It's...Underdog!!!

(Make sure you play this while reading the following...)

Transdyn started the season 1-3. Missing our starting left fielder the whole season, nominally the most consistent hitter in all rec league softball. Two outfielders injured in the first game, not to be seen again as of yet, so we have been playing with three of our five regular outfielders out.

Number three hitter, one of the most feared hitters in Pleasanton, coaching his kids, and missing all the 6:30 games. In a season that due to the limited number of teams five of twelve games are at 6:30.

New power hitter from last year - in LA for three weeks for work training. Rams busy entertaining. Chopper gets a promotion and is acting the part of dedicated worker. Hama - well the mail must be delivered? Super sub Zach from last year, don't have his phone number, didn't email him in time.

Only nine guys could show and oh by the way our newest new blood with the speed of youth, Mark, has a bad hammy so we take the field with three outfielders, average age 48 or so.

And yours truly the Coach, is late because I got stuck at work, and technically we started the game with eight players (for a few batters).

So the table was set. Playing the first place Ringers, who started off the season so hot, 5-0. We have crawled back into the race with a couple of wins, but this one was a must have. Win it, and we are one out barely half way through the season. Lose it, and we're three games plus tiebreaker guaranteed, which might as well be four games out with five left.

Play it again: Underdog!

And they scored four in the first. But they also started with nine players, and we answered on a couple of walks and a smash triple by Cage and a gapper double by Tom, who might as well face the fact that he is a permanent fixture for this season at least.

4-3, not bad, even 6-3 not too bad after they added on in the second. And then both teams got cold. We were colder and going into the bottom of the fifth we were down 8-4.

And then a remarkable thing happened. Play it again! We loaded the bases with none out (starting with Sir Guy, my motto: bottom of the order hits, we win). and it was off to the races when we turned over the order. A big play was when Cage hit a grounder toward the hole with bases loaded and the third baseman took it and ran to third and tried to gun down the old guy running home. I ran 'inside' and he nailed me in the back, and that let the inning extend. Mario's next hit was thrown around and we ended up taking a 10-8 lead and using up most of the remaining time.

Then the Ringers 'discovered' their 'new bat', a pink thing that if it isn't juiced, sure hits like a shaved bat. They ended up with the bases loaded and their power hitter up and he golfed one over the fence for a 12-10 lead. They should have added more, Sir Guy and our defense did a good job keeping it there. Pauly had a tremendous game at the hot corner - he must have had a third of our outs.

In the end old age and treachery took over. Monty started with one of our ten walks (patience). After a fly out Jas did the same. But when a ground out ensued, it was looking grim - still two down and two outs. Cage extended it with a single; Monty scored and Jason went in to run at second as the tying run.

Mighty Mario stepped in and looked around, and saw the Hole. They were playing him to pull as he usually does, but we know he can hit to all fields. And he hit a perfect rope to the LC gap, and with two outs, Jas and Cage took off at full speed...tie game and then the walkoff! The Ringers made a desperation throw, and it was actually closer than it seemed it would be, but the joy was in Transville that night!

Play it again: Underdog!

Milestones:

Mario        200 rbi (#10) (how appropriate)
Jas            100 g (#13)

Mexican Bud

Back in the 80s, my original softball team, the Lyons, were co-sponsored by one of the first pubs that served upwards of 30 microbrewery beers, Lyons Brewery in Dublin. We were so cool because we drank 'good beer', and joined the 'Connoisseur Club' which rewarded you with a t-shirt when you tried your 50th different kind of beer. Remember, this was when they handed out trophies for softball championships. The BC era (Before Cotton), if you will. So the Beer Cotton was about all that you could hope for.

At Lyons, the owner hung various bits of memorabilia from the ceiling. One of the artifacts was a bottle of Corona beer, with a necktie wrapped around it. The thing was, was that it was only yuppies who thought that Corona meant Mexican beer, hence the tie and the slightly arrogant attitude that Corona was the Budweiser of Mexico (depending on your taste in beer, this might be true).

Now we are not as cool, but we have a lot more Cotton.

Well, Joe made the Corona team look just like ordinary swill last Sunday. He one-hit them, let me repeat ONE-HIT them, and JFT just plastered the Corona Crushers, 17-0.

Joe had a chip on his shoulder (quelle surprise!). The last two years Corona had lobbied to remain in the Lower division successfully, and took easy Cotton. This year, their argument continued, and apparently it emphasized the fact that the only team in the upper division they could beat was JFT. Despite Gerry's long term statistics, this has been true at times the last couple of years: The last two years we were 2-2 against them, and they eliminated us from the post-season in 2010.

So a chip it is planted firmly on our shoulders. And we made them pay.

Yeah, yeah, it was Mothers' Day, and they were missing some players (although I looked around and except for the SS it looked like Corona's to me). But one hit is one hit in slow pitch softball - Joe owned them.

We blasted out with a continuation of our last inning the week before - eight straight hits after a lead-off fly out, and an 8-0 lead after one (it was essentially over). Chopper had the highlights, a two run double in the first and a bomb over RF when they played him cheap for a two run homer in the third, giving him team high four RBIs. Unfair Goose to the runner in front of him, the rules clearly state that there is no Goose unless you catch him. On the way to the dugout does NOT count. The Geese in the outfield sat down in protest.

But D had the Big Blast. With the reduced compression balls, it would be a nearly impossible shot to hit the trees beyond right field these days. But Derek nearly pulled it off. He slugged it so far he jogged around the bases, like the Babe himself.

Randy had a clutch two out two run single in the 4th to make sure we would end it in 4 1/2 innings. He and Bruce and the Knight had perfect 3-3 games.

Record against Corona:
2008: 26-3, 12-3, 7-7, 15-1, Playoffs 10-7 (4-0-1)
2009: 12-11, 13-7, 17-2 (3-0)
2010: 7-3, 13-6, 10-8, Playoffs 16-4, 7-11 (4-1)
2011: 11-7, 14-4, 4-3 (3-0)
2012: 12-11, 4-16 (1-1)
2013: 11-6, 3-9 (1-1)
2014: 17-0 (1-0, Total 17-3-1)

Milestone:
Chopper        100 h (#12)

I Love To Laugh, Ha Ha Ha Ha Ha

Let's face it, it's been a rough start this year for Transdyn.

First it starts when Transdyn gets bought out by a company called KapschTraffikKom or something. Lot of germanic K's. Never good when there are changes at the top...you never know how that will effect the purse strings, the after game Bibimbap, etc.

Ok, just kidding, it's rec league softball. As long as we have Monty, and he doesn't start speaking German to Sir Guy on the mound, we'll be fine there. And it's KapschTrafficCom, and they are Austrian not German.

But really, we lose Timmy to injury for at least this season to shoulder woes, and then we lose Rene and Coop in the opener, both with severe ankle sprains. Who knows when they will be back. That's 3/5ths of our outfield folks.

Thank god for Jas coming back, allowing Hama to roam the OF or we'd be in deep weeds. Wait it's Jas...we are deep in the weeds.

But I digress. Despite this, we have enough talent to overcome such obstacles, or so I think. We scuffled for a couple of games, and found ourselves looking up in the standings, glad that everyone will be in the playoffs this season.

And then along come the Ballers...they seem to be the antidote for us. We already had hurt them 17-3 the first time around. Last week we had to face them without three of our big boppers, Alberto and D and Chopper, and we had to scramble to get 10 players by game time. Jason brought out a new guy, Mark. A Youth! Can run! Can catch! Can hit!

We did nothing in the first, and gave up two in the second, and then the season finally kicked in...we sent 17 batters to the plate and scored twelve of them, and the game was pretty much over. The young Ballers could just gape open mouthed as guys old enough to be not only their fathers but even grandpas showed them how it is done. We only had one run in, when there were two outs - then starting with Jas at the top of the lineup, the next eleven batters hit safely - that's one more than batting around with two outs. Mostly it was singles, with a little Baller defensive help - or lack of same - and then strode up our new kid, with the bases loaded, and he promptly cleared them with a shot over the left fielder's head for a triple. He scored for the last run of the inning, and it was pretty much over except waiting out the clock to the fifth inning.

We put up six more in the third - Pauly hit one of his two bombs to the fence, this one for a double, the other for a triple in the fourth. In the mean time the Ballers were doing nothing against Sir Guy and our defense. The Kid had a nice running catch on a potential gapper for one highlight, and Jas dove to his left a couple of times for our defensive highlights.

Other heroes were Heffe with a perfect 4-4 night, Tom the super sub 3-4 and Sir Guy 2-2 plus a sac fly. Mario and Jason broke out of their mini-slumps with a couple of knocks each.

Yes we are in the playoffs, but we can still go 9-3 and we are already in second due to tiebreakers, and the Blue Dots did us a favor by giving the Ringers their first loss. All is well.

Milestones:
4/8
Cage        400 r (#3)
4/15
Sir Guy    400 h (#7)
Cage        750 ab (#7)
Jas           10 sf (#13)
4/22
Jas           350 ab (#12)
D             200 h (#13)
Hama       100 r (#16)
4/29
D             300 ab (#13)
Rams       100 r (#17)
Hama       200 ab (#22)
5/6
Pauly        40 ab (#8)

Mario       500 ab (#10)

Wake Up Call

I woke up today at 7, forgetting it was Saturday, a little panicked to be late to work. Then I remembered it was Saturday. Whew...back to sleep.

And then I had the dream. In it, JFT/Coneheads' own Chuckster came over as I was just waking up. He had made and brought a really STRONG triple espresso...and he threw it in my face!

Well I thought, what was that all about...and it came to me. You all miss the blog so much, that this was my 'wake up' call to get back to the post. And leading the way as he does in the lineup, Chuck. Because it has been another week and a game ago, and Chuck still had received no love for getting the walk off hit to beat Pinky's and make this a season. In our great comeback two weeks ago, when we scored eight in the bottom of the sixth with time running out and two outs, Joe walked to load the bases for Chuck. He slashed a single, two runs scored, walk off! And then - everyone mobbed Joe! Chuck moaned and whined, there is no love for our hero. Well Chuck, here it is in black and white! High Five!

Not to mention he went 4 for 5 and started a double play, and started that sixth inning rally with a single.

It was a weird game due to the game being timed to go against one of the big tournament weekends, this one in Vegas. That meant half of Pinky's team was gone against us losing Derek and Reg (who?). But Pinky's just went to the well of players and fielded a team that may have actually been better than the regulars. We played like we usually do against Pinky's...which is to say let's get this over so we can get to our beer and talk about how they have our number. We have had many games against them that were competitive close losses and some blowouts. In this one, they just didn't seem that keen on pulling away, despite how badly we were playing.

We did scratch out 10 runs by the fateful sixth, so it wasn't out of reach. Knight's season debut was a big factor, as he went 4-4 with a triple and four RBIs. As were cameo appearances by Nomar Dacey, who had his usual 4-4 with a double, and Larry, who held Pinky's in check in the middle innings after a rough seven run third. But it was the five hits to start the sixth and the three sandwiching Joe's walk that produced the Conehead inning to end it. Joe had the walk on, but Chuck had the walkoff.

And speaking of Wake Up Calls, we repeated the pattern last week against previously winless Oak Park Construction. We napped through five innings once again, giving Oak Park hope as we were tied 6-6 after five. And that was with our stellar infield turning three double plays to keep Oak Park from running away.

When OPC turned over four runs in the top of the sixth with time awasting, it looked kinda bad for the good guys. Then we had a true Conehead inning, and scored 11 before time ran out. Yours truly started it with a single, but everyone was in on the action as we batted around plus half the lineup, all told 17 hitters. The game winner scored on a force out by D, but we weren't done. Knight and G loaded the bases with hits, and when I hit a ten hopper past the first baseman, two runs scored to double the lead, and they were done. The game ended on an error, a hit and then the pitcher completely lost it, walking the last three batters to force in runs. Final score 17-10.

The real game MVP was Randy. He went 4-4 with a homer, a double, and four runs scored, and an assortment of plays at the hot corner. If he just had some speed, he might have been able to get a triple to complete the cycle.

Honorable mentions go to Haz and Joe. Both went 3-3 with a walk, and have started the season hot. And of course Nomah, who really can't stay away. He's 'retired', which means he has almost played as many games as the regulars.

Pleasant dreams, next game is less than 24 hours away. Hope no one hits you in the face with hot coffee.

Milestones:
4/6
Lefty        350 ab (#4)
Haz          300 ab (#6)
D             100 ab (#18)
4/13
Chuck      250 h (#1)
Chopper  100 rbi (#5)
Joe          300 ab (#7)
Ol' G       10 2b (#13)
4/27
Gene        20 bb (#9)
Gene        250 ab (#11)
Chopper  50 r (#14)
Randy      100 ab (#19)
5/4
Randy      1st hr