Richland High grad helps pitch Milwaukee Brewers to a win over Chicago Cubs

What an interesting journey former Richland High School standout Eric Yardley has had the last 10 years.

Yardley, whose story has been documented in the Herald, almost was cut from his Seattle University baseball team after his second season.

His coach told Yardley he needed to make a change — “Had he thought of ever trying to pitch sidearm?’”

Yardley took to it, practicing against a wall for what seemed like forever.

By the time he was a senior for Seattle U, the right-hander was the team’s closer and was getting players from Washington, Washington State, Gonzaga and Oregon State out on a consistent basis with his sidearm pitches.

From there, Yardley signed with an independent professional team that would eventually fold in his first season. But Yardley would persevere and get signed by the San Diego Padres.

For the next seven seasons, Yardley toiled away in the Padres’ minor league system, slowly moving up the ladder.

Finally, last August, he got his first call-up by the Padres. He pitched in a couple games before being sent back down. But in September, he was brought back up when the rosters expanded, and he did well.

When the offseason rolled around, however, and his contract with San Diego was expiring, he was released by the Padres.

The Milwaukee Brewers signed him pretty quickly, and he was in camp with the team this past spring.

Right before the coronavirus shut down everything, Yardley was sent to the Brewers’ minor-league camp.

And that’s where things stood until Major League Baseball opened back up earlier this month.

He was invited to the team’s spring training 2.0 session and opened some eyes.

Yardley made his first Opening Day roster this past week, and on Saturday he made his Brewers’ regular-season debut.

In an 8-3 win over the Chicago Cubs, Yardley pitched in the ninth inning, striking out one batter and shutting the Cubs’ hitters down.

Mitchell makes Mystics WNBA debut

The WNBA also got going this past weekend, with the league in its own bubble in Bradenton, Fla.

Each team will play 22 regular-season games in Florida before the postseason begins.

Kennewick High grad Leilani Mitchell is with the defending champion Washington Mystics, and they won their season opener 101-76 over the Indiana Fever on Saturday.

Mitchell started at point guard, and she scored 5 points, grabbed 4 rebounds and had 4 assists.

But she looked great running the offense and played strong defense.

With the long-time veteran out on the floor, it’s like having another coach out there.

The Mystics have three games this coming week: Tuesday versus the Connecticut Sun; Thursday against the Seattle Storm, and Saturday against the Chicago Sky.

The Thursday game against Seattle will be televised live at 3 p.m., on ESPN.

Rodeo finals

The National High School Rodeo finals ended late last week in Guthrie, Okla., and four Mid-Columbian athletes really stood out.

Benton City’s Brayden Schmidt teamed up with Coy Aldrich of Terrebonne, Ore., to finish seventh in the average for team roping.

The pair totaled 27.23 seconds in their two go-rounds, and that gave them seventh place among the 90 teams competing.

Walla Walla’s Tice Hiner placed ninth among 68 competitors in the boys cutting event.

Hiner scored 429 total points in his two go-rounds.

Kennewick’s Madi Conner finished 18th overall out of 168 barrel racers.

She totaled 52.771 seconds in her two go-rounds.

Finally, Outlook’s Kacie Jo Wiersma totaled 283 points in her girls cutting event’s two rounds. That gave her 21st place among 92 competitors in the event.

Sounders FC

Josh Atencio made his Sounders FC debut on Monday, July 20, in Seattle’s 3-0 win over the Vancouver Whitecaps in the MLS is Back Tournament.

Atencio, 18, came into the game in the 90th minute for Seattle.

Atencio grew up in Bellevue and was a member of the Sounders Academy, and he was recently signed to a Homegrown Player contract by the club.

He is the grandson of Richland’s Matt and OkSu Atencio, and the son of former Bombers standout Andres Atencio.

Notes

• Madison Doepker (Walla Walla) finished her college track career at Eastern Washington University by being the school’s female recipient of the Big Sky Conference Scholar Athlete Award.

Doepker carried a 3.97 grade point average while earning her degree in professional accounting.

She was named to the Big Sky Conference all-academic team all four of her indoor track seasons and all four of her outdoor track seasons.

On the field, Doepker was named All-Big Sky Conference three times – twice in the javelin and once in the hammer.

She finished her career as the fourth-best all-time women’s hammer thrower with a toss of 194 feet, 6 inches.

• Blake Loftus, the former Kennewick High star athlete, has transferred from Eastern Washington University and will play baseball at Eastern Oregon University next spring.

The Mountaineers have revived their baseball program and will have their first new season in 2021.

• Chiawana grad Elsa Young has agreed to play women’s soccer for Shoreline Community College. That season was supposed to start in August, but it’s been moved to next February because of COVID-19.

• Chiawana quarterback JP Zamora will be a junior this coming school year and he’s already receiving interest from college teams.

Last week, Zamora tweeted that he’s received an offer from the Pac-12’s University of Utah. It’s his first offer.

This story was originally published July 27, 2020 at 4:53 PM.