BREWSTER — Harwich Port native and Brewster pitcher Cody Crowell had a breakout year in the Cape Cod Baseball League this summer, but his dream of winning a CCBL title came up just short, as Crowell’s Whitecaps fell to eventual Cape League champion Y-D, two-games-to-one, in last week’s best-of-three East Division championship series.

Brewster took a 1-0 series lead last Tuesday, scoring two in the 13th inning to upend the regular season East Division champion Red Sox by a count of 4-2.

That put Crowell, who emerged as the team’s number two starter, in the position of trying to slam the door on Y-D in game two, and send Brewster to its first championship series since 2000.

But alas, a few clutch hits by the Sox, and lack of total hits by the Whitecaps, prevented that from happening.

Y-D’s Tyler Henley led off the game with an infield single on a bang-bang play that could’ve been called either way, Alden Carrithers followed with a bunt single, and Steven Strausbaugh delivered a two-out triple to the gap in right centerfield to give the visiting Red Sox a 2-0 lead. 

Crowell settled from there, working a perfect second and third.

Brewster got a run back in the home half of the third on Justin Snyder’s run-scoring single to right. But Michael Taylor helped the Sox regain a two-run cushion in the fifth with a leadoff homer to left. 

Brewster, which squeezed out just five hits, never threatened, as reliever Nolan Gallagher and closer David Robertson no-hit the Whitecaps over the final three innings to make a winner out of Y-D starter Nate Bowman (five strikeouts over six innings), and force a third and decisive game – which Y-D won the next day, 6-5, on its home turf.

Crowell, who will be a draft-eligible junior when he returns to Vanderbilt University in the fall, went seven-and-two-thirds innings, gave up seven hits, three earned runs, walked one and struck out five in what might’ve be the final game of his two-year Cape League career. 

“A few breaks here or there and we might’ve won, but it just wasn’t our day,” said Crowell. “The team played well behind me today,” he added, referencing Snyder’s throw from centerfield that nailed Taylor at the plate in the seventh, “so I couldn’t ask for anything more than that.”

A standout at Harwich High School, Crowell went 30-5 over his four-year varsity career, and is perhaps best known for striking out 24 batters in a 2003 Memorial Day victory over Norton High School. 

After red shirting his freshman year at Vanderbilt, Crowell went 2-0 with a 1.12 ERA and two saves in 13 appearance for the Commodores in the spring of 2005. His proficiency as a closer earned him a spot on the Harwich Mariners roster, though Crowell struggled, going 1-6 with a 4.23 ERA last summer. 

But Crowell rebounded, posting a 6-2 record with a 3.95 ERA in 17 appearances for Vandy this spring, prompting Brewster to sign the six-foot-three southpaw. 

Crowell translated his stellar spring into summer success, going 2-2 with a 3.14 ERA and striking out 46 in 48.2 innings for the Whitecaps this season. All told, he racked up 79 strikeouts and walked 31 in 76.1 innings over his two years in the Cape League. 

by Eric Adler
Eric Adler