by Keith Morehart, Chubby Gangsters
(Pictures to come later)
Coming into Wednesday's matchup between the Foul Balls and Chubby Gangsters, Team Captain Buster Patterson and his home team (CG's) were a slight favorite over the Foul Balls. In fact if you ask Vegas, they had them at a slight 1.5 point favorite. Little did Sin City know, the final results would be even closer than that!
The Foul Balls were up to bat first and come out of the gate like gang busters. Dropping fly balls out of the sky right in the middle of the outfield between all of the Gangsters (they typically try and plug as many holes as they can with 4 outfielders and a deep playing short field). Between the well placed fly balls and a couple huge kicks, Foul Balls were able to ground and pound 3 runs to lead off the game.
The Gangters get up in the home half of the same inning and utilize their first 5 batters wisely. Four of their first five batters reach base safely, and score 2 runs in the process. The following batters were able to sacrifice to move the base runners into scoring position. Unfortunately some poor base running, and a poorly placed clipboard cause the Gangsters to end the inning without scoring any other runs.
The innings to follow were a defensive battle. Yes, a battle between the defense and themselves. There were some errors, and maybe some plays weren't up to the standard of the kickball Gods (keep in mind, it was still kind of wet outside), but the ability of the defense to allow 2 to 3 base runners almost every inning, only to pull out the stop and keep both teams virtually scoreless (Gangsters were the only team to break through with a single run until the 4th inning, leaving the score tied at 3).
The errors were many, however there were exceptional plays from both teams to keep everyone ramped up and going. I particularly remember several difficult pop-ups to the FB's first baseman, but I'm here to focus on the CG's! The Gangsters had a spectacular diving catch by Thane Osterdahl at first, as well as Keith Morehart working together with both Stan Johnston, Jr and Osterdahl (twice in one write-up!) to make some key outs.
That brings us to the bottom of the 4th. The Gangsters get up to bat and decide to break the game wide open. Getting through almost their entire lineup by utilizing the wet grass (and inevitable wet ball) by small balling the hell out of those bases and scoring 5 runs!
So it's the top of the 5th and the Foul Balls have nothing left and the game ends at 8-3, a convincing offensive victory for the Gangsters.
Except that's not what happened at all!
A combination of some deep balls, taking advantage of good base running and, once again, a slippery ball, the Foul Balls battle... and battle... and battle. They rally back to 8-7, with 2 outs and runners on 1st and 2nd (I'm pretty sure there were only 2 base runners). A bunt is dropped, and quite honestly I can't tell you exactly what happened. I know the runner hustled down the first base line and it seemed to be another error was going to be charged to the CG's, and then out of nowhere the ball and the runner arrived on first at the same time. Luckily, "tie goes to the runner" did not apply here and the runner was called out to end the game, and all the built up anxiety for Team Captain Buster Patterson, and the incessant sideline yelling from Chris "Bundy" Leblanc (who probably could have given a much better write up than anyone else at the game) come to an end.
Both teams gathered in the middle of the field, then again on the sidelines post game, and then again at the bar to discuss how much fun the game was and a few of the screwey/awesome plays. I can tell you, speaking as one single member of the Gangsters, this game was the most fun we had all season. I swear to you it had nothing to do with the long awaited win. It was just two teams who really just wanted to play some kickball, with some good people, and then go drink some beer. Quite frankly, I just defined what I hope to be every Wednesday for a long time to come.
Here are some of the quotes from some of your fellow WAKA'ers about this epic battle:
"It ended up being a barn burner." -Kim Merritt from the Jagernauts
"I'm not on the CG's or the FB's... but I wish I could have been a part of this historical game." - Brandon Silver from Battlestar
"We played behind them at 6:30, and their game looked so phenomenal that I almost left my game to ask and see if I could come play in theirs." -Nikki LeBlanc from JFK
"I feel like this could be a turn around for both of these studly teams. I expect both of them to get votes in the Coaches Poll this upcoming week." -Brent Wentworth (SPOILER ALERT: Neither team has received any votes)
Sidenote: I have have made up some of those quotes, but I trust all of those people were thinking these things, regardless if they actually spoke them to me or not.
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