DeLand – With the Winter Park Diamond Dawgs 8-0 loss on Monday night to the DeLand Suns, they officially have no chance at making the Florida League playoffs in 2025. Winter Park dropped to 6-25, and now both DeLand and Winter Garden have 11 wins. 

With just four games left on the Diamond Dawgs schedule, the most wins they can pick up is 10, and they are 7 and 8 games back in the loss column on both DeLand and Winter Garden since they have played a few more games than the rest of the league.

Monday’s contest was pretty symbolic of the Diamond Dawgs' season thus far. The team walked 10 batters in seven innings, and also struck out 10 times in the shortened mercy rule. On top of that, they had several chances to score, like in the first inning with second and third and nobody out, and were unable to scratch a run across the plate. 

Winter Park had three more hits than DeLand, but again, they were unable to come up in the clutch when they had opportunities saw this game get out of hand. Ayden Tran (Indianapolis) started the game for the Diamond Dawgs, walked six batters over 3.2 innings, and gave up four runs as the last batter he faced, Eli Tidwell, had a two-run double. After Tran, it was Justin Webster (Embry-Riddle), who had no control on the evening. He hit a batter and walked four Suns in just 0.1 innings. 

Maddox Meeks (Florida Gulf Coast) turned out a really quality start, striking out seven over 5 strong innings to earn the win. Again, there are technically still a lot of games left to be made up for other teams, but the most wins Winter Park can get is 10, and that would be if they win their last four games. Even then, since they have more games played than both DeLand and Winter Garden, their winning percentage would still be lower. You have to think they could be flipped in the standings with DeLand, but the Suns defeated Winter Park in six of their seven matchups on the year. 

Kai Lwin (Florida Atlantic) did have his best night at the plate this season, going 3-3 with three singles. However, the offense for the Diamond Dawgs has gone ice-cold over the last three games. In the previous 22 innings, Winter Park has scored just one run.

Winter Park, of course, still has to complete its schedule with one game against Leesburg on Tuesday and then a three-game weekend set against Winter Garden to close out the season. 

TJ French (University of Georgia)