Quincy Jones just wants to do what he can to help his team win.
Tuesday night, he did a lot. Jones finished with three hits, two runs scored and two RBI to help the Jefferson City Renegades to a 5-3 victory against the Springfield Redbirds at Vivion Field.
"I feel like I helped the team win today and that's always my goal when I come to the park," Jones said.
Jones, who just wrapped up his junior season at Saginaw Valley State in Michigan, led off the second inning with a double down the line in left. The Southfield, Mich., native then moved to third on an infield single by Marquise Doherty before scoring on a groundout by Jordan Smith.
The double came off Redbirds starter Travis Henke, the former all-state pitcher and coach at Blair Oaks.
"The first couple of pitches got up on me, I was just trying to stay short with my swing and get the barrel of the bat on it," Jones said.
The Redbirds, a team made up of players primarily from the Springfield-Joplin area, informed Renegades coach Mike DeMilia on Sunday they wouldn't have enough players to play the non-MINK League game. So DeMilia, who replaced Henke at Blair Oaks, went to work to help the Redbirds fill out their roster.
"We wanted a competitive game, we wanted to find some guys who could play a little bit, not a bunch of schlubs," DeMilia said. "We're here to compete."
Henke, who wasn't sure he wanted to pitch until earlier in the day, said it was his first time on the mound in more than a year.
"I'd give anything to be back out here again," Henke said. "It's a childhood dream to be playing baseball, this was fun to be back out here.
"Coach DeMilia asked me to come out and give what I could give."
Henke pitched four innings, allowing four runs on eight hits. He didn't walk a batter and struck out two.
"For not pitching in a year, I'd give myself a C," he said. "I threw strikes, they did a good job of hitting the ones I left up in the zone."
DeMilia graded Henke's performance a little higher.
"I told him he would give us some good looks and he did," DeMilia said. "The first couple of batters came back to the dugout talking about how good his stuff was.
"He filled the strike zone. Our hitters need to see pitchers like that."
Henke also got an at-bat Tuesday, singling with one out in the second.
"That's an A-plus," Henke, who will turn 30 next month, said. "After not hitting against live pitching since high school, I'll take that."
The Renegades, who trailed 2-1 after two innings, strung together five straight singles to take the lead for good in the third.
Jones had the fourth single in the streak, driving in two runs.
"We knew Quincy had some ability, but to be honest, I wasn't totally impressed after the first couple of practices," DeMilia said. "But he's shown a lot during the games, he has done a lot for us."
The Redbirds cut the Renegades' lead to 4-3 with a run in the sixth. Jefferson City got an insurance run in the bottom of the eighth when Jones led off with a single, advanced to second on a Doherty single and scoured on a double by Austin Blazevic.
Alex Loosbrock was the winning pitcher for the Renegades, allowing two runs on three hits and three walks in five innings. He struck out nine. Ben Fugitt got one out in relief, walking three, before Shane Fontenot pitched the next 2 innings. He gave up one hit and struck out two. Jeremy Hodalgo got the save, working a perfect ninth with one strikeout.
Nolan Hair, who will be a senior this fall at Blair Oaks, had a hand in a pair of the runs for the Redbirds. He drove in one with an infield single in the first, then scored in the sixth after leading off the inning with a walk.
Mason Gipe, a 2017 graduate of Blair Oaks, also scored a run for the Redbirds.
The Renegades and Redbirds will meet again at 7 p.m. today at Vivion Field. DeMilia said Colton Hoelscher, a May graduate of Blair Oaks, should see some time on the mound for the Redbirds.