FORFEITS PUT CAPE, CHAFFEE IN SEMIS

Cape Girardeau Ford & Sons and Chaffee Medicap Pharmacy both picked up first-round wins Monday in the American Legion District 14 Tournament -- and neither baseball team had to make the long trip to Senath, Mo.

Top-seeded Chaffee and third-seeded Cape each received a forfeit victory when the managers of No. 8 seed Stoddard County and No. 6 seed Jackson informed American Legion commissioner Homer Dickmann late Sunday night that they would not have enough players to compete Monday.

Dickmann said that the managers of the forfeiting squads -- both have been hurt by a lack of players for much of the summer -- indicated that they were planning to try and field teams for today's loser's bracket games.

"Both told me they were going to play their second games," said Dickmann.

Cape and Chaffee move directly into the winner's bracket semifinals of the eight-team event that runs through the weekend.

"It's pretty nice for us to go right into the semifinals without having to use any pitching," said Cape manager Tom Reinagel. "And we saved a day of travel."

Reinagel had actually been wary of Jackson because Ford & Sons had used its top two pitchers during Saturday night's final regular-season doubleheader against Sikeston. Those games were important because the squads were battling for the third and fourth seeds.

"We won three of four games against Jackson in the regular season, but most of the games were close," Reinagel said. "We were looking at this as potentially a very tough game."

Ford & Sons will have ace hurler Jason Chavez -- who is 10-1 with an impressive earned-run average of barely more than 1.00 -- ready to go in Wednesday's 8 p.m. semifinal against either second-seeded and host Dunklin County or seventh-seeded Charleston.

In Monday's only game that was actually played, No. 4 seed Sikeston defeated No. 5 Poplar Bluff 13-7. Sikeston advances to Wednesday's 5 p.m. semifinal against Chaffee.

Three games are scheduled for today, beginning at 2 p.m. as Dunklin County plays Charleston in the final first-round contest. There will be elimination games at 5 p.m. and 8 p.m.