AquaSox coach Darrin Garner returned to the team Sunday after spending a week at home in Port Charlotte, Fla., assessing the damage to his house caused by hurricane Charley.
“It’s not good,” Garner said. “There’s structural problems to the house: the roof, air conditioning, little odds and ends that are going to add up to a lot of money. It’s a lot of damage everywhere there. We just got to parts of it, a little water in the house, on the floors. It’s going to take a while before we get it fixed.”
The eye of hurricane Charley passed right through Port Charlotte. Many of the community’s houses were destroyed completely and electricity remains out for most of the town.
“It’s very ugly there,” Garner said. “There’s a lot of people who don’t have houses. Fortunately mine stayed up. It has a lot of damage, but there’s a lot of people that don’t have houses, so it’s pretty bad there.”
Garner’s wife, Karen, and daughters, Regan and Katie, are OK. And through the tragedy, the hurricane has had the effect of unifying the community.
“It’s a beautiful thing, actually,” Garner said. “Everybody’s helping each other. We were taking out the trees from my back yard and we had people come over from my church to help out. We actually took care of three houses – both my next-door neighbors got their trees, cut them up, took them to the front yard – so everybody’s kind of pulling together, which is a good thing.”
The AquaSox have been making efforts to help out Garner. Friday night all proceeds from the post-game launch-a-ball promotion were donated to Garner, and the team also received several donations. So far the team has raised close to $2,000 for Garner.
“From my understanding, they’re taking some of the money and giving it to their neighbors to help out as well,” AquaSox owner Mark Sperandio said. “Their house has all but been destroyed, but they’re finding the time to help their neighbors. They’re great people.”
The AquaSox are still accepting donations for Garner. Donations can be taken to the AquaSox offices or during games can be dropped off at the souvenir stand.
Heads up: Scoring from third on a pop-up to an infielder is something rarely seen on the baseball field.
Everett’s Casey Craig has now done it twice in one season.
Craig scored Everett’s first run in Saturday’s 6-3 victory over Salem-Keizer in the bottom of the third inning, tagging up and scoring on Brent Johnson’s pop to deep short that Volcanoes shortstop Jeff Palumbo had to dive into the outfield to catch.
Craig also pulled off the feat earlier in the season at Yakima, again on a pop to deep short.
“The shortstop was kind of at a point where he couldn’t get up and make a good throw home, so I figured I’d just try it,” Craig said about Saturday’s play.
“We needed something,” Craig added. “We didn’t have anything going right then, so I figured I’d try it and see what happened.”
Short hops: Everett infielder Yung Chi Chen went 1-for-3 and scored two runs as the Taiwan Olympic team defeated the Netherlands 5-1 in its final round-robin game. Taiwan finished 3-4 in round-robin play and did not advance to the medal round. … Marshall Hubbard, whose two-run single provided the tying and go-ahead runs Saturday night, is batting .329 with 21 RBI with runners on base.
Nick Patterson, Herald writer
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