In a perfect world, there is some comic relief. Every day. My Dad used to say, "have some fun every day." And it takes a big man to play the clown, whether by design or happenstance. Regardless of intent, I am willing to provide such service for my team.
In Dennis Perrone's highlight of the year, I sent a ball up the middle, and he fielded it on one short-hop. He was so surprised, he stepped on second for the force out, except there was no one on first to force. There was a runner on third, and he broke for home. Dennis started to go that way but - yours truly was so stunned at how hard he had hit it and how nonchalantly Dennis had picked it, when I saw Dennis make the phantom out at second, I stopped to admire the goings-on. And then Dennis could very nonchalantly throw to first to get an easy third out. And my teammates roared.
And roared. And I think White did too.
Of course, when your team is up 20-5 in the fifth, it's easy to find humor in the coach's lack of hustle and brains.
So, rewind back to square one, Orange spotted White the Curse of the First, relapsing into some early season lack of defense. but we responded with five of our own in the bottom half, and never looked back. Mike Saindon and Greg Wilson hit back to back bombs for a triple and home run, respectively, and we were off to the races. We then scored 3, 5, 5, 2, 4, and 1, and except for a single run in the sixth, we shut out White the rest of the way. Final score was 25-6 after we flipped and flopped and gave up our last two at bats.
Highlights included Mark Edelstone hitting three gappers for two doubles and a triple and six RBIs, Art Oller, Steve Sloat, and Brian Black going 4-4. Edelstone, Saindon, Wilson, and pitcher Mark Narciso all collected three hits. Each of the rest of the lineup had two hits, so no one was left out of the fun.
Narciso, pitched 8 strong innings, throwing strikes despite the gusty wind, and kept White's great hitters off balance. Howard Davis made his season debut after an eight week road trip, and allowed just one unearned run in his one inning. Gabe Tanaka made several highlight stops at 2B after a rough one in the first. Sloat caught a screaming line drive in the later innings keeping the ball from decapitating him, and also grabbed a much tougher chance out of the air when he wandered into the outfield on a softly hit pop-up. The first baseman picked one out of the dirt, and stopped a hard hit grounder for an out. Wilson tracked one down in the RC gap after a long run, and in his one inning at rover also grabbed a hard liner up the middle and knocked down a grounder to his left, stayed with it, and gunned down the batter at first.
But the web gem was Edelstone going to his knees in shallow dead center to pick a ball before it touched green with the bases loaded and two outs in the fifth. That catch changed to tone of the game.
I do want to congratulate White for playing hard and having fun despite the lopsided score. I'm not sure I would have been such a good sport as their players were, and kudos to them.
Every week someone else steps up on this team. Who's next?
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