The provincial Molson Senior A baseball final resumes this weekend at St. Pat’s Ballpark with the defending champion St. John’s Capitals leading the Corner Brook Barons 2-1 in a best-of-seven final showdown.
The Capitals won two out of three at Jubilee Field one weekend ago, coming up with timely hitting and solid pitching in close games that Flood figures could have gone either way.
Flood believes his team pulled out a big 5-2 win in the opener, but came up short in the next two games despite having the winning run on base or at the plate in the last inning of both losses — 3-0 in Game 2 and 5-2 in Game 3.
The positive attitude of the players when things were tight was refreshing for him because he saw it as a sign the team was serious about giving the Caps a run for their money.
“We stayed in the game the whole time. We fought right until the last possible pitch and that was what we had to do. We couldn’t quite pull through in the key moments,” the Barons’ leadoff hitter said earlier this week.
Flood is among a number of Barons who play in the St. John’s senior baseball league, so he’s familiar with the friendly confines of St. Pat’s and that’s something he hopes works in his favour, but he expects both teams to put it all on the line this weekend, so he believes everybody will have to be at their best to knock off a team he believes is blessed with solid pitching.
One game at a time is the way he will approach the weekend, but he makes it clear the Barons have to be solid in all areas of the game because there won’t be much room for error with the two teams clearly on the same mission.
“We’ve got to play perfect defence and we have to cash in with runners on base,” he said.
