UD AL-BAYDA, United Arab Emirates – Like heavyweights trading punches, starting pitchers Karan Patel of the Mumbai Cobras and Shuto Sakurai of the Mid East Falcons battled on Friday night in Game 1 of the inaugural United Series.
Patel, the first Indian-American to be drafted by a Major League Baseball team when the Chicago White Sox selected him in the seventh round of the 2018 MLB Draft, and Sakurai, who played four seasons in Nippon Professional Baseball with the Yokohama DeNA BayStars and Tohoku Rakuten Golden Eagles, gave the fans a display worth the price of admission. In the end, it was Patel’s team that came out on top, taking Game 1 of the United Series 3-1 and putting themselves one win away from the becoming the league’s first champion.
For five innings, they dueled, with Patel mixing an electric fastball with a changeup and a good slider to strike out 10 Mid East hitters, including former MLB players Munenori Kawasaki once and Alejandro de Aza twice.
There was no secret to what Patel did, though, it was a return to a fundamental pitching philosophy that got him success.
“I think I was just able to locate my fastball finally in this outing and my off speed was over the plate, so I gave myself a chance,” he told World Baseball Network following the game.
Commanding the strike zone was something his manager, MLB veteran Mariano Duncan, had emphasized.
“Doesn’t matter what level you play, you gotta command your fastball. You gotta command the strike zone, especially that team that we played,” Duncan said. “They put the ball in play, they don’t chase too much, and you gotta go after those guys, because you can pitch better when you’re ahead in the count.”
For the Falcons, Sakurai held the Cobras scoreless until the top of the fifth, when Miguel Ojeda led off the inning for Mumbai and smashed a fastball from Sakurai over the bleachers in left field for a solo homer and a 1-0 Mumbai lead.
Sakurai, who mixes six different pitches from a motion with a high leg kick, has a pitching style some of the younger American players haven’t seen,
“He’s got control of four or five, six pitches, whatever he’s got. He’s just a veteran guy who’s around. He makes you swing the bat. He gets you to expand a little bit,” said Mumbai’s Brantley Bell, who was awarded the league’s inaugural MVP award before the game.
Staked to a 1-0 lead, Patel retired the side in the fifth, and left the game having allowed four hits and a walk over five scoreless innings with 10 strikeouts. Sakurai only went one inning more, allowing one run on three hits, striking out seven and walking none for the Falcons.
With Patel off the mound, the Cobras had to make the slim lead hold, and there was a bit of a sweat for Duncan and his crew. In the sixth, they escaped a first-and-third, no outs jam, and then the Falcons evened the game in the seventh as Baseball United’s unique rules began to come into play. With Brandon Kaminer on the mound for Mumbai, Duncan called for a “fireball” against Hiroyuki Nakajima, which would have ended the inning had Kaminer struck him out. But instead, Kaminer walked Nakajima, who stole second and then scored when Manato Tanai singled of Kaminer’s replacement, Chandler Woolridge.
But Bell led off the bottom of the seventh for Mumbai with a single, which prompted Mid East manager Dennis Cook to call for a fireball against Justin Williams, who singled and then advanced on a wild pitch to Maniel Ascanio.
With Williams taking a huge lead off second, Ascanio hit a grounder to short, but Williams’ presence distracted the Falcons’ 18-year-old shortstop Masato Tanai, and the ball rolled under his glove into shallow left field, allowing Bell to score to give the Cobras a 2-1 lead. With two outs, Gedionne Marlin singled to score Ascanio and make it 3-1.
In the ninth, Federico Celli singled after Duncan called for a fireball, which would have ended the game, and then Nakajima reached on an error by Cobras’ shortstop Lord de Vera.
But U.S. Virgin Islands native Akeel Morris induced flyouts from Gregori Cano and Carlos Garzon to end the game and put the Cobras one win away from the title.
“We got lucky because we made a couple mistakes. And that’s exactly what I said to them. When you play the game, it doesn’t matter what level you play, if you give a four- or five-out inning, you’re gonna get beat,” Duncan said. “But I got to give a lot of credit to Patel, because the first three games that he beat here, he a little bit struggled. And today, he showed what kind of pitcher he is. He threw the ball really well.”
NOTEBOOK – In the top of the fourth, with a 3-1 count to Federico Celli, Patel delivered and fell to the ground, but after a brief check from the trainers and a few test pitches, stayed in the game. … In the first, Munenori Kawasaki hit a hot grounder at Mumbai first baseman Manuel Ascanio. Ascanio got in front of it, but it caromed off his glove into foul territory and was scored a double. … Duncan said the Cobras will bullpen the game tomorrow, with India native Akshay More starting. More has developed a mid-90s fastball and is drawing interest from MLB clubs after posting a .238 ERA and 10 strikeouts through 11 1/3 innings. He will likely yield to lefty Nyan Hernandez after an inning or two.
Photo: Karan Patel struck out 10 and walked one over five shutout innings for the Mumbai Cobras, who won Game 1 of the United Series on Friday night in Dubai. (Photo courtesy of Baseball United)
