This was our third tournament of the year. This was a Clint Eastwood Spaghetti Western type of weekend. There was some good..some bad..and some ugly. There was also some Mickey Mouse Club stuff, with Smoochie Hollenback dressed in an Annette Funicello pink poodle skirt...and that wasn't even the ugly. The ugly was the team having the coin toss 15 minutes before the scheduled game time and then taking an ugly vote and having me put on the pink poodle shirt. That was a ugly thing to do. We won the game tho, so that was good. Snooki Stokes is not to be trusted..E' tu Snookie?
Playing with us this weekend were, Snooki Stokes, A pitcher formerly named Alex, Governor Hiller, Fed-Ex Elam, NASA Thompson, Smoochie Hollenback, Bonsey Fox, Ambu-Lance Horner, David, Meet-the-Felkers, Pastor Ellis, and Travis from the High-line, picked up with us and did a great job at 2nd base.
First Game: Lose 11-10
We played Rhino of Missoula. They beat us in a close game and went on to win the tournament in the second championship game against Ryan Cook's team. Congratulations to both of these teams, they played well.
This was a low scoring contest. We sent 42 battters to the plate. 22 of them got on base, and 10 of the 22 scored. Yikes! Our team batting average for this game was .524...and that is after I rounded up the percentage. We actually had a 1 run lead going into the bottom half of the 7th, however each of the first 5 batters Rhino sent to the plate got on base and they scored the tieing and winning runs with no outs. On to the next game.
2nd Game..Won..14-8 vs Ryan Cook's team.
We scored 6 runs in the first inning and held on for a nice win over Ryan's team. Once again we were not home team. Perhaps Mr. Funny Boy Stokes should play a few less tricks on his teammates and spend a bit more time connecting with the coin toss spirits. He appears to have fallen out of favor with them. As a team we were 27-43, for a game average of .628. Alex's pitching and solid team defense played a big part in the low scores put up by our first two opponents. T%his game felt food. WE had lost to Ryan's team the last couple of times we played..so yea and thank you!!
3rd Game: We won 20-8 in 5 innings.
We scored in every inning. Allen Fox hit 2 balls right outta the park and Brandon Thompson also launched 2 balls into orbit. We expect it of Brandon "NASA" Thompson. However it was equally impressive to see Allen "Beep-Beep, The Road-Runner" rocket a couple balls over the fence. As a team we were 28-41, for a game average of .683. We averaged 8 batters at the plate per innings in this game.
4th Game of the day: vs Slumpbusters Won 28-24?? or something like that.
This was our best game of the tournament. Slumpbusters are a dang good team. They have a solid defense and score lots of runs. They have far too many guys on their team who can hit the ball over the fence. They have also had our number this season, so it was nice to finally give them a call. Good guys, fun games, win or lose.
Most unfortunately I do not have the scorebook for this game. Due to technical difficulties beyond our, whatever that word is, we had to use their scorebook. I do not need a score book to help me remember how well we hit and how awake and fired up the team was. It was as tho we had taken our daily dose of Geritol. We never let up the whole game and it was important becasue Slumpbusters was once again hometeam...grrr.Snooki..and they kept scoring right up till the end. Allen Fox and Pastor Ellis, both made home-run robbing catches, that were huge momentum stoppers and rally-killers. This was the best ball we have played since the C'mon Blue Tourney that we won, the first weekend of the season.
5th Game: Sunday morning..Lost to Gilley's 13-11.
Well..high priced gas and overcooked hot dogs.....dang..dang..dang. That gets me. Gilleys is a good team but I think all of us left this game feeling like we did not play as well as we could have. Gilley's employed a 5 man infield on us and it was very effective. We were hitting high fly balls to the outfield or ground balls to the infielders. The frustration was in our inablility to take advantage of the gaps in the outfield. Slumpbusters used a 5 man infield against us in our win against them Saturday night and we were hitting the gaps so well, they had to abandon it. No such luck today. It weren't for lack of effort..it were for lack of execution. As a team, we were 23-42 for a .586 game average. We put 23 runners on base and scored 11 of them. In last nights game, we put 28 runners on base and scored 20 of them.
Softball keeps us humble and it keeps us coming back. Saturday night's ability to take advantage of the 5 man infield was a huge, feel-good. Sunday mornings inability to take advantage that same defensive scheme, was equally frustrating. We tried hard like we always do. Despite the disappointment, I was proud of our demeanor and composure. We shook hands, mumbled to ourselves, treated each other like friends, and went back to our homes and families. The lawn always seems to need mowing on Sunday..it is easier and more fun to mow when we are filled with winning memories rather than with, woulda',coulda', should'a, thoughts. But whether we won or lost, the lawn always looks like a winner after we have mowed it. And that is our job, to take care of ourselves. To mow away the frustration and bad memories. They are weeds and bad seeds. We each have so much to be thankful for in our lives. We start Monday off with a nice looking lawn and fond memories of our families, our teammates, the game we share, and what is truely important in life.. We are indeed fortunate folks.