Watertown Sports

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JIM’S VIEW: Watertown Baseball Faced Stoneham, Winchester at Victory Field

By Guest Writer | May 6, 2026

Watertown Baseball moved to 1-5 in league play with an 8-2 loss to Stoneham at Victory Field on the afternoon of May 1. In six league games to date, Watertown has scored 0, 1, 1, 4, 1 and 2 runs. It’s not a recipe for winning baseball, whether you are the run-prevention Red Sox or the Watertown Raiders Varsity Baseball. The Raiders have some good, young talent and they are only going to get better, but putting together hits and scoring runs continues to be a challenge in a very stingy Middlesex League. The Raiders sent Julian Boas, their sophomore right hander, to the mound, and early on he was in command. So was Stoneham’s tall right hander, along with his decent fastball and curve. After two innings on a beautiful Spring day, and at the end of a cool and rainy week, the game was scoreless and visions of a pitcher’s duel seemed real. But the Raiders came unglued in the third, letting their starter down with poor defense and flat play. Boas started the third with a ground out to first. It looked like he had the second out when a wicked breaking ball got Stoneham’s leadoff hitter to chase for strike three — but, the ball bounced in front of Raiders catcher Andrew Reilly and by the time Reilly retrieved the ball in fair play, the Stoneham runner was three-quarters of the way down the first base line. Reilly didn’t have a chance to throw him out by this point, but he tried and best intentions went awry, as the ball went to the right of first baseman Peter Pavlidis and towards the chain-link fence behind first base. The runner had struck out, but got the bag at first and took second on the throwing error. Instead of two outs and no one on, it was runner on second with one out. Demoralizing if you are a pitcher!

Sports

JIM’S VIEW: Watertown Baseball Wins First League Game of ’26 Behind The Right Arm of Boas

By Jim Vershbow, Contributor | April 16, 2026

Spring baseball turned into summer baseball Tuesday night at Victory Field. Temperatures were in the 80’s most of the day and still in the low 70’s at game time. Ah yes, game time. This is an important piece of Tuesday’s story. Start time was slated for 7 p.m. At 6:50 P.M., under mostly clear skies both teams had completed their warm-ups, and both starting pitchers were deep into preparation in their respective bullpens.  Seven P.M. passed – no umps.  By 7:15 P.M., Wilmington was throwing a football around. Finally at 7:20 the umps strolled in thru the DPW gate and across the football field. By 7:30 P.M. we had first pitch. Not a big deal on a beautiful summer-like night, right? Wrong, but first the skinny on a 4-0 Watertown win. Sophomore Righthander Julian Boas got the start Tuesday night against Wilmington, who came into the game 0-3 in league play, losing three times last week, their first week of the season.  Watertown was also 0-3 in league play, and like Wilmington, lost all three league games played last week. Boas got experience on the hill last season as a Freshman, and takes a regular turn in the rotation this year. 

He has good velocity on his fastball, throws an affective breaking ball and mixes in a few change ups. What Boas has in spades is command and control. He can paint the outside corner with all his pitches, he knows when to mix in the fastball out of the strike zone, and best of all, he is not afraid to pitch inside and he does it with command. He sawed off many a batters Tuesday night with inside fastballs and his breaking ball. Rare to find someone so young so in control of location with his pitches, but Boas is, and it was on display Tuesday night. Boas retired the side in order in the first, third and fourth innings. Of the 22 batters he faced on the night, he got nine outs via the groundball and he struck out five.