When you're one of the new pitchers a championship-ready baseball team, it helps to have some veterans around ready to lead by example.

Haymarket hurler Matt Benedict is one of those returners. He entered the week fourth place in the Valley Baseball League for lowest ERA among the league's most active pitchers at 2.27. Benedict's 6-2 record helped launched him to the VBL North all-star team, which won the annual mid-summer night game 9-2 over the South all-stars on July 11.

In fact, when coupled with fellow returning starter Bob Van Woert (4-0 overall, 2.68 ERA), Haymarket's top-two gunslingers account for more than a third of the team's 26 wins, helping the Senators to a league-best 26-12 record.

Haymarket started the week on a big note too by becoming the first VBL team to clinch a spot in the playoffs after topping Covington on the road 7-6 Sunday night.

Harvard University sophomore Matt Doyle picked up the save in that game, mowing down the Lumberjacks in order in the bottom of the ninth inning on a fly out and two ground outs without giving up any hits or walks. Doyle credited Benedict for emphasizing the importance of short, efficient at bats and innings.

"You want three pitches or less and that's what he believes in," said Doyle.

The 6-foot-3 righthander explained that Benedict and he incorporate similar pitching strategies on the hill, with Benedict earning outs without "always trying to blow it past everyone for strikeouts."

It's an effective strategy for Doyle too, whose save against Covington put him tied for the league lead at five while sporting a 1.17 ERA. Doyle's only allowed two runs, both of them earned, in 15.1 innings of work, posting a strikeout-to-walk ratio of 18-to-4 while opponents have just a .182 batting average against him.

"Coming out of the bullpen, I'm starting to realize, I'm not throwing it 95, but I can still get it over the plate pretty well," said Doyle, who said he studies the pitching philosophy of former MLB great Greg Maddux .

Instead of overpowering opposition, Benedict, Doyle and the rest of the Haymarket pitching staff have put their collective faith in the team's defense as only Gregg Nappo has struck out 50 or more batters this season, tying him for fifth in the league. With a fielding percentage of .959, Haymarket is in the middle of the pack when it comes to reliability and actually holds the dubious distinction of being only one of four teams in the league with 60 or more errors.

However, with the league's best hitting team to back up the pitchers, random defensive flubs cost Haymarket less than other teams. As of Monday, the Senators led the league in hitting by 24 points at .298. To put that in perspective, the VBL's second best hitting team, the Winchester Royals (.274) were only 23 points higher than the ninth-best team, the Staunton Braves (.251).

"We got a great team going right now," said Doyle. "A lot of it starts with chemistry at the top."

Doyle's had one other advantage pitching at home that most of the league does not get to enjoy: he lives nearby. Doyle grew up and still resides in Vienna, having attended Flint Hill High School in Oakton. He claims to think "realistically" about baseball given that only a small percentage of players ever are drafted by the big leaguers.

That meant he's taken studying hard and has been willing to sacrifice Friday night parties for the sake of Saturday pitching performances.

"Some people think just because you're smart doesn't mean you can play ball," said Doyle. "I'm trying to break that."