Alley Oop

Short notes, long notes. Some noted plays, some plays already forgotten that should be mentioned.

Allée Allée! - French for Go! Go!
Alvin Alley! - World Class choreographer (Dance! Dance!)
Aileron! (Wing flaps - Fly Fly!)
Ali! Ali! Boom Ba Yea* (see below)

Chopper the catcher called it out on many batters: Alley! Alley!

Go Go? Dance Dance? Fly fly? What does it mean???

He actually explained it to us Saturday. "No it means 'Alloy! Alloy!'", noting the hitter's got an Aluminum Bat, meaning the outfielders should move in because he won't hit the ball as hard as with a composite bat.

But by Sunday we all forgot, or we didn't hear it, because we are old. The hearing aids were off.

In the mean time, Pope in left field is dancing left, dancing right, he doesn't know which gap to cover, he doesn't even know if it's his gap or Gene's gap or Bruce's gap, he just knows the ball's going in a gap. In left center, Bruce is just Go! Going, running in circles. And Lefty in RC, he's taking it literally...running around flapping his arms (not unlike a couple of swings in the last game), "Look at me, I'm FLYING!"

Somehow the ball got caught, and Chopper is already on to the next batter. "Popcorn" "with Butter!"

Wha?

Next year, to improve the team, I'm going to compile the CTM - Chopper Translation Manual. We will all memorize it, and then we will be truly invincible.

Although Four Championships in a Row in Orinda, we might be there already. We won by smashing Cal Bronco 17-1 (or 19-1 if you believe the blue). We crushed them like last year's sour grapes. And although the scores of the first three games were closer, we were never really threatened the whole weekend. Gene coined it the "Aura", maybe it is, but the other teams go into this thing, thinking, how are the Coneheads going to beat us this year?

I was worried this year. All season long we couldn't get a lot of guys to show up for the regular games. Ol' G a.k.a. Alfred E Neuman, kept saying no sweat, let's see what happens in the playoffs. Like Joe, due to a quirk of ethnic makeup, I am genetically wired to worry. After all, 8-3 is a pretty pedestrian record for the Coneheads.

Gerry, our .700 hitter, retired. Markley, our other .700 hitter, out with a bad leg. Don gone, no one to piss off Joe and give him his game face. Reggie gone to chase glory in the Ring Tournament. Knight has the temerity to let his personal life get in the way of softball. All gone. And then, Big D gets kidnapped, practically literally, and whisked off the the Forty Niner Super Colossal State of the Art State of the Art (double intentional) PRE-SEASON football game. This hurts. We are practically down to the minimum 10. How are we ever going to do this?

But last night I had a revelation. I was at a party in Marin. These friends of Julia's, a couple who raised their kids with hers, were having a Pisco Sour party. He had spent some time in Peru, and fallen in love with the culture and the food and especially, being a good drinker, the Pisco Sour, which is kind of the national drink, a mix of their local brandy and lime and other ingredients. Quite delicious, I might add. As was the food, as they created a bunch of Peruvian dishes, a shredded chicken thing, home made ceviche, some tasty spiced corn on the cob - the works. But yours truly could just think about how we were going to get our Knight to come play third. And I had misplaced my phone. I wanted to text Joe, to plot, but it was not to be.

I went outside - had a smoke, then closed my eyes. I hearkened back to my youth when I took up Transcendental Meditation - but I needed a new mantra. And then it came...Cohhhhhhhn.....Cohhhhhhhn, Cohhhhhhhhhn. I sat there and got into a trance...Cohhhhhhhn, and it was good.

And I had the revelation. As they say in the pros, when you win the Championship, you enjoy it for ten minutes, and then you are already thinking about the next one. Even today, Joe and I talked about how this was the second time in Conehead history we have won four in a row in Orinda, but now we have to get the fifth, which we have never done. So the real joy comes in the anticipation...Saturday night, knowing we had played well Saturday, and were in the driver's seat for Sunday even without D, and this edge, the angst of not knowing what will happen the morrow, the unknown, that is the great and focusing feeling.

We came out Sunday without all our guys. But take no offense any of you, the Coneheads can lose ANYBODY, and as long as we have at least 8 1/2 somewhat healthy bodies to throw out there, we will pick each other up, and carry the day. This is what it means to be a Conehead. Derek is out, and Haz goes to third base for a game. He makes a play, doesn't get the lead runner but gets an out. "I'll do better next time". And then Knight shows up on his White Horse (OK, Prius, after all this is the 21st century). Jeff changes his tune when Knight comes to the rescue to play third in the Championship Game. "We are undefeated with me playing third," he now says, with a smile.

Greg goes 3-4, with three knocks, just another day at the office. Or out of the office. It was great but (no offense intended again) I have a feeling that without our Knight we still would have won.

Joe is the best slowpitch pitcher in the land. But he is only playing half the game. Larry comes in every game in the middle innings AND COMPLETELY DOMINATES EVERY TEAM. I don't have the exact numbers of innings but he allowed something like five runs in 14 innings. In Slow Pitch Softball. This is against teams that score 20+ runs a game like the Broncos. And I have a feeling if I didn't tell Larry to pitch to him, he would have walked the Broncos big bat Brady when it was 17-0 and no one was on base, and we would have completed the shutout. Instead his solo home run was all they could muster when it counted most. Larry gets my vote for MVP. That was phenomenal. And I haven't even mentioned the catch he made on a ball headed hard and straight at his head, or the clutch hits he had.

Ol' G was extremely hot most of the season. The last couple of weeks, not so much. He kept thinking a foul ball to the right was a hit. Well he woke up and drilled not one but two homers Saturday against the Old Scouts. The first one, a two run job, produced the game winning RBI as it completed the scoring in the only real Conehead inning of the weekend. That inning (nine runs) was the microcosm of the weekend. We were down 11-4 in the top of the fourth. With two outs wee had only a man on first, and starting with Haz we smacked nine straight hits - the other big blow was Bruce's three run homer to get us close. I think that was the moment we all realized this was our year once again. Except G, of course, he never had any doubt.

And Joe - we beg him to bat, really it's only in your Head that you aren't good enough. He pokes it into right center and the ball skips by the same Big Bat who is an All World Fielder, and G, who is running for him, is once again off to the races. Two run triple.

Bruce hit three home runs with a gimpy leg - he did a pretty good Derek impression. Chuck was dirtier then I ever remember him this weekend. He had at least one dive play in the hole that was just impossible. He added a little of everything, lot of hits, walks, sac flies.

Lefty had the two most beautiful swings and misses Sunday. Complete with curtsies and a bow at the end. Then you look up and realize that he also had twelve hits over the weekend, and gunned out a guy at the plate.

Gene had a great regular season but was a little cold Saturday. I switched him and Haz, and how did he respond? 5-7 with a walk Sunday. In the mean time Haz was off in the first game (out of comfort zone because of playing third?) then went 4-4 in the penultimate game.

And Pope, in between dancing to Chopper's tune, thinks that he doesn't contribute enough. Besides being lockdown in left field, he had four doubles over the weekend - and most were singles he hustled into doubles. He's like a horse thief out there. In the second biggest rally of the weekend, six runs against Bay Alarm, we had tied it at seven in what until that point was a close game. Up stepped Pope, and his three run big fly rang Bay's alarm - the game was never out of reach as we only won 15-9, but that blow took all the wind out of their sails and they did not threaten us again.

And of course our first baseman. I'm just here to make you guys look good in print, but after turning the big six oh two weeks ago, I think this weekend I played first like I was...59 all over again. Scoops in the dirt, falling and stretching for the few errant throws, and I even had a few line drive hits and loud outs to go with the patented bloop doubles I seem to thrive on.

In other words, once again no one carried us alone, and we achieved our little corner of glory, even if for only ten minutes before we start to think of fall league and next year. It's a good feeling.

*Last night when I found my phone, which of course was in my car all along, there was this mysterious message on it (this is true, I played it for G and Haz, you can ask them). It went something like this in a thick middle eastern accent: "Hey Jeff, this is (unintelligible), I was switching through the channels and I came across the movie Ali. You know, 'Ali boom ba yea, Ali boom ba yea' and he chants this over and over...This was the people's chant in Zaire in the famed Ali Foreman fight, the Rumble in the Jungle, I looked it up...he closed with "I may be in the Bay next week so we can go golfing maybe" so I have no idea who this crank caller is but in light of Chopper's call, it's almost spooky.

Stats to follow but in closing...Ali, Cohhhn Ba Yea. Which means, loosely. Coneheads Kill.

Milestones:
7/28
Chuck        850 r (#1)
Pope          120 hr (#1)
Larry          450 rbi (#4)
Derek        200 r (#16)

8/4
Gene         250 g (#7)
Pope         30 sf (#8)

8/16 Game 1
Gene        400 r (#7)
Ol' G        50 2b (#15)

8/16 Game 2
Ol' G         30 hr (#8)
Haz           200 ab (#23)

8/17 Game 1
Pope          600 h (#6)

8/17 Game 2
Pope         40 gw (#1)
Gene         850 ab (#9)
Craig         200 h (#20)

Yoenis Who?

The A's are all in this year and Billy Beane is either a genius or an over-tinkering fool, depending upon where the A's end up this post-season.

Popular home run contest winner Yoenis Cespedes was dealt for more pitching today. The A's will miss his bat, but they might miss his outstanding arm in left field even more. He did create that amazing throw and the next one against the Angels by kicking the ball around just to tempt the runners into going, but then he gunned them down. The first was the highlight of the year.

However, if they find that they need some late season help, there is a secret weapon in the East Bay. And I hear after this weekend he won't be playing on Sunday afternoons until next year.

Of course I am talking about our own Chopper who last Sunday gunned out another who dared to run on him. That made two in two games if you count last week in our Conehead game, and although I am sure he played a few games in between, we like to think he has a streak of two going. We would hate to see him signed up to go pro, but hey, we would do our part to support the local pros.

The game was mostly meaningless. OK, totally meaningless for any effect in the standings. We had clinched first place and they were stuck in fourth no matter what. Corona had eight players show up, and we picked them apart. We started with 8 hits and a walk and poured on eleven runs in the first. Lefty and Randy in a row, and Ol' G and Chopper and Gene found gaps in the outfield for triples, and the rout was on. The rest was trying to make sure we kept a 15 run lead so we could get out of the heat ASAP, which we did.

Oh, and Derek pitched great filling in for ailing Joe, and our first baseman turned an unassisted double play on a line drive smash. He wanted a triple play but the runner off first made a move to evade the tag, and our hero doesn't move too fast. He had to settle for going back to the bag to get the second out.

Bruce returned from the DL and went 3-3, including one shot so far into right field (for a grand slam) that he could jog around the bases. His physical therapist was happy, I'm sure. Chuck and the Knight were also perfect at 4-4.

All this was practice for playoffs this weekend. We get to face a full Corona squad in the first game and then take our chances. This could be the year we get over the hump. Even though Pinky's is a tournament tested team, we took two of three, and let's face it we have better chemistry, better defense, and I put our bats up against them or anyone. But first let's continue to punish Corona's for thinking they are in our league.

And hopefully the A's won't have signed Chopper until after Sunday.

Milestones:
Gene          10 3b (#5)
Randy        50 rbi (#15)

3.2.1...Blastoff!

I'm gonna be 60 within two weeks, and I never knew pressure like this in all my decades.

Pope, Ol' G, and D went back to back to back in the first inning of the Conehead game last night. Derek hit it so hard and so far, he admired it, then he hobbled to first, then thought about a double, hobbled to second, thought about it some more, and so on until he scored before the ball got back to the infield.

Now it's up to me to continue the streak. What do I do? How can I go yard? I mean I haven't done that in like 10 years...and it usually requires someone falling down...

Stay within yourself...see ball hit ball...don't over swing...you can do this...I close my eyes, and take a mighty swing...and when I open them I see the ball in the 5-6 hole, and the shortstop almost gets to it but instead deflects it into short left field...the third baseman chases it down, picks it up while I round first. Another damn single.

And then the miracle happened...there's no one covering second! So I steal second base!

Now we have seen home runs in game after game after game on this team. We've seen Pope stretch singles into doubles with head first slides. But tell me, have you ever seen a stolen base in slowpitch softball???

And that's how it went in our game against the Reds. Larry hit the other home run. Sting coulda had one in the first - he stopped at third with no outs and Pope on deck. That woulda been back to back to back to back. How utterly demoralizing to the Reds.

The middle of the order batting line: 12-12, 11 runs, 3 doubles, a triple and 2 HRs for 11 RBIs (G, D, and me). Pope drove in a team leading 5 on a couple of hits and a sac fly. Chuck, who made a very professional stop on a hot one hopper to his left, scored four times, drawing two walks to go with his two hits. Joe started the 1-6-3 slick double play.

We even gave them mercy from the mercy rule - after we took a 1-2-3 and out in order extra frame (the score was past the mercy rule after five), we gave them a shot to score fifteen in the phantom sixth. The ump was having none of it - he marked the score 24-9 even after they eked out a couple of runs in the sixth.

Next week another double header. Fun fun fun til Daddy takes the T-bird away. Or the lights go out, whichever comes first.

Signed Heffe 'Rickey' Heffinator

Milestones:
Pope          650 rbi (#1)
Chuck        1600 ab (#1)
Pope          120 ab (#2)
Heffe          550 rbi (#3)
Ol' G          700 ab (#14)
Chopper     30 2b (#20)

Just Wait Til Next Year

Next time we play St. Mo's, we are all batting the opposite and playing out of our regular positions. Because, after all, when do we do that? When we are just slaughtering someone. Why not just do that from the beginning of the game?

And they just have our number, or so it seems. On Monday we plated all of two runs in the first three innings. The night was so strange that we had the exact same inning in the first and the third: Chuck got to first (ok the second one was a walk not a hit), Reg put one over the fence 900 feet away ON A BOUNCE, so it was ruled a ground rule double, Pope brought in Chuck with an out, Lefty hit a sac fly to bring in Reg, and Bruce ended the inning.

We took a 6-0 lead into the top of the sixth. One bad inning, and suddenly it was 8-6, and even though we tied it in the bottom of the sixth, gave up one more in the seventh then went down quietly, one two three to end it.

9-8, 6-5, 13-11, 20-14, these are the scores the last four losses out of the last five games with them. We have lost five total games to the rest of the league combined over that time. Something's gotta change.

A few of us had decent games, led by G who went 3-3 with a triple, but there was no Conehead inning to be had, and so we were had. Our luck we will draw them first game in the playoffs like last year but look what happened then. We would welcome yet another chance for revenge.

The weather was strange at Wilder that night - the later it got the warmer it was, and the sunset was outstanding over the East Bay hills. Maybe that affected us, as we managed to eke out an 11-6 win in the nightcap over the Areolas. We got warmer as the night went on as we scored nine runs the last three innings.

Sting continued to be a highlight reel - he hit a bomb but this time managed to get the ball to land in a way it stayed in the park, and he could follow Joe's runner in for a two run homer. Sting was joined by Pope, Lefty and Heffe with three hit games. But the game turned when we got patient and the Areola pitcher could not find the plate - Chopper (!), Haz and Joe all took walks to set up our mini-Conehead five run fifth that put us ahead to stay.

With our second loss in the opener, it will be tough to end up first or possibly even second. That did not seem to matter the last couple years, we know when it really counts in this league. And besides, don't we want St. Mo's to open the playoffs again? I'm going 4-4 batting righty, and making diving catches in left field.

Milestones:
Game 1
Larry        1200 ab (#4)
Larry        70 2b (#8)

Game 2
Heffe         150 2b (#1)
Chuck       600 rbi (#2)
Sting         20 gw (#3)
Chuck       30 sf (#7)
Lefty         20 3b (#16)
Lefty         30 2b (#19)
Chopper   350 ab (#19)

Joeless and Shoeless, Again

This is how it goes...time to clinch the regular season championship and the coach is out of town, one outfielder is hurt, our second baseman is missing the one game he misses per year. Our regular subs are missing in action, but luckily we have pressed GMac into action, so we will have twelve players, one over a full team in the over 40 league, so we are protected in case someone goes down.

Then of course I get the warning that our third baseman may get 'stuck' at his daughter's softball tournament if she makes it to the championship, and then our catcher neglected to tell me (until two hours before game time) that he is playing an hour away and won't be leaving there until 35 minutes before the bell goes off in ours. Are we a little math challenged?

The topper is that Lefty arrives in sandals, and finds he has no shoes. Literally. No tennis shoes, no dress shoes, no spare golf shoes in the trunk (although the Knight did offer his), no army boots, just a pair of oh so comfy sandals. The casual look is in.

Ah but we are playing the last place and fairly hapless Crazy 88's for the second week in a row, and they can only field nine breathing bodies, some of whom we certainly haven't seen before. Not sure if they actually were breathing. And so it went from there.

Randy and Chopper made it by the second inning - Randy just in time to change out of his wife-beater to take a spot in the lineup at the bottom. By the time he arrived, we were in the midst of our first of two seven run innings that committed the Crazy 88's to yet another defeat. We ended up winning 16-4 and it really wasn't that close.

In the first rally Gene took advantage of the three outfielders and hit a looping gapper to knock in the first run and later the Knight blasted one far deeper into the gap for a two run triple. In the third it was more of the same but we were aided by some rather shoddy defense as four runs scored on errors.

D led the team with four hits, with Knight just behind with three. Gene and Reg made nice running catches on defense, Chuck picked off a couple of tough chances, Johnny was solid as he probably had the most action on the infield, and D made two nice plays - one he hustled on his gimpy knees to grab a dribbler in front of home to get a guy, and on another picked off a laser over his head.

And so it was written or will be in this sentence, that we clinched a first place finish with a game to go for the first time since arch-rival Pinky's has jumped into our league (actually longer - there was Rocco's before that so it's been since 2009). And we know what that means - not a whole lot. It gives us the first playoff game against the fourth place team, but really is there much difference between Corona's and Advance Construction? When I left the park the two of them were tied 7-7 in the fourth or fifth inning in the game following ours, as they played to settle who ends up third.

So we don't care who we play first but it does feel good to go into the playoffs knowing that this year things are different. And who knows - we are due to have a different outcome in the playoffs.

Milestones:
6/22
Heffe        400 ab (#3)

6/29
Ol' G        100 rbi (#6)

7/13
Chuck       100 rbi (#7)
Joe            100 r (#7)

7/20
None

You Just Can't Win Em All

You look at the championship games last year between the Coneheads and the Old Scouts (yes there were two) and what jumps out at you is that these were two very evenly matched teams...we won two games by a total of four runs, and that included our epic eight run sixth inning to take the ultimate contest.

So it should not come as a surprise that we battled to the end Monday night against the Scouts and the winner was on a walkoff hit by the home team. Unfortunately, it was the Old Scouts that drew the 'home' game this year, and we fell 21-20.

We trailed much of the game: 2-1, 9-7, and finally 13-7 after four innings. But when we rallied with two mini-Conehead innings in the 5th and 6th, we seemed destined to pull out a victory. I mean how many teams come back from a six run deficit against this team in the last inning?

The Scouts had other ideas. I will tell you one thing - they picked up a couple of new players that can hit. They all hit in the bottom of the sixth, we barely got an out before the winning run scored. Ironically, Randy our teammate on Sundays and in the fall, had a chance to win it, but only managed to tie it, and someone else became the hero. If I wrote the script Randy would have blasted it over our heads to win the game, if they were going to win anyway.

Johnny was nowhere to be found - perhaps he just can't play against us any more (kidding).

We may not go undefeated, but the game sets up the playoffs...there is no predicting, and there is still the Cal Broncos to deal with, but it sure looks like these two teams could make it to the finals again this year.

The Jeffs had big games - Hazel had five RBIs with a mini-cycle, and Heffe led the team with four hits. Haz - who ironically was the only one not to score - was not the only one with a mini-cycle; he was joined by Chuck and Bruce. Bruce hit one nearly to the street in right center. Larry slugged another triple among three hits - he is our new power hitter. Sting and Markley rounded out the players with three knocks.

Double header Monday, a great chance to get back on the winning track in a hurry.

Milestone:
Larry        30 3b (#7)

Plie

There was a moment in the Conehead Waitlister game. I mean when we weren't laughing our asses off at the antics at third base. When we weren't running around scoring 16 runs in one inning. When we weren't watching in awe at liner after liner by the three big lefties, Pope, D and Bruce (and Lefty and...who else is lefty?). When we weren't watching Larry nail the line for a home run (what - an old guy that can run???), and we certainly weren't watching our new power man Chuck hitting a gapper.

It actually did happen during our XVI Conehead inning. I was headed to third on a single to right by Larry with the Chop Chop on first. Chopper thought it might be caught, and then had to hustle into second as the throw cam in. And he SLUD! Or was it a flop? Regardless, he had to stop all that momentum (Force = Mass X Acceleration, and he wasn't accelerating), and he landed and that momentum started to take him past the bag and then a remarkable thing happened. His left leg raised into the air but his right one stayed on the bag, and it was a Perfect Plie, only horizontal. That'a pronounced PLEE-AY for those who have never had the pleasure of partaking in the fine art of ballet. I think there is a place for Chopper in the next summer Olympics, in artistic Gymnastics. Or maybe, even, the Bolshoi Ballet? Only time will tell.

And speaking of artistic endeavors, how bout that guy at third base? I mean I don't think Sting has played seven innings total in his life at the hot corner before this game. And everything found it's way to him. I have faith that he will learn to cover the bag, given a couple of hundred games there. And who has a 7-(hit runner)-2-5-2 assist on their resume? But seriously, it is a testament to the all around talent of one of the most athletic guys on this or any team - and even more important that Reggie went to third for the sake of the team if that's what it needs (more depth at third). Bravo Sting!

The rest was all Joe keeping the Waitlisters off balance, some nice catches in the outfield, and mostly HIT HIT HIT particularly in the sixteen run fourth. Five guys were 2-2 in the inning, led by Chopper with a homer and a single and Bruce with a triple and a single. Game leaders were Pope with 4-4 and two doubles, Larry 3-3 with a HR, Chopper 2-2 and a walk with a HR. D was 3-3 and a game high 5 RBIs because he also had TWO RBIs on one sac fly, it was so deep.

If Knight makes the game, before first pitch in lieu of BP he will teach a class: Playing Third - Hot Corner or Cool as a Cucumber? Maybe Randy will make a guest appearance. All are urged to attend.

Milestones:
Chuck        1050 h (#1)
Heffe          1400 ab (#2)
Chuck        110 2b (#3)
Pope          850 ab (#8)
Larry          20 hr (#10)
Sting           750 ab (#11)