CARY, N.C. – The long-awaited day arrived for a pair of teams on championship Sunday at Thomas Brooks Park in Cary, North Carolina. Two teams entered, one team would walk away with the title of 2025 10U Futures Invitational champions. There was a plethora of action on the fields today, with both gold and bronze medals on the line. Catch up on today's games from an incredible day of baseball.
Scottsdale Dirtbags 16, TBT Ballers SoCal 7 (Championship)
In a game that was full of runs with 23 total, at least one run was scored in every inning and led to a high-scoring affair. Heavy presence from the bats was what led the Dirtbags with 16 total hits, as five of the nine batters in the lineup recorded multi-hit games, with two of those players having three hits apiece.
A solid outing from starting pitcher Jacoby Bowden gave the Dirtbags four innings of work while only giving up three earned runs, striking out four during his day on the bump.
Starting the game with a leadoff triple, Noah Kirk drove home the opening run of the game with an RBI single. Following Kirk, Mathias Solis brought in the second run of the inning with an RBI single of his own, giving the Dirtbags a 2-0 lead.
TBT responded accordingly in the bottom half of the first, putting up five runs on three hits, headlined by Jayden Agee hammering a three-RBI double. TBT’s lead didn’t last for long; in the top half of the second, the Dirtbags tied the game using four singles and help from defensive errors to bring in three runs and even the score at 5-5.
Putting up the first zero of the game in the second frame, the Dirtbags got out of the inning by facing only four batters to keep the bats rolling. The Dirtbags did exactly that, scoring two more runs and capitalizing on an error from a hard-hit ground ball to third to score their seventh run of the game.
Looking to respond in the third, TBT came up empty, going three-up, three-down.
In the top of the fourth, the Dirtbags jumped out to the largest lead of the game, scoring four more runs and putting themselves up 11-5 with RBI hits from Grayson Bader, Colt Patten, and Kirk.
Trying to keep their championship dreams alive, TBT used three straight hits to scratch across two in the fourth. Kingston Mohammed drove home both runners on an RBI single to center field, bringing TBT within four.
Finding two runners on with two outs in the top of the fifth inning, Enzo Rijo-Berger hit an inside-the-park home run to add critical insurance runs and gave himself the team lead in RBIs with three on the day.
With the Dirtbags looking to close it out, they handed the ball off to Jace Fenzel, who retired TBT in order in the bottom of the fifth.
In the top of the sixth, Scottsdale landed a leadoff man on base after a defensive miscue, who proceeded to steal second and advance to third on a wild pitch one batter later. A sacrifice fly off the bat of Mavric White, followed by an RBI ground out by Bader to further their lead, 16-7, and inch the team closer to their championship dream.
Fenzel came back out to close out the game and retired the side in order, getting the last two outs via strikeout. Going two innings of no-hit baseball, Fenzel closed out the championship and secured the win for the Dirtbags.
Original Florida Pokers of Parkland 16, Knights Knation 1 (Bronze)
In bronze medal action, the Original Florida Pokers of Parkland jumped out to a 5-0 lead in the first and didn’t look back.
Scoring in every inning of the run-rule shortened, four-inning game, the Pokers scored nine runs in the first two innings of the game. Christian Lindsay went 2-for-2 with an inside-the-park home run, picking up three RBIs to help power the Pokers to a bronze-medal finish. The Pokers’ strong performance saw the squad tally 14 hits as a team, with six players recording multi-hit performances.
The pitching staff held it down with a combined four innings of work, only allowing two hits, with a pair of strikeouts. The Pokers took third place in loud fashion thanks to an all-around great performance.
