GALION — It’s a small step, but for the Galion Graders it’s a small step in the right direction.
The Graders are 2-1 through the opening week of the Great Lakes Summer Collegiate League season and while general manager Mike O’Leary isn’t making postseason travel arrangements just yet, the improved early play is a welcome relief for the third-year franchise.
In its first season in 2015, Galion staggered to a 1-4 start and finished 16-22. Last year, the Graders were 3-7 after 10 games and stumbled to a 12-30 mark.
“Thanks for pointing that out,” O’Leary joked when reminded the Graders were above .500 for the first time in franchise history. “It’s true, though.”
After Sunday’s 11-9 walk-off win over Grand Lake, Galion is alone atop the GLSCL’s Central Division standings.
“Winning games early in the season makes it easier. You build some confidence and all of the sudden you show up to the ballpark expecting to win every day,” manager Taylore Baker said. “If we can win two out of three throughout the summer, it will go a long way toward putting us in a position we want to be in.”
The lone holdover from last year’s team is Lexington product Brody Basilone, a right-handed pitcher who appeared in 18 games for Division I Northern Kentucky in the spring. Basilone was Galion’s opening-day starter, surrendering five hits and two earned runs in seven innings of an 8-2 win at Licking County.
“This year’s group is a lot different than last year’s team,” Basilone said. “I’ve never seen a group of guys come together so quickly. It seems like everybody in the dugout has known each other for years. It’s awesome.”
The starting pitching has been key to Galion’s strong opening week. All three starters have gone at least five innings.
“Our starters have been fantastic. They’ve all given us at least five,” Baker said. “When you can do that and get to your bullpen and bridge guys from inning to inning, it just makes things easier.
“It gives everyone else a good feel from the standpoint that our starter competed for us and the guys are going to play that much harder behind him.”
Former Graders manager Ray Neill lamented after the 2015 season that the team needed more left-handed power hitters to take advantage of Heddleson Field’s 300-foot fence in right field.
That issue may have been resolved with the addition of University of Charleston (West Virginia) outfielder Austin Hathaway, a product of nearby Fredericktown High School, and undersized Lenoir-Rhyne (North Carolina) University third baseman Josh Kent. Hathaway belted his second home run during Galion’s four-run second inning Sunday.
Kent launched a solo shot in the first then blasted a walk-off two-run shot with two out in the bottom of the ninth.
“We went out and got some left-handed power,” Baker said. “Our guys have very good approaches at the plate right now and it has translated to us scoring a lot of runs.”
The Graders host Lorain at 7:05 p.m. Tuesday, June 12. Galion plays a 41-game schedule that concludes July 29.
“We are looking forward to the season,” Basilone said. “We want to win some games and bring home a championship to Galion.”
