2014 55+ Central
‘Peyman and Pawelek Lead the Way’By Jason Skoda, special to MSBL
Maryvale Stadium, Phoenix, 10/30/2014–The North County Indians, from the San Diego area, rode the bats of Dave Peyman and Jeff Dickert and played defense behind the 
complete game heroics of pitcher Danny Pawelek way to capturing a thrilling come from behind 6-5 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals in the 55-over Central division of the MSBL World Series. Peyman’s warning track double in the top of the ninth scored Mike Thatcher with the tying run while Peyman’s pinch runner, Dave Detrich, scored shortly thereafter from walks to Pawalek, Paul Contreras and an RBI single by Dickert to close out the scoring. Pawalek then shut out the game in the bottom of the ninth, though the Cardinals stranded the tying run on third to end the game.
The game could have been a little more lopsided if it weren’t for the Cardinals coming up big when there were Indians all over the
bases. They left an amazing 17 runners on base. “We just couldn’t pick up runs,” explained Indians manager Paul Contreras. “These guys played their hearts out but that’s just baseball.”
The top of the Indians order seemed to bring the wrecking ball as Mike Thatcher, Detrich and Peyman scored all six runs. Dickert was the other RBI machine by driving in two while going 3-5 from the six hole. Contreras provided an early spark with a two RBI single in the first inning.
The Cardinals will be thinking that they let this one slip away in this battle of 
heavyweights. They were led at the plate by Andy Bowie and Charlie Zunda, who each had three hits, while Don Stovall and lead-off hitter Robin Jones had two apiece. Barney Owens started the game on the hill and gave way to Tyler Steinbach in the fourth inning. Steinbach went the rest of the way for the Cardinals.
“We were always just one hit away from breaking it open,” said Contreras. “But those guys are excellent hitters so we were never comfortable. Their top five guys in the line-up can match up with anybody in this division.”
Danny Pawelek went the distance for the victory. “Danny is an iron man and has been that way for us all week,” Contreras further explained. ‘But we all still had our legs under us after a long week, including Danny, so we rode him to the finish. We brought over 20 guys so that we could stay fresh and every one of these guys had something to do with this win.”
The Cardinals seemed to grab the momentum in the third inning by scoring two runs to close the deficit to 3-2 after a five hit explosion but Pawelek shut them down until the seventh, where they scored three more runs on two hits to knot the score at four apiece. They were able to put together two hits in the bottom of the ninth but a ground ball to second base ended the threat, and the game, 6-5.