In the last event of the 2014 Italian Baseball League season it was the Rimini Pirates that walked away winners of the Italian Cup Finals for the second straight year in a row. The win keeps Rimini in the European Champions Cup in 2015, which will allow them to have a crack at the top European title for the 3rd year in a row. Picking up the win for the Pirates on the hill was Enorbel Marquez (6.2 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 3 SO), with the loss being handed to Yomel Rivera. Walking away with the game’s MVP was Riccardo Babini who slugged out a 3 run homer to left to put Rimini up 3-0 after 2 innings of play. Babini finished the day going 2 for 3 with 2 runs scored and 3 RBI’s.
After Babini gave Rimini the 3-0 lead in the 2nd, Enorbel Marquez was able to control the pace of the game on the defensive side of the ball, as the southpaw pitched into the 7th before giving way to Escalona for 1.1 innings of work, and finally Tommaso Cherubini in the 9th.
Rimini scored 3 more times in the 4th off of Rivera after Bertagnon singled to center to lead off the inning, which was then followed up by a walk to Babini. Di Fabio then reached on a sac bunt to load the bases with no one out. Up next was Cit who reached on an error to the shortstop, which allowed both Bertagnon and Babini to score. Chiarini then topped off the inning with a two out RBI single through the left side that scored Di Fabio to put the score at 6-0.
Parma came alive for the only two runs of the game in the top of the 6th off of 3 hits and an error. Run number one came off of the innings sole error, with Ugolotti coming around to score. Run number two happened on a groundout to short off the bat of Sambucci that scored Desimoni from third. Rimini was able to tack on another run in the bottom of the frame on an RBI single to center by Mazzanti, which scored Santora from second after he had led off the inning with a single and a stolen bag.
The win for Rimini comes in the shadows of having lost both the IBL and EU Champions Cup Finals in 2014, but give new life to the 2015 season after earning a birth to the 2015 European Champions Cup.
