SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic – The X Pan American Men’s Softball Championship began today in the capital city of Dominican Republic. The regional championship is a qualifier for both the Pan American Games and the Central American and Caribbean Games.
Argentina got its first victory this afternoon beating Panama 5-0. Argentine pitchers Maximiliano Montero, Huemul Mata and Román Godoy combined for no hits or runs, while on offense the game was decided in the seventh, with a two-run homer by Gustavo Godoy.
Argentina scored the first run of the game in the third inning. After loading the bases from a single by Mariano Montero, and two walks to Federico Eder and Teo Migliavacca, Montero scored as Manuel Godoy hit into a double play.
In the opening of the seventh, Nicolás Carril led with a triple and was sent home following a home run by Gustavo Godoy.
From there the game opened up for the South American team, who played a string of four consecutive hits to score two more runs and a 5-0 victory.
Tomorrow Argentina will face Mexico, while Panama will play against Canada.
In the second game, Puerto Rico had the bats going against Aruba, winning 12-2 in four innings. The game was won by David Rivera, working four innings with 2 hits, 2 runs, and 3 strikeouts.
Eduardo Nuñez and Emanuel Colón hit home runs for the winner in the third and fourth inning respectively.
Both teams started the game with intensity, scoring five combined runs. Puerto Rico scored three, including three RBIs by Nunez (who totaled 5 RBIs in the game). For their part, Aruba responded with two, including a simple single from Kelvin Silvania.
However, Puerto Rico continued to score with pleasure, while Rivera contained the Aruba offense to win comfortably in their first game of the championship.
In the last match of the day Dominican Republic defeated Brazil with authority 15-0, in front of a large crowd. From the start, the home team dominated, scoring eight runs in the first inning. The South American team could not do anything in their debut in the tournament.
In other results, Cuba beat Colombia by 7-0; Guatemala beat Belize 15-0 and Canada beat Costa Rica 20-0.
