Last weekend was a tough weekend for JFT, which is now essentially the same team as the Coneheads. We had the highest mountain to climb - beat the Grand Pinky Poobahs of Walnut Creek Senior League in the playoffs. David and Goliath and all that. We gave them a scare - winning the last regular season game with 25 unanswered runs and then taking our first game against them last Saturday to set up a Sunday in which they would have to beat us twice - which of course the history books will tell you they did. It hurt. We had perhaps our best chance, certainly our best to date, and we couldn't close it out. Wait 'til next year.
In the mean time, the Coneheads are getting near the end of the regular season as well. We have been very up and down - fortunately we are not the only team. But we needed something to ease the pain when we took the turf Monday, and the scheduler was kind - they gave us the Usual Suspects to cure our hangover. These poor schleps are one of the handful of teams in the Orinda league that keep coming out every year to win once or twice against the other poor schlep teams, and then go home. Good for them, I respect that. Couldn't do it, but I respect them for it.
Monday night was the Usual Crushing. We scored twenty runs in the first three innings before they could even crack the scoreboard, and the end result was 25-1 before they cried uncle (score was reported 24-1 but does it really matter?). The defensive highlight (besides a couple of the Usual Chuck gems), was when a guy tried to go home on a delay 'steal' with two outs (why wasn't he running?) on a grounder to short - Chuck made a rare offline throw to me at first, and although I was heads up to get the ball off quickly to home, it was Gerry that made the great play. With my sore candy-ass arm, all I could do was one hop it to him on the turf, and he gathered it into his body and held on. It would have doubled their run output.
The rest was all Conehead offense. Sting had two booming home runs to the right center gap. The first was legit. In the case of the second one, the 'gap' was the right center fielder, who really couldn't catch anything. Reggie sheepishly said 'I'll take it' when he came home, and yes we will, any time. Gotta love the turf, cause when the fielder blows it, it's really blown. Conehead!
Ol' G continues to be the hottest hitter on the team - he matched Sting's blasts with one of his own. Sting and Markley led the team with a perfect 4-4, but G and several others had three hits - Lefty and Chopper (both with two doubles), Dizzy D and Chuck. Nice to see Markley regain his stroke to right - Mexico must have done him some good. Someone else should have been 3-4 with a walk but we'll get to that.
Lefty now leads the team with average batting the opposite way - in his case of course righty. Although, ahem, there is an asterisk. Another lefty on the team, not mentioning any names, hit a clean 'single' to left right handed, and Dizzy D, must have been in awe or something at second base - he watched it get to the left fielder and tiptoed into third only to get forced out. The Conehead Unhit.
But the batter's not bitter, much, because now he knows he's better and fitter than Derek. And Betty Botter bought a bit of bitter butter. And he has this forum in which to vent. Really? Really? Really!
(Footrace anytime Derek, I would have to say that besides the 70 year old with two knee replacements, you are officially the slowest on the team).
(Now Chopper, don't be bringing up when I did the same thing to you).
Ok, I'm better now.
So we come to the last two games of the season, and due to several teams inconsistency, including us, it is quite a race, at least from third to seventh place. We are now tied with three teams for third place, with St. Mo's just behind. some of the interesting results:
St. Mo's beat Cal Gaels in one of the earlier unreported games. They have had some season - they have beaten us, the Gaels, and the Scouts, but lost to the Areolas and the Reds.
The Gaels beat the Waitlisters Monday. They are now tied for first with one loss. This leaves the door slightly open for us to get to first. Realistically the Waitlisters, who have the easiest finish will not lose two. But if we win out we have a chance to pass the Gaels (Broncos). The Scouts will probably end up at least tied with us, and they have tiebreaker so they would probably end up second.
There's more but I won't bore you with it. Including a very interesting tie-breaker rule if head to head is even unique to this league. The main thing is we need to continue to build a Head of steam going into the playoffs, and it starts tomorrow night against the Areolas (eight o'clock at Wilder ONE). They are also 6-3 this season but they haven't played many of the top teams, and they finish against the Scouts, so it's time to put them behind us. Then we will deal with the Broncos, er Gaels.
No Chuck this week. Will be strange.
Milestone:
Chuck 1500 ab (#1), how appropriate, why don't you take a day off?
In the mean time, the Coneheads are getting near the end of the regular season as well. We have been very up and down - fortunately we are not the only team. But we needed something to ease the pain when we took the turf Monday, and the scheduler was kind - they gave us the Usual Suspects to cure our hangover. These poor schleps are one of the handful of teams in the Orinda league that keep coming out every year to win once or twice against the other poor schlep teams, and then go home. Good for them, I respect that. Couldn't do it, but I respect them for it.
Monday night was the Usual Crushing. We scored twenty runs in the first three innings before they could even crack the scoreboard, and the end result was 25-1 before they cried uncle (score was reported 24-1 but does it really matter?). The defensive highlight (besides a couple of the Usual Chuck gems), was when a guy tried to go home on a delay 'steal' with two outs (why wasn't he running?) on a grounder to short - Chuck made a rare offline throw to me at first, and although I was heads up to get the ball off quickly to home, it was Gerry that made the great play. With my sore candy-ass arm, all I could do was one hop it to him on the turf, and he gathered it into his body and held on. It would have doubled their run output.
The rest was all Conehead offense. Sting had two booming home runs to the right center gap. The first was legit. In the case of the second one, the 'gap' was the right center fielder, who really couldn't catch anything. Reggie sheepishly said 'I'll take it' when he came home, and yes we will, any time. Gotta love the turf, cause when the fielder blows it, it's really blown. Conehead!
Ol' G continues to be the hottest hitter on the team - he matched Sting's blasts with one of his own. Sting and Markley led the team with a perfect 4-4, but G and several others had three hits - Lefty and Chopper (both with two doubles), Dizzy D and Chuck. Nice to see Markley regain his stroke to right - Mexico must have done him some good. Someone else should have been 3-4 with a walk but we'll get to that.
Lefty now leads the team with average batting the opposite way - in his case of course righty. Although, ahem, there is an asterisk. Another lefty on the team, not mentioning any names, hit a clean 'single' to left right handed, and Dizzy D, must have been in awe or something at second base - he watched it get to the left fielder and tiptoed into third only to get forced out. The Conehead Unhit.
But the batter's not bitter, much, because now he knows he's better and fitter than Derek. And Betty Botter bought a bit of bitter butter. And he has this forum in which to vent. Really? Really? Really!
(Footrace anytime Derek, I would have to say that besides the 70 year old with two knee replacements, you are officially the slowest on the team).
(Now Chopper, don't be bringing up when I did the same thing to you).
Ok, I'm better now.
So we come to the last two games of the season, and due to several teams inconsistency, including us, it is quite a race, at least from third to seventh place. We are now tied with three teams for third place, with St. Mo's just behind. some of the interesting results:
St. Mo's beat Cal Gaels in one of the earlier unreported games. They have had some season - they have beaten us, the Gaels, and the Scouts, but lost to the Areolas and the Reds.
The Gaels beat the Waitlisters Monday. They are now tied for first with one loss. This leaves the door slightly open for us to get to first. Realistically the Waitlisters, who have the easiest finish will not lose two. But if we win out we have a chance to pass the Gaels (Broncos). The Scouts will probably end up at least tied with us, and they have tiebreaker so they would probably end up second.
There's more but I won't bore you with it. Including a very interesting tie-breaker rule if head to head is even unique to this league. The main thing is we need to continue to build a Head of steam going into the playoffs, and it starts tomorrow night against the Areolas (eight o'clock at Wilder ONE). They are also 6-3 this season but they haven't played many of the top teams, and they finish against the Scouts, so it's time to put them behind us. Then we will deal with the Broncos, er Gaels.
No Chuck this week. Will be strange.
Milestone:
Chuck 1500 ab (#1), how appropriate, why don't you take a day off?
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