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Beast of the East begins today

Jefferson County Post 33, Madonna among the teams taking the fields

BUSY WEEKEND AHEAD — Jefferson County Teramana Post 33’s Aiden Fernandez is one of several pitchers the team will need as it takes part in the Beast of the East tournament, beginning today. - Andrew Grimm

WHEELING — The Ohio Valley will play host to well over 200 baseball games over the next four days as the Beast of the East returns for the 34th time.

The four-day tournament includes 54 teams in the three ages groups (19U, 16U, 14U) this year and each team is promised to play seven games. The level of competition will be high and the schedule is grueling.

“We’re excited for this,” said Wheeling Post 1 varsity coach Jon-Michael Brunner. “It’s a hometown tournament and we’re playing teams we’ve never played before. We don’t know what they have and we’re excited, we get to come out and play on our home field in front of our fans.”

Brunner and Post 1 are no strangers to the Beast of the East and they will play six games on their home field at the J.B. Chambers I-470 Sports Complex over the next three days.

“It’s a grind,” Brunner continued. “With that amount of games, it’s an opportunity for these guys to figure their toughness out. If we can battle one pitch at a time, one play at a time, I think they can start to turn this over heading into the middle of July.”

Post 1 will play games against the Silverstars from Canada, the Lakewood Rangers and Hiland Hawks from Ohio, the Oxford Keystone Bruisers and Armory Baseball from Pennsylvania and the Wheeling Wildthings, a local travel team.

While Post 1 will stay home at I-470, Moundsville Post 3 will play on their home field at John Marshall today before moving to Patterson Field for the rest of the tournament.

“The Beast of the East — that’s what we’re working for,” coach Tim Koontz said. “We’re hoping to make a run. That’s our plan…Hopefully we get some good hitting and good pitching.”

Like Post 1, Post 3 will be playing teams from all over, including the Motor City Hit Dogs from Michigan, the TCT Kings from Pennsylvania and the Ontario Giants and Sudbury Voyagers from Canada. Moundsville will also play the Wildthings and another local team in the OV Mountaineers.

The Wildthings’ players are looking forward to their matchups with Post 1 and Post 3 as there is a lot of crossover among the players from the high school season.

“They look forward to playing Post 1 and Post 3,” said Wildthings coach Mike Bittinger. “They circled (Thursday) night at 6 o’clock on the schedule and they circled Friday morning. Those were two of the games they’re excited and ready to go for.”

The Wildthings draw players from Wheeling Park, John Marshall and Linsly. Post 1 draws from Wheeling Park, Linsly and Wheeling Central and Post 3 draws from John Marshall and Tyler Consolidated, among others.

The Wildthings will play Post 1 at I-470 today at 6 p.m. and Post 3 at Patterson Field at 8 a.m. Friday morning. The Wildthings will also play the OV Mountaineers, Lakewood, the Silverstars and the Bruisers.

Other local teams in the tournament include Jefferson County Legion and Madonna.

Playing seven games across four days puts a high value on pitchers’ arms and managing their staff will be a big task for every coach.

“We’re going to need every single arm this week,” said Jefferson County coach Anthony Pierro.

Coaches will face the challenge of keeping their best pitchers rested enough to go in the playoffs on Sunday while also staying competitive throughout the week.

“You’ve just got to make sure that you take care of the arms that you have,” Bittinger said. “It’s good to have a team that mostly can all pitch like with our team. I can look at anybody and they can give me one to two innings here or there.

“There are some games where you may have to pitch people that you don’t normally pitch and you have to see if you can get by with your hitting and defense.”

Teams with larger rosters shouldn’t have a hard time filling innings, but smaller teams like Post 1’s varsity squad will have to be strategic in who pitches when and for how long.

“(Pitching coach) Dustin (Henry) is my go-to guy,” Brunner said. “If I didn’t have him, it’d be really difficult to do. He knows these kids, he knows what they can do and he knows where they’re comfortable and where they’re not.”

Teams will play two games every day starting today through Saturday with the playoff bracket beginning Sunday.

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