Game 89 Recap, Aug. 29: Playing Hard All Year Long
Ballers have tying runs in scoring position in ninth but fall to the Coast 5-3
by Joe Horton and Anthony Brooks
WEST OAKLAND—A day after being officially eliminated from the postseason, the Oakland Ballers were playing for pride in a Town that has plenty of it. It helped to have 3,124 at Raimondi for its penultimate game of 2026 cheering them on.
Starter Hunter Day shone against the tough Long Beach lineup. He went 6.2 giving up five runs—one earned—on five hits. He struck out three and walked only one. Said Day of his gameplan, “I was attacking hitters and getting ahead most of the game. I threw a lot of fastballs and changeups and let them get themselves out early. Having a few starts against them now definitely helps and makes it easier to attack hitters and know their weaknesses.”
It certainly didn’t seem like it today on the mound, but is it a challenge to stay focused later in a season? “It definitely is a challenge late in the year to stay focused, but everyone who plays sports knows any game can be your last game, so just having that thought in the back of your head of leaving it all out there is important to me. Everyone has the day where they get the jersey taken off their back for one reason or another and I can only imagine that’s worse than a bad game. Always finding a reason to compete is very important, and late in the season it might reward you by playing hard all year long.”
Offensively, it was once again the Logan Johnstone show. A day after hitting two homers and driving in five, he decided two more were on order. Until Jeter Ybarra’s single in the ninth, Johnstone’s solo shots in the third and sixth accounted for all of the team’s scoring.
On such a hot streak, is Johnstone a superstitious player? Anything he’s doing that he’ll keep doing? “I’m not that superstitious,” he wrote after the game, “but I am repeating some daily habits over these past few days. I usually don’t drink energy drinks but over the past few days I have so I plan on continuing that.”
Aside from the action on the field, there was also a lot of action going on outside the lines at Raimondi on Saturday.
The event-filled afternoon began with the Le Pit Club onfield car show where there were classics, exotics and rare sports cars to bring thrills to any car enthusiast. As I prepared for my photo shoot, I could smell the exhaust from the lime green Porsche and the rotary Mazda RX-7 as their engines growled as the rolled off the field.
Meanwhile, the sound of the band drifted over the right field bleachers as the East Bay punk rock band Stay Out belted out tracks during their album release concert in Scrappy Town. The area was packed with fans cheering, dancing and grooving with the tunes.
As the concert wrapped up, I made my way back to the field level seats to take in a beautiful and unique rendition of the Star-Spangled Banner by the Oakland Interfaith Gospel Choir as the players lined up on the field and the crowd stood to honor America.
In the middle of the 6th, Ice Cold Kenny remained undefeated in knockerball as he rocked his opponent off his feet three times straight, drawing good-natured laughter from the Ballers’ faithful.
To wrap things up, Casey and the Ballers associates shot souvenir balls into the stands for fans young and old to take home for the evening as the game and festivities drew to a close.
Odds & Ends
The game was a positively brisk 2h23, a nominee for the Oscar short film category by Pioneer League standards.
Sunday’s Fan Appreciation Day will see superfan and canine companion celebrity Colt Rosensweig as the fan manager of the Ballers. She topped the Ballermetrics program and will call the shots for the home side. Read our quick interview with Colt here. This is the third year of the B’s innovations for fan day—in year one they had a fan-controlled game, and year two saw an AI program on a tablet in charge.
Ballers co-founders Paul Freedman and Bryan Carmel penned a letter to fans before the game taking stock of the team not making the playoffs after two consecutive postseasons to open B’s history. You can read the full reflection here.
Photos from Brooks Creative Photography.
Video recap from Ben Verhoek.
Anthony Brooks is a lifelong baseball fan who enjoys attending games with his son. He is founder of Brooks Creative Photography where he focuses on high school sports photography and fine art photography. He resides in the East Bay and is a Ballers fan owner. You can find him on Instagram.
Joe Horton is the editor of Dispatches from Raimondi.
