Las Vegas on the Mr. Olympia stage morphing into Ronnie Coleman when he hit a most muscular pose to secure his eighth Sandow trophy.
His teammates mirrored his irrepressible enthusiasm.
“I won’t remember that I got the bases loaded and got out of it,” Cammarata said.
“I’ll remember hanging out with my teammates. The baseball part of it is awesome and it matters, but building relationships with my teammates and coaches is the most important thing and that’s what I’ll remember.”
Cammarata was one member of a hectic cypher on Saturday night that had difficulty finding the zone. He exited the following inning with the bases loaded and two out, ending the day with four BB’s in 1.1 IP.
Lefty Corey “Corndog” Sanchez bailed Cammarata out by getting Eduardo Rosario to hit a sluggish fly ball to deep left to end the seventh.
Another example of a Spartan coming up big in a do or die, sink or swim, feast or famine, kill or be killed scenario.
These antsy situations wouldn’t end at Sanchez as Brady Hill came in to relieve him with runners on the corners and two outs. A peculiar situation for the former Washington State Cougar as it was his first time touching the diamond in the doubleheader.
“For me that was the first time I ever did that in my life,” Hill said. “It was different for me and was kind of tough being down there.”
With confidence in his coach’s game plan he fanned the first hitter he faced to end the inning.
Hill was given one of the most daunting duties in baseball for the top of the ninth: obtain outs 25, 26 and 27 in a tight game.
Things got off to a rocky start when Drew Hmeilewski hit a pinch-hit jack to make it a 5-4 ball game.
The early turbulence was short lived as he struck out the side after, ending the game on a controversial check swing call on an offspeed in the dirt.
“Honestly I don’t think he went,” Hil saidl.
However, in the moment he was willing to put his life at stake to make sure it was a strike. “It was cool to see our team freaking out saying ‘He went! He went!’. I was pointing, Omar [Gastelum] was pointing, everyone on the field was pointing [at the first base umpire] … that was a team pitch right there.”
“We feel like we have some depth at the back end of the bullpen,” said SJSU head coach Brad Sanfilippo.
The next-man-up mentality out the pen will be essential for the Spartans to improve from the 6-30 record suffered the year before. Cammarata getting out of the jam was a paradigm shift that helped swing the momentum back toward the Spartans. Depending on how the season goes, this could be a butterfly effect moment where it seems small, but holds powerful implications for the rest of the season.