Wednesday, April 17, 2019

The Ugly, the Bad, and the Good

I was raised be one parent who was generally an optimist, and one who was an extreme pessimist. Which makes me AFU.

So I am not going to sit here and say that Kapsch starting 0-3-1 is great, nor am I going to say is it the end of all hope.

After all, in my continued Tuesday night slump, I may be 1-11 but on the bright side, I have five walks! With that kind of production from the 11 hole, how can we fail??

The good news is that we have battled back in all of our losses. Last night we were down 12-4 and lost by four, ending the game with the bases loaded. Last week we were down 17-2 and lost 18-15. The first week, down 20-5 before succumbing 22-18. You might say that the other teams relaxed after taking a big lead, or you could say we didn't quit and came back.

Either way, what we have to work on is our early inning offense, defense, and pitching. Last night Tom was getting squeezed mercilessly by the strictest most inconsistent umpire I have seen in the 33 years of Pleasanton softball I have played. The strike zone was about 8-10 feet. But Tom adjusted and kept the Ultimate Warriors to zero after the fourth inning.

Similarly, on defense, we played the first three innings like Little Leaguers. Bad ones. We missed balls we normally catch; we didn't hustle for balls that dropped near us; we threw to the wrong base. Then suddenly we looked like the team that used to consistently be the best defensive team out there. Cage and Bo catching everything, Brian doing his magic at SS, Pauly picking up hot shots at third. We even turned a nifty Cage to Bert to D back door double play in the fifth.

Bo, B, and Cage (four RBIs) at the top of the lineup continued to scorch. They went 9-10 plus two walks. Tom got his usual three line drive hits, and Pauly and Coop had multiple hit games. Bert had a rough game but managed the biggest hit we had, a bases loaded, bases clearing two out double in the third.

If we can just clean up our early game woes, maybe there is hope for the season. After all four of five teams will make the playoffs. We can't wait much longer though.

Now, if we could just get some production from the 11 hole...

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