What started out looking like a real bummer of a game with only about 11 players turned into a really great affair with 16 at our highest. We were helped out by the inclusion of a couple of kids playing catch in the park who agreed to be part of our motley crew for as long as they wanted to, they turned out to both be really nice and not too shabby ball players.
Nick W started for the home team and Satch started for the visitors. Nick has been on the extended pitching DL for quite some time with a nagging back injury but he looked very sharp, he was mixing his speeds and his locations very well and the first three innings of the game we went down in order. Three up, three down, no notes.
I started out trying to pitch well and then realized that I was having better luck downshifting into batting practice fastball mode for the majority of the pitches. I have had a lot of luck with that, I don't know if its an old adage but if you give the guy exactly what he waiting for, most of the time he won't know what to do with it.
I was also helped by the excellent catching of Greg, my defense (eventually) and the fact that when you're only throwing it about 50% you can throw a lot longer if you need to. Also, when you're throwing batting practice fastballs usually people are swinging at the first or second pitch, so I had a couple of sub-six pitch innings which also really helps.
Nick bowed out and in came HR, who had a lot of trouble finding the dish. He would be lights out for a batter and then eight balls in a row to the next one. He eventually found a rhythm he could work with but by that point we had gotten some runs on the board. The home team kept threatening; every single inning I had runners at second and third, and less than two outs for most of the game but our defense locked it in and we were able to avoid most of the problems. Mitch came in after HR with the score six to five and threw well but we finally managed to get some runners on at the right time with some timely hits and a few timely errors and going into the bottom of the 9th we had somehow miraculously pulled ahead 7-6. I had enough gas in the tank to finish out the game and we pulled one out of the fire for a close win, with Mitch stranded at 3rd.
We were all pretty exhausted by that point. Our two young guys had gone home and the rest of us were the walking wounded. In the middle of the game we joked that this had gone from a game that we might not think would happen to possibly the last game ever of the Mission Baseball Club. Rick sprained his ankle chasing a fly ball, Mike Naldony twisted his knee going for a ground ball, I bruised the palm of my hand catching a line drive off the mound, Greg got his bell rung on a foul tip, Nick W found out exactly why we wear cups when I swung inexplicably at a ball over my head and chopped it straight down and then it bounced up directly into Nick's cup.
Then I got stuck on the Bay Bridge on the way home when the CHP stopped all traffic to nab this giant dirt bike gang that had been causing a menace all day in Oakland and SF.
Highlights
* Big thank you to everybody who came out and played
* Another big thank you to Mitch who got passed back and forth before the game started about three times
* Alec was in the infield for one inning before we realized we needed him in the outfield a lot more
* Defensive player of the game had to be Mike Gaspar who made several amazing catches in the outfield, a close second was Anna at first base with a couple of very crucial digs on plays that we needed to make
* Mitch had a great game at the plate, our team philosophy became Let's make sure there's nobody on base when Mitch is hitting
* Always great to see Johnny Bartlett out!
* Thanks to Greg, McG, Nick for doing the catching
* Not to toot my own horn too much but I also had a pretty good day. Four hits, three RBIs including the go-ahead run thanks to HR for asking to play shortstop and then letting one go through his wickets to score that crucial extra run, scored a run on a passed ball, and I also pitched a complete game but enough about me
* We saw James in the distance of the other field playing with the old timey players and resisted the urge to scream Judas too loud
* Let's hope this dip in attendance is not lingering as we really need to have these games well staffed it's hard playing with 13 people especially when you're all beat the hell already so if you're torn between playing and not playing I would urge you to play
Roll Call of the Faithful
Greg, Nick W, Nick S, Mike N, John McG, Mitch, Gaspar, Alec, Anna, Satch, Johnny B, Rick K, Lynch, HR
