Miles' effort special on a special day
by MARK STODGHILL staff writer
Duluth News Tribune, April 29, 1982

Ray Miles wanted to do something special when he pitched the first high school baseball game ever played on Terry Egerdahl Memorial Field in Proctor Wednesday.

"To tell you the truth, I was looking for a no-hitter," Miles said, with only a slight smile, after the game. "I have a goal of never giving up more than three hits, but because of Egerdahl (the former Proctor athlete and coach, who died in 1980) I wanted to make this a big thrill."

Miles will have to look somewhere else for his no-hit thrill, but his performance was special. He tossed a three-hit shutout as Proctor defeated Duluth East 9-0 in a Lake Superior Conference game. It was the 20th straight win in conference play for the two-time defending LSC champions.

The 6-foot, 185-pound righthander retired the first 11 batters in order and had a no-hitter until East's Mike Marmon beat out an infield hit to the shortstop hole to lead off the fifth.

"That (hit) took a big breath out of my chest," Miles said. "I would have liked to get the no-hitter, but I didn't want to get greedy. Nobody on the bench had been talking to me and I think everybody kind of relaxed after they (the Greyhounds) got the hit. I just concentrated on strikeouts after that."

Miles concentrated and grunted his way through a masterful performance. He allowed only three balls to be hit out of the infield. He struck out 12 and didn't walk a batter. In fact, Miles went to a three-ball count just three times. He threw 98 pitches, of which 68 were strikes.

Lack of that same kind [of] control was the undoing of East pitcher Mike Roberg. Roberg wasn't hit hard, but hurt himself by walking eight batters and throwing six wild pitches.

Bill Norton and Tony Dincau scored on wild pitches to give Proctor a 2-0 first-inning lead. The Rails got two more cheapies in the third inning. Dincau and Jay Anderson, who paced the winners' eight-hit attack with two hits apiece, singled. Anderson put himself in a hotbox between first and second while Dincau raced home to score on a throwing error. Anderson then came home on another Roberg wild pitch. Proctor 4, East 0.

Left fielder Norton turned in as good a fielding play as one could see on any field as he raced to the left field line and made a diving backhand stab to rob East's Mike Cortes of an extra-base hit in the fifth.

Shortstop Skeeter Moore hit the hardest ball for the Greyhounds all day when he drove a double up the left-center field alley in the sixth. Inexplicably, he tried to steal third with two outs and his team four runs down. Proctor catcher Dan Sojka threw him out, one of two such assists Sojka had in the game.

The Rails broke it open with a five-run sixth. Roberg, who struck out five, made a throwing error for one run and Dincau singled for another score.

East brought in Moore to pitch. Anderson doubled on Moore's first pitch for a run, Craig Pionk doubled over the third-base bag to score Anderson and Sojka singled in Pionk, but was thrown out trying to stretch it into a double to end the inning.

The Greyhounds threatened in the top of the seventh putting runners on first and third, with Marmon getting his second infield hit. But Miles blew down East's Wayne Opsahl on three straight fast balls to end the game. Better days are probably ahead for Opsahl. He's just a freshman.