Blog-Off!!!

Kickball In the Time of the Peninsula;  or 
Who Will Kick Our Balls When We’re Gone?; or 
How I Learned to Stop Worrying About Co-Worker’s Questions and Love Kickball

The Foul Balls had plenty of motivation going into their week 2 match against Ballsagna:

1. Memories of last season’s playoffs where the Foul Balls took a slim lead (3-2) into  the bottom of the fifth inning. But after an inning of timely kicking and Foulie miscues, Ballsagna moved on to the next round and the Ballers left the field in tears (or maybe we were just cutting onions after all we were making a ballsagna… for one).
2. The ‘experts’ at Three Up Three Down put the Foulers as eight run underdogs!
3. Worries of having to read the Silent Killer’s blog after a Ballsagna win entitled ‘Ballsagna Put their Nicely-Smelling Balls On the Foul Balls’ (editor’s note: that is a horrible title, change before posting). Well, luckily for you there will be two blogs detailing this epic match-up. That’s right – IT’S A BLOG-OFF!

Center field at War Memorial Stadium was the setting for this showdown of Ballsagna and the Spring 2009 champion Foul Balls. Action started quickly as singles by Andy Doye and Wade Brock and a sacrifice by Laura Schmitt put runners on second and third. This was followed by a RKI-double by Jesse Rogers and a 2 RKI-double by Mark Flores. Unfortunately, that would be the entirety of the Foul Ball’s scoring. Their defense would have to save the day.

And their defense stepped up almost immediately. In the bottom of the first, with two runners on Wes McClain kicked a line drive to shallow left field. Glancing off the third baseman’s hands, the ball was intercepted by outfielder (and awesome guy) Andreas Beyersdorf. The throw from the outfield was too late to stop Mark Thompson from scoring. But instead of grabbing the ball, charger Kim Merritt (now halfway between third and home) volleyballed it into the air towards the first base sidelines. The second Ballsagna base-runner now rounding third assumed this was an error and headed home. What he couldn’t know was that this was a masterful piece of trickery by Kim knowing it would result in an out. Andy Doye grabbed the kickball and threw it to Mark Flores who applied the tag at home; Foulies 3, Ballsagna 1 after one.

The Foul Balls defense continued to impress with key plays by Wade Brock in the second and Sarah Schmitt with an unassisted double play in the third inning. And after four and a half innings the score was 3-2 for the Foul Ones – the same as last season’s playoff match-up. Ballsagna wanted a repeat of that first-round game and quickly put runners on first and third with only one out. But a popped up foul ball caught by Andy Doye resulted in the second out and the game was left to Jon Lenard at the plate. His bunt down third was fielded well by Andy Doye who threw towards first… the runner on third heads for home… the throw is high… too high… too high… but it’s caught by Dennis Gholson stretching out to make the grab while tippy-toing on the bag… Foul Balls Win… FOUL BALLS WIN! FOUL BALLS WIN!!! Oh wait, it’s only week 2 let me tone it down a little… the Foul Balls win and are now 1-1. Next week – Recess Rejects.

That’s it. Blog-off over. Silent Killer you just got served! #KITTOTPOWWKOBWWGOHILTSWACQALK

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Speaking of You Got Served, here are my problems with the ending to the movie: At the end of the dance competition, Lil’ Kim declares a tie between the LA crew and the OC crew but Mr. Rad (Steve Harvey) says it can’t go down like that. So a tie breaker round is started to be decided by loudest cheering from the crowd. But here’s the problem… the competition is being held in downtown LA (Staples Center?) – there is no chance for the OC crew to win over the home crowd. Plus, Lil’ Kim allows anyone to join the crews thus enabling the two main characters to settle differences and both dance for the LA dance team while Orange County was left with their original dancers. Finally, the LA crew is named after a dead 10 year-old thus getting additional sympathy from the crowd. No contests should ever be judged based on crowd noise but this competition was particularly unjust!