EAST BUTLER — Cody Herald admits he doesn't know the finer points of pitching.

“I'm just a thrower,” Herald said. “I just throw as hard as I can for strikes.”

And that's just what Herald did.

The East Butler shortstop took the hill in the second inning with his team trailing Butler City 5-1 and got the final out of the frame.

A half inning later, East Butler erupted for seven runs — all unearned — to take an 8-5 lead on the way to a 16-6 win in the Butler County legion baseball loser's bracket final at Speed-O Field Tuesday night.

“Cody has been consistent for us all year,” said East Butler coach Rob Armahizer. “He's a complete player. We did need to shut them down there. (Butler City) is a good team.”

The last time the two teams squared off was early in the legion playoffs. Butler City blanked East Butler 2-0 on the strength of a three-hit shutout by left-hander Tim Butler.

Herald pitched in that game, too, striking out 10 in the loss.

East Butler battled its way through the loser's bracket to get another shot at Butler City. As it turned out, it got another shot at Butler as well after it chased BC starting pitcher Alex Ziegler in the second inning.

Ziegler was haunted by errors — four in the frame and three coming when there were two out. He was also plagued by fatigue on a sweltering evening.

On two occasions, Herald ran water out to Ziegler from the other dugout, prompting cheers from the crowd.

“He got a call to go to work at 6 this morning,” said Butler City coach Jerry Piroch. “He worked until 4, didn't eat and came right here to play.”

Butler City used four pitchers and committed nine errors. Even Butler, who was masterful earlier in the tournament against East Butler, was merely mortal Tuesday.

“The games we won in this tournament we made no errors,” Piroch said. “We just handed it away. We gave it away.”

Technically, Butler City should have had a home game against East Butler at Highfield Park.

“It could have been my home game,” Piroch said. “But I chose to let them go home because I like to hit first.”

Now, it's Butler City going home.

Josh Friel homered and Ziegler, Jordan Winters and Tom Bruce each had doubles for Butler City.

But they were not enough to keep up with East Butler's scintillating bats.

Herald scored four runs; Colin McKee drove in four and had three hits, including a double; Zach Slater drove in three and Jordan Rodgers also had three singles for East Butler, which had 15 hits in the game.

It all added up to giving East Butler a shot at the legion title.

It must, however, beat king-seed Saxonburg twice. The championship game is slated for a site, time and day to be determined.

“It's real exciting,” Armahizer said. “I wasn't too sure we'd make it there, to be honest with you. We had a tough road. We got into the loser's bracket right away and that's always tough. But we stayed resilient and fought back.”

Butler City 140 000 1 — 6 8 9

East Butler 172 204 x — 16 15 4

W: Cody Herald 5.1IP (9K, 2BB). L: Alex Ziegler 1.2 IP (2K, 1BB).

Butler City: Ziegler 2B 1B RBI, Jordan Winters 2B RBI, Josh Friel HR 1B 2-RBI, Tom Bruce 1B 2B, Dane Petricilli 1B

East Butler: Herald 2-1B 2-RBI 4-R, Colin McKee 2-1B 2B 4-RBI, Chris Cotton 2-1B RBI, Zach Slater 2-1B 3-RBI, Jordan Rodgers 3-1B RBI, Kriley 1B, Dustin Kepple 1B

TBD: East Butler vs. Saxonburg, site and time TBD.