Winnipeg team beats Rainy River royally

Ken Johnston
Editor

Swish... that was a sound many batters heard when they faced the rocket powered arm of Brady Woods at the Rainy River Labour Day Classic.
He lead the Plum Coulee Farmers, a Winnipeg League team, to the finals against Rainy River Royals Sunday, both teams undefeated to that point.
Woods hurled the ball so hard that many hitters had a great deal of trouble picking it up at all and that was the story for Rainy River in the finals.
The Farmers were up first and wasted little time getting on the score board. Brad Clark lead off with a triple and that was followed by Barwick native Trevor Oltsher’s homerun two batters later. They scored two runs and would lead 2-0 until the third inning.
Woods struck the first six batters he faced out.
In the top of the third Clark started things off with a walk to first. Nathan Wiens then hit a sacrifice bunt to advance Clark to second base. Barry Zerbin then flew out to center field for the second out. Joey Brunell then hit a triple, on a error by fielder Marty Armstrong, where he would be stranded but he brought in two more runs to increase their lead to 4-0.
In the bottom of the inning Rainy’s bats started to pick up the timing on Woods. Matt Bartlett hit a single and then stole second base. Joel Ashworth hit what might have been a triple and was a double for sure. However, he slowed down at second base and was caught in the hot box and eventually tagged out between second and third. But he did get an R.B.I. and put Rainy on the score board. It was 4-1 after three.
In the top of the fourth Rainy River native Justin Wagner hit a triple and was batted in by Stratton native Rick Bonot to put the Farmers up 5-1. The score would stay that way until the seventh inning with both Woods and RR’s pitcher Murray Armstrong throwing hard and tough.
In the top of the seventh RR fell apart making several errors that saw Clark, Oltsher, Zerbin, Brunell and Rolly Compt score to lead 10-1.
In the bottom of the inning with one out, Jim Chorney tried to get things going for RR hitting a triple. However that would be as far as he got as Marty Armstrong struck out, Matt Ashworth walked and then Wes Blight was thrown out at first.
The Farmers received $800 for first and RR received $400 for second.
At the end of the game a special presentation was made to former Rainy River resident Gus Lindberg. Having umpired for 37 years Lindberg ended his career in Rainy River by base umping the last game of the tournament. RR Royal Don Gall presented him with a game ball that all the players at the tournament signed. Lindberg also received a round of applause from the audience.