Bears pull even in the East

EVERETT, Wash. — One night it’s 19 hits and a blowout win, the next it’s stellar starting pitching and a thrilling extra-inning victory.

Whatever is needed, the Yakima Bears are getting plenty of it and more these days.

Powered by Alex Capaul’s seven brilliant innings and capped by Danny Pulfer’s RBI triple in the 11th inning, the Bears won their seventh straight game Saturday night, outlasting Everett 6-5 and drawing even with Tri-City for the East Division lead.

With Yakima dominating the AquaSox during this five-game road series, which concludes today, the slumping Dust Devils continued to have trouble in Vancouver, falling to the Canadians 9-4 on Saturday.

Keeping the streak alive took some doing despite Capaul’s seven shutout innings, after which he exited with a seemingly comfortable 5-0 lead. That’s because Everett put up five runs — all with two outs and the assistance of four walks — in the bottom of the eighth to erase his chance for the win.

But in the 11th the streak was saved.

Raul Navarro drew a leadoff walk and advanced to second on Westley Moss’ sacrifice bunt. The table-setting proved unnecessary when Pulfer lashed a triple to left-center for the go-ahead run.

Yakima’s Justin Albert came on to clean up the mess in the eighth, then pitched three shutout innings for the victory.

Capaul’s best outing of the season saw Everett manage just three hits off the 6-foot-2 right-hander from Idaho. He struck out four, walked none and lowered his earned-run average to 3.09.

Yakima’s suddenly insatiable offense, which rolled up 19 hits on Friday and has 52 hits in four games at Everett, pounced on Everett starter Jordan Pries for a run in the first inning and three more in the second for a quick 4-0 lead.

The Bears were hitting gaps, too, with doubles by Steven Rodriguez, Jimmy Comerota and Navarro and triples by Justin Hilt and Pulfer.

Yakima’s win streak has contrasted Tri-City’s recent slide, which has left the two rivals tied at 17-15 atop the East. Since sweeping the Bears at home to open at six-game lead on Yakima, the Dust Devils have lost four straight and six of their last seven.

8/28/11 Minor League Stats

8/28/11 Yakima Bears update

Next game

Opponent: Everett AquaSox.

When, where: 4:05 p.m. today, Memorial Stadium, Everett.

Radio/Internet: KUTI (1460)/yakimabears.com

Probable pitchers: Yakima LHP John Pedrotty (2-3, 2.93) vs. Everett LHP Cameron Hobson (2-2, 1.95).

Click here for box score

Click here for standings

Bears gain ground

EVERETT, Wash. — The charge continues.

And with bats as hot as these, it may last a while.

With Garrett Weber lashing the ball all over — and out of — Everett Memorial Stadium, the Yakima Bears used a season-best offensive breakout to claim their sixth straight win, humbling the AquaSox 9-3 with 19 hits on Friday.

Combined with Tri-City’s 2-0 loss at Vancouver, the Bears have pulled within one game of the East Division-leading Dust Devils.

Just a week ago they were six back.

Weber, who played second base and batted in the clean-up spot, did exactly that — cleaned up. He hit his team-leading 15th and 16th doubles to help Yakima build and early 4-0 lead, then clubbed a two-run home run in seventh as the Bears responded big to an Everett rally.

Weber finished 4 for 6 with four RBI and has now hit five doubles in his last six games.

Jimmy Comerota, batting in front of Weber, was 4 for 5 to lift his season average to .320, and Carter Bell hit his first home run and scored three times as the Bears plated runs in all but two innings.

Yakima got to Everett starter Bennett Whitmore steadily, scoring a run in each of the first four innings. Everett scratched back, however, pulling within 4-3 in the fifth as the AquaSox’s bullpen was finally able to suppress the Bears’ bats.

It didn’t last long.

When Everett’s Max Krakowiak took over in the seventh, Yakima greeted him with five consecutive hits, including Weber’s two-run shot to build the lead back to 6-3.

Weber added an RBI single in the eighth for an 8-3 cushion.

Yakima starter Adam Kudryk leveled his record at 4-4, working five innings. Greg Robinson was stellar in relief, closing out with four scoreless innings while giving up just one hit.

8/27/11 Yakima Bears update

Next game

Opponent: Everett AquaSox.

When, where: 7:05 p.m. today, Memorial Stadium, Everett.

Radio/Internet: KUTI (1460)/yakimabears.com

Probable pitchers: Yakima RHP Alex Capaul (2-2, 3.45) vs. Everett RHP Jordan Pries (4-2, 3.26).

Click here for box score

Click here for standings

CWU QB Robertson rising to the occasion

Confident junior settles into starting job||

ELLENSBURG, Wash. — There was nothing notably different about Ryan Robertson on Thursday, save for the absence of wrist and knee braces he’d worn during prior seasons. Yet as Central Washington’s scrimmage progressed and Robertson directed the first-team offense, there was an evident newness to the redshirt junior quarterback.

Especially compared with Ryan Robertson the redshirt sophomore, and Ryan Robertson the redshirt freshman.

“I’m healthy now, which is a good start,” said the 6-foot-3, 202-pounder from Eastlake High School in Sammamish.

But there was more.

He stood a bit taller in the pocket, threw with a touch more confidence and, in general, carried himself like he’s prepared to, well, carry a team.

“Yeah, I do feel like this is my team,” Robertson said later. “A lot of things have factored into this — a lot of work. For one thing, I’ve prepared myself better for this season than I ever did before. Maturity, I think, has been part of that.”

Maturity, to be sure. And confidence — both from within himself and from his coaches and teammates.

And since neither has come easily, with Robertson having taken more than his share of lumps both physically and psychologically, both are commodities in which the quarterback takes considerable pride.

“I’m not a senior yet,” he said, smiling, “but I feel like one.”

He should.

As if succeeding the legendary Mike Reilly weren’t demanding enough, Robertson as a redshirt freshman opened the 2009 season in a neck-and-neck duel with Western Washington transfer Cole Morgan for the starter’s job.

He won it to begin the season, then progressed steadily as the Wildcats won their first four games, including a nationally televised upset at second-ranked Minnesota Duluth.

But even when CWU posted an impressive 33-22 triumph at Football Championship Subdivision member Idaho State, Robertson encountered a serious speed bump.

“I’d never thrown four interceptions in a game before,” he said, recalling a performance that also included some timely completions and enabled him to retain his No. 1 status. “That was tough to deal with.”

And three weeks later, when the Wildcats found themselves down 21-0 at halftime of their Battle in Seattle with Western Oregon at what was then Qwest Field, Blaine Bennett replaced Robertson with Morgan.

The head coach had no choice, especially when the Wolves’ final touchdown came on a 60-yard return of a Robertson interception.

Central rallied for a 23-21 victory and with redshirt senior Morgan at the helm, the Wildcats completed an 11-0 regular season and took a No. 1 ranking into the NCAA Division II playoffs.

And while CWU reached the quarterfinals before falling to eventual national champion Northwest Missouri State, it was hardly the high point of Robertson’s career.

“After the Western Oregon game, I just went into a downward spiral,” he said. “I just pretty much shut down as a quarterback.”

Last year, Robertson was coming off assorted injuries when heralded transfer Alex Cate hit town. From Oklahoma State, Cate started Central’s first two games.

But two days before a Seattle showdown with ultimate FCS national champion Eastern Washington, Bennett tabbed Robertson as the starter.

And while his performance began ominously — his first pass was intercepted and returned 55 yards for a touchdown — Robertson played his best game as a Wildcat, finishing 29 for 46 for 251 yards and two scores as CWU took the Eagles to the wire before losing, 35-32.

“We’d lost three of our O linemen that week during practice,” Robertson said, “so I knew I was going to get hit. But I figured I just had to get the ball out quicker, make my reads and make plays and just deal with it.

“I felt I grew up some as a quarterback during that game.”

Central didn’t return to the D-II playoffs last year, but Robertson’s growth continued. He closed out the year as CWU’s starter — Cate eventually left the team and school — throwing for 2,203 yards and 15 touchdowns with eight picks. His completion percentage was .626 and his quarterback rating 130.7.

The 22nd-ranked Wildcats, of course, are preparing for a blockbuster season-opener, a week from today at home against seventh-ranked Texas A&M-Kingsville. And there is a transfer — junior Jose Mohler of Cardiff, Calif. and North Dakota State — listed as No. 2 on the QB depth chart.

But there is clear indication, from both Robertson and Bennett, that a quarterback duel does not exist.

“This has been the best camp Ryan Robertson has had here,” Bennett said Thursday. “He’s become a leader, he’s throwing the ball stronger and he has a much better understanding of our offense now. We’re very pleased with him.”

Said Robertson, “This is the year I expect our offense to re-assert itself. We’ve been a defensive-dominated team the past couple of years, and it’s obviously a good thing to have a great defense. And our defense should be really good again.

“But this season we expect to put up some points this year, and that should allow our defense to attack more instead of just sit back in a base, prevent mode. So I’m expecting big things this year — from myself and our offense. It’s going to be fun.”

Yakima inches closer

Fifth straight win leaves Bears 2 out of first||

EVERETT — The Bears stayed red-hot Thursday night at Memorial Stadium, and 112 miles to the north, the Tri-City Dust Devils were feeling the heat.

Yakima extended its season-best winning streak to five games with a 6-0 blanking of the Everett AquaSox, moving to within two games of first-place Tri-City in the East Division second half race.

Eight regular-season games remain, with the Bears meeting Everett for three more here before their off day Monday, after which they return home for five with Eugene. The Dust Devils, who for the second straight night lost at Vancouver, have three more with the Canadians before coming to Pasco to close the season with a five-game set against Salem-Keizer.

With an announced 2,402 watching in Everett, Yiomar Camacho, Willy Paredes and Justin Albert combined for the Bears’ third shutout of the year.

Camacho, coming off a rough start against Boise, went the first five innings, scattering four hits and striking out five while walking one. Paredes followed with three two-hit frames in which he fanned two and walked none and Albert, continuing his stellar performance as Yakima’s closer, worked a one-hit ninth.

The Bears (15-15 second half, 28-40 overall) led 2-0 through eight innings on Jimmy Comerota’s two-run double in the third inning, then tacked on four more tallies off Everett reliever Kyle Hunter.

Kerry Jenkins, who had two hits Thursday and has totaled 10 in his last four games, drove in one run with a sacrifice fly. An error allowed two more runs and another plated on Matt Jensen’s groundout.

Jose Campos was a hard-luck loser for the AquaSox (18-12, 34-33), who saw their second-half lead in the West reduced to one game over Eugene. He pitched eight innings and allowed four runs and no earned runs since an error contributed to Yakima’s third-inning rally. Campos struck out 12 and walked one, lowering his ERA to 2.12.

The Bears, who had lost seven straight road games before winning their last two, are 11-5 since team-leader Comerota returned from Class AA Mobile on Aug. 10.

Ike hoops hires a coach, loses one

YAKIMA, Wash. — Eisenhower’s boys and girls basketball programs have one coach on the way in and one on the way out.

Branden Johnson, a 2005 Ike grad, has been hired as the girls varsity coach while Brad Schultz has stepped down as the boys coach after one season.

Hoping for some stability in a program that will have its fourth different coach in four years, Johnson was a standout at Montana State who has played pro basketball in Europe. As a 6-foot-8 center at Ike, he helped the Cadets win a school-record 26 games and place fourth at state during his senior year.

Schultz was Ike’s junior varsity coach for eight seasons before replacing Pat Fitterer last season. Schultz is joining Fitterer, his father-in-law, on the coaching staff at Ellensburg.

Bears get fourth straight victory

EVERETT, Wash. — If the Bears considered themselves to have been realistically if not mathematically eliminated from the East Division second-half race after being swept in a three-game series last week at Tri-City, they haven’t played like it since.

Yakima won its fourth straight Wednesday night, 10-6 over West second-half leader Everett, to move to within three games of the first place Dust Devils with nine remaining.

Before an announced crowd of 1,937 at Memorial Stadium, the Bears won on the road for the first time since July 30 and equaled their season-best winning streak. Tri-City, meanwhile, lost 4-3 at Vancouver.

For Yakima, four contests remain here with the Seattle Mariners farmhands before the Bears return home to conclude their Northwest League schedule with five games against Eugene.

Tyler Bream was 3 for 5 with three runs batted in and Jimmy Comerota was 2 for 4 with four RBI to lead a 15-hit assault that saw the Bears break the game open with a five-run fourth inning.

After Tyler Bream scored Justin Hilt with a single and later came home on Raul Navarro’s sacrifice fly, Westley Moss singled and Danny Pulfer walked to load the bases with two outs.

Comerota then singled to right to score two runs, and a third came home on Mario Yepez’s fielding error, although Comerota was thrown out at the plate.

Moss, Pulfer, Hilt and Kerry Jenkins had two hits apiece, with Jenkins having produced eight safeties in his last three games.

Teo Gutierrez, replacing 19-year-old starter Blake Perry, allowed three hits and two runs over the final five innings to improve to 4-3. Perry, in his Yakima debut, yielded six hits and four runs over four frames, walking three and striking out six.

8/25/11 Yakima Bears update

Next game

Opponent: Everett AquaSox.

When, where: 7:05 p.m. today, Memorial Stadium, Everett.

Radio/Internet: KUTI (1460)/yakimabears.com

Probable pitchers: Yakima RHP Yiomar Camacho (1-1, 3.97) vs. Everett RHP Jose Campos (5-3, 2.37).

Click here for box score

Click here for standings

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