Red Smokes the Forest

Bob Muegge brought a smoked salmon lunch to share with the team and other Creaker hangers-on after Red's game today. It was a fine dining experience.

In a prelude to lunch, Muegge shut down a potent Forest lineup for the last three innings, allowing but three runs in his five inning stint and Red won going away 16-8.

It was a tight game until the eighth inning. Forest took their last lead at 5-3 after 3 1/2 innings, but we answered with a five spot in the bottom of the fourth. Seven of the first eight hitters in our lineup got hits and Bill Martinsen hit a line drive to plate the fifth run with one out. James Del Rio's hustle double was the only extra base hit in the frame.

After we traded three run sixth innings (again Del Rio had the biggest blow, a two run triple, and we scored all our runs with two outs), Muegge pitched a scoreless seventh, but the most significant inning was the top of the eighth, when he held the first four Forest hitters to a single hit.

In the bottom, the bottom of our lineup got us the start we wanted. Tony Gorgone (3-3 with a double) and Coach Larry Rafferty set the table for the top of the lineup and Kevin Kane, Rich Brown, Randy Crase, Del Rio, and yours truly finished the five run outburst. While it didn't completely seal the deal with just 16-8 lead going into the ninth, Muegge took care of it from there.

The only home run we hit was by Larry Fogli. It was a gapper to right center and Larry just put his head down and started running. And running. And running. It may have been ill advised but when he tried for third Forest threw wildly and guess what? He just kept running to complete the circuit. Run, Larry, Run!

Along the way to holding the opponent to eight runs there was some very good defense. In the second, a certain weak armed right fielder managed to catch a ball and toss it to Gorgone, who made a strong throw home to complete a double play by a step. In the fifth, LT Thompson ranged (can we use that word with Creakers?) far to his right at 1B for a grounder and raced over to beat the runner to first for the third out. I think he was just showing off his lately discovered speed. In the critical eighth, Crase playing rover made an exceptional play on a hard shot up the middle. Kane made a running catch on a ball that was twisting in the wind for the second out, and Gorgone used his boiler to knock down a ball and throw to first for the third out.

No one was perfect in the batter's box but Kane, Brown, Del Rio (double, triple), Mark Pitzlin (2 doubles), LT (triple), and Gorgone (double) all had three hits, and four others had two.

Wish we didn't have a break next week. We are smoking!

Double Trouble

It's easy to write about a win, especially a tournament victory. Everyone is a hero, and contributed to the greatness that we all agree we are.

Not so much when we lose.

The Coneheads had an unprecedented August, losing both the Walnut Creek final to Advance Construction and in the Orinda semifinal game, and had to watch the Old Scouts and Cal Broncos battle it out, both teams decimated, perhaps by us pushing them both by losing our last games to them Sunday by one run each.

Yeah we were shorthanded and one of these years, I have a dream that we will be at full strength going into the Orinda playoffs in particular. You just don't lose the firepower of Bruce, Chopper, and then Mark and Reggie to injury without it diminishing the returns.

But I won't complain - we made it nearly to the end of each weekend, and most teams would take that. We just have higher standards.

I won't go into excruciating detail about the games and the weekends. You will just have to live in your own memories on that one. What I will do, though, is call out three players for being exceptional in the playoffs, not only as players but as men.

Second runner up is the Sting. He has had a serious illness for the last almost full year, and he did everything humanly possible and then more to get back on the field with us. He hasn't yet been given the OK to play outfield, but he managed to DH or catch for us in the last three games of the Orinda regular season. In his second game back, he only went 5-5 with two doubles, a homer and three RBIs. In the same game he made a tremendous catch playing catcher on a popup up the line, and on a putout at home from the outfield, he stretched full out and kept the plate to reward the strong throw I think from Bruce.

On playoff weekend he had to choose between us and making a mandatory appearance for his tournament team - he chose split the weekend but to be with us on Finals day. And then when the Doc said no, no, no you can't play both days, he chose us. Not easy for him. His reward for his giving 110% every time he takes the field was a pulled hammy in our last game Sunday. It was then that I knew we weren't going to prevail. But it was great to have his smiling face back with us.

Runner up was Pope, who locked down left field on the Coneheads as a 'kid' of about 27 many years ago. Seems like it was 27 years ago but I think it was only twelve or thirteen.

I also knew that it would be near impossible to win the Orinda finals without him since he had to leave at noon on Sunday. Somehow it made losing a little easier. He hit .700 in the Walnut Creek series with our team's only two home runs and both our game winning RBIs among the seven he collected. In Orinda, he hit .688 and a slugging percentage of 1.437. He hit three home runs in four games - including the first ever by a Conehead over the fence at Wilder. Thanks Dave for collecting that souvenir. And he started the greatest play of the weekend, a 7-5-4-5-4-6 rundown in the first scouts game. Things surely looked up when we routed them 14-4 in that one.

Pope's performance would have been epic, except that he was completely upstaged on the Orinda weekend. Ol' G just came out there on a mission, and if the rest of us played with half his heart and talent we would have swept through the weekend easily.

His line: 13 for 15, good for an .867 average. He knocked in 17 runs, and had the game winner in both games we won. His on base percentage was .813. The seventeen RBIs were fourth in Conehead Orinda playoff history and fifth overall - Pope had 20 once and 19 twice, but they were in seven and six game series, respectively, so G now has the most in a four game series. Second to him this year was Pope with ten. It seemed every time we needed a clutch hit, G was up and he came through.

The great thing about sports is that once it's over, it's over. At least for me. Time to start anew and we all start 0-0. Time for revenge on Cream and Clear, starting tomorrow!

Orinda Milestones:
7/24
None

7/27
Chopper        350 h (#16)
Haze             300 ab (#22)

7/31
D                  400 h (#14)
Ol' G            250 g (#13)
Mark            50 ab (#39)

8/7
Sting            60 hr (#2)
Heffe           1650 ab (#2)

8/12 Game 1
Larry            1400 ab (#3)
Ol' G            450 rbi (#6)

8/12 Game 2

Larry            80 2b (#7)
Gene            1050 ab (#7)
Ol' G            550 h (#8)

8/13 Game 1

Lefty            200 r (#18)

Haze            100 g (#20)

8/13 Game 2

Pope             150 2b (#2)

Ol' G            350 r (#12)

Walnut Creek Milestones:
7/30
Knight        150 g (#4)

8/5
Game 1:
None

Game 2:
Lefty       40 bb (#4)
Pope        50 rbi (#17)

8/6
Game 1:
Ol' G       400 ab (#8)
Pope        50 r (#19)
Pope        100 ab (#22)

Game 2:
Chopper 350 ab (#10)
D            150 h (#13)

Red Eclipses Black

Don't ever give up your spot in the field. You just might be Wally Pipp'ed.

It took me two weeks to turn two double plays. This doesn't happen very often at first base. You just don't get that many chances, and have to perform when you get the chance.

I moved off first base for two innings today, and Lamont 'LT' Thompson turned the feat twice in his two innings there. The first was a hard grounder and he stepped on the bag and wheeled to second and threw a strike to nab the runner coming from first. The second was even better. He snared a hot shot, and had the presence to tag the runner trying to go to second and then stepped on first base. I may never get back there.

Today Red's hitters may have been somewhat blinded by Monday's eclipse, but our gloves found the ball on defense enough to prevail over Black 17-9. Besides LT's great day, Tony Gorgone was a vacuum cleaner at second base, and Mark Pitzlin made a couple of huge running catches on short bloopers to the middle of the field. Al Kidwell started a nifty 11-4-3 double play in the eighth, and he managed to get a force out on a very bad hop grounder in the second.

The game was close through four, in fact it was 7-7 and had the markings of a battle to the end. We took a 3-1 lead after one, but Black answered in the second with three of their own and when we answered back with three they repeated the feat. So after three full it was tied, and anyone's game.

This is when LT and the defense took over. We only allowed two runs the rest of the game.

The offense sputtered but put up five in the fifth and sixth, and that was the difference in the game. The hitting was spread throughout the lineup - everyone had at least two hits, except Rich "A walk's a hit") Brown, who had a sac fly and an RBI bases loaded walk, and Larry Fogli who did have a clutch RBI single in the no out five run fifth to clean things up. The bottom of the lineup produced eight runs and the top nine - that's how balanced it was.

Kevin Kane was the best of us with four straight singles. Jerry Ginochio was 3-3 and Pitzlin, Bill Marthinsen and yours truly joined them with three hits. Gorgone had the only real power hit of the day, a middle gapper good for a triple.

We might even make the playoffs at this rate!

Walkathon

I thought I was done with Walkathons when my kids graduated elementary school. No such luck. Transdyn walked away to a 27-13 victory over Cup Check with sixteen walks gifted to us. We had pitches behind us, flat pitches not being called (perhaps out of sympathy), three pitchers, walks with the bases empty, walks with the bases loaded, you name it. Bubba of Forrest Gump fame didn't have more shrimp recipes than we had walks.

By the way, I won the contest with four walks, tying a career high. Only Pauly failed to walk, but then he was 6-6 (with six RBIs). He swung at everything, which might explain his multiple hits that blooped into empty green spaces.

In between, we tattooed the ball all over the yard. Although Cup Check had five bombs over the fence (the team name maybe should be Bat Check), six of our players hit doubles, and D only failed to get one because he was admiring his hit to the fence that he thought was out (the wind knocked it down, or so the excuse went). We had innings of eight, six and five runs in the rout.

Rusty was perfect with three hits and three walks, Hama and Nick also had three hits, everyone scored a run, and everyone had a hit except me and my four walks.

There were no defensive plays to speak of except a couple of nice catches on shallow popups by B and Hama and Jay, and a double play or two.

The win leaves us in a virtual three way tie for first at 5-1, but we own the tiebreakers on both tied opponents. Win out and cotton is ours. A tall order perhaps but maybe there will be more gifts down the line.

Milestones:
8/8
None

8/15
D            350 h (#11)
D            550 ab (#12)

Red Butler 21, Scarlett Ohara 13

The Red Menace kept rolling today, roasting Scarlett 21-13.

Our MO lately is to build a lead, tease the other team (and worrying our coach) by letting them into the game, and then slamming the door in the late innings.

Today we built leads of 12-0 through three and a half, and then 13-3 through the top of the fifth. But then the Other Red came roaring back led by the bottom half of their order, and made it a 13-10 game.

It stayed close for a couple of innings, and going into the bottom of the seventh it was just 14-10.

Then the stuff of legends. Scarlett had their leadoff batter aboard, and Lee Namanny, nominally the most feared hitter in Creakdom, stepped to the plate. He had already crushed a three run home run down the left field line when we dared pitch him inside in the seven run fifth.

This time Lee was just thinking about getting the runner to third with no outs. He stung the ball into right field, but Oh No, our first baseman leapt to the skies, and snagged the line drive! I'm not naming names in deference to Greg Slauson. The runner, sure the ball was ticketed to right field, was half way to second, and the slow footed first baseman was able to beat him back and tag him out.

Now everyone agreed he got off the ground. Some said you could put a credit card under his feet, some said he rose at least three feet or five feet or more off the ground. Me, I'm not saying, until I see the video. But the play killed their rally, and Rich Brown ran down a deep fly in the right center gap to end the inning.

Then said first baseman led off the eighth with a walk, and the bottom of the order put up five runs to go up by nine. Scarlett only responded with one, and when James Del Rio crushed a two run homer in the ninth, it put it out of reach. There was talk about Scarlett's 16 run open inning last week, but it was not to be today.

You don't hold Scarlett to five scoreless innings out of nine without a lot of great pitching and defense. Jerry Ginochio shut them out the first three innings and only gave up three total in his four innings. Bob Muegge had the rough seven run fifth, but a lot of that was we faltered on defense for an inning, and then he settled down, allowing only three the rest of the way.

Tony Gorgone made two great catches from second base, in the fourth and the sixth, ranging into shallow right to make over the shoulder catches. On a third blooper to that area also in the fourth, he nearly collided with Randy Crase playing right field, but Randy made a shoestring catch. In the fifth, Lamont Thompson cut off a ball in the 5-6 hole and got a force at second. And then put the icing on the cake by scooping a ball in the dirt when Al Kidwell tossed it low after making a great stop at rover. Al also made a great pickup of a ball heading into center field and tossing to Howard Davis covering second to end the game.

On the offensive side, we were a little inconsistent, but a few guys had great games. Of course Del Rio came in at 5-5 with the ninth inning home run. The bottom of the lineup did a lot of damage, and LT, who arrived late as usual, and thus batted last, cleaned up four runs with three hits, including a slicing shot down the right field line good for a triple.

Gorgone was hot today, a perfect 3-3 plus a walk. Davis continued his hot streak with three hits of his own, as did Kidwell and Crase. Davis and Kidwell had RBI doubles, and Crase got a one out triple to start a rally.

Past the half way mark of the last half. One team to go to run the table (he said without jinxing anything) (hopefully).

Red Justice

I don't want to take too much credit for this, I really don't. But the play of the game, the last play of the game, was an unassisted double play turned by yours truly.

The set up is that our Red team jumped all over Royal with a near max 19 runs in the first four innings to go up 19-4. After a scoreless fifth, Royal came up with seven in the top of the sixth to make a game of it - they're too good to go down that quietly. We scored three in the seventh to establish a 22-11 lead but we knew it wasn't over.

Things were getting a little testy with little issues here and there, but then went a step further in the eighth. Since we were up by 10, Royal declared that we should 'flip-flop'. Our manager knew that the rule only comes into play when it is the visiting team up by 10 or more (Rule 5.12). Doesn't make sense otherwise, you'd end up with potentially the home team batting twice in the case of a tie or the visiting team taking a lead.

At any rate, we stood our ground, but it didn't matter as we went out 1-2-3 in the bottom of the eighth. In the top of the ninth, Royal clawed their way back, and five runs later with just one out, Steve 'Mongo' Alvarez stood on first as a courtesy runner from home for Rich Shuler, who had singled and driven in the what turned out to be the last Royal runs of the game.

One of the players that had scored on the hit by Shuler is arguably the fastest player in the league. They wanted him to run for Mongo. We insisted that you can't have a courtesy runner for a courtesy runner. They wanted to see it in the rule book, which, of course, we did not have in our back pockets. The thing about it is, is that a bunch of old men are all arguing and no one is really sure about it but they are all bluster and very 'sure' about their viewpoint. I don't exclude myself from this. There are probably a handful of Creakers who REALLY know the rules without looking them up, and even they are susceptible to senior moments.

So I looked it up when I got home - sure enough there it is clear as day (Rule 8.16 (A)): "A courtesy runner may not be replaced by a courtesy runner except for injury causing the removal of the original runner permanently from the game." And I didn't see Mongo limping, at least not any more than normal, and certainly he was not coming out of the game.

But we caved in and the runner took over his spot on first. Justice was about to be served.

Because the next batter, a lefty, hit a hot liner to my right at first base, just above my shoe tops. I managed to snag it before it hit the ground. The runner, assuming it was going through, had taken off, and had to back the engine up. I was a little too slow to catch him going back to first but he overran the bag, thinking this was Creaker-legal. Not this time, I tagged him out sliding back into first from foul territory, and that was it, game over.

Gives one hope that there is justice in the world, or will be eventually.

Hitting heroes abounded for the Big Red. Howard Davis continued his reputation as Clark Kent/Superman. He was 5-5 with five RBIs, including a two run triple. He drove in at least one run every time he was at bat. Lamont Thompson was 4-4 with a booming triple and a two run two out blooper in the first. Mark Pitzlin knocked in four, including a three run bomb, but was robbed twice by great plays in the Royal outfield. James Del Rio was also 4-4, including a home run. Someone else was 3-3 plus a walk and scored four runs. Everyone had at least one hit as we hit .633 as a team.

Coach Larry Rafferty joked that he had two errors and a K in the same inning and that might be a dubious record, but he neglected to say he started a double play at second and was the middle man in another one that stifled a Royal rally. Tony Gorgone made a couple of fine plays at 2B.

Jerry Ginochio settled down after a rough start adjusting to the gusty wind, and only allowed four runs in his four innings. Muegge, as usual shut the door in the latter innings.

Batman (and Robin)

Note: Severe artistic license has been taken in this one. Started it Sunday so now it's a little behind the times; tomorrow is playoffs. But anyway...here it is.

When they were growing up together as two carefree young lads, our own Bruce "Willie Mays" Reed and Lefty were star athletes together.

Bruce was the smooth fair sandy haired one with the rocket arm, and probably got all the girls. Lefty looked at this and developed his class clown persona, and got the laughs, and learned to pitch, and it was all good. Batman and Robin, fighting crime everywhere.

But deep down, Lefty watched Bruce, who by his own admission practiced countless hours at this, make basket catch after basket catch, and was just waiting for his turn. For years...until finally in Sunday's Conehead game against the Hammers, the ball floated into short left field, and he had a bead on it, and this was it! and kerplunk, it hit him in the gut and popped to the ground, and the moment vanished, never to return.

Dang. The best-laid schemes o' mice an' men.

In truth, Lefty made probably the best catch of the game, which we won 19-7 (or 20-7, according to the league web site). It was on a sinking liner to right center that he managed to track down.

And we turned a couple of double plays on the infield, and Chopper made a nice grab of a popup behind the plate. We played without a schmiddler and then finished with nine after Randy got hurt.

But the game belonged to Bruce "Wayne (Batman)" Reed, who gunned out not one, but two Hammers trying to challenge his arm running home from third. We were only up something like 14-2 the first time, why not try to beat the best arm in the league? And then in a stunning repeat they did it again in the late innings. In both cases the throw was right on the money on a bounce, and Chopper made nice pickups. On the second the runner on second was dancing off the base and eventually took off for third. Chopper was doing his best Self impression celebrating the out at home and actually had his back to the field. In a case of classic Hammerbating, he then woke up, and turned and threw a strike to Knight at third who slapped a quick tag on the runner just in the nick of time. Inning over!

Speaking of class clowns, Lefty decided that this was the game to debut his right handed batting. And promptly fouled enough off to get a strike three called. Beer, Here!

Lefty - look at your friend, maybe some practice is in order here.

Bruce was 4-4 to finish a perfect game. Lefty managed to get a couple of hits and a walk and a sac fly good for three RBIs the rest of his times up. Haze also drove in three with two hits and a walk. Heffe, Knight, and Chopper all had three hits.

Milestone:
Knight        150 g (#6)

Walk On By

Quick - who sang the song in the title of this post? Only Bill may be old enough to remember this one...no cheating...*

3-1 in the Fall Season is a great start for Transdyn/Kapsch, especially considering one of the wins is against defending playoff champion the Brews Bros.

And then there is winning the ugly ones, this week in the case of beating Pitches Be Crazy 9-6. We were shorthanded, but not desperately so, missing three regular outfielders, plus super sub Gregg. We didn't hit, well not much by our standards, no extra base hits at all.

But we walked, and walked and walked. Six in all and three of them were with the bases loaded (Rusty X2 and yours truly), and that was the difference in the three run game.

And we played defense. The critical moment in the game came in the bottom of the sixth with the score stuck at the final tally of 9-6. There was a medium deep fly ball to Cage, and the runner on third put his head down and tagged up. He was fast, but not as fast as Cage's bullet on the fly to Monty. He was dead out. After that the air was out of the Crazy balloon. Even though we didn't add on in the top of the seventh, after a sizzling line drive to third to open the bottom half that D caught, they went down quietly on a fly out and a ground out.

Cage and Hama had three hits, and Rusty was 2-2 plus the two bases loaded walks.

Winning the ugly ones is a good sign.

* Dion Warwick, music by Burt Bacharach, lyrics by Hal David

Milestones:
7/25
None

8/1
Heffe        140 bb (#1)
Tom          20 bb (#14)

Red Storm

Red took a vote today for game MVP and it was unanimous. Mike Howard won in a vote of 1-0. The rest of my team weren't in my living room.

This wasn't because we scored 33 runs to his Navy's 14 with him pitching most of the game - he pitched pretty well, and we just hit from top to bottom of the lineup.

It is for giving us Mark Pitzlin when we lost our third player to season ending injury, and solidifying our team.

Once again we gifted an early lead, committing a base running gaffe to keep us from scoring in the first inning. After two it was 3-2 to Navy, but we scored five in the third and never looked back. Even though we built a 19-4 lead at one point, Navy didn't quit and it was 20-12 going into the open inning. For the second time in three weeks we busted it open by batting around and then some to score 13 this time in the last frame, led by the bottom of the order: Tony Gorgone, Bob Muegge, Jerry Ginochio, and Coach Larry Rafferty all went 2-2 in the inning.

Big hits in the game included a two out, two run double in the third by Pitzlin; two out hits from Rich Brown, James Del Rio, Pitzlin, and Kravin plated the five runs.

Al Kidwell, Gorgone, Muegge and Ginochio got successive hits in the fifth to ignite a four run rally. Randy Crase, Brown, Del Rio, Pitzlin, and Kravin also had consecutive two out hits in our five run seventh.

In the open inning onslaught, the big blows were a three run homer by Del Rio and a two run triple by Lamont Thompson. In that inning we had eleven straight hits at one point.

The defense was sometimes solid, sometimes iffy. Howard Davis had a good inning in the fourth at rover - he tied a record by getting one assist and two putouts including a step on second, throw to first double play. Kevin Kane, Pitzlin, Del Rio, and Brown all had some nice running catches in the outfield, including robbing Gary Tryhorn one time. Kidwell at rover also turned a run to second, throw to first double play, and also made a great stop on a bad hop grounder up the middle that threatened to send him to the dentist after the game. Unfortunately there was confusion on second base coverage so we didn't reward him with an out.

Ginochio pitched his best game this year, holding a potent Navy lineup to four runs in his four innings as we built the 19-4 lead, even with our usual share of gifts in the field. In his five Muegge fared not quite as well, but had to deal with more errors, and still kept Navy from mounting a serious comeback.

Gorgone was a perfect 5-5. Kane, Brown, Del Rio, Pitzlin (three doubles), Kravin, LT, and Coach Larry all had four hits, as we hit .710 as a team. Hope it continues!