Friday’s Titans’ game is going to be big for Torrington’s hometown baseball heroes and it’s going to be the one to watch.  If the weather holds with what is projected to be only light rain in the morning, then a cool night of baseball will follow with a light wind blowing out to left field. It will be perfect basebal weather for the most exciting game of the season.

As of this writing Wednesday night at 11pm, the Torrington Titans are ranked #1 in the Western Division of the Futures Collegiate Baseball League with an 8-6 record and the Bristol Blues are ranked #2 in the same division with a 9-8 record but in baseball the standings can change rapidly depending on what occurs Thursday.

Our Titans have a double header on Thursday against the Pittsfield Suns but by all accounts T-Town is heading north with the momentum. The Suns are coming off a 2 game losing streak while the Titans will arrive boasting a 2 game winning streak. And although the two prior contests are evenly split with the Suns and Titans each winning a game, considering the Suns’ win came on the first game of the season and the Titans experienced a fast learning curve, the Titans are poised to make some positive movement in the standings.

But then so are the Blues who are red hot and their battle on Thursday will be against the Dirt Dawgs who currently have a 6-10 record.  If the Dawgs are unable to give Bristol “the blues” then the batters from “the Bell City” will arrive in T-Town poised to grasp the number one position directly from the #1 rivals and right on the Titans’ home turf. Expect this motivation to bring the bats around a little faster on Friday.

For Friday night’s game the pitching will be evenly matched. Nick Johnson for the Titans has a 3-2 record with a .348 ERA. Kyle Dube is 3-3 but has a .337 ERA. Neither pitcher is known for walks (Johnson has given up no walks this season and Dube has given up only 1) which means the battle will be the sticks.

Here’s where it gets interesting for the Titans. Cody Doyle has a .471 batting average but part of this is due to playing only 5 games this season but regardless, 8 hits at 17 at bats shows fantastic promise. For consistency look to Nick Lamberti with a solid .345 batting average through 13 games. For the Titans as a whole there’s 5 home runs and 109 hits overall between them (as of Wednesday). Conversely the Blues have four batters hitting over .300 and three of them have played more than 15 games.  The Bristol Blues collectively share 8 homeruns and 139 hits overall (as of Wednesday).

So Friday is poised to be a Battle of the Bats. The pitchers will get the ball over the plate and the contest will be who can connect.  With the light wind blowing out to left field there may be more home runs on the board for either team. Without a doubt, Friday night at Fuessenich Park is going to be the most exciting game of the FCBL season to date.

There will be an update by Friday after the games on Thursday.