Season wrap

And just like that it is over. It goes quickly. First, the biggest regret. And that is not something I can do much about, but that is simply to have more practice. I knew that was the case from last year. Basically all we are doing is throwing the boys out there, and letting them play, and maybe do some in-game coaching.

It was a good group of boys to be around. There was various levels of squirlyness, which is expected with 13 and 14 year old boys. Some are a little more quiet, and that is appreciated too. But there wasn't a kid on the team that I didn't like to be around, or lamented having him.

On the baseball side, we finished about where I thought we would. In drafting the R-S based teams, we really focused on having competitive teams. And I think we did a good job with that. We finished 6-4, the Blue Jays were 7-3, and we split with them. The Rays finished 7-2, though we lost twice to them. But we were competitive. There isn't a lot of value being in 10 run games, especially between teams from Roland-Story.

We wanted to keep the Zearing boys together, so that helped the Rays, as all 3 of them are actually playing varsity ball this year for Colo-Nesco. But we still got them out.

Here are my top memories of the season. (no particular order, though the first ones came to mind first)
Triple Play to end the game at Gilbert (Austin to Ryan to Will)
Sam's Home Run at East
Aren at 2nd starting the front end of turning a double play at Gilbert
Our first game against the Blue Jays, we lost, but scoring 3 in the top of the 7th to force extra innings
CJ's being one batter short of a complete game in the win against the Blue Jays
We lost to the Rays in our first meeting, but scoring 4 in the top of the 7th to get within one run.
Ryan coming out of an early batting slump to hit the ball like crazy to end the season
Jerald and Ryan only walking 3, and holding the Indians scoreless for the last 6 innings in our last game of the year.
Wyatt fouling a ball off into his face (how the heck did that happen?)

Obviously there are more, but that is what first popped into my noggin.

So have a good summer, and I hope the 7th graders give it a whirl next year as well.

A tale of two teams

Well, another Tuesday, another failed attempt in 10 running our opponent. The moms get to keep their tube tops in back of their drawer. But we did close out the season with a W, so that is nice.

Tonite we played like the biggest boneheads, and tonite, we played really solid. We had some pretty bad defensive lapses at times. Balls through the wickets, balls sailed over people's heads, coming in on fly balls to the outfield and having the hits go over our heads. Yikes.

But our defense at times was real solid. Nick did a great job at catcher, catching a couple foul tips to give us a strikeout. Drew caught a pop up at catcher, which isn't always easy to do, and also fielded one nicely at 2nd base. Ryan caught that liner when he was pitching. Sam had a nice job fielding from 3rd, and threw it over to first. Wyatt caught a pop up to end the game, Zach also had a nice field and throw over from SS. And CJ and Ryan had to catch them over at first.

Our pitchers did a very good job. Three total walks in 7 innings. Yay! 1 by Jerald and 2 by Ryan. My streak of knowledge continues. Keep it under a walk per inning, and we will win. Nice to see Jerald's hoof getting healed up. He got shelled in the first, and combined with those errors, led to 3 runs. But he and Ryan scattered some hits and errors, and we didn't allow a run the remainder of the game. Jerald had 10 strikeouts, and Ryan 3. Everybody on their team, except the 2nd to last batter struck out at least once. But only two of them, their 7th and 11th batters stuck out twice. So it wasn't like Jerald and Ryan were feasting on some guy, they really spread it out.

We put the ball in play 18 times, with 6 base hits. We got walked 9 times (NINE TIMES), reached on 3 errors, and struck out 6 times. Some of our guys are still a little antsy in the box. They are going to have to get more aggressive in the box, if they want to have success in Jr Hi ball.

A little different lineup for us tonite. I called it 8th grade night. I put 8th graders in the top 5 batting order spots, and Sevvies in the bottom 6. Also I limited the 8th grade time in the dugout. It was the last Juniors game for the 8th graders, and I wanted them to have a little more opportunity to enjoy it.

I'll have a season wrap up in a day or two, so check back then for that.

Game on!

Doug reports the field is wet, but playable. So gametime tonite is 6:30. Be there by 6.

Topless Tuesday!

No practice Sunday. Go to the graduation, or parties.

Our last game is Tuesday at 6:30 at East. I think the Mathis and Halstead families are our "volunteers" for the concession stand. I might be wrong tho.

Unless you want your son to go home topless, bring a shirt along for him to wear home. I will be stripping them after the game. I'd rather wash a load of shirts than chase down 12 shirts after the season.

Jays round 2

Well, that wasn't the most stellar of performances. The thing that drives me the most cuckoo is 9 strikeouts looking. Aye carumba!





I realize we were facing the best pitcher in the league for the whole game except the first 1 2/3 inning. But it was frustrating to see our guys dropping the bat, or just staring at strikes. It is one thing to swing and miss, but to be baling out or just looking at strikes is rough. I was telling the guys, if they didn't think they could get around on the fastball, just wait for the curve ball. It was coming, just hang in there and poke that. That plan didn't work too well I guess. But of course, with no practice.....

We also did not meet my goal of a BB/HBP or less per inning. We gave up 9.



On the good side, we started the game nicely against Taylor Hill. Walk, hit, walk, walk, hit, hit. That got us a couple runs. Of course the base running limited us. CJ went on a hit and run that I gave, but just sank in the mud, and didn't have a good slide. The batter missed the sign too, and maybe the swing would have given CJ a split second more. Then Jerald got thrown out at the plate. Pretty much everybody on our side thought he was under/around the tag, but so be it.

Our defense was reasonable. We had a couple errors, which cost us. Also an error that gained us! The dropped liner just in front of 2nd base got us a double play. In my opinion, that wasn't an Infield Fly, because it was more of a looping liner. But that is why Infield Fly is in the rule book, to prevent the defense from getting cheap double plays. So since the ball ended up getting dropped, we got a cheap double play.

We did get a lot of putouts in the field. We only had 3 strikeouts on the night. Aren had a couple nice plays fielding, and then throwing to first. Ryan and Sam each did so from the mound as well.


Guess how many games we have now played. Let's ask Mrs. Bueller.

Plan A1

We are going to attempt to play tonite at 6PM at East Diamond. Have your son there no later than 5:30 if possible.

2PM today is rained out

If we get some sun and wind, and can get the infield dried off, we may attempt it tonite at 6:30. Plan B is tomorrow night around 6, 630ish. So standby...

Photos

Vicki got some team photos tonite. I will get them posted and/or sent out to everybody sometime soon. Twas the last game of all 12 players.

We blew a great opportunity

Tonite, we had an opportunity for Ten-run Tube Top Tuesday, and we blew it. On Saturday, we could have had Roland and Story City's finest looking ladies parading around the East Diamond in their tube tops, but we could only manage a 7 run win. Doh!

However, not all is lost. Because most of the players are more interested in dancing than playing baseball, we have postponed this Thursday's game. So they can dance, and we will play the Indians next Tuesday at 6:30 PM at the East Diamond. So my Thursday "volunteers" for the concession stand will be moved to next Tuesday. I'll send out a reminder of our Saturday and Tuesday "volunteers" later, after I look it up. So we have one more Tuesday. If we 10 run the Indians next Tuesday, I will schedule another game somewhere, some how, just to provide the opportunity to wear the tube tops.

Anyway, on to the game tonite. Triple freakin' play.

Didn't see that coming. But I'll take it. Good job by the guys for field awareness. I was just gonna be happy with the double play, and thanks to a bunch of hollering, we got it thrown over to SS, Will I think was there. So good job outta Austin with the catch, the awareness to throw to 1st and the good throw to 1st. Good job by Ryan to catch it, and then throw over to 2nd. We hadn't looked real good there in the 6th prior to that, so it was a nice job to close it out.

Also had some other nice defensive plays. Aren did a great job tonite. He had a catch in LF, and then when playing 2nd, fielded a ball, stepped on 2nd, and threw over to 1st for the twin killing. Awesome.

Ryan also was listening! Yay. He backed up a wild throw while playing RF, and gunned it over to 3rd for an out on an advancing runner, with Sam putting the tag down. That was nice. Ryan also had a couple catches at first, including snaring a liner to his left.

Cole made some defensive plays from the mound. And no one is going to confuse Cole with being a strikeout pitcher this year. He only has struck out 3 so far this year. But he had 2 in one inning tonite, and another later, to double his total on the year. Cole is going to be gone for a week or so. So I was thankful to his mom for letting me know. So that way, I could burn him up tonite, and save other pitchers for later. He had his longest outing of the year I think. As long as the defense is solid behind Cole, he is going to be fine, and for the most part we helped him out.

Jerald is slowly getting his leg tightness worked out and pitched reasonably well, considering he is still not 100%. He and Cole met my goal of allowing 1 walk or less per defensive inning. Cole had 4 and Jerald had 1 in 6 defensive innings. We have not lost this year when we met that goal.

One thing we still try to talk to our outfielders, is not to take that 1st step in. Twice tonite we had balls just go over our heads. That will come with practice, which we never have.

On the bats, the hits were pretty even, they had 10, and we had 9. However the big difference was we walked them 5 times, and we got walked 11 times. The big lumber came in the first where we had a single, double, single, single, double, and walk right in a row by Nick, Sam, Jerald, Will, Ryan and Wyatt.

Sam went 2-3 with a single and double on the night, and also reached on an error. Dittos to Ryan. Drew walked 3 times. Everybody got on base tonite, either by hit, walk, error, or via fielder's choice.

I was a little disappointed with the middle of our order, and how they batted against the left hander with those slow pitches. We were lunging and getting all out of balance. I've seen better swings by blindfolded people trying to hit a pinata. Then some other guys are prepping for the dance already, by dancing around in the box. I want them to get aggressive in the box, but of course, that takes practice, which we never have time for.

Speaking of dancing, I worked with Sam before the game. His rhythmic dancing at the concert last night was very wooden. So I worked with him before the game on his swaying, and to emulate my smoothness. He still has a way to go, but my one lesson helped him tremendously. That may be my 2nd greatest coaching moment. My greatest coaching moment was teaching Josiah Soderstrum that guys, when standing with hands on hips, put their thumbs backwards.

Tuesday and Thursday

Tuesday night is the last night all 12 players will be at a game. Cole is going to be missing the last two. So we are going to have non-official photo night after the game. So bring your cameras, we will line the boys up, and you can get a pic of the gang, whether you did or didn't get a photo from Tekippes.

Then on Thursday, here is the deal. I think we are going to have enough of a team to play, so we are going to play the game. I will survey the boys again on Tuesday, and if we have enough, we are gonna play. (for more enticement, there is a dance at Scandy Days, so they won't have to wait long). So they can do what they gotta do.

The game on Thursday

We have a game this Thursday in Story City. And I just found out there is a Jr Hi dance that night. I don't think the dance was on the schedule when our schedule came out, but it is now.

So I pondered moving it to Wednesday, but 2 kids have confirmation stuff, and I don't want them to miss our game or their confirmation stuff.

So we surveyed the guys and asked them what they would rather do. 8 of 12 said baseball, and I had another "volunteer" for baseball. So that is 9 for baseball. If I can confirm 9 for baseball, we are going to play with what we have. I am going to check with the Indians coach, and see if he has any interest in playing the following week.

I get that the guys want to go to the dance, so if they want to do that, so be it. So stand by, decision yet to be made.

We got the win, so we have that going for us

Well that was not the most pleasant of baseball experiences. Horrible weather combined with 22 walks/HBP was ugly. But, so be it. The guys did their job when it mattered, and we got the W.

We didn't meet my goal of a walk/HBP per inning. We walked/plunked 7 in 5 defensive innings. All in all tho, the pitchers did a pretty good job. They also got some nice defensive help. We got a ball relayed in quickly from left field, and got a guy tagged out at 3rd. Nick had a super catch as catcher on a foul pop up, and Ryan made the plays he should at 3rd base.

The Dbacks actually outhit us 6 to 3. But we got walked 15 times. Jerald, Ryan, and Drew each went 3 for 3 in walks. Not much you can do when they don't throw strikes, and I like to see base hits, but I am not complaining.

Our 3 hits were by Nick, CJ and Austin.

No practice on Sunday. Lotsa graduations. The weather will be better, but not great, and practice starts for school this week, so they will be getting some in there. So we coaches decided to punt on that.

Next game is Tuesday at Gilbert at 6:15. School practice ends about 5:30. So what the Fritz family will be doing is picking up Jerald from practice and heading to Gilbert. Mom will have a sandwich in the car, and Jerald's Dodgers jersey. So anyway, get there when you get there, and we will make a go of it.

Blah.

Well that was ugly. However that is one that can be easily washed from the memory banks.

From the get go, I was in kind of an owly mood. And then I was mad at myself for sending Austin to 3rd base on his nice hit there in the first. That broke one of the Cardinal Rules of Baseball. Don't make the 1st or 3rd out at 3rd base. Their guy dropped it, I thought we could advance a base, and I got burned.

Then our guys seemed in a bit of a cloud tonite. I don't mind the physical errors so much. We don't practice. But it is the mental stuff, that drives me cuckoo. A lot of standing around, when we could be backing up bases. So we overthrow somebody, whoop di do. But I expect the guy behind him to be assuming a missed throw, and already be moving to back it up.

One guy did a great job with that tonite. That was Aren. There were a couple opportunities, and he was there. In most cases, nothing happened, but he made the effort, which I appreciate.

I thought Cole and CJ pitched pretty well for us tonite. Didn't always get the help they needed in the field, but that is no indictment of their pitching.

We did not meet my goal of less than a walk per inning. We gave up 6 in 4 innings.

Our batting looked good in the first inning. Nick reached on an error, then we had 2 triples and a double. Then it kinda slowed down, with a minor rally in the 5th. Sam had 2 hits, and CJ, Jerald, Ryan, and Cole all had a hit. Considering everybody only had 2 plate appearances, that kinda cuts down on hit opportunities. (Nick had 3 plate appearance, and reached twice due to errors.)

Speaking of errors, we had 4 errors in the first inning. No surprise, they scored 4 runs in the 1st inning.

So the D-backs get another crack at us Saturday. The game is at 2 at East Diamond. Off the top of my head, I don't remember who my "volunteer" concession stand folks are, but I hope you remember. See ya then!

Well, that was interesting part 2

Where do I start? Well, first Wyatt has a big knot on his head. That is pretty weird, getting hit in the head with your own foul ball. I'm guessing he hit it off the handle, and it came back and bit him. He seemed ok, but I decided he could sit in the shade for the rest of the day.

Nice bomb by Sammy Sosa, I mean Mathis. I don't think anybody heard me, but I got to do both my White Sox and Twins announcer calls on that one. "You can put it on the boarrrrd, YES!" and "Touch 'em all, Sam Mathis". And Jerald missed a Grand Salami by 2 feet. Bases juiced, and hit the fence in the air. And only got a single out of it, because the runners had to hold to see if it would be caught.

I was telling him he could be like Kirk Gibson of the Dodgers in the 88 World Series. Gibson could barely run due to an injury, he came off the bench and hit a pinch hit homerun to win Game 1 of the World Series. Gibson did not play in the rest of the World Series. Not quite the drama today, but Jerald could barely run, but he is a Dodger, so that would have been fun, but not quite. HERE is a link to the video of Gibson.

But I digress. All in all, nice to see us hit the ball today. Everybody got on base at least twice. Wyatt got his first base hit of the year. Ryan got off the schnide, and CJ had 3 base hits. We put the ball in play 20 times, and got 14 base hits, and got walked 14 times. (14 walks makes for a bad baseball game to watch, but I'll take it.)

We walked them 9 times. Yes 9 times. Since I'm doing videos, here ya go.
So we didn't meet my goal of a walk per inning or less.

Defensively, we were pretty solid. Wyatt and Will each had nice catches in LF. Wyatt's was a little too nonchalant for my liking, but an out is an out.

Also, a clarification for the little rhubarb, when we had runners at 1st and 3rd, Nick was stealing towards second, and then there was a foul tip by CJ, which went directly to, and was caught by the catcher.

Both umpires said foul, and the base ump started sending Nick back. I told Nick to stay at 2nd, and then blah blah blah. I may moan about umpire judgment calls, but I am not going to go out and argue them. I've been there many times, they are all trying their best, and as amateurs, they are going to miss calls, and balls and strikes.

However, I will go out and discuss a misapplication of the rules. And in this case, the rules were misapplied, and it would be easy to correct the misapplication, namely to put Nick back on 2nd.

Here is the deal, a foul tip that goes directly to the catcher, and is caught by the catcher, is a live ball strike. Runners can advance at their own peril. If the catcher had dropped it, Nick would have had to go back. Here is a discussion of it that I stole from the net....

FOUL-TIP RULE MYTH
There is nothing foul about a foul-tip. If the ball nicks the bat and goes sharp and direct to the catcher's hand or glove and is caught, this is a foul-tip by definition. A foul-tip is a strike and the ball is alive. It is the same as a swing-and-miss. If the ball is not caught, it is a foul ball. If the nicked pitch first hits the catcher somewhere other than the hand or glove, it is not a foul-tip, it is a foul ball.

So anyway, Gunnar agreed with me, after realizing the ball was caught. Then the umpires started arguing with each other, and we scored 7 runs and batted 11 people, and it all got ugly.

So anyway, with us scoring 16 runs, that gives a good practice for Ten-run Tube Top Tuesday. If we 10 run the Padres on Tuesday, all the moms have to wear tube tops for the next game. Yay! That game is at 6:15, or sooner. We gave it an extra 15 minutes due to track or baseball practice as Gilbert does not have lights, but that week, there is no track or baseball practice. So if you can be there by 530 great, maybe we can get started early. It is the field behind the elementary, to the north of where most minors and majors games are played.

Practice on Sunday from 1 to 2:30, if you can make it. I realize it is Mother's Day. If you have stuff going on, go do it.

5 games in, we are half-way done!

Well ,that was interesting

Nice comeback by the guys, but we fell a little short. That's something where we were facing probably the best pitcher in the league, and that makes it tough to get something going offensively.

Tonite was a good game, because the guys seemed to be interested, they were up on the fence a lot cheering on their teammates, and weren't acting downtrodden about the situation. I really enjoyed being the coach of this group tonite.

I was looking at the book, and I can go with a positive spin, or be negative, so I'm gonna go positive! Here goes...
Alex pitched 5 1/3 innings for the Rays. Of those 16 outs, 13 were strikeouts, he caught 1 pop up from Sam, and picked us off 2nd once. The only out that didn't involve Alex was a 6-3 groundout by Jerald. (Alex also surrendered 3 walks, Jerald reached on an error, Nick got a hit, and Austin reached on a catcher's interference.)

Not so hot hitting by us, but here is where I am happy. I see Juniors LL as development for Jr Hi ball. Going down our lineup, every single person on our team got us outs defensively tonite. We aren't getting much practice due to track and weather, but the guys are getting their opportunity to get outs, and improve themselves.

Through the first 6 innings for the Rays, only the pitcher, catcher, short, and 1b even got to touch the ball. For us, going thru our lineup tonite, what we did defensively....
Nick played a good catcher, including a nice play on a ball hit just in front of home plate, and threw the runner out at first. CJ got to apply a tag at first, and some put outs there as well, Jerald pitched 2 innings of shutout ball. Sam, after struggling at 3rd last game, threw a kid out from 3rd tonite, and also pitched an inning for us. Will caught a couple innings, and pitched a scoreless 6th. Austin caught a pop up at short I think, and also threw a kid out from there. Zach had a nice catch in CF. Aren fielded a ball at 2nd, and threw a kid out. Wyatt applied a tag at 2nd on an attempted steal. Ryan applied a tag when he and Jerald picked off a runner at first, and Cole pitched 2 innings for us.

So in short, every player on our team had a putout tonite.

Now, we had a couple errors. We had outfielders not backing up bases. And our offense was pretty sad, until the 7th inning. We did not meet my goal of 1 walk/HBP per inning or less (8 in 6 innings) But again, we didn't give up, and hits combined with walks made the Rays earn it, at least.

Of course no practice doesn't help. A lot of the guys were not used to seeing curve balls, and got froze on those. I'm thinking we will have much better success hitting the ball this Saturday.