Ernie brings the electricity as late Buccos rally jolt the Smoke

Ernie Garcia, an electrician by trade, provided a much-needed jolt to Thursday’s game and his season, with two triples and sterling defense at third base leading the Buccos to a hard-fought 13-6 victory over Smoke n Mirrors in an LA County Senior Softball League contest.

Smoke had a 4-2 lead going into the final two frames, when the Buccos exploded for 11 runs to ice the game on a cool night in the Valley, with contributions coming from up and down the lineup.

“Ernie came up with some great plays at 3^rd base with really great reflexes,” said Raul Aguilar, one of the Bucco field captains. “And Gary (Schwartz) made some really good plays at second. They were hitting a ton to the right side.

“The last two innings, when we had a chance to score, we came up big all through the lineup," Raul said. "It just took (Smoke) out of it. By the time they came up in the bottom of the 7^th, they knew they were defeated.”

Manager Bill Tarrant and other voices in the dugout started chanting “our breakout inning” going into the 6^th. The Buccos season has been characterized by cold starts and hot finishes. Tarrant waved an imaginary pirate sword around (the plastic Halloween one was missing from the dugout), but few of his teammates seemed to notice.

As it has for much of the season, the bottom six of the lineup was key to the victory: The top six went 12 for 24 (.500 OBP) and the bottom six went 11 for 20 (.550), paced by Bill Barnard’s three hits.

“Bill was like the only one hitting in the early half of the game when no one else was,” Raul said. “He’s so consistent.” Indeed, the 6-rated Barnard at 80 years old has a remarkable .655 OBP on the season.

Days before the game, the 8-rated Garcia, who had been scuffling at the plate for much of the season, went into the garage of his home just south of Downtown Los Angeles where he fixes things – this time his swing.

“I started hitting the ball off the tee in the garage. Focusing on not letting my left side fly out and open up completely toward third, which results in mishits. Stepping forward toward the ball and going toward the pitch, instead. Keeping my head down and arms level. So that was the fix.”

And for the first time this season, Garcia shrugged off his bad knees and ran for himself, which made legging out those triples all the more remarkable.

“We had no runners! We had to save runners for the bottom of the lineup,” Garcia pointed out.

Garcia, 62, started playing in the senior softball league two years ago when he spotted his glove in that garage “and started getting the itch to play again” after retiring from playing in his 40s.

The father of three daughters was born and raised in East Los Angeles. He went to trade school in the early 1980s to learn how to be an electrician. For the past quarter century, he’s worked for Comet Electric working on major industrial projects, currently at the LAX terminal renovations.

The electrician certainly put a charge into Thursday’s game and may have short-circuited his slump.