Intense rivalry can lead to intense injuries, as baseball players learned first-hand on April 14 when Las Lomas’ Seth Blume’s suffered a tibial fracture in an outfield collision with his teammate.
The game was being played at Campolindo and sports medicine teacher Ray Albiento managed to stabilize Blume’s leg and check for head injuries just minutes after the incident occurred. Sports med students JV Baldwin, Patrick White, and Bridget Coleman were also on the scene to assist Albiento.
Within 10 minutes, a fire truck and ambulance had arrived.
Paramedics took over and an ambulance was driven onto the field through double-door gates in left field fence. Blume’s leg was set in place with an air compression wrap-around. Witnesses reported a bulge on Blume’s anterior lower leg.
Blume was taken to Kaiser Permanente hospital in Walnut Creek, and his parents were called by coaches to meet Blume at the hospital.
After the paramedics and firefighters cleared out, the Cougars were unable to get their heads back in the game, committing several errors that resulted in a 7-2 loss.
Campolindo had been leading, 2-0. Sophomore Shane Dalton and junior Max Flower had contributed to Campolindo’s offense, each scoring a run. Flower was 2 for 3 at the plate, with a run batted in.
However, after Blume’s injury in the bottom of the 3rd inning, the Cougars fell apart.
Following the 30 minute interruption, players took the field without much warm-up. With single runs scored in the 4th, 5th, and 6th innings, and 4 runs in the 7th inning, Las Lomas dominated the remainder of play.
“Yeah, we had to basically sit around for thirty minutes, and during a baseball game, that’s pretty hard to do; to just, start playing again in the middle,” junior Myles Harris said.
“Our pitcher struggled to throw strikes, and our infielders kind of got flat and weren’t really ready to make plays,” Flower added.
“It’s all fielding,” Flower said. “The whole year has been fielding [problems].”
“Our main issues have been defense and pitching,” Harris added. Former star pitcher Matt LaDrech and shortstop Denis Karas both now play for the Cal Bears.
7 of 22 players on the Cougars’ roster are underclassmen.
While injuries would seem to be a greater detriment to the team of the injured players, it didn’t seem that way on Tuesday. “I don’t think [the injury] really affected their team,” Harris said. “Everyone just came back from that flat after a half hour of sitting, and no one was really ready to play. We ended up just making more errors in the infield than they did.”
Las Lomas’s record is 6-8, and 1-1 in the Diablo Foothill Athletic League [DFAL]. Campolindo’s record falls to 6-7, and 1-2 in DFAL.
