San Juan baseball team wins six of last seven games in past two weeks to take 2A East lead

by Rhett Sifford
Sports Editor
It has been a busy and productive past two weeks for the San Juan High School baseball team. The Broncos have won six of their last seven games beginning with the Red Devil Invitational in Moab March 15-16.
At that tournament San Juan beat North Summit 19-1, Emery 3-1, and Montezuma-Cortez 5-4. Their only loss was to tournament host Grand County in a hard-fought 4-3 battle.
Following their trip to Moab the Broncos swept North Summit in a 2A East doubleheader in Blanding March 19, outscoring the Braves 42-4 in the two games combined.
Most recently they got some revenge on their local rivals, beating Grand County in Moab 8-6 to open the current week on Monday, March 25.
Suddenly San Juan is 7-4 on the season, 3-0 in region play, and they’re sitting atop the 2A East region standings with the initial 2A RPI standings set to be released next week.
Through the first 11 games the Bronco defense is getting the job done. Branten Bethea leads the team with a .981 fielding percentage with 46 putouts. Parker Snyder has a .957 fielding percentage with 35 putouts.
Cooper Palmer has a .952 fielding percentage with 18 putouts, Derrick White sits at .889 and 13, and Talon Mendoza has an .800 percentage with 18 putouts.
San Juan pitching is sporting a 3.73 earned run average. Talon Mendoza, Jaiten Knight, and Jagger Nieves have handled most of the work on the mound.
Mendoza has allowed a measly four earned runs in 19.1 innings while striking out 24 batters and walking just four. He’s allowed 14 hits and has a 1.45 earned run average with two wins and one loss on the season.
Nieves is 2-0 with a 2.52 ERA. He has struck out 12 batters, walked five, and allowed just six hits and three earned runs in 8.1 innings pitched.
Knight has pitched 12.1 innings, allowing ten earned runs with seven strikeouts, 16 hits, and four walks. Though he hasn’t registered a win, he does have the lone save on the season so far.
Other pitchers who have registered a win this season include Baylor Nielson, Brody Bilbao, and Jake Ivins. Ivins has seven strikeouts. Parker Snyder, Nielson, and Bilbao all have four apiece. Corbin Middleton has struck out four of the five batters he has faced this season.
When you’re outscoring your opponents 93-46, that means the offense is working well too. Derrick White leads the team with 13 hits and a .542 batting average in 24 at bats. He has nine runs batted in, ten runs scored, one double, and one triple.
Cooper Palmer is batting .407 on the season with 11 hits, four of which are doubles. He has eight RBIs and ten runs scored in 27 at bats.
Parker Snyder also has 11 hits this season with a .367 average in 30 at bats. He has driven in eight runs, scored 10, and has four doubles and one triple.
Branten Bethea is batting .312 in 32 at bats with ten hits, three RBIs, ten runs scored, two doubles, and two triples.
Talon Mendoza has a .333 average with eight hits including two doubles in 24 at bats. He leads the team with ten RBIs and has eight runs scored.
Corbin Middleton has one of the Broncos’ two home runs this season. He’s batting .421 in 19 at bats with eight hits, seven RBIs, and seven runs scored.
Brody Bilbao has the other homer. He has six hits, seven RBIs, and ten runs scored. And Jake Ivins has seven hits, four RBIs, and six runs scored.
Bethea leads the team with five stolen bases. Mendoza, White, and Bilbao all have three apiece. And Nieves, Knight, and Snyder have stolen two bases each.
The Broncos will finish off this week with a trip to Cortez, CO to take on the Montezuma-Cortez Panthers on Saturday, March 30.