MAY 16, 2024

Rusty Royals Report – John Koopman

The Rusty Royals and the Grey Beards played a seesaw battle in game one.  The highlight was a preplanned play whereby we agreed that if there was a runner on first, our first baseman Willi Thurner would let the next line drive deflect off his glove, tempting the Grey Beard runner to take second. Jeff Biren would then catch the ball in the air, off of the deflection, and then relay back to Willi who would tag the hapless Grey Beard who was now scrambling to return to first, to score a double play.  It worked to perfection.   Tinkers to Evers to Chance have nothing on this Rusty Royal combination.  Jeff Palmer's little league home run was the highlight of the Rusty Royal offensive display.  He was also 3-4 on the day as were pitcher "Crafty" Rich Halyk, seasoned veteran Bill Johnson and John Koopman.  The Royals led going into the bottom of the last inning but were unable to hold what seemed to be juiced Grey Beard bats.  The final was 14-13 for the Grey Guys.

The Rusty Royals were not about to lose two games. Palmer hit another home run (and made some good catches in left centre). The league's oldest player, Al Stokes (sorry Barney), celebrating his 50th year in slo-pitch, added two hits and a run, plus a nice grab on a long throw from Jeff Biren to catch a runner trying to take home.  Dan Cooper enjoyed his first game back and we think he will be one of the league's power hitters this year. Only too many real estate deals can stop this sophomore sensation. Andy McMakin continued his hot hitting, Jeff Biren continued his hot defensive play and the Royals cruised to a 9-6 victory.

Grey Beards Report – Larry Young

Another glorious day of sunshine. Perfect for slo-ptich. First game went back and forth with the lead changing several times. Greybeards came up to bat in the bottom of the 7th down a few runs. Stringing together a number of hits with two out. The winning hit was by King Brock (Paterson) for a 10-9 victory.

Second game the timely hitting went away and every line drive seemed to get caught by the opposition. Clearly the scouting reports paid off. Greybeards had a loss. So a split in the day maintaining our .500 record.

Big bats for the day were: Barney Henderson 4/6, Bruce Locke 6/6, Randy Heinbecker 5/7 and Greg Macauley 5/7.

White Hairs Report – Jeff Morton

The White Hairs pregame discussion included "don't take these Blue Pills lightly."  Well, the Hairs didn't take any Blue Pills resulting in ineffective performance.

Game one ended in a 7-7 tie.  Game two 8-5 for the Pills.

Several Hairs had 4 hits including Go Go Brazier, Secret Weapon Grudzinki, Morton, Wild Bill Manson, Prancer Byj, Vince Moffat and Doug Hyland.

Pitchers for both teams enjoyed working on their unlimited arc skills. 

The Hairs left the diamond in reasonably good spirits feeling confident that at least we would at least be first to Monaghans.  Alas, the damn Red Faces beat us there and took our table to boot.  We'll just have to see what happens when we play those wankers next Thursday.

Enjoy the long weekend.

Blue Pills Report – Frank Sturm

“At least we didn’t lose”. Quote of the day from Mike Canham. The 0-4 Pills took on the 4-0 Hairs. An epic showdown that pitted a (Uhmmmm) good team against a struggling team?? Anyway, the tension was high and every run mattered in this defensive game 1 battle. The lead was always narrow and the“Pills” meds were kicking in. They fought tooth and nail to try and break their losing streak. The game came down to the 7th inning. The visiting Pills scored 1 run to tie the Hairs at 7-7. The Pills were kept at bay from scoring their 8th by the arm of Jeff Morton. Silver Fox Sturm was indeed tempted to round third and challenge that arm. But the coach called him off. He might have made it, or he might have been thrown out at the plate, but the history books will never know. The bottom of the 7th was equally tense. The Hairs fought back getting their winning run to third, but were unable to score. Final score 7-7.  Oh how sweet it is!! Pills get their first point of the season. Even if only a tie.

Game 2 went smoother for the Pills. The mojo from the game 1 motto “we didn’t lose” was infectious. Everyone contributed to the effort. Pills had two throw-outs at home with great catches by Gord Preston.  IMC (Iron Mike Canham) was stellar on the mound as always. Notable hitters were Frank Sturm 5-7 (scoring 4 times in game 1) and Darrel Northcott 4-6 with an rbi. Final score 8-5 for the Pills.

Infinite arc? what is that? An AutoCAD command? An infinite arc for those that don’t know (including this reporter) is when the height of a pitch goes WAY above 12 feet and is not called by the umpire. Rumor has it that it may have affected hitting. Ask Dave Walker for his thoughts.

Great job Blue Pills. Onward and upward.

Red Faces Report – Tom Hunter

[Ed. Note – the Red Faces’ game report from Game 1 was lost in the mail. Coincidentally, the Red Faces were mercied 15-3 in five innings.]

Having finally returned from the wilderness (or wherever he was), Manager Mike Boyle gave a stirring speech to pick up his dispirited team following their dismal performance in Game One.  In his dreams.  In reality, Mike decided to adopt the Jon Cooper approach to coaching – “I chew gum and let the players play.”  It worked.  In the first inning Jim McDonald’s leadoff single was promptly followed by triples from Ron VanderMeulin and Jeff Francis. However, the Winers were not intimidated and quickly put up a mercy in the bottom half.  The pitching mastery of Jack Pang kept the overripe Wines scoreless for the next three innings while the Faces rebounded to claim a 4-run lead going into the precarious seventh.  Two quick outs later, the Winers were hanging on by their fingertips and the Faces could almost taste the victory beer. But in the OMMSPL the third out can be elusive.  A high infield fly looked like the final out, but a slight miscalculation (or was it the Sun?) left pitcher Pang with his pride and noggin equally wounded. The Wines graciously provided another opportunity to end the contest with a fly ball to left field, but it dropped in. The next batter had a strong hit into centre left field which looked certain to bring home the tying runs, but speedy Dan Sancartier preserved the victory with a nicely timed running catch.  Whew!

VanderMeulin, Francis and Bernie Renwick were all a perfect 5-5 at the plate on the day, and Jim MacDonald was 3-4 with a walk. The defensive highlight of the day was an unassisted double play by reciprocally named Dave George.

Fine Wines Report – Dave Adams

Player expectations were high that the Fine Wines could extend their one-game win streak which began the previous week. Four runs in each of the first two innings gave the Wines an 8-4 lead over the Red Faces. An additional 3 runs were added in the 4th frame, followed by 5 more in the fifth which brought an end to this mercy-shortened contest with the Wines coming out on top 15-3. Offensive output was provided by Geoff Coulson and Jonathan Kamin with 4 hits apiece, and 7 runs. Mike Way produced a 3-run dinger as part of his 3-hit game. Ian Schell found his groove at the plate, going 3 for 3 and scoring once.

Picking up where they left off in game 1, the Wines scored 5 runs to lead off Game 2. Unfortunately for the Wines their bats then became as quiet and useless as a corkscrew at a boxed wine convention. Innings 2 thru 6 saw the Wines send a lowly 20 batters to the plate and score but a single run by Schell, who again supplied 3 hits. With the Wines needing a bunch of runs in their half of the final frame, your intrepid reporter was in a pickle because he had to vacate the diamond to participate in another kind of ball game. [Ed. Note – Dave left early to play in an Ontario Seniors Pickleball Tournament.  There is no truth to the rumour that some unusual betting activity was connected to his premature departure.] Manager Chris Barrett reported to me that Mike Way skyed a ball (a homerun in an elevator shaft) that ended up landing on the Red Faces' pitcher's head for a hit. A screaming line drive to the outfield by one of the team's Ians (either BIG IAN or little ian) was caught to end the game.

 So with the split in games, the optimist in me says the Wines' glasses were half full.

2023 SEASON FINALE!

Congratulations to the White Hairs for achieving first place in the regular season and, for an encore, winning the Playoff Championship.

From left to right:  Barny Henderson,  Tony Fratia,  Frank Strum,  Kim Warren,  Roman Kryzaniwsky,  Mike Canham,  Jeff Morton (Manager),  Al King,  Brock Paterson,  Greg Potter,  Nick Wollaston,  Rick Cummings,  Vince Pileggi 

Congratulations also to the Fine Wines for their terrific regular season (1 point out of first place) and a hard-fought battle in the Championship Game.

From left to right - Ian Schell, Tony Foscarin, Jim McDonald, Steve Isaacs, Rick Wilcox, George Merrick, Vince Moffat, Andy Kozai, Rick Wilkinson, Dave Adams, Mike Way, Chris Barrett, Ted Wierda

And congratulations to Shane Noseworthy, the recipient of the Bill Carson Award for 2023, which is awarded to a player who exemplifies patience, a positive attitude, enthusiasm, support of his teammates and a proclivity to lead by example, and who commands respect from both his teammates and competitors.

BOYS OF SUMMER 2023