2025 Rocky Mountain Classic tournament report!

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2025 Rocky Mountain Classic

Aurora, Colorado

July 18-19

Aurora Sports Park was a great place to play and watch.

Rocky Mountain Team List

Rocky Mountain Article and Video Links

Rocky Mountain Results & Bracket Link

Rocky Mountain Picture Album link

USSSA Stats from the Rocky Mountain Classic

Rocky Mountain Link to BallClubz Boxscores

Rocky Mountain Link to BallClubz Team Stat Reports

Rocky Mountain livestream archives link

GTL vs CutThroatSports condensed game link

Dirty Vegas vs Legendz condensed game link

Cheap Suits vs Bay Area Legends condensed game link

Winner’s Final – Ataraxis vs Cheap Suits condensed game link

Friday Night Recap

The tournament opened with Thin Air taking it to the new Payeload.

The 2025 Conference USSSA season continued at the Rocky Mountain Classic in Denver, Colorado at the beautiful Aurora Sports Complex. They used fields ranging from 310 feet to 325 feet for the games with 20 teams from 9 different states playing for 180 + (4 x 11) = 224 Conference points. The tournament began Friday at 5 PM Mountain time with Thin Air/CBB Athletics (CO-B), the local fan favorite, taking on Payeload/Famous (CA-A) a team that has new ownership with John Gilmore sponsoring and basically a whole new roster and a recently successful appeal to class ‘B’. Thin Air jumped on Payeload in the top of the 1st inning batting 3 times through the order as a windstorm blowing out to left field kicked up mid inning. Couple that with some Payeload misplays in the outfield and Thin Air found themselves up 19-0 on 7 of their 12 allowed home runs. In the bottom of the 1st Payeload scored 5 on 2 and was trying to answer when they grounded into a double play to end the inning. In the top of the 2nd with the wind still blowing out, Thin Air added another 20 runs on 4 homers to take a 39-5 lead and they won 39-7 in 3 innings after a 40 minute delay for lightning. In other “Round of 16” action DIRTY VEGAS/BDC/ARK CONCEPTS (TX-A) run ruled a very good Seminoles/NACSF.INC/TPS (OK-IndComp) team with a lot of ex-conference players 27-9 in 4 innings. Legendz/Beloli/MSGA Sports (OK-A) run ruled R1/Our Fam/Louisville Slugger a Colorado non-conference ‘A’ team 37-15 scoring 15 in the top of the 1st and 11 in the top of the 4th. Matt Mosel, Kevin Miller, Carlin Yoder, and the newly acquired Gary Levesque were all 5-5 and John Schlabach and Kevin Miller both hit 3 HR in the win. #1 seed and the favorite to win the tournament, ATARAXIS/SONNYS/JBLNEWBREEDKOVALBAF (MD-AA) run ruled Wichita Bonding/ Warkins Agency Inc (OK-B) 47-30. I-57 Roofing / I-55 Logistics (MO-B) scored 7 runs in the bottom of the 6th to take a 29-24 lead on Twisted D / A3 / JAG Apparel (OR-B) and held Twisted D scoreless in the top of the 7th to win. Blake Haag and Joseph Dowlen were each 5-5 and Dowlen hit 2 home runs and drove in 10 RBI. GTL/Legacy/Dirty (WA-B) scored 9 on 4 in the top of the 1st inning against CutThroat/EliteSec/Soares/Coursey (CA-B) but the GTL defense struggled in the bottom of the inning and a very good CutThroat offense scored 13 on 4. Then GTL went down in order 1-2-3 in the top of the 2nd and GTL pitcher Chris Benigno got a between the legs strikeout looking in the bottom of the 2nd to hold down CutThroat. But GTL struggled offensively again on a 4-10-3 double play in the top of the 3rd but recovered to score 4 runs before CutThroat center fielder Daunted Freeman made a great catch on the fence to end the inning. It was mostly CutThroat from there as they pulled away to a 32-17 run rule win, walking off GTL by scoring 3 runs in the bottom of the 5th with no home runs left. CutThroat lefty Joe Lewis was 5-5 with 2 HR and 9 RBI and Joe Acevdo, Nicholas Thompson, and Daunted Freeman were all 4-4. Acevedo hit one of the longest home runs of the tournament as well. Bay Area Legends (CA-AA) run ruled the local Stars (CO-B) (Will Sanchez’s team) 35-20. Cheap Suits /REPUBLIC REALTY /ESP (CA-A) dominated Smoke/TopNotch/CompleteAutoGlass (CO-B) 33-3 in 4 innings, out homering them 12-3, and scoring 12 runs in the bottom of the 4th to leave them on the field. Demario Boyd, Carlos Abrigo, and Justice Arranda were all 4-4 and Abrigo hit 3 HR and drove in 7.

CutThroatSports CF Daunte Freeman makes a great catch on the fence vs GTL.

The “Round of 8” was also played at 8:30 PM Friday night as it cooled off into the high 70’s and the Dudley Pro-M ball which was already flying in the 5,000+ foot altitude, began to fly even more. And all 8 teams were Conference teams. Ataraxis scored 8-10-8-14 in 4 innings to run rule I-57 Roofing’s ‘B’ team 40-20. Bay Area Legends in a long game beat a CutThroat team that wouldn’t go away 40-32. Cheap Suits out slugged Thin Air 14-0 in the decisive 4th inning and left them on the field in the 5th 39-24 as Daniel Cayton, the newly acquired Charlie Cano, and Demario Boyd all went 5-5. Boyd hit 2 home runs and drove in 7 while Justice Aranda hit 2 and drove in 8 in the win. And the best matchup of the night was Dirty Vegas vs Legendz which you can see here in condensed form on YouTube. Dirty Vegas with their veteran lineup which included Donald Hollingsworth, Ben Dunn, and Erik Kanaby among others, got off to a 39-20 lead going into the bottom of the 4th inning and it looked like Legendz might roll over and lose by the run rule. But Legendz scored 17 runs on 3 – 3 run homers and a deluge of doubles to pull to within 39-37. And it would have been much worse if Dirty Vegas right fielder Hollingsworth and left fielder Kanaby hadn’t made incredible diving catches for two of the outs. In the top of the 5th with the momentum, Legendz then had a perfect defensive inning as Kyle Slicker at pitcher stabbed a hot grounder, gave up a solo homer (DV’s last), then the tall 1st baseman Levesque stabbed a liner, and Slicker let up a homer for an out to end the inning. But Legendz only managed 1 run in the bottom of the 5th and went to the 6th down 40-38. In the top of the 6th Legendz held Dirty Vegas scoreless when they turned a 6-10-3 double play where middle infielder Matt Mosel barehanded the catch at 2nd and threw to first. In the bottom of the 6th with neither team having any home runs left, pinch hitter Cody Anthony hit a clutch 2 run single to tie the game at 40-40. In the top of the 7th Dirty Vegas who’s offense had disappeared, came to life, and they scored an incredible 11 runs on no homers and ended up winning the 2 hour plus game 51-44 behind the relief pitching of Scott Patterson.

Late Friday Dirty Vegas pitching to Legendz in the game of the week.

Dirty Vegas right fielder Donald Hollingsworth makes the catch of the tournament.

Late Friday night Bay Area tries to finish off CutThroat who wouldn’t go away.

Final 4 Recap

Cheap Suits SS Carlos Abrigo makes a diving stop which leads to a double play.

The semifinals were played at 11 am Mountain time on Saturday with the top 4 teams in the tournament squaring off. Ataraxis handled Dirty Vegas 29-14 over on the show field. And over on field #3 which was only 310 foot fences Cheap Suits and Bay Area were locked in a relatively low scoring game for today’s Conference with Bay Area Legends leading 17-15 going into the 5th inning as Bay Area pitcher Shawn Jones was stabbing grounders, getting good hitters to pop out, and even got a strike out looking. But everything changed in the top of the 5th when Cheap Suits scored one of the most impressive offensive innings in the Conference this year. They scored 28 runs! They had 9 hits before the 1st out and then after the 2nd out they still scored another 19 runs! The crazy thing is Bay Area defensively in the inning got a glove on 7 of those hits. In the bottom of the 5th with Bay Area needing 13 runs to extend the game, they scored 4, as Cheap Suits shortstop Carlos Abrigo made an impressive diving stop and they turned a double play and Cheap Suits advanced to the winner’s final 43-20. Charlie Cano was 6-6 with 7 RBI and most of the top half of the lineup was at least 5-6 for Cheap Suits in the win.

Winner’s Final Recap

The winner’s final was then played in the late afternoon between Ataraxis and Cheap Suits. This was a 2 hour long game. Ataraxis scored 18 runs on 5 homers in the top of the 1st inning and led 26-2 on a Josh Cardwell grand slam going into the bottom of the 2nd after Josh Kirsten robbed Dante Broome on the fence in the bottom of the 1st. Cheap Suits never gave up and scored 10 in the bottom of the 3rd, turned a double play on Ataraxis to hold them to zero runs in the top of the 4th, and scored 10 more in the bottom of the 4th to pull to within 30-27. But Ataraxis refocused in the top of the 5th scoring 15 on 4 including a bunch of runs with 2 outs to go up 45-27. From there Cheap Suits again crawled back into the game avoiding the run rules and going into the bottom of the 7th trailed just 48-42 with 1 homer of their 14 left. Charlie Cano singled, Brandon Traylor walked, Demario Boyd singled, Carlos Abrigo grounded into a fielder’s choice, and Dante Broome hit their last homer to pull to within 48-46 with still just one out. But with no homers Marquez grounded out, Aranda singled, Malovrh singled, and Rob Banks hit a homer for an out to end the game.

Loser’s Bracket Recap

Cheap Suits Josh Jones hits one to the end of the rainbow.

The loser’s bracket actually started with a couple games on Friday night and played out all day on Saturday. In the top half of the loser’s bracket Seminoles beat Banana Slugz, R1, and Thin Air before losing to CutThroatSports to finish tied for 7th and then CutThroat beat Dirty Vegas 38-35 before losing to Bay Area and finishing 4th. In the lower half of the loser’s bracket I-57/I-55 and Legendz each won a game before I-57/I55 beat Legendz 52-45 and then lost to Bay Area to finish tied for 5th. And Bay Area beat CutThroat as mentioned 32-17 and then got a revenge win on Cheap Suits leaving them on the field in the bottom of the 5th 40-24. Brady Bate went 5-5 with 4 HR and 10 RBI in that one for Bay Area.

Championship Recap

Ataraxis Adam Ussery gets “Yodered” in the championship game.

In the championship game at sunset Saturday evening, both Bay Area Legends and Ataraxis were hitting into double plays and the wind was blowing in slightly so the scoring got off to a slow start with Ataraxis leading 11-6 going into the bottom of the 3rd. In the bottom of the 3rd Ataraxis opened up some scoring 12 runs including a 440 foot home run bomb by Chris Greinert to take a 23-6 lead. Bay Area responded by clearing out the benches and it looked like a 4 inning run rule win when Bay Area’s backup center fielder John Borelli climbed the fence and robbed Orlando Castillo of a walk off run rule win for the last out of the inning. But Bay Area still needed to score 5 runs to extend the game in the top of the 5th and only scored 3 and Ataraxis had the win and the tournament championship 25-9. It was Ataraxis’s 3rd tournament win of the season as they moved up to 3rd in the Conference points standings. MVP Marc Wik was 26-26 in the tournament! For Bay Area they moved to 7th in the points standings, which is 3rd among ‘AA’ teams.

The tournament was well run, with really long games, and incredibly high scores. I want to give a special thanks to tournament director Juan Martinez and for the help and hospitality of Will Sanchez, Andrew, Elise, and Julie.