Perfect Four A Rainy Night

The Pen & Pencil Club softball team finally finished the first half of the CCSL season on Tuesday night on damp and deep Edgeley 8 with a 15-4 win over the National Constitution Center.
This was a makeup game of a previous rainout and for much of the day, it looked like another rainout was on the way. But we did not have compatible dates with NCC for squeezing in the game between now and the rest of the season, and the radar maps clearly indicated there would be an end to the rain by game time, so we gave it a try.
Maybe we should play all our games on fields that need significant raking and shoveling ahead of time. We hit well, fielded well (except for the odd rundown goof) and got the game finished 10 minutes before it started raining again.
With the win, we finish the first half 7-2 against the other nine teams in the CCSL and if we can duplicate that in the second half, we’ll head into the playoffs with a good seed and a chance to do some damage.
The hitting star on the night was Ellen Kenney, who was 4-for-4, making solid contact every time, including a hard smash to third base. Ellen, and all the hitters near the bottom of the lineup, helped keep the innings going, and she had a hit and a run in the five-run sixth inning that took all doubt from the contest.
We did start slowly, scoring just one run in each of the first two innings, while NCC scored a total of three to lead 3-2 heading into the third. We added five runs in that

inning for a 7-3 lead, and the score stayed that way until the five-run sixth. We tacked on three more in the top of the seventh, allowed one in the gloaming and finished off the game with a spritely double play turned Keith Craig-unassisted-to-Chris Brennan.
At the plate, we had 27 hits and should have scored more runs perhaps, but left 13 on base, including eight in scoring position. Fortunately, we got plenty this time. Behind Ellen’s leadership, we had three hits from George Miller, Stick Lynch and Dan Rubin, and two each for Russ Krause, Mark Nevins, Kathy Matheson and Tommy Rowan.
Ed Cascarella singled sharply into left field in his only at-bat. Matheson, who was playing mad because of work, roped the ball in every at-bat and suggested that perhaps she should play mad more often. Whatever works.
We start the second half of the schedule with a M-T doubleheader next week, meeting Team Green Tambourine at Lake Belmont on Monday and then enjoying a Hoagiefest! evening with the Bishop’s Collar on Tuesday at Dairy 2. April and May were good to us. Let’s make it a June to remember as well.

Leave Him There, He'll Be All Right

Actually, when it comes to our history against the South Philly Tap Room team, things do not generally turn out to be all right in the end. In fact, when we get knocked down – or trip ourselves, depending on one’s vantage – we usually stay right there.
Heading into Monday’s matchup on surprisingly-playable Belmont 4, the Pen & Pencil Club softball team had lost 10 straight to the Tap Room. Our last win, in The Management’s first season as The Management, came on June 11, 2007, a 23-22 win on Edgeley 4 that was secured only when George Miller pulled down a smash into the left-center gap with the tie run on base and the winning run at the plate. (I know you are asking yourself who is going to keep these records and do this kind of research once The Management hangs up the clipboard and the aluminum scorebook with the field permits inside, arranged in alphabetical order: Belmont, Dairy, Edgeley. Here’s the answer: No one is going to do it.)
Anyway, yes, it was 10 straight losses and if you would like to know the aggregate score of those 10 games, or even if you don’t, it was 191-89, or an average loss of 19-9. We had some shots at the Tap, losing 21-20 in a 2010 game that had to be suspended and resumed, and then we lost twice in extra innings (8-7, 14-11) in 2011. Nevertheless: L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L, L and L.
Well, the Tap will have to start a new streak now. The Red Inks of the P&P held on for a 12-9 win on Monday. We bunched six runs in the decisive fourth inning to take a decent lead and then kept the SPTR’s scoreless in their final three at-bats.
It was an action-packed game, and a little too much of the action took place around the upper thigh area of The Management, if you really want to know. But the game highlight was obvious and you can see the full video of it here.

Unfortunately for us on this slide at the plate by Jon Snyder,
the gentleman in the right of the frame has the ball. A good
aggressive try in our six-run fourth inning, however.

 As it turned out, Brian Donlen did not kill himself accepting a three-foot flip toss from second base in order to force out Pam Hill for the final out of the third inning. Everyone will view the film with a different eye.
The shortstop claims he was about to raise his glove off the ground with the ball in it – after corralling it finally, that is – and at that off-balance moment Hill tripped him and sent him sprawling. Other interpretations suggest he might have tripped himself. But you decide.
In any case, we were trailing 6-5 when that out was made and needed to keep the Tap off the scoreboard any further. Motivated by Donlen’s courageous play, our offense came in and got those six runs that turned out to be the difference. Dan Rubin, Jon Snyder, Russ Krause, Ellen Kenney, Kerry O’Connor, George Miller, Steve Lynch and Mark Nevins strung together hits to get the runs – Lynch’s was a two-run home run to right – before Donlen hit a fly ball to Elmer in center because he knew we had enough.

Management's left thigh,
if you must know.

Our offense did a decent job of finding the holes in a Tap Room outfield that only had three occupents, and Rubin led the way, along with Miller, Nevins (HR) and Snyder with three hits each. Two hits for Kerry O’Connor, Lynch, Donlen, and The Mangement.
It was a really nice win, and would only have felt better if Al Heinle had not decided to follow up a first-inning home run with a line drive that left a large bruise on the pitcher. He got thrown out at first for that impertinence and struck out in his next at-bat. (Claiming something about the sun and his sunglasses.)
It was a typical Belmont game in that only one run was scored total by both teams in the final three innings, once that sun did dip low enough to make every at-bat seem like laser surgery.
A great win and a long time coming, if you consider six years a long time. That puts us at 6-2 on the season, with a makeup Tuesday against NCC on the way. Get your running in.

Scene 26: In which Elmer says to his pitcher, "Hey, Bruno. You just gave up a double to a guy in khakis."



At Least It Didn't Rain

Well, it isn’t as if a play here or a play there would have made a difference. Our 21-10 loss to the Catahoula Orcs wasn’t that kind of heartbreaker game.
It would have taken a play here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and here and there to turn around this baby.
And we didn’t make any plays. None. Zero. Our stunning inability to catch and throw turned what was a seemingly close game in the middle innings into a rout. Now, we’ve seen this game before, and the outcome might have been preordained. But we made it a little easier on them than necessary.
For the record, it was a 6-6 game after three innings, and we trailed just 8-6 after four innings, but Catahoulas put up a nine-spot in the fifth inning. They might have batted around twice. (We don’t know for sure because there was no one on the bench to keep their side of the scorebook. More on that later.)
I didn’t keep count, but we probably made five or six errors that inning. It was good that we bunched them together and gave up only a pretty reasonable 12 runs in the other six innings, but that’s pretty much inventing the bright spot. And I hope Nevins is having a great vacation.

Score was still close after four innings. George did get the
opponents' name wrong, though. Easy mistake.

We didn’t do too badly on offense, although our big four-run inning came in the third when we batted out of order and they didn’t catch it. I think what I’m going to do in the future is post a clipboard on the fence with the batting order written really big so we don’t mess it up against a team that pays better attention. (Oh, wait. I do that? Damn.) And I'm not going to mention who exactly batted out of order because Lynch is actually very sensitive.
From our side of the book, which George Miller did keep for us, Chris Yasiejko, Keith Craig and the Management had three hits. George, Steve Lynch and Dan Rubin had two hits each.
We turned our 17 hits into 10 runs, which isn’t so bad because Catahoula does not give extra outs. They catch the ball, which is another reason not to like them very much.
We come back Monday against the Tap Room on Lake Belmont. Get your swimming in.
                                                           (***)
A word about punctuality and showing up if you sign up: Please do.
OK, those are two words, but you get the idea. We have never been a late team and I’m not sure what’s going on, but the Management is going to have an aneurism looking at the time and at the parking lot every week at 6:25 p.m.
Try to arrive by 6 p.m. We can have batting practice! That would be fun!
And if you can't make it, text the poor Management. Don't make Brennan have to find a replacement this early in the season.
As you were.

A Win By A Nose

To be honest, which is never, ever the best policy despite what you might hear elsewhere, Monday’s game against the much-improved Fleisher Art Memorial is the kind of game we have lost in recent seasons.
It goes like this: We kind of loll around, miss some pop-ups, don’t put together innings, let the game stay way close until late and then, well, lose. That could have easily been the case on sun-washed Edgeley 4 against a very good Fleisher team that will certainly be in the postseason when and if this year ever gets that far – which sometimes seems doubtful.
The management team of the Pen & Pencil Club voted to expand from 13 games to 18 games this season and, wow, now we have to actually play them. Nevertheless, the P&P arrives at the one-third mark of the season with a 5-1 record after coming from behind and then holding on to beat the Fighting Sammys of Fleisher by a 9-7 count on Monday.
We trailed 7-5 after Fleisher batted in the top of the third and scored in only one more inning, but our four-spot in the fifth turned out to be enough as FAM went 0-for-the last four innings. That’s not going to happen every time, but fortunately, it happened this time.
We had a good turnout, some of which turned out prior to the later 6:30 p.m. start, which Management clearly should never have mentioned. We had fans, including Ed’s buddy Fred, and Courtney, our exceptional waitstaff executive from the Club, and some CCSL lowlifes who have nothing better to do than drink our beer while simultaneously heckling us. It was festive.

O'Connor: 3-for-3 and two RBIs, great sliding catch. Soop-ah.

The scorebook shows that seven of Fleisher’s first 15 batters scored, and that of their final 16 batters no one scored. That’s quite a shift and pretty unexplainable. Usually, when a team starts hot, it has confidence and keeps going. That’s why things looked dreary for us after FAM took that 7-5 lead in the top of the third (which it still held as we entered the bottom of the fifth).
But some bloops that eluded our gloves early on began to be caught. Kerry O’Connor had a nifty sliding catch of one of those, as did Steve Lynch. Chris Brennan pulled down a semi-high throw to complete an infield out.
Everything else seemed kind of routine as Fleisher brought just 13 to the plate in its final four at-bats. Management would like to take credit for this, but he wasn’t doing anything different from the first three innings. Sometimes, you just get the ball hit to you.
On the offensive side of the slate, O’Connor was key near the bottom of the order with a 3-for-3 night and two RBIs. Same for Keith Craig, who batted in front of Kerry, had two hits and an RBI and also got the batting order turned over for us.
Up at the top of the order, where the big boys are supposed to lurk, Brian Donlen carried the load with a 3-hit game and two RBIs. George Miller had two hits and two RBIs. Russ Krause was a leadoff with two hits and an RBI, and two hits as well for Jon Snyder. Big hit for Ellen Kenney in the fifth to make our winning rally possible.
Overall, a pretty composed win over a good team, and, well, 5-1 isn’t bad.
We play the undefeated Catahoula Orcs on Tuesday. The Orcs won their showdown with the Tap 18-16 and now seek new blood. Let’s surprise them.


Also 3-for-3, including this insurance run RBI in the fifth. (All photos by Chris Yasiejko.)