I'm trapped.
I'm like the rat in the cage, or is it hamster, the one who has that wheelie thing and keeps spinning and spinning on it, never getting anywhere. I start writing the blog, and it just spins and spins and spins.
This is because I have been spoiled all year, and most of my teams have been racking up the wins hand over fist. JFT sweeps the playoffs after going 12-2 in the regular season. Transdyn does even better: 12-0 and also on the way to sweeping through the playoffs. The Coneheads headed into the playoffs with four straight Orinda championships under our belts and on the heels of an inspiring win over Cal Bronco in the last week in which we broke out with 19 runs in the first inning.
Then it all unraveled in one lousy week, which since has stretched into two or three. I don't know how to write about losing. The journalist in me wants to single out the reasons we lose - just as I highlight the individual performances that give rise to our wins. But this is no good for team chemistry, who wants to read about their failures? And besides, you may not believe this but some of them are my own failures and I would have to take responsibility for those. Now we can't have that can we?
The one single thread in common between the change of fortune of the two teams, Transdyn and the Coneheads, is a common frustration: We have not had a full team on the field for either team for much of the last month. There are some injuries: Both teams lost the starting pitcher, Joe breaking his hand (and valiantly playing through the JFT playoffs) and Sir Guy with his degenerative knee condition. Reggie has been out for the year with his Tommy John surgery (and yes we miss you Sting), and there have been some personal issues that put softball in its place in perspective. But there have also been no-shows and people committing to playing and then not showing up. I know that not everyone has the level of commitment of those of us that are complete softball sluts, but it is surprising on teams this successful when there are so many no-shows.
Transdyn was bumped up to the higher D "Upper" league after going undefeated in the spring season. We are stuck in limbo land - too good for the lower division but perhaps not good enough for the upper. Or are we? Playing shorthanded, we started out the Fall League with a win, and even though we have lost three straight since, it has been by a total of nine runs. A player or two that missed the game shows up, and then we don't have three guys playing out of position, and just perhaps the result is different. So there is hope but we need to field a complete team.
The Coneheads - well let's face it, the playoff championship streak had to end some time. Just not like this: five projected starters missing the playoffs. You could feel the fall from grace in the air - it felt heavy like the hot muggy (for California) weekend weather for the playoff tournament. After winning the opener against the hapless Reds. we melted down in the Waitlister game. We all saw what happened, bad pitching and no hitting is an awful combination. Even with our two-inning wildness streak by three different pitchers, we only allowed nine runs, but on our end we scored six in the first two innings and then were shut out the rest of the way. What sucks is that the three long time rivals that more often than not have won the tournament (The Heads, Scouts and Cal Bronco) have cemented a mutual respect 'club' in this league and we all went down to the Waitlisters this year, who do nothing but nitpick the small stuff and this year at least managed to wear us all down.
You could tell we had no stomach for coming through the losers' bracket on Championship Sunday in our last game against the Broncos. This was just not our year. I can only think of one highlight worth mentioning for the whole day of three games - Gene made an absolutely tremendous catch on a long fly ball to left. He juggled it what must have been five times on the way to the ground and finally corralled the damn ball. It was truly remarkable concentration.
The beauty of softball is that we have the delusion that it will go on forever. There is always a new season and we started the fall season 0-0 like everyone else last Monday. We faced Pat's Bats - who I unapologetically say is not in our class when we are whole. But they beat us last Fall in the regular season and then again in the playoffs to end the Walnut Creek run of four straight championships - so we owed them and we played like it.
Chuck and Randy and a hobbled Lefty managed three hits each and most everyone had multiple hits. But the hero was one Patrick the Knight, son of Greg the Knight, who made his Conehead debut. He stepped up in the top of the third in a 2-2 game with runners on first and second, and promptly pummeled the ball, sending it nearly to Concord, like the shot heard round the world. Only Brandon Crawford hitting a grand slam in his Giants' debut tops this, but he took three ABs to get to that shot.
It went for the game winning RBI as well as it set the tone for the rest of the game. After we had a 14-3 lead in the sixth, Pat's Bats rallied for seven to make it closer, but the end outcome was never in any real doubt. We had the real Pat's Bat.
So there is hope for both teams - but please get back on the winning track for good. I hate losing, I hate having to write about losing, and really hate that damn wheel.
Milestones:
Transdyn
8/4
D 250 h (#12)
Bert 50 h (#35)
8/11
Brian 50 ab (#50)
8/18
D 50 2b (#6)
Pauly 650 ab (#8)
D 400 ab (#12)
8/25
Cage 120 2b (#1)
Monty 80 bb (#4)
Jas 250 r (#7)
Rene 150 ab (#27)
Coneheads
8/15, Game 1
Gene 550 h (#7)
Lefty 150 r (#19)
Haz 150 h (#21)
8/16, Game 2
Chuck 1700 ab (#1)
Ol' G 300 r (#13)
8/16, Game 3
None
8/24
Chuck 900 r (#1)
Chuck 60 3b (#1)
I'm like the rat in the cage, or is it hamster, the one who has that wheelie thing and keeps spinning and spinning on it, never getting anywhere. I start writing the blog, and it just spins and spins and spins.
This is because I have been spoiled all year, and most of my teams have been racking up the wins hand over fist. JFT sweeps the playoffs after going 12-2 in the regular season. Transdyn does even better: 12-0 and also on the way to sweeping through the playoffs. The Coneheads headed into the playoffs with four straight Orinda championships under our belts and on the heels of an inspiring win over Cal Bronco in the last week in which we broke out with 19 runs in the first inning.
Then it all unraveled in one lousy week, which since has stretched into two or three. I don't know how to write about losing. The journalist in me wants to single out the reasons we lose - just as I highlight the individual performances that give rise to our wins. But this is no good for team chemistry, who wants to read about their failures? And besides, you may not believe this but some of them are my own failures and I would have to take responsibility for those. Now we can't have that can we?
The one single thread in common between the change of fortune of the two teams, Transdyn and the Coneheads, is a common frustration: We have not had a full team on the field for either team for much of the last month. There are some injuries: Both teams lost the starting pitcher, Joe breaking his hand (and valiantly playing through the JFT playoffs) and Sir Guy with his degenerative knee condition. Reggie has been out for the year with his Tommy John surgery (and yes we miss you Sting), and there have been some personal issues that put softball in its place in perspective. But there have also been no-shows and people committing to playing and then not showing up. I know that not everyone has the level of commitment of those of us that are complete softball sluts, but it is surprising on teams this successful when there are so many no-shows.
Transdyn was bumped up to the higher D "Upper" league after going undefeated in the spring season. We are stuck in limbo land - too good for the lower division but perhaps not good enough for the upper. Or are we? Playing shorthanded, we started out the Fall League with a win, and even though we have lost three straight since, it has been by a total of nine runs. A player or two that missed the game shows up, and then we don't have three guys playing out of position, and just perhaps the result is different. So there is hope but we need to field a complete team.
The Coneheads - well let's face it, the playoff championship streak had to end some time. Just not like this: five projected starters missing the playoffs. You could feel the fall from grace in the air - it felt heavy like the hot muggy (for California) weekend weather for the playoff tournament. After winning the opener against the hapless Reds. we melted down in the Waitlister game. We all saw what happened, bad pitching and no hitting is an awful combination. Even with our two-inning wildness streak by three different pitchers, we only allowed nine runs, but on our end we scored six in the first two innings and then were shut out the rest of the way. What sucks is that the three long time rivals that more often than not have won the tournament (The Heads, Scouts and Cal Bronco) have cemented a mutual respect 'club' in this league and we all went down to the Waitlisters this year, who do nothing but nitpick the small stuff and this year at least managed to wear us all down.
You could tell we had no stomach for coming through the losers' bracket on Championship Sunday in our last game against the Broncos. This was just not our year. I can only think of one highlight worth mentioning for the whole day of three games - Gene made an absolutely tremendous catch on a long fly ball to left. He juggled it what must have been five times on the way to the ground and finally corralled the damn ball. It was truly remarkable concentration.
The beauty of softball is that we have the delusion that it will go on forever. There is always a new season and we started the fall season 0-0 like everyone else last Monday. We faced Pat's Bats - who I unapologetically say is not in our class when we are whole. But they beat us last Fall in the regular season and then again in the playoffs to end the Walnut Creek run of four straight championships - so we owed them and we played like it.
Chuck and Randy and a hobbled Lefty managed three hits each and most everyone had multiple hits. But the hero was one Patrick the Knight, son of Greg the Knight, who made his Conehead debut. He stepped up in the top of the third in a 2-2 game with runners on first and second, and promptly pummeled the ball, sending it nearly to Concord, like the shot heard round the world. Only Brandon Crawford hitting a grand slam in his Giants' debut tops this, but he took three ABs to get to that shot.
It went for the game winning RBI as well as it set the tone for the rest of the game. After we had a 14-3 lead in the sixth, Pat's Bats rallied for seven to make it closer, but the end outcome was never in any real doubt. We had the real Pat's Bat.
So there is hope for both teams - but please get back on the winning track for good. I hate losing, I hate having to write about losing, and really hate that damn wheel.
Milestones:
Transdyn
8/4
D 250 h (#12)
Bert 50 h (#35)
8/11
Brian 50 ab (#50)
8/18
D 50 2b (#6)
Pauly 650 ab (#8)
D 400 ab (#12)
8/25
Cage 120 2b (#1)
Monty 80 bb (#4)
Jas 250 r (#7)
Rene 150 ab (#27)
Coneheads
8/15, Game 1
Gene 550 h (#7)
Lefty 150 r (#19)
Haz 150 h (#21)
8/16, Game 2
Chuck 1700 ab (#1)
Ol' G 300 r (#13)
8/16, Game 3
None
8/24
Chuck 900 r (#1)
Chuck 60 3b (#1)
Larry 600 r (#3)
D 450 ab (#17)
Lefty 100 g (#19)Knight (sr) 250 ab (#26)
Bruce 100 ab (#31)
Bruce 100 ab (#31)
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