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Report: Victim says Paterno tried to quash accusation

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Lehigh Valley IronPigs turn the tables on SWB RailRiders

This was all supposed to be the other way around, wasn&#8217;t it?With one of the milder months of March in recent years, Wyoming Valley Conference baseball teams were able to get outside earlier and more often. More opportunities to see live pitching before the start of the league season.But for most of the league, the advantage has not been to the hitters. Not in April and not at the start of May. It seems 2016 has been the year of the pitcher in the WVC.&#8220;Definitely,&#8221; Holy Redeemer coach Chris Ritsick said. &#8220;The pitchers, they&#8217;ve been ahead of the hitters all year.&#8221;&#8220;The pitching,&#8221; Lake-Lehman coach Brian Gorski said, &#8220;is so superb. Every run is at a premium. Every runner is at a premium. It&#8217;s been a total adjustment. The parity in the league has been phenomenal.&#8221;The numbers support that across all three divisions.Runs are down. Team batting averages are down. And the league-wide ERA is the lowest it has been in at least a decade. Through Thursday&#8217;s games, WVC pitchers have combined for a tidy 2.80 ERA, significantly lower than any other season since 2007 and the only year in that timeframe under 3.00.Not that ERA is the first and last word on a pitcher&#8217;s effectiveness &#8212; it&#8217;s just one of the most useful stats that can be gleaned from box scores reported each game by the home team over the last 10 years.But there are also more dominant performances by pitchers. Rarely a day goes by where a WVC team doesn&#8217;t pitch a shutout, allowing one, two or three hits. Dallas has thrown two no-hitters. Coughlin threw a perfect game on a Monday and then came back on Wednesday and just missed another one by one batter.And games have been closer as well. Amazingly, there have been only two WVC games so far this season that ended early because of the mercy rule. There were 13 last spring.&#8220;Maybe it&#8217;s that the caliber of pitching is a little bit better,&#8221; Meyers coach Matt Skrepenak said. &#8220;I think there&#8217;s a lot of parity. I don&#8217;t see many high scores around the league, period. For the most part, they&#8217;ve been pretty tight, close games.&#8221;There are mitigating factors. For one, the season isn&#8217;t over and the recent scheduling havoc from the weather could potentially disrupt pitchers down the stretch. Beyond that, the latest realignment in 2015 organized teams into divisions strictly by enrollment, so there are no longer 2A teams playing 4A and 3A programs in league play.It&#8217;s also important to factor in the change in bat specifications to the BBCOR-certified (bat-ball coefficient of restitution) models, which provide less of a trampoline effect on the ball for safety reasons. But that switch came back in 2012.There&#8217;s a notable drop in offensive statistics these past five seasons compared to the five that preceded them &#8212; in part, perhaps, because of the new bats. But that doesn&#8217;t explain dropping down from a 3.58 league-wide ERA last spring and 4.35 the year before that.Most likely, there isn&#8217;t any one factor that can solve the mystery. There are, however, a few clues.&#8220;Pitchers are not walking a lot of batters,&#8221; Gorski said. &#8220;I&#8217;ve played more small ball, bunted more than I have in 10 years of coaching.&#8221;Gorski also believes that teams are developing deeper staffs with fewer squads relying heavily on an ace. Berwick, Coughlin, Crestwood, GAR, Lake-Lehman, Meyers, Northwest, Pittston Area and Wyoming Seminary have all cut their team ERA by more than a run since last spring. Gorski&#8217;s Black Knights may be the most dramatic example, going from 5.97 in 2015 to 1.90 this year.Part of it could be the guys in the dugout as well. The coaching ranks throughout the league have experienced little turnover relative to other sports in recent years.&#8220;I think pitchers across the board are coached better,&#8221; Ritsick said. &#8220;They&#8217;re hitting spots, they&#8217;re hitting locations. They&#8217;re realizing they don&#8217;t have to throw 90 in order to get batters out.&#8220;If they hit spots and change speeds, they can get the job done. Throughout the league it seems like that&#8217;s what&#8217;s happening.&#8221;Stretch runRitsick&#8217;s Royals have already clinched the Division 3 title. Wyoming Valley West and Wyoming Area are on the verge of joining them in Division 1 and Division 2, respectively.The Warriors can earn a second straight crown on Saturday by winning the end of a suspended game from last month in Tunkhannock. Losses by both Dallas and Lake-Lehman would do the trick as well.Valley West has a 2.5-game lead on Crestwood. The Spartans are scheduled to play five league games over the next six days.<style>
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<div class="neCaption">Meyers sophomore Kenny Macko is one of several underclassmen who have shined on the mound this spring. Macko has allowed just one earned run in 24 innings. </div></div><div class="metaInfo"><photo0>https://www.timesleader.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/web1_meyers_nw5_faa.jpg</photo0><caption0>Meyers sophomore Kenny Macko is one of several underclassmen who have shined on the mound this spring. Macko has allowed just one earned run in 24 innings. </caption0><photoCredit0>Fred Adams | For Times Leader </photoCredit0></div></div>
<div class="metaInfo"><bylineMeta>By Derek Levarsedlevarse@www.timesleader.com</bylineMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><factboxMeta>WVC STANDINGSDivision 1`W`L`PCT`GBValley West`7`1`.875`&#8212;Crestwood`5`4`.556`2.5Hazleton Area`4`4`.500`3.0Pittston Area`4`6`.400`4.0Coughlin`3`7`.300`5.0Division 2`W`L`PCT`GBWyoming Area`8`1`.889`&#8212;Dallas`5`5`.500`3.5Lake-Lehman`4`5`.444`4.0Berwick`4`7`.364`5.0Tunkhannock`3`7`.300`5.5Division 3`W`L`PCT`GBx-Holy Redeemer`12`1`.923`&#8212;Meyers`7`3`.700`3.5Northwest`7`3`.700`3.5GAR`5`5`.500`5.5Hanover Area`4`5`.444`6.0Wyo. Seminary`3`8`.273`8.0Nanticoke`3`9`.250`8.5MMI Prep`1`8`.111`9.0</factboxMeta></div><div class="metaInfo"><shirttailMeta>Reach Derek Levarse at 570-991-6396 or on Twitter @TLdlevarse</shirttailMeta></div>

Pitchers stealing the show so far in WVC baseball