You guys think if you just show up...

...we'll win.

Ever since we had that tie, our fearless leader Joe has been especially ornery. We are like his flock, and everything we do is to please him but nothing is good enough. Maybe it's ever since we didn't get Cotton last year in this league and in the Orinda Summer League - he takes losing hard, and this is what he came up to inspire us.

Think about it though, we could start a whole new trend in sports...just show up! and expect to win!

We need to talk to Steve Kerr. How can the Warriors repeat as NBA champions? Just show up! The other teams will just lie down! I'll bet my last dollar he hasn't thought about that strategy. We could be on to something.

And take the 49ers...please. If they had 'just shown up' they couldn't have done worse than in a couple of their games, against the Steelers and the Falcons and even in the Green Bay game. In fact, I am not sure they did show up in those games. So if they had...who knows? Maybe Roethlisberger and Ryan and Rodgers are so surprised to see the 49ers they start throwing picks left and right.

Joe makes you think a little of Yogi Berra. Joe is from Brooklyn, Yogi plied his trade mostly in the Big Apple, although most of his years were in the Bronx as we all know.

Yogi said, "It ain't over til it's over."

Joe said (when we were up 22-5 going into the last inning), "If we hold them to less than two runs, we'll win." Really?

So yes, I'm afraid that Joe's words putting us in our place must have inspired us. Down 4-0 after 2 1/2 innings, we put up fourteen and eight runs in the next two to put the Bunt Pirates out of their misery. Final score 22-6 (whew).

What does Bunt Pirates mean anyway? There's no bunting in softball. Maybe that's their problem.

In the fourteen run Conehead third, Larry started things off with a walk. Then the merry-go-round continued with three singles and two walks, until Ol' G came up and promptly cleared the bases with a two run double. That put us ahead to stay, and we batted all the way back around to G before we were done. Randy had the other big hit, a two run triple in the gap.

Similarly in the 4th, Heffe started it with a walk and we worked the bases loaded, and up stepped Larry who cleared all three runners with a double to right. Pope and D had back to back two run hits, a double and a triple, respectively. D's in particular was a shot, back spinning nearly to the trees in right field. He had been drooling over how shallow they were playing him the whole game to that point.

Chuck, Pope, Chopper and Larry had perfect games (each walked once and hit in the rest of their ABs). Chuck is as hot as we have seen him in a while, he hasn't made an out for weeks. The webgems included a running catch by Pope nearly to Field 5 behind us, and for laughs, Bruce took a few steps in one one fly ball that started to sail on him, and made a nice recovery to nab it.

We clinched first with a week left at 6-0-1. We play Pats Bats in the last regular season game, and this game is huge for them. If we win, we likely will knock them out off the playoffs. Four teams make it, and they are in third but just a half game ahead of HBF and Dub MD behind them, who both should win their games. I still think we owe them for sending us reeling out of control in last year's playoffs. Payback time.

All in all, we showed up...and we won...in typical Conehead fashion. As long as we keep those 14 and 8 and 20 run innings coming, I think we'll be all right. And we can always look forward to Joe's next "Yogi-ism."

That is, if you show up.

Milestones:
Heffe       400 g (#3)
Ol' G       800 ab (#12)
Ol' G       60 2b (#12)
D             250 r (#15)

One Word - Wow

I wanted to do it, Pope had the ultimate blog idea: I got a rare triple so the title would be "Triple" and that would be it. No body. That might be fitting Conehead tradition (look at me, look at me!). But it just wouldn't be right when the team just went off tonight. Thirty nine runs on 44 hits. An 11 run Conehead inning in the first (ten with two outs) but we were just warming up. We had TWENTY ONE straight hits to start the fourth inning, and by that time we had scored twenty runs. I think somewhere in the back of my mind I remember a 24 run inning on one of my teams, but never twenty before an out was recorded.

Think I should focus on the defense in this game Chuck? (Although Bruce did make a highlight catch in the first going back on a ball, and Pope did the same later in left, and Lefty made a shoe-top catch in the early going).

Eight through twelve hitters (Bruce, Heffe, Chopper, Buddha, and Gene) were 19-19 plus a walk with four doubles, two triples, and two homers. In front of them Lefty and G were 7-9 and behind them Larry/Joe were 3-4 and then Chuck was also 4-4 (plus a walk).

Someone had to make the outs but no one was worse than 2-4. D was the only 2-4 but he had the sac fly that was the game winner as the fourth batter of the game. And hobbled to second and third on his two hits, plus provided the gallows humor as the courtesy runner for yours truly and Joe in the first.

It goes on and on - big bombs from Pope and D and Bruce, and a slicer on the line by Chopper, and I hit the line in right for the triple. Buddha just slashed and burned them for two doubles.

Don't know what else to say. But the lesson is the other team better not try to come back after a Conehead inning (they had a nine run second to 'narrow' the margin to 18-12) - we truly let the dogs out tonight.

And, for good measure, the team batting average was .815.

And to prove what dogs we are - the biggest laugh of the post-game chatter was "We should get their beer - No WE SHOULD GET THEIR WOMEN"..amen.

Milestones:
Pope        950 ab (#7)
D             30 3b (#8)
D             10 gw (#12)
Chopper  450 ab (#18)
Lefty        350 ab (#20)

In The Driver's Seat*

For the Coneheads, the last couple of wins have been as important as any regular season softball games can be (which is to say...). We sent Dub MD packing 18-14 (wasn't that close, a 12 run Conehead inning did in WMD). And even more importantly, this week we walked off on the Cream and Clear, last year's champs, 12-11.

The thing about the Coneheads is, though, that we are older than all the competition, and even though we have a lot of talent in the lineup, I think we need to step up the intimidation factor on these youngsters. In time for the playoffs, when the games really count.

Seems like we have new uniforms every season, and soon many of us devolve into wearing whatever shirt happens to have gotten washed that week. We need a unifying, signature look. So here is what I am proposing - new hats. They will look like this:

Now you may laugh, but really can you see the distraction it will cause for the other teams?

And - bonus - the girls love them:

This could be you!

Speaking of guys with issues with their bald heads,

Derek carried the day in Monday's game. After inheriting a 3-3 tie from Joe, he gave up a three run rally in the top of the third, but settled down for a couple of scoreless innings after that.

Going into the bottom of the fifth, we trailed by a run, and back to back two run doubles by Lefty and Randy put us up by three. Not exactly a Conehead inning. It seemed tenuous and proved to be so, as the Clear came roaring back and matched that output to retake a one run lead. But we had the secret weapon. Joe re-entered the game at the mound, and shut them down in the seventh. I don't even remember them getting anyone on base.

In the bottom of the seventh, Pope gave it up to take a walk to lead off, putting the tying run on base. D singled him to third, and Randy put one deep into the outfield to make sure game was tied on his sac fly. Lefty followed up with another single sending the winning run to third, setting the stage for Ol' G, one of our RBI machines. I'm sure he had visions of a single to center or another fly ball to sacrifice the game winner home but just to make it interesting, he hit a hard grounder to second. With one out, Cream and Clear tried to turn the DP instead of going home, but G hustled up the line and beat out the relay throw and another win was in the books. Walk off FC!

Lefty led the way with four hits, including a double and a triple - he takes that lineup demotion very seriously. In fact, he is a very serious guy. Downright analytical. Like, he thinks, "Which team has the most post-game beer?" That's where I need to be..." He also drove in four of our eleven runs. No one else had more than two hits, but everyone was on base at least once.

The previous game featured Bruce with five RBIs on a double and a triple, Randy with 4 RBIs on 2 doubles, a single and a sac fly, and Pope and Chopper going 3-3. They accounted for eight of the twelve RBIs in the Conehead inning.

With H.B.F. losing we are in first place alone. For you Coneheads that means it's simple - if we win out, we will have the top seed for the playoffs. Keep that under your (new) hat.

Milestones:
9/21
Pope        500 r (#5)
Chopper   250 rbi (#17)

9/28
Ol' G        10 gw (#12)
D              20 sf (#13)
Lefty         40 2b (#16)
Chopper   200 r (#17)

*Note: In the Conehead movie, Beldar Conehead was both a "respected taxi driver" (Wikipedia) and driving instructor...

Streaking...

Somehow the Transdyn team disappeared for a month. I didn't know where it went. I kept looking. Under rocks, on the bay, up mountains and down in the valley. Did anyone else see them from August 11th to September 8th? Not I...however..

We awoke from our slumber, and played three very good games in a row. Back is our solid defense, and our clutch hitting up and down the lineup, and especially, our pitching.

Last week Tom followed up his excellent outing against the Sons of Pitches with a beatdown of another old rival, the Brews Bros. The result was an 18-7 game that was never close. We followed up a three run first with a seven run second and never looked back.

The core of our lineup dominated this game. Cage (who is this season's hottest hitter), D and Berto combined for 11 hits, 10 runs, and 11 RBIs, including a bomb by Alberto. Jas and Brian each had three hits to set the table for the big guys.

This week's game was more of the same. Solid defense. Brian made yet another far ranging play on a popup to shallow center. The best play wasn't an out but deserves mention anyway. It was a deep fly to right that Coop got to cutoff Jason and he threw a strike to me at home. Unfortunately, the Ringer runner didn't even test us since they were down about 19-3 a the time. He would have been out by ten feet.

The game MVP was Derek, as he came out of the weeds to take the mound, with Tom out of town and Sir Guy still really on the DL. He owned the Ringers. That team scored 29 runs one game and 31 in another, just two weeks ago. They couldn't do anything last night but mostly lift easy fly balls to our outfielders. Of course they managed to hit a few up the middle to try to test Big D, but he didn't flinch. It helps that he is still taking his meds. He wanted to go at it with them too. They wouldn't have a chance, except they are very young and fast so they could have easily run away from him.

Back to the game. The wrinkle this week was that the entire lineup was productive. Maybe there is something to the theory that you should only bat ten. We scored at least two every inning. Must say that the Ringers helped - they did not seem very interested in catching the ball - but all but one of us had at least two hits.

D led the way at the plate too - he had four hits in five innings, and the only out he made was a laser in the last plate appearance for our offense - it ended the six run fifth that qualified us to finish the slaughter rule shortened game. It was a seed all the way to the right fielder who was camped at the fence in right.

As I said, Cage also stayed hot. Similar to D, the only unproductive out he made (he also had a sac fly), was a bomb. At least it sounded like it off the bat, but the mush properties of the ball Pleasanton uses knocked it down and the left fielder tracked down his drive at the fence. His hits were line drives mostly, with runners on, as he knocked in four runs. Well, one was a Heffe special, it was a line drive only in the book but that bloop scored two.

There was only one player who didn't make an out - I'll let you guess who that is. Although there is an asterisk on one of his plate appearances - he was helped by one of the Ringers' gifts.

Not going to say too much about how much one player means, just gonna say that we are undefeated when Bert takes the field. And winless without. But then again Mark, out latest super sub, can nearly say the same thing. We are 4-1 with him in the lineup.

Bottom line is that we have to talent to be competitive in this league despite our complaints about being old and being bumped up to the higher level league. The momentum we have built the last three weeks can be leveraged for the rest of the season and the playoffs.

It starts next week with a game vs. Pleasanton Auto Mall. They are by far the worst team in the league, at 1-6. Yet we have our worst record head to head (1-3) against them. We are 3-3 against the Sons of Pitches, 4-4 against the Brew Bros., and 6-5 against the Ringers. So let's get this win, and continue on our way. I love the smell of cotton in the Fall.

Milestones:
9/22
Heffe        1350 ab (#2)

9/29
Coop        400 g (#2)
Jas            500 ab (#11)

A Perfect Game

I've played approximately 1900 softball games since 2000. That's about 120 a year on average. A little embarrassing - how could I possibly have a life outside softball with that much time on the field and writing the blog, and getting players, and doing stats, and all the other trivial duties of being a softball slut.

Well, maybe I do or maybe I don't have a full life, but once in a while you play a game that is tense and dramatic, and tautly played, and you just wonder why it can't always be like that.

Tuesday night, Transdyn came into the game in the doldrums. One and four. One season after going undefeated and bumped up to the Upper League, we couldn't get enough players on the field, almost literally at times. We hung in there - we lost four games by a total of thirteen runs. We just couldn't turn the corner and play up to our abilities.

Sons of Pitches came in confident. Although they had a 29-29 tie with the Ringers, their other games (which they won) were not close. They are the token tournament team, they just come out for batting practice like many other teams that play the rec circuit. In this scenario, we could have just folded up and given it up.

Instead we played one of the tautest games we have in a long while. The game featured five lead changes - the cry of "Lead Change" rang out of both dugouts at times. In the end it was Tom shutting them down by mixing up front and back, short and tall, and in and out, and keeping them just enough off balance. And making great plays on the mound. You see they went up the middle far more than we did, even though later their SS was crying about it when Jason hit one off their pitcher's glove.

And the rest of the team made all the routine plays, and a couple of great ones - Brian made one of the ESPN highlight stops of the year deep in the 3-4 hole, and even nailed the lead runner at second. Cage threw out a runner gunning for second, but not sliding, by a hair. In the mean time, the Sons made a few gaffs, especially on the infield to gift us a few runs. In fact that was really the difference right there.

The Sons probably thought they had the game as they started to solve Tom in the middle of the game and plated four in the fifth and sixth to take the lead once again at 11-9. But after the middle of our lineup produced the game winning rally (to take the final lead of 12-11), in the top of the seventh he shut them down and even though we had the heart of the lineup coming up in the bottom we had no need for further heroics.

The big hits were booming doubles by Berto and D. Cage also slashed a double down the left field line, and Coop had a twister double over the right fielder's head to start a rally in the fifth. One of the highlights was a warning track sacrifice fly from D with runners on second and third. I was coaching third and I didn't bother trying to stop Brian coming from second - I could see the fire in his eyes that he was going to score - and he did. Two ribs for D.

But it was the little ball rally from Mark, Pauly, Heffe, Chopper, and Coop that finished the scoring to put it away. Everyone contributed in this game.

Afterwards you could tell players from both teams felt that this was one of those games in which it was great to have a part. And amazing things can happen if we could just get our team whole on the field - playoffs are not out of reach if we play like this every week.

Milestones:
9/8
Cage        500 h (#5)
Chopper   100 h (#22)

9/15
D              20 sf (#5)
Tom          100 h (#23)

Everyone's A Critic

The Snorts used to be the Duck Snorts. I guess they thought that Ducks didn't sound macho enough. Or Duck Snorts was too long to write out on the lineup card. Or maybe, just maybe, they read my blog last year when I suggested that all the teams with two words in their names replace the second with Schmutz. I guess Duck Schmutz didn't resonate with them - who knew? So now they are the Snorts.

I won't be mentioning any names, but suddenly I have a critic. It has been suggested that I should perhaps spend more time highlighting the defensive gems...after all, perhaps just as much as the Conehead inning, our trademark is that we play better defense than most teams, and as the cliche goes, defense wins championships.

Here I was sailing along with my high opinion of my clippings, and now I find that everyone is bored with hearing about Larry going 2-2 and Heffe hitting the weakest 3-3 possible (all singles, no runs, no RBIs) and watching in amazement as Chopper takes a bases loaded walk. For God's sake, that was the eighth wonder of the world.

So I won't be making a big deal out of Chuck's 3-4 with a game starting triple down the line...when Knight drove him in (with the first of his three hits) it set the tone and even though we gave up the lead temporarily in the second and the third, really our offense was consistent enough that no one ever had an doubt about the outcome. It's just not that important, right Chuck?

Nor will I make a big deal out of Pope's off field moon shot with the bases loaded in the fourth. The game actually was close at that point, and the grand slam converted a 9-6 lead into 13-6, and when we added three more that inning for a mini-Conehead inning (I can't believe I am not even that impressed with a seven run frame on this team), at 16-6 destiny really had solidified. The ultimate score was 17-9.

Oh and I can't talk about Bruce - we wanted to get him up again but time ran short - because he had the maxi-mini cycle. How many guys have a homer, a double, and a triple in their first three at bats, and just need a single to get the four pack? I told him he had to stop at first his next time up, and when I said that, we agreed that he was totally jinxed now. Not that we are superstitious. Luckily or not, he didn't come up again so I am off the hook for that one at least.

No, instead I have to reward the defenders who make the great plays, even though half the time I forget about them between coming off the field and the next inning due to not-so-early senility. But I do remember Chuck, a great dive up the middle and an out in the first inning that kept the Snorts off the board for at least the first.

And Larry made two tremendous stops that were on him in a flash on the mound - and he turned one of them into a double play. Although when a pitcher makes a great stop you are never sure if it was just pure animal instinct, i.e. self-preservation that took over. Nevertheless, great stuff.

But the play of the game was on a five foot batted ball straight back off the plate over Chopper's head at catcher. He leaped! and he grabbed and snagged it! We will have to change the Chopper to the Cleaper. Or Clopper? Or Cheaper? He already is the Cheeper back there behind the plate, with his jive. Popcorn! No Butter! Alley Alley! Cheep! Cheep!

There. I highlighted the defensive gems. I'm sure I forgot a half dozen but progress will come slowly. Please be patient.

Solid win on both sides of the ball really, though.

Milestones:

Pope        700 rbi (#1)
Larry        30 sf (#9)
Bruce       50 r (#29)
Bruce       50 rbi (#30)

Kiss My...Sister

One of the few bad things about recreational softball is the fact that we have a clock. Baseball is not supposed to have a clock. It's supposed to be played on lazy afternoons, when you need nothing else to make a perfect day, as long as the game takes. Someone walks away the winner, and someone the loser.

I know, old school, and all that.

But no, not in the city run softball leagues. Can't have the neighbors complaining about games going too late into the night. Can't have to pay the umps and field monitors OT. So we have the notion of a tie game, or as the cliche goes, "Kissing your sister." Not that there is anything wrong with my sister. She's great. It's just that her romance is with her husband, not with me. I don't even want to think about it.

Monday we tied HBF, in what was a very entertaining game that began at 9:15 - after some of our players' bedtime. The question after the game was who was more frustrated, HBF or us, because we both had our reasons to feel we blew the game.

We punched ahead with a relentless attack for the first four innings. By the time HBF came up in the bottom of the fourth, we had a 13-0 lead.

Not to last long. HBF put up eleven in one of those nightmare innings every team faces some time or other, and only a huge running deep catch by Pope kept us in front (I think it was that inning). In this case it was mostly their bats, not errors, that produced the rally. Yeah we had a couple of near miss plays that could have/should have been made, but they were hitting the ball all over the place. HBF kind of reminds me of young Coneheads - some of them produced flares to the opposite field while others smashed it deep. A smart team, a rarity among the younger generation.

The fifth came and went with no runs being scored. It was a tense game at that point. When we put up four in the top of the sixth, already known to be the last inning (damn clock), it was a decent lead but not that comfortable given what happened in the fourth.

The kept the pressure on. Runs were pouring in, and ultimately they had the bases loaded with one out, tie game with the winning run 70 feet away at third. All they needed was a decently deep fly ball. At that point Randy called for a double play ball to Chuck, and the HBF batter complied. Chuck was flawless, and Randy's turn and throw were perfect and the game was over, with everyone's sister in attendance. It was a miracle finish, not losing, at that point.

So who is more bummed in the end? We are the Coneheads, we think we should win every game, there is that. And we blew 13-0 and 17-11 leads. But ultimately we snatched the tie out of the jaws of defeat. There was some relief there.

On the other hand HBF wasted two huge comebacks with the hammer in their pocket, and couldn't finish the win. I'm voting for it feeling worse for them at the end. It will be fun if we face them in the playoffs. It's clear that these are two of the best teams in this league, and we both trail Cream and Clear, last year's champions by a half game.

D and Pope were the hitting stars. Pope blasted a monster three run job in the first to launch our game. D was perfect at 4-4 with a triple and a double. Chuck and Knight added three hits each, and the Junior Knight, although he made his first out at the plate, had yet another Moon shot way past the outfielders chasing in futile pursuit.

Milestones:
Randy        10 bb (#23)

Randy        10 sf (#23)