By Dylan Butler
As he raked out some mud behind home plate, Rich Kashdan felt like a proud parent before the president of the Long Island Cardinals baseball organization watched two of his teams — the Long Island Cardinals and the Cardinals Red — clash at Cardozo Monday.
“It’s like a family get-together on a Sunday, when you just split the players into two teams and you play,” Kashdan said. “It’s a nice little rivalry that doesn’t get out of hand with each team looking for bragging rights.”
On this day, those rights belonged to the Cardinals, who shook off a slow start and scored five runs in the fifth inning in a 10-3 win over the Cardinals Red in a game called due to darkness after six innings.
“We both wanted to win,” said Cardinals third baseman Frank Terzo, who was 3-for-4 with three RBIs and one run scored. “We’re all friends but we wanted to go at each other.”
The slow start was typical of the Cardinals, who have fallen into the habit of turning their intensity on and off, although head coach Ian Millman was surprised because of the familiarity between the teams.
“We need to win games against teams you should beat, and I was worried about my team coming out flat,” Millman said. “And we were flat early. We weren’t focused early at all.”
Thanks to Terzo, the Cardinals (15-7, 5-2 Elite) still led 3-2 after three lackluster innings. The Holy Cross standout, who will join teammate Charlie Foster at North Florida Community College in the fall, drove in all three runs on a pair of seeing eye singles.
The Whitestone native was also stellar in the field, making a few tough plays look easy at the hot corner.
“I had a lot of focus and I concentrated on what I had to do,” Terzo said. “I went up with a lot of confidence and I hit the ball.”
But his teammates didn’t respond until an impromptu meeting with Millman before the fifth inning.
“Coach brought us over and spoke to us, and we just got our butts in gear,” Terzo said. “We knew what we had to do and did it.”
Added Millman: “I basically told them at some point your pride is on the line. I challenged them to see what they were made of. Fortunately the guys responded.”
And they responded in a big way with five runs in the top of the fifth inning, chasing Cardinals Red pitcher Anthony McCarty.
The Bayside standout didn’t help his own cause with a two-out walk before Mike Rutcofsky belted a two-run triple to center field to give the Cardinals a 5-2 lead.
Kenny Bowers then drove Rutcofsky home with a single to center, and Bowers then reached on a throwing error, one of four errors for the Cardinals Red (3-11, 1-4).
“We have talent but we’re not a team,” said Cardinals Red head coach Greg Reo. “We don’t play as a team. We have 18 guys playing for 18 different reasons.”
Brian Berg relieved McCarty but was uncharacteristically wild, walking Charlie Foster before giving up an RBI-single by Sean O’Brien to cap the fifth inning outburst.
“They played better than their record indicates,” Millman said of Reo’s Cardinals Red. “If they can motivate themselves, they’re capable of playing some good baseball.”
Reach Associate Sports Editor Dylan Butler by email at TimesLedger@aol.com or call 718-229-0300, Ext. 143.
