LevI Abbott: Starting Pitcher
Levi Abbott has been the Lethbridge Bulls’ go-to starter on the mound for most of the 2021 season. He led the Bulls defense to start Sunday’s game against the Sylvan Lake Gulls. A game which the Bulls would eventually drop 13-11 despite winning the other 2 of their 3 games over the Heritage Day long weekend. Levi gave up two runs early in the 1st, before rallying to hold the league-leading Gulls to a total of 4 runs before being relieved midway through the 5th inning.
A key moment early in the game was a mound visit from pitching coach Luc Herbert following the Gulls’ 2 early runs. Abbott says the mound visit was helpful. “Sometimes the pitcher just needs a bit of a break, a chance to cool down. It can be a smart move to use a mound visit to let that happen.” Something we rarely get is a glimpse of what happens during those three-way discussions between the pitcher, catcher and pitching coach, but Abbott opens up about the conversation. “Luc - that’s pitching coach Luc - he said that I was trying to aim too much and wasn’t giving it my all. He told me to stop worrying about where I was trying to put it or put too much spin on it, and just throw hard. I changed it up after that.”
The Bulls finally mounted a comeback with a 7 run rally in the bottom of the 6th inning. Levi says that made a big difference on the bench. “We really shouldn’t need runs to get the energy going, but we did." The bench had been really quiet for the first half of the game. Once we finally put those runs up and got the bats going, it got the guys energized. Energy builds on itself and you start making things happen.” Though the Bulls would ultimately fall short of a turnaround, they put 11 runs on the board over the 6th, 7th and 8th innings to end the game 2 runs behind.
The Bulls would indeed come out looking better on Heritage Day’s game. Prior to the game, Levi shared his thoughts on the game ahead. “I’m looking forward to tomorrow’s game. We want to keep that energy we ended today with and bring it into tomorrow’s game. We need to make sure we keep our bats going and get a little tighter on some of the simple plays so we can pick up the win.” Levi would end up getting a break Monday as Bryce Fraser started against the Okotoks Dawgs Black team to round out the weekend, but his team would pick up the win.