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The Scenic Salt Lake City Classic!
The Salt Lake City Classic was played June 6-7 at the Lakeside Park in South Orem, Utah just outside of Salt Lake City. There were 15 teams overall from 6 different states and 10 of the teams were from the Conference USSSA. They played on 5 – 315 foot fields that had artificial turf infields and used the Dudley Pro-M ball. The tournament began on Friday at 5 PM mountain time. Thin Air/CBB Athletics (CO-B), BeHappy/Proton/Standard (AZ-A), and Bay Area Legends (CA-TBD) were all Conference teams that won their first round games by the run rule. Meanwhile D2/Brush Masters (UT-B) knocked off CutThroat/EliteSec/Soares/Coursey (CA-B) 36-20. DIRTY VEGAS/BDC/ARK CONCEPTS (TX-A) knocked off Standard Plumbing/GHP (AZ-B) 31-20. I-STONE (UT-C) took down a struggling Payeload/Famous/VIVID (AZ-A) team 35-28. And Cheap Suits/Republic Realty/ESP (CA-A) had to score 3 runs in the bottom of the 7th to beat upset minded Goonies/Tranont (UT-C) 28-27 on a walk off double by Josh Jones.
In the “Round of 8” #1 seeded ATARAXIS/SONNYS/JBLNEWBREEDKOVALBAF (MD-A) played their first game where they slowly separated and beat Thin Air 21-12. Brock Frentzel at lead off was 5-5 in the win. In a showdown of west coast ‘A’ teams, BeHappy scored 11 in the 3rd, 13 in the 4th, and 10 in the 6th after a slow start to beat Dirty Vegas 38-29. Jagger Harjo was 6-6 and CJ Shepherd hit for the cycle in the victory. In the lower half of the bracket D2/Brush Masters upset Bay Area Legends 23-20. D2 led Bay Area 23-14 going into the bottom of the 7th. And Cheap Suits scored 9 in the top of the 2nd and 20 in the top of the 4th to beat I-STONE 36-4 in 4 innings. Everyone on the team except Robert Banks had a home run and Banks had 3 doubles.
The ball was flying in the thin air Saturday as well. The two semifinals were played at 11:30 AM. BeHappy trailed Ataraxis 37-25 going into the bottom of the 7th when BeHappy scored 14 runs in the inning, getting 7 straight hits to start, and winning on a walk off homer by Blake Lively with just 1 out! They were 14 for 15 in the inning with 3 home runs. Robert Lundy was 5-5 with 2 HR and 6 RBI in the win. In the other semifinal Cheap Suits scored 10 runs in the bottom of the 1st and 10 in the bottom of the 3rd to beat D2/Brush Masters 26-10, leaving them on the field in the bottom of the 5th. Daniel Cayton, Brandon Traylor, Nic Guillen, and Billy Malovrh were all perfect on base in the game and Guillen hit 3 homers and drove in 8 runs.
Winner’s bracket finals at 1 PM between BeHappy and Cheap Suits.
In the winner’s bracket finals Cheap Suits scored in every inning and BeHappy failed to score in the top of the 4th and 7th innings and Cheap Suits pulled out a 25-24 win without having to use the hammer in the bottom of the 7th. Cayton and Demario Boyd were 4-5 and Brandon Traylor 5-5 in the win. Boyd and Traylor each hit 3 HR.
The loser’s bracket played out all day long on Saturday. In the top half of the loser’s bracket CutThroatSports beat R1 44-31, Thin Air 27-26, Dirty Vegas 30-10, and got a revenge win over D2/Brush Masters 30-15 before losing to Ataraxis 42-18 and finishing 4th. In the lower half of the loser’s bracket Bay Area Legends beat Novva 31-16, and ended Standard Plumbings run 27-7, before losing to Ataraxis 29-27 and finishing tied for 5th with D2/Brush Masters.
And Ataraxis went on to beat BeHappy in the loser’s finals 33-30 after trailing 25-18 going into the top of the 7th where they scored 13 runs and then held BeHappy to zero.
Championship game in Utah between Ataraxis and Cheap Suits.
Saturday night Ataraxis who had just beat Bay Area and BeHappy in close games found themselves down 21-20 going into the top of the 6th in the championship game against Cheap Suits when they scored 24 runs in one inning, held Cheap Suits to 8 runs in the bottom of the 6th, and won by the run rule 44-29 to force the “if” game! Newly Acquired Jason Martel was 4-6 with 3 HR and 10 RBI and Brock Frentzel was 6-7 with 2 HR and 9 RBI in the win.
In the “if” game late Saturday night Ataraxis again found themselves trailing 16-12 going into the bottom of the 4th where they scored 9 runs to go up 21-16. Then Cheap Suits scored 7 to get the lead back 23-21. But in the bottom of the 5th Ataraxis tied the game at 23-23 and then scored 15 more runs to leave Cheap Suits on the field 38-23. Ataraxis had done what they came to do and win those 220 points for 1st place and they did it with HUGE offensive innings at the end of what was otherwise close games. Way to close out games!
Ataraxis had a .708 team on base percentage. Their only pitcher Eric Keller pitched his heart out and was .667 with the bat. Greinert, Martel, Cardwell, and Lattimore all had double digit home runs. Cardwell led in on base at .806. And Greinert and Martel led the team in RBI with 33. And this is Ataraxis’s 2nd tournament win of the season (Las Vegas). With the win Ataraxis moves into 1st place in the points standings.
Salt Lake City Results & Bracket Link
2025 Salt Lake City Picture Album link
Salt Lake City Link to BallClubz Boxscores
Salt Lake City Link to BallClubz Team Stat Reports
Link to USSSA Stats for the Salt Lake City Classic
1st Place – Ataraxis/Sonny’s/JBL/Newbreed/Koval/BAF (MD-AA)
2nd Place – Cheap Suits/Republic Realty/ESP (CA-A)
3rd Place – BeHappy/Proton/Standard (AZ-A)
4th Place – CutThroat/EliteSec/Soares/Coursey (CA-B)
