Ryan Fischer Dominates in Return to Bourne, Leads Braves to 5-2 Win

By Mojo Hill

A day after Garrett Horn turned in one of the best starts of Bourne’s season, Ryan Fischer was even better.

Fischer started the summer with the Braves, then took a hiatus to figure out the next step in his schooling journey. After deciding to transfer from NJIT to Carolina, he returned to Bourne on Saturday and made the Diamond Heels look smart for choosing him. He threw six scoreless innings, allowing just two hits and one walk while striking out seven. It led the Braves to a comfortable 5-2 defeat of Harwich at Doran Park, clocking in at a swift two hours and two minutes.

“He was landing his slider,” Bourne manager Scott Landers said. “It’s a thing that we were working on before he left. He came back, and the slider’s better now and he was landing it. And his command was good.”

Fischer struck out two in each of the first two innings. His fastball sat at 90-91 mph in the early innings and faded into the high 80s as the game went on, but he quickly found the feel for his slider after leaning on the fastball in the first inning. The breaking pitch, which had some sweeping action at 80-82 mph, helped him complete his third and fourth strikeouts of the evening.

“He’s done an awesome job,” Fischer said of Landers’s guidance. “Just doing what works for me, and figuring out what’ll work best for me, what grip works best. He’s a great coach. I think it really helped me out there tonight. It’s coming along great.”

The Braves’ offense gave Fischer an early cushion with two runs in each of the first two innings. Josh Kuroda-Grauer got them started with a two-out, two-run single in the first, and Jonathan Vastine slapped an opposite-field two-run homer in the second. It was an impressive piece of hitting from the left-handed hitter, poking it 90 mph over the left field fence.

“Got me down in the zone early. Got me 0-2,” Vastine said of his at-bat. “I went with the pitch up, and went with it, hit it where it was pitched. And it ended up going over the fence.”

It was Vastine’s first home run of the summer. He now owns a .929 OPS on the season, adding a dose of pop to go along with his .450 OBP. The opposite-field shot was hit 90 mph off the bat.

“I didn’t know he had it in him to go that way and do it,” Landers said. “But he’s been working on that, and I’m pleased that a lot of his hits right now aren’t just to the pull side. Put a good swing on it, and good things happen.”

The Braves’ offense fell silent in the middle innings, not recording another hit until the eighth inning. But Fischer stayed locked in, working in the slider effortlessly to keep Harwich hitters off balance.

Vastine made a spectacular play in the third inning, though his efforts were unrewarded as first baseman Garrett Michel’s glove broke when trying to catch it. Fischer still worked out of it with two flyouts. Balls in the air accounted for the majority of Fischer’s non-strikeout outs throughout the night.

The Mariners’ only two hits against Fischer were singles in the fourth and fifth. He completed his outing with a quick 1-2-3 sixth, collecting his seventh strikeout in the process. It was an important performance not only for him, but for this Bourne team that’s running short on pitchers after Horn, Matt Duffy and Logan Evans all went home. An outing like this could propel Fischer to be an important asset down the stretch of the second half of the Cape League season.

“I love the staff and the guys in the dugout, the guys on the team,” Fischer said. “There’s a lot worse places to be than Cape Cod and playing baseball every day. This is it right here. This is life. This is the life.”

Derek Bender got the Braves back in the run column, leading off the bottom of the eighth with a double and scoring on two wild pitches. Gabe Driscoll pitched the final three innings and earned a save. He surrendered a two-run homer in the ninth, but still locked down the final nine outs with little stress and put the capper on the 5-2 victory.

Bourne is now 13-10-1 on the season, and 12-5 since a 1-5-1 start. Despite missing a chunk of the summer, Fischer is already right back at home with this team, which has seen a large cast of characters rotating in and out — especially on the pitching side.

“We just try to make everyone feel welcome. I know I try to. I know everyone else in the dugout tries to,” Fischer said. “That’s where you get your wins. And that’s why last year we were so good. It’s just one of the closest teams I’ve been on, and that’s where the winning comes in.”

The Braves will head back on the road Sunday to play Brewster at 5 p.m.