It was a cold, overcast, and windy day at Jackson 2. It even drizzled a little toward the end of the game. Beat clean-up hitter Donnell Moody, recovering from rotator cuff surgery that will have him on the bench for the remainder of the year, sat in as interim manager for Pete Wenner currently traipsing around eastern Europe pretending to have a life outside of softball.

The Beat entered the second half of the summer season tied for second place with rival Flor de Cana. Just before game time, news came across the wire that Flor had fallen to Finnegan's and now the Beat was in sole possession of second place with their future in their own hands. Unfortunately, Flor, realizing that they'd fallen to third place saw an opportunity as they walked across the park to help the shorthanded Ballers field a team against the boys in gray. When the dust had settled, the Ballers had wracked up 23 runs on 29 hits led by 3 Flor players that combined for a 12-12, 12-run, 7 RBI thrashing from the bottom of the order.

A Pitcher's Lament
Now I'm going to break from the 3rd-party reportage for a minute, because this was just that kind of day. You see, one of the things you always have to keep in the back of your mind as a pitcher in the slow pitch game, is that this is a hitters' game. You might be able to fool the weaker teams, but a good hitting team will hit whatever and whenever they want because, honestly, you can only do so much with a lob. Despite the result...this game felt good. I was ahead of the count all day, had a great arc, snappy backspin, an awesome curve and not a bad knuckler to boot. Three solid pitches that would have humbled most teams and managed to keep the Beat on top of the Flor/Ballers for four innings. Of their 18 outs, 4 were grounders back to the mound and 4 more were infield popups; from a pitcher's perspective, this is usually the sign of a pretty good day.

Sheep to the Slaughter
So what happened? What was the key to turning this good, competitive game into a humiliating defeat? Well two things, one of which I'll touch on later. But the first key to the game was simply hitting. What happened between those 18 outs? The Flor/Ballers batted .644 with 29 hits to the Beat's .474 team average and 18 hits; that 170 point differential was huge.

When push comes to shove, a good hitting team steps up and this all-star combo did just that. Down 9-7 in bottom of the fifth, the Flor/Ballers suddenly hit everything. For a stretch, the Beat defense was rendered useless as the offense drove hard grounders through holes in the infield, bloopers over their heads, and liners that dropped for singles or soared over the outfield. A string of 6 consecutive singles led to 6 runs before the first out was made. By the time clean-up man Jenkins fouled out to Gunnar behind the plate to end the carnage, they had score 9 runs on 9 hits and gone up 16-9.

The Beat answered back with two in the top of the 6th on singles by Brian Greenblatt (1-3, run), Mark Briscoe (1-3, run), and Derek Rey (2-3, run RBI) to bring the score to 16-11.

The Ballers came to bat in the bottom of the 6th with only 5 minutes to play and the Beat knew we'd need to turn this one over quickly to get another chance to bat. Well...the blue got a tad lenient with the clock and kept this one going in spite of the fact that the Ballers sent 10 batters to the plate and dropped another 7 spot on the reeling Beat capped by a 2-run homer that sailed over Jacque's head in left field and rolled all the way to the fence on the far side of Jackson 1.

When the Beat was allowed to bat in the top of the 7th, down 23-11, you could tell the fight was gone. Mark St. Georges (2-4, run, RBI) drilled a liner down the third baseline for a leadoff single, but 3 quick outs ended the game there as the Beat fell to 3-2 but remain in a tie for second place (now 4 teams).

But I Digress...
So I guess I left out the best part of the game as it was rather obscured by the incredible shellacking we took in the last two innings. Not that it started all that well either...the Beat went down quietly without scoring a run in the first two innings. The Ballers were held scoreless in the first but managed to take a 3-0 lead in the bottom of the second on two triples.

The Beat finally strung some hits together in the top of the third led by their 6 of 9 bottom three Derek, Gunnar Rosenquist (2-3, 2 runs), and Rich Reinholdt (2-3, run, RBI). Rich drove in Gunnar who had advanced to second on an outfield error that scored Little 'D'. Jacq Wilson (1-3, run, SF, 2 RBI) extended his hit streak to 35 with another single and Kevin Austin (2-4, 2B, run, RBI), who also extended his hit streak to 35 games in the first, doubled in Reinholdt. MSG and Mondo Lopez (2-4, HR, 2 runs, 2 RBI) both singled in runs. Jim Colletto (2-4) singled to load the bases and Jacque Wilson (1-4, 2 RBI) came through with a clutch 2-run single. So if you're keeping score at home, that was 9 consecutive hits for 7 runs and still no outs in the top of the third. This is where key of the game #2 comes in. With  no outs, 2 runners on, and a chance to put the game away, the Beat was retired without another run on a liner to right and an inning-ending double play. Ouch. Still, the Beat found themselves in a much more comfortable position suddenly up 7-3.

The Ballers scored one more in the third when #3 hitter Williams drew a full-count walk. Clean-up man Jenkins, held to a 1-4 day with 2 infield popups, popped foul to Mondo outside the third baseline, but as Mondo was moving away, Williams advanced to second on the catch. A single by Faga drove in the run but the inning ended with the Beat still up 7-4 and looking to add to their last inning heroics.

Gunnar and Rich combined for back-to-back singles again and Jacq sacrificed Gunnar to make the score 8-4, but that was all the team could muster. Flor's fill-in lefty pitcher came up and after pulling a triple to right in the second, Austin gave him a series of curveballs away. Unfortunately, as mentioned earlier, this was one of those days and the batter drove an absolute perfect line drive down the third baseline landing in a cloud of chalk and skidding away through foul territory for the fence. By the time Q caught up to it, the batter was rounding third for a leadoff homer and player of the day honors finishing 4-4 with a homer, 2 triples, 4 runs, and 3 ribbies. Hell of a day for a player not even on the Ballers roster. The Ballers managed 2 more runs on 3 singles and a sac fly and closed the gap to 8-7 heading into the 5th.

With one out in the books, Mondo Lopez, in the cleanup spot for Big Daddy, stepped up with a monster homer of his own that rolled past the mound on Jackson 1 extending the Beat's lead to 9-7. However, the Beat otherwise went down quietly with Q making the last out for Beer Bitch honors of the week.

That's about where we left off above so you know what happened after that. It was a nice, well-fought game for four and a half innings until the Flor/Ballers went on a tear and put the game out of reach. Damn!

Coming Up
This upcoming week should be really interesting with 4 teams tied for second (while the league uses points putting Finnegan's in second by 1 point based on their 6 games with a tie, I prefer to go by winning percentage which puts 4 teams at second with 3-2 records and Finnegan's in 6th at 3-2-1). Second place Flor de Cana (3-2) plays second place Il Pirata (3-2), first place Ronin (4-0) plays Finnegans (3-2-1), the second place Ballers play the 0-4 Blacksox and the Beat tee off with Spread the Glove at 1-4. We'll know the results of the big game between Flor and Il Pirata early as they go at 10am. The Beat and the Ronin/Finnegan's match both go off at 12:30. See you there!!!