Vintage Vintage

I played a lot of years in Pleasanton on Sunday and Tuesday nights. One year my Tuesday league had eight teams. And we had sort of a bad season, going 3-6-1. But playoffs came and for the only time in Pleasanton league history that I know of, the powers that be said all teams make the playoffs and there would be two divisions and two declared 'Champions'.

We went out and kicked ass in the 'Lower' division and took home the Cotton.

That's what we need in the Danville League. Let's face it, there are two divisions, the Hornets/Leos and Crows/Vintage. If we end up third we should get an award, and Don should talk to the league about it.

That's because in our second great matchup with Vintage this season we came out on top 17-15 after winning the first game by a run. We are now up 2-0 in the season within a season.

Having previously played for the Wolfpack in Winter ball here, I can say in the years I have played in Danville there is one constant - there will be a call that goes Vintage's way because their umpires do not know how to make a call against their own team if a play is close or is in their minds open to 'interpretation'. Such a play happened in the second inning when one of their base runners stormed right at Mike at third base when he was cocking his arm to throw to second to try for a double play. Runner obviously should have been called out. Their argument was the runner going to second would have been safe. Weak, weak, weak and not to mention that is not the intent or meaning of the rule. There is no 'interpretation'. They ended up scoring more runs, but it just fought off the inevitable as it turned out.

It always happens with that team. It was vintage Vintage. Yet, it seemed to wake us up and we came charging back from the 10-2 deficit we had gifted them with some tough luck pitching and on defense. It was not a roar but we chipped and chipped away and by the top of the sixth we tied it at ten. Then when they answered with two in in the bottom half, we responded with the only five run inning of the game in the seventh. They tied it again in the eighth, but we squeezed two across in the ninth and then had our fifth shutdown inning to close it out 17-15.

Much of the credit goes to Don's pitching, as he settled us down after falling behind. But a lot of that was due to several plays up the middle by Howard at rover and Bruce at SS. And then a couple of times Anthony fired to second on a 'single' to get a force out on some old slow guys, including on the last play of the game to nail the victory.

It was truly a team game, especially on offense. Al, Mike, Anthony, Steve, Bruce, David C, and Howard all had three hits. AND COACH DON, who also walked. David had the biggest hit of the game, a two run triple on the fifth. Anthony had a two out two RBI hit to end the five run inning. Al had a two out two run single in the fourth.

Hopefully you guys can get a win against Leo's or the Hornets while I am on the East Coast. In any case I will see you for the third act of Vintage Vintage in three weeks.