Oak Park Scores Most Runs but Winds Up Loser

In most baseball games, the team that scores the most runs wins.

Such was not the case in Friday’s Tri-Valley League game between Oak Park and Carpinteria.

In the sixth inning of a 1-1 tie at Carpinteria, Oak Park’s Gary Silverman hit a bases-loaded, two-out single that scored two runners. Scott Ziegler, trying to score from first base, collided with the catcher and was ejected.

A CIF rule, aimed at encouraging safer plays at the plate, mandates that it is a runner’s obligation to avoid contact with the catcher.

Oak Park led, 3-1, but had used all its substitutes, so the umpires forfeited the game to Carpinteria.

Oak Park Coach Veres, who is protesting the game to the league office, says he should have been able to use a junior varsity player to fill Ziegler’s spot, but the umpires would not allow it.