After starting the 2023 season with 19 straight wins, the Healdsburg Prune Packers are now fighting for the right to represent the Northern Division in the California Collegiate League playoffs in August.
As of Wednesday, July 25, their league record stands at 24-7, but the Crawdads are at 22-8. Tuesday’s afternoon game in Walnut Creek found the Packers leading going into the late innings, but two Crawdads runs gave the host team the game, 5-4.
Coach Joey Gomes was frank in saying that playing on the road was not the same for the Packers as the home games, and the record shows it: all but one of their losses have been on road games.
The other side of that is that this is a team that wins at home.
“Any high school kid that’s played for a championship knows what it’s like to play in front of a few hundred people in California,” said the coach. “And it’s like that every single night in Healdsburg. What’s been great is that the energy really does trickle its way down into our dugout.”
Case in point: the Saturday, July 22 game against the Solano Mudcats. Led by newcomer Ivan Brethowr’s two home runs, with other round-trippers from Peyton Schulze, Joey Kramer and Travis Sanders, the game more closely resembled a home-run derby than a late-season matchup. The final score was 30-2.
Winning pitcher was Devan Kirby, who struck out five in four innings and gave up three hits. Five different Healdsburg pitchers finished out the game with an inning each to get some time on the mound in preparation for the playoffs.
Losing pitcher Karon Casey gave up 17 runs in 2.1 innings, but he was followed by Ryan Fortune who let nine more runners come home.
Overall it was not a great or even a very good game for Solano, but the determined Mudcats turned the tables the next day with a 5-4 win on their home field. Where, of course, the energy of Packer Nation is sorely lacking.
Massachusetts Slugger
The last two weeks of the season have certainly been highlighted by Brethowr’s play. “He was playing in the Cape Cod league,” said Gomes. “He had called me and asked if there was an opportunity to play for us.”
At the time there wasn’t, but when first baseman Will Hodo badly injured his wrist in a home-plate collision, Gomes called him back.
The 6-6 righthander from Massachusetts showed up two days later and started slamming the ball from his first game on July 18. “He’s elevated us,” said the coach.
Hodo, meanwhile, is back in Alabama recovering from the injury, and is expected to be out for the rest of the year.
Final Week
According to Joey Gomes, one of the season’s biggest games will already be over by the time you read this, the Wednesday night game at Rec Park. It’s against the Crawdad team that has bedeviled the Packers all season long.
“The most pivotal game of the year is going to be tomorrow,” he said flatly on Tuesday.
It will be followed by a final third game in the series at the Concord playing field on Thursday, but Gomes believes the No.1 seed for the playoffs will be settled with the Wednesday game, a 6pm meeting at Rec Park. Where they will have that crucial home field advantage.
The disappointment the team has faced in the last two weeks, when they’ve lost four games, must surely be wearing on their morale. But Gomes keeps things positive and clearly loves the Healdsburg crowd.
“Our guys are used to playing in the cool evenings with the cotton-candy sky. There’s Wicked Slush being sold. There’s the Wurst being sold. On occasion a brass band, the Healdsburg Prune Pickers, are playing,” he said, laughing. “It’s just such a great environment that we literally play to our capability, you know?”
The shape of the CCL post-season is coming into focus. The No. 1 seed is able to skip the first playoff game, on Aug. 1, but it all comes down to a single game for the league title, on Wednesday, Aug. 2.
The top three teams in the division, all of whom will reach the playoffs, are the Lincoln Potters, the Solano Mudcats and the Prune Packers.
Friday and Saturday’s games are against the Mudcats, both at Rec Park. The season’s final game is Sunday, July 29, against the San Francisco Seals. It’s at Rec Park at noon, and to celebrate the fans and the season, admission is free.
