At the end of March we played the perennial doormat. I can go back several years in the state records and this team basically wins 0 - 2 games every season. Two years ago, I think we were their only win, and it was because they invited another team over to play us first and didn't actually tell our coach until the bus was 20 minutes away from arrival. We didn't have two pitchers who could get it done, so they blew us out. But we beat them something like 18-1 when they came to our place a few weeks later.
Anyway, back to the present. At this point I've decided never to consider any team a "gimme" game, but it's hard not to think that when playing this bunch.
It was not to be, though. I don't know WTF happened. Maybe it was the rubber being at 40ft causing our hitters to be wonky. Maybe it was the enormous hole at the rubber causing our pitcher to lag. It was so deep my kid's cleat was vertical as she pushed forward (she struggled bad in the JV game), or maybe it was just dumb luck, but we barely got out of there with a 6-5 varsity win. Their pitching was very weak. Their hitting was below average. Everything I had expected to see, but we were just OFF. I know that happens periodically, but geez. These girls have taken so many games down to the wire. But, they've won most of them. I'll take that.
Several days later we traveled out of state a ways and played a christian school. There are basically no stats available for them, and christian schools are kind of a crap shoot. They're usually either loaded with scholarship kids and destroy people, or they're loaded with 7th graders and they suck. This one was actually somewhere in-between.
Pitcher #1 got the start and came out hot. She had given up just a couple hits and one run over four complete innings. Then, things went south.
My family had shown up to watch since it was closer to home for them, so I was behind the dugout chatting and getting them set up, and when we sat down to watch, our other pitcher was out there, and the starter was nowhere to be found. I found out she had stepped out of the dugout, which sits about 6 inches above ground level, and rolled her ankle so bad she had to leave. So, the game carries on. Now 3B had to move to 1B because 1B had moved to pitcher. 3B was now occupied by a girl who had been in RF and has no real infield experience. DD2, who has three years of 3B experience, is still in the dugout, presumably still being saved to be fresh to pitch the JV game.
The opponent starts hitting the ball well and some runs are given up. The next inning I look up and our catcher has been replaced. I go ask her parents what's up and am told she hurt her knee. The gound was ROUGH. I didn't even realize it because it looked nice, but it clicked when I realized why none of the girl had been sliding.
By the 6th inning, we had given up a few runs (which would have been more had we not seen one of their runners miss home plate as she trotted in ahead of a 3 run homer) and the score was something like 6-4. Luckily our girls were still hitting well. They had also replace their pitcher around the same time we did. I'm not sure if it was her performance, or injury, but she had the best mechanics I've seen all season. Not much movement, but I expect she'll be a killer in the next few years. Her replacement had been decent, but we hit her just as well and finally stopped the bleeding and won 9-6.
I started warming the kid up for JV and over the course of 20 minutes, 3 of the 4 field lights clusters went dark. They were unable to get them fired back up (not the first time it's happened) so JV was cancelled. So we hit cracker barrel with the family and called it a night. That's probably the 4th or 5th time there's been no JV game for one reason or another.
Anyway, back to the present. At this point I've decided never to consider any team a "gimme" game, but it's hard not to think that when playing this bunch.
It was not to be, though. I don't know WTF happened. Maybe it was the rubber being at 40ft causing our hitters to be wonky. Maybe it was the enormous hole at the rubber causing our pitcher to lag. It was so deep my kid's cleat was vertical as she pushed forward (she struggled bad in the JV game), or maybe it was just dumb luck, but we barely got out of there with a 6-5 varsity win. Their pitching was very weak. Their hitting was below average. Everything I had expected to see, but we were just OFF. I know that happens periodically, but geez. These girls have taken so many games down to the wire. But, they've won most of them. I'll take that.
Several days later we traveled out of state a ways and played a christian school. There are basically no stats available for them, and christian schools are kind of a crap shoot. They're usually either loaded with scholarship kids and destroy people, or they're loaded with 7th graders and they suck. This one was actually somewhere in-between.
Pitcher #1 got the start and came out hot. She had given up just a couple hits and one run over four complete innings. Then, things went south.
My family had shown up to watch since it was closer to home for them, so I was behind the dugout chatting and getting them set up, and when we sat down to watch, our other pitcher was out there, and the starter was nowhere to be found. I found out she had stepped out of the dugout, which sits about 6 inches above ground level, and rolled her ankle so bad she had to leave. So, the game carries on. Now 3B had to move to 1B because 1B had moved to pitcher. 3B was now occupied by a girl who had been in RF and has no real infield experience. DD2, who has three years of 3B experience, is still in the dugout, presumably still being saved to be fresh to pitch the JV game.
The opponent starts hitting the ball well and some runs are given up. The next inning I look up and our catcher has been replaced. I go ask her parents what's up and am told she hurt her knee. The gound was ROUGH. I didn't even realize it because it looked nice, but it clicked when I realized why none of the girl had been sliding.
By the 6th inning, we had given up a few runs (which would have been more had we not seen one of their runners miss home plate as she trotted in ahead of a 3 run homer) and the score was something like 6-4. Luckily our girls were still hitting well. They had also replace their pitcher around the same time we did. I'm not sure if it was her performance, or injury, but she had the best mechanics I've seen all season. Not much movement, but I expect she'll be a killer in the next few years. Her replacement had been decent, but we hit her just as well and finally stopped the bleeding and won 9-6.
I started warming the kid up for JV and over the course of 20 minutes, 3 of the 4 field lights clusters went dark. They were unable to get them fired back up (not the first time it's happened) so JV was cancelled. So we hit cracker barrel with the family and called it a night. That's probably the 4th or 5th time there's been no JV game for one reason or another.