8/21/11- Cop Field and Camp Swampy

Well it was a first for me, and I have been coming out for going on 8 years.  We ended up with almost 30 players, a real conundrum.  We weighed the idea of a 12 inning game, and let the wheat separate from the chaff as the game wore on, but that didn't seem like fun.  There was a lone duo using Camp Swampy, so we figured, why not just split the squads and play two games?  Why not indeed.  With a few notable exceptions, the games were split along years of service to the MBC, old guys at the Swamp, new guys got the Cop Field.  So we did.  We offered a spot for the two guys who's field we took over, and one of them played the whole game (Vince, nice kid, got a hit) and his dad just left him to play with a bunch of strangers!

I will need to get a proper review from someone at the other game, but I know that Johnny Bartlett and Noah started for the teams, and they seemed to play a much faster game than we old fellers.  They were done and asking about playoffs while we were trying to get out of the 6th inning.

As for our game, it was classic match up with Sean and Satch squaring off, and we battled as usual.  Well, at least on the mound, when it came to hitting, Sean left me in the dust, as he continued to connect with everything I could throw.  At the plate, I contented myself with bloops and opposite field hits and one very ugly strike out.

Luckily, his team was slightly less powerful than he, so I could at least get some outs.  The wind was blowing the ball right back at me, and I figured the fastball wasn't going to be very overpowering, so I relied on the knuckle and change up for most of the game.

We scored 1 run apiece to begin with, and then we visitors got a few runs to take the lead.  It didn't last long though, as the the homers took the bait and bashed us for a few innings, tallying up four runs on some big hits and charitable defense.  We can't really even say that the inning came to a real close, as Nick Smith was called out at home on a play that had definite reasonable doubt.  Sorry Nick.  And you had to slide too.  I was waiting for someone other than me or Nick to make the call, but didn't get any help.

We lingered in the hole for a while, but kept it close until suddenly we figured out Sean and got in the scoring business, put up some serious runs and ultimately holding on to win.  John Carey came into pitch the last frame, with his dad as his battery mate ( a better showing than the last Patri/Fili duo we saw) and I handed the ball off to Rojas to close it down.  The homers took their walks in the 9th, as they should, but could not come up with the big one. Final score, 9-5.

Highlights:

* 30 Fucking people!  Ok, officially stop bringing new guys until this gets under control.

* We had a rare infield showing one inning of Tony, Greg, Brian Cagle and Adam, also known as the Final Four Horsemen of the original MBC (who still play, I hear you barking Simonelli...)

* The infield at Swampy is not any better than Cop Field, maybe even slower

* Daniel came a little late but made a number of great catches in the outfield

* Mitch saved me from the humiliation of giving up yet another home run to Sean, with the best running catch I have seen in a long time.  Of course, Sean also hit a triple off me.

* Bob had some great hits, as did John.

* I struck out the poor kid who came out with Bob, like three times.  Hopefully he can come out again so he doesn't get bitter towards the game

* We almost had a perfect suicide squeeze play

* JT hit a rocket back to the mound that I barely held on to

* A lot of collisions and near collisions at 1st for some reason

* Aiden gets the Free Range award for most distance covered in the day.  We all got to catch up on our parenting skills, keeping an eye on him

* We got Lattig to foul out in a 2nd and 3rd, no out situation.  You remember those, cuz they don't happen too often.

* Adam hit the ball hard, ran hard, blocked a lot of badly thrown balls at 1st

* We had a lot of extra base hits it seemed.

* We had 5 HBP, three of which were Bob and the other two were Nick.  They were all hit by me.  The only one that I was concerned about was the one where I tried an inside corner pitch and hit Nick in the leg. None of the one's I hit Bob with would have a dented a custard pie.

* Greg came though on a bases loaded, two outs, Tony at 3rd situation, the very same one that he flubbed at Swampy three weeks ago.  Way to go Greg!

* Greg also was proudly displaying the wound he received at SQ, result of a over eager tag in the face

* I messed up a play covering third for the other team.  I froze up, not knowing if I should try for the ball, then didn't cover third, as Lattig chose to go to me for the out.  Sorry.  I think it all worked out.

* Glad we all had fun, and made the most of a strange situation.

The Cop Field Game by John McGrath, Esq.

"Game 2" featured a large contingent of first timers on the vistor's squad and a fair number of MBC regs on the homer squad.   Johnny pitched the whole game for the homers and Ed caught.  Johnny pitched great and even struck out the side in the early going.   

Noah pitched for vistors and did a great job with Tim and Nero sharing the catching, but unfortunately for him Rich hit him hard, getting at least 2 triples and there was some generous D behind him.  Chirs Powell also had a timely hit and so did Johnny and Duane.  

Loren-the-birthday-boy, (yes, it was his actual birthday) took over for him in about the 6th and was impressive.  He had about 4 pitches going (fastball, curve, slide and knuckle) and slowed down the homers scoring big time.  He even struck Rich out after a 8 to 10 pitch at bat.  

 

Johnny kept the homers off the bases for most of the game and along with some pretty good D (there may have been only a 2 or 3 Es by the homers the whole game), pretty much cruised to a win with the homes in front the whole way.  This author does not recall the exact score, but thinks it was something like 7 to 4, or maybe 10 to 6.

 

As far as new guys (first timers) it seemed like there was as least 4 to 5.  One of them, Will, played with Sean at Evergreen.  They all seemed like real nice guys and were solid players and it was a fun game.

 

Highlights:

 

* Liam got a legit single, whacking a knuckler from Loren the opposite way down the 3rd base line well past the 3rd baseman.  (He also hit one over his old man's head, who apparently wasn't giving that 8 year old the respect he deserves.  The little upstart nearly got it to the outfield grass on the fly!)

 

* Rich's hitting and D 3rd.

 

* A  4-3 double play, doubling Loren off of first

 

* A few solid/ and very nearly completed attempts at some double plays by the homers (a 5-4-3 and a 6-4-3)

 

* Good outfield play by new guy Carter in center (making one run like crazy off the crack of the bat B line to snag a rope)

 

* Solid outfield play by Paul in right

 

* Loren's stop-the-scoring (for the most part) pitching

 

* Duane played a great 1st sack

 

* Loren's hitting, at least 3 ropes to the outfield

 

* Just in:  Liam says that the new guy on 1st for the visitors was Loren's dad, who is 70. Could have fooled me.  I would have put him at 60 at the most.  He whacked a few pitches pretty hard (now we know were Loren gets it) and played a solid first with catcher's mitt!

 

I apologize if I left any other highlights out, but I don't have the same game recall as old Satch.

No apologies necessary, half the time I write out what I think happened, not what I know happened.  


Just don't bring any new guys.

S. Paige