B League Picayune
Often in error, never in doubt.
Volume 7, Issue 66 – November 10, 2025
Department of Corrections: It was Ken Brown, not Tony Garcia, who ran for Jeff Stone in the fourth inning of Maroon’s game last Thursday and wound up caught off first base on the F-7, 7-3 double play. And I credited Donnie Janac for making a good running catch in the bottom half of that inning; it was Ken who ran the ball down. The Picayune regrets the errors.
Games of Monday November 10:
Game times were moved back 30 minutes on account of the cold morning temperature (see Dave Berra’s game one weather report).
11:00 a.m.: Red (8-7) at Green (7.5 – 7.5):
1 2 3 4 5 BUFFET FINAL Red 0 0 0 0 0 2 2 Green 3 5 0 5 5 X 18 Pitchers: Red – Tom Kelm; Green – Chunky Wright. Mercenaries: Red – Tom Kelm, David Pittard, George Romo, and Scott Wright; Green – George Brindley, Jim Foelker, and Ray Pilgrim. Umpires: home – Larry Young; bases – Marvin Krabbenhoft and Spike Davidson. Perfect at the plate: Green – George Brindley (2 for 2 with a walk and a double), Jim Foelker (3 for 3 with a double), Mike Garrison (3 for 3 with a walk and a home run), and Ralph Villela (4 for 4 with a double). Home run: Mike Garrison (inside the park) (8).
Dave Berra’s weather report: 53 degrees, felt like 51; humidity 24%; wind from the north (Polar Vortex!), 8 MPH; sunny – a touch cool but nice.
On the 50th anniversary of the wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald, with apologies to Gordon Lightfoot, and also anyone with a sense of rhythm:
Introduction:
The legend lives on, from Buster Goode on down,
of the B League at Krieg in East Austin.
Green team it is said will just leave you for dead
When the temps in November turn chilly.
And Red team will flail and throughout the game trail
When it runs the bases willy-nilly.
Red’s at bats:
With mercenaries three, an outfield so tight,
and a pitcher named Chunky to guide them,
Green set down Red scoreless all morn, every fielder a hero,
And in the home halves slashed, slugged, and bashed
And built a lead 18 to zero.
“Two out” we all heard in the top of the third,
So Sundquist got doubled on Jack M’s fly ball-o.
Then Spellman TOOTBLAN* on Galindo’s long drive,
Out at third like a right dumb git, boyos.
In the top of the fifth it was Rolando on base
When Sundquist lined back to the pitcher.
Wright caught the ball, snapped a throw to Greg Lloyd,
Rodriguez out, too, a twin killing.
Green’s at bats:
Every man knew, as Prez Galindo did, too,
Twas the lineup of Green that came sluggin’.
Three runs in the first, it was far from the worst,
With five-run tallies all too soon coming.
The second inning so did end as Mike Garrison did send
A home run to deep left-center field.
And then in the fourth buff Greg Lloyd used the wind from the north,
A two-run triple for runs four and five, oh.
And five in the fifth on seven more hits,
Four Green guys so perfect at hitting:
Brindley and Foelker, and Ralph and then Mike, nary an out amongst ’em.
Conclusion:
When buffet inning came Jack McDermott exclaimed,
“Fellas, we mustn’t get shut out. Like Orange we would seem
And Lisa will scream if we don’t score at least one.”
Inspired was Red, a walk and three singles were spent
In getting across two late tallies.
Does anyone know where the love of God goes
When Chunk’s pitches turn minutes to hours?
The umpires all said we might not have drowned
If they gave Red the player Dave Brown.
Now all that remains is the faces and the names
Of the guys who got trounced 18-2, ow.
* TOOTBLAN: Thrown Out on the Bases Like a Nincompoop
Additional notes:
Mike Garrison’s home run was his eighth of the season, tying him with David Brown for the season lead.
Green turned two inning-ending double plays: top of the third, F-8, 8-4 on Jack McDermott’s fly to George Brindley in left-center, Peter Sundquist doubled up after taking off on contact because someone, not an umpire, just before the pitch very clearly said “Two out!” (Really annoying – honestly, don’t do that, it’s the opposite of sportsmanlike.) And top of the fifth, L-1, 1-3, Chunky Wright making a terrific catch of Peter Sundquist’s liner back to the box and doubling up Rolando Rodriguez, running at first for Tom Kelm, no chance of getting back to the bag.
George Romo turned an inning-ending 6u., 6-3 double play in the bottom of the third.
Ralph Villela, as usual, was terrific at shortstop for Green. He made an excellent catch to his backhand of Rolando’s line drive to start the second inning, and a great relay to throw out Jack Spellman trying for third on Anthony Galindo’s hit to left field in the fourth. I exhibited some of the season’s worst base-running on that play: I tagged up at first, rather going halfway, thinking Mike Garrison would catch Anthony’s drive; the ball glanced off Mike’s glove, and I took off, but Mike made a quick recovery and throw to Ralph, and Ralph’s throw to Chris Waddell beat me to third by about 20 feet. I should have retreated, but Anthony was behind me, and one or the other of us would have been out. Just world-class dumb running at my end, my Little League coach is spinning in his grave.
Despite the game being a blowout, the teams did not flip-flop.
Writing for a 6/8 time signature is really difficult. Props to Shane MacGowan.
Final score: Green 18, Red 2, Green extending its winning streak to four games.
Noon: Purple (6-10) at Blue (5.5 – 9.5):
1 2 3 4 BUFFET FINAL Purple 3 0 3 5 7 18 Blue 1 5 5 5 3 19 Pitchers: Purple – Spike Davidson; Blue – David Pittard. Mercenaries: Purple – Anthony Galindo, Tommy Gillis, Jim McAnelly, Ray Pilgrim, Peter Sundquist, and Chris Waddell; Blue – David Brown, Jack McDermott, and Jack Spellman. Umpires: home – Mike Garrison; bases – Ralph Villela. Perfect at the plate: Purple – Anthony Galindo and Ray Pilgrim (both 4 for 4 with a double) and Chris Waddell (4 for 4 with a triple); Blue – Daniel Baladez and David Pittard (both 3 for 3) (Ohtani Award for David), David Brown (3 for 3 with a double and a triple), and Jack McDermott and Jack Spellman (both 3 for 3 with a double).
Weather update: 56 degrees, felt like 54. Humidity 23%, wind from the north at 7 MPH, sunny (nice in the sun!).
Excellent, hard-fought game. Purple jumped in front, scoring three runs on five singles, Spike Davidson’s walk, and Ray Pilgrim’s double; Ray’s hit, the last three singles, and the last two runs all came with two out, after Jimmy Sneed started a 6-4-3 double play, George Brindley on the pivot. Spike Davidson then held Blue to a single run in the home half: Jimmy Sneed hammered a triple to deep left-center with one out and scored on Tom Bellavia’s sacrifice fly to Anthony Galindo in right-center.
Blue dominated the middle inning, scoring five times in each of the second, third, and fourth innings, making just four outs across the three frames. They knocked six singles and Steve Sandall’s double in the bottom of the second, after David Pittard worked a scoreless top half, stranding Anthony Galindo after his lead-off double; five singles and David Brown’s triple in the bottom of the third, consecutive hits coming after one out; and six singles in the bottom of the fourth, the last five hits and all five runs coming after two were out. Jim Foelker scored the fifth run on Daniel Baladez’s opposite-field single – Jim took third on the play and then was waved home when the relay to third bounced off a bat just inside the visitors dugout; base umpire Ralph Villela was perfectly positioned to see that the ball had gone into (and then bounced back out of) the dugout, and correctly awarded Jim home.
Purple scored three runs on five singles in the top of the third, then put across five runs on eight singles in the top of the fourth. The first out in that inning came on a 10-3-2 relay, Jack McDermott to Jack Spellman to Daniel Baladez, that cut down Matt Levitt (I think it was), running for Spike Davidson and trying to score from second on Mark Hernandez’s single to right field. (Red mercenaries playing well for teams other than Red was a theme of the day: The Jacks, Anthony Galindo, Peter Sundquist, and Jim McAnelly went a combined 15 for 18 in this game, and Anthony added a 2-for-3 in the third game, after Red as a team managed just 12 for 27 in the first game.)
Purple trailed 16-11 entering the buffet, and proceeded to grab the lead, its 1-7 hitters all hitting safely to start the inning, five singles to start, then Chris Waddell’s bases-loaded, game-tying triple, and then Peter Sundquist’s double to drive in Chris with the go-ahead run. David Pittard retired the next two batters, catching Jim McAnelly looking at a called strike three and getting Tommy Gillis to ground out to second baseman George Brindley, who made an excellent play to his left of a hard-hit two-hopper. Anthony Galindo singled in Peter, joining Chris and Ray Pilgrim with 4-for-4 games. David got Matt Levitt to pop out to shortstop Jimmy Sneed, and Blue came up needing two to tie, three to win, its mercenaries due to lead off the bottom of the buffet.
David Brown, Jack Spellman, and Jack McDermott each squared up on pitches and hit doubles: David to just right of center field; Spellman through the 5-6 hole, driving in David; and Jack McDermott up the middle, sending Spellman in with the tying run. Steve Sandall came up and knocked a clean single up the middle, sending Jack McDermott racing in with the winning run.
Final score: Blue 19, Purple 18
David Pittard poses for Toshiro Mifune and four of the other six of the seven samurai with his third Ohtani Award of the season.
1:00 p.m.: Gray (5-10) at Orange (12-4):
1 2 3 4 5 BUFFET FINAL Gray 2 3 0 0 1 1 7 Orange 5 5 0 5 2 X 17 Pitchers: Gray – David Pitard; Orange – Ray Pilgrim. Mercenaries: Gray – David Pittard; Orange – Anthony Galindo, Mark Hernandez, Steve Sandall, and Ralph Villela. Umpires: home – Mike Garrison; bases – Dave Berra. Perfect at the plate: Gray – Jim Aaron (3 for 3 with a triple), Tommy Gillis (4 for 4), and David Pittard (3 for 3 with a triple); Orange – Mark Hernandez and Ken Mockler (both 3 for 3 with a double), Terry O'Brien (3 for 3), and Ralph Villela (3 for 3 with a double and a triple).
Gray couldn’t keep up with Orange in this one, Orange completing a sweep of the day’s games by home teams by scoring five times in three of the first four innings and holding Gray to just two runs over the final four frames.
Gray briefly led, scoring two runs on singles by four of its first five hitters in the top of the first, but the rally was shortened by a 1-6-3 double play started by Ray Pilgrim on Adam Reddell’s hard bouncer back to the box; Ray short-hopped the throw to second, but David Brown made a nice catch and was able to turn the pivot successfully.
Daniel Carvajal led off the bottom of the first by refusing a walk and then grounding out to third baseman George Romo. David Brown skied a ball to short right-center, and Morgan Witthoft made a very good running catch, coming in and to his left after getting a good jump on the ball. Two out, none on? Didn’t matter to Orange, as its next six batters hit safely – four singles, a two-run double to left-center by Ralph Villela, and a single up the middle by Steve Sandall that brought in Ralph with the fifth run.
Gray scored three runs in the top of the second to briefly tie the game, on four singles and Dave Jaffe’s double to left-center, off Steve Sandall’s glove. Dave tried to score on David Pittard’s single up the middle, but was thrown out 8-6-2, Steve Sandall (I think; non-zero chance it was actually Anthony Galindo) to David Brown to Marvin Krabbenhoft. The inning ended with David ranging way, way to his left, beyond the second base bag, to field George Romo’s bouncer up the middle and throw to first for the out.
Orange then scored five times again in the bottom half. After Anthony Galindo grounded out to third baseman George Romo to start the inning, the next five batters singled, three runs scoring, and Ken Mockler drove in the fourth and fifth runs with a double to left field.
Neither team scored in the third. David Brown made another fine defensive play, moving to his left to field Adam Reddell’s bid for a single through the 5-6 hole, and making a strong, accurate throw to first for the out. Jim Aaron then tripled to deep center field (might have been out of the park at Krieg 3), but wound up getting stranded as Johnny Lee grounded out sharply to second baseman Terry O’Brien and Morgan Witthoft flied out to Ken Mockler in left field. David Pittard worked a scoreless bottom half. He allowed a one-out single to Ralph Villela, then started a 1-6-3 double play, Jim Aaron on the pivot, on Steve Sandall’s sharp grounder back to the box.
Ray Pilgrim shut out Gray again in the top of the fourth, working around David Pittard’s two-out single, and Orange effectively put the game out of reach with five runs in the bottom half, on seven singles and David Brown’s sacrifice fly to Tommy Gillis in left field. I want to mention that as part of that rally, Ray Pilgrim went first to third on Terry O’Brien’s single to right. Ray was a running maniac all day, legging out a double and scoring from second on a single in the middle game, and generally outpacing the cheetahs that view him as a role model:
Gray got back on the board with a station-to-station run in the top of the fifth: Tommy Gillis led off with a single, took second on George Romo’s walk, advanced to third on Adam Reddell’s 4-6 force-out grounder, and scored on Jim Aaron’s opposite-field pop-fly single.
Ralph Villela led the bottom of the fifth with a drive to right field; it was an easy triple, but, perhaps hoping to tighten up the home-run race, third-base coach David Brown waved Ralph in, even though the ball was in the infield by way of a relay, Dave Jaffe to Adam Reddell to Jim Aaron. Ralph ran up to the commit line, started to retreat, but Jim threw behind him to third baseman George Romo, who forced Ralph to pass the commit line and then threw to catcher Hal Darman for the out, 10-4-6-5-2 in your scorebook. Steve Sandall followed with a fly to Morgan Witthoft in right-center for the second out. Orange still managed to score two runs, as the next four batters hit safely, three singles and a double to the fence in center field by Mark Hernandez, completing a 3-for-3 game, all well struck.
Orange held a comfortable 11-run lead entering the buffet. Ray Pilgrim got two quick outs to start the inning, grounders to shortstop David Brown. David Pittard came up and socked a triple to right-center field, completing his second perfect game at the plate of the day. (Ralph Villela also was perfect at the plate in his two games, going 7 for 7 with two doubles and a triple. David played in all three games, because he can pitch, and was 8 for 9 on the day.) Paul Rubin extended the inning with an infield single, a grounder to second that Terry O’Brien knocked down but couldn’t make a play on, David holding at third. Tommy Gillis knocked a single through the 5-6 hole to drive in David and complete a 4-for-4 game. The game ended on a somewhat anticlimactic note, with George Romo grounding a ball to shortstop David Brown: Terry O’Brien was late covering second, so David threw to first; Daniel Carvajal knocked down the low throw, keeping it in front of him, and picked it up before George, who’d stopped running, thinking there would be a force at second, could reach first. Ballgame.
Final score: Orange 17, Gray 7
Session 4 standings:
| Session 4 | Games | Runs | Runs | Runs dif- | W/L | |||
| Wins | Losses | Win %: | behind: | for: | allowed: | ferential: | streak: | |
| Orange | 13 | 4 | .765 | 0 | 226 | 176 | 50 | W1 |
| Maroon | 10 | 6 | .625 | 2 | 184 | 165 | 19 | W3 |
| Green | 8.5 | 7.5 | .531 | 4 | 194 | 163 | 31 | W4 |
| Red | 8 | 8 | .500 | 4.5 | 168 | 191 | -23 | L1 |
| Blue | 6.5 | 9.5 | .406 | 6 | 183 | 193 | -10 | W1 |
| Purple | 6 | 11 | .353 | 7 | 185 | 215 | -30 | L4 |
| Gray | 5 | 11 | .313 | 7.5 | 152 | 189 | -37 | L1 |
| Home | Visitor | Walk-off | Extra-inning | Flip-flop | 1-run games | |||
| W-L: | W-L: | wins | W-L: | W-L: | W-L: | |||
| Orange | 7-1 | 6-3 | 2 | 0-0 | 5-2 | 2-2 | ||
| Maroon | 5-3 | 5-3 | 0 | 0-0 | 1-2 | 1-1 | ||
| Green | 5-3 | 3.5-4.5 | 1 | 0.5-0.5 | 1-1 | 2-3 | ||
| Red | 6-2 | 2-6 | 2 | 0-0 | 1-3 | 4-0 | ||
| Blue | 4.5-3.5 | 1-6 | 1 | 0.5-0.5 | 3-2 | 1-1 | ||
| Purple | 4-5 | 2-7 | 2 | 0-0 | 3-3 | 2-3 | ||
| Gray | 3-5 | 2-6 | 1 | 0-0 | 2-3 | 1-3 |
2025 total victories (read across) and losses (read down):
| Blue | Gray | Green | Maroon | Orange | Purple | Red | TOTAL | |
| Blue | X | 2 | 6.5 | 3 | 4.5 | 6 | 5 | 27 |
| Gray | 7 | X | 2 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 7 | 23 |
| Green | 3.5 | 7 | X | 4.5 | 2 | 5 | 5 | 27 |
| Maroon | 5 | 6 | 6.5 | X | 5 | 7 | 3 | 32.5 |
| Orange | 5.5 | 8 | 5 | 4 | X | 6 | 5 | 33.5 |
| Purple | 4 | 4 | 4 | 3 | 3 | X | 8 | 26 |
| Red | 3 | 4 | 3 | 6 | 5 | 2 | X | 23 |
| TOTAL: | 28 | 31 | 27 | 22.5 | 21.5 | 29 | 33 | 192 |
Green and Maroon tied their game of August 7; Orange and Blue tied their game of August 28; Green and Blue tied their game of October 2; these are counted as half a win and half a loss for each team.
Full-season standings:
| Wins | Losses | Win % | GB | |
| Orange | 33.5 | 21.5 | .609 | 0.0 |
| Maroon | 32.5 | 22.5 | .591 | 1.0 |
| Green | 27 | 27 | .500 | 6.0 |
| Blue | 27 | 28 | .491 | 6.5 |
| Purple | 26 | 29 | .473 | 7.5 |
| Gray | 23 | 31 | .426 | 10.0 |
| Red | 23 | 33 | .411 | 11.0 |
2025 season home run leaders:
David Brown – 8
Mike Garrison – 8
Bobby Miller – 6
Ralph Villela – 6
George Brindley – 5
Tim Coles – 5
Anthony Galindo – 4
Tommy Gillis – 4
Jack Spellman – 4
Larry Fiorentino – 3
Doc Hobar – 3
Mike Malay – 3
Jack McDermott – 3
Paul Rubin – 3
Jimmy Sneed – 3
Tim Bruton – 2
Tony Garcia – 2
Rex Horvath – 2
Matt Levitt – 2
Terry O’Brien – 2
George Romo – 2
Pat Scott – 2
Scott Wright – 2
Jim Aaron – 1
Peter Atkins – 1
Tom Bellavia – 1
Ken Brown – 1
Gary Coyle – 1
Donald Drummer – 1
Buddy Gaswint – 1
Ken Mockler – 1
Ray Pilgrim – 1
Jeff Stone – 1
Mike Velaney – 1
Chris Waddell – 1
Chunky Wright – 1
Hit for the cycle:
Scott Wright – June 5
Walk-off grand slam:
David Brown (inside the park) – August 4
Ohtanis (winning pitcher + perfect at the plate):
Jeff Stone – 10 (March 20, April 17, July 17, July 21, July 28, September 11, September 15 (2), September 29, November 6)
Spike Davidson – 7 (June 19, June 30, August 4, August 7, August 14, September 8, October 9)
Joe Bernal – 6 (March 3, April 3, June 5, October 2, November 3, November 6)
Tommy Deleon – 6 (March 3, March 13, April 14, April 28, May 12, September 8)
Tom Kelm – 4 (March 3, March 13, May 1, June 16)
Ray Pilgrim – 4 (April 14, August 4, August 7, October 16)
David Pittard – 3 (June 2, October 13, November 10)
Terry Thompson – 3 (July 31, September 15, September 29)
Chunky Wright – 3 (June 9, October 30, November 3)
Donald Drummer – 2 (May 1, August 11)
Jack Kelly – 2 (March 10, May 12)
Greg Lloyd – 1 (June 26)
Schedule for Thursday November 13:
10:30 a.m.: Green (8.5 – 7.5) at Orange (13-4), Gray umpiring
11:30 a.m.: Gray (5-11) at Maroon (10-6), Orange umpiring
12:30 p.m.: Red (8-8) at Blue (6.5 – 9.5), Maroon umpiring
Purple has the bye, with priority for its players out of the bucket.
Preview: Final games of the regular season. Per the full-season standings above, only one seed for the end-of-season tourney has been settled: Purple, which has the bye Thursday, can’t catch Blue, can’t be caught by Gray, and will be the 5 seed. Orange has a one-game lead over Maroon for the 1 seed, and can clinch itself a bye for the first day of the tourney by defeating Green at 10:30. Green needs to win that game to clinch the 3 seed – Green currently leads Blue by half a game. If Green wins, Maroon can win the 1 seed by defeating Gray at 11:30; this would give Maroon and Orange identical full-season records, and Maroon is 5-4 head to head versus Orange. Gray and Red are battling to avoid the 7 seed, which will play either Maroon or Orange to start the tourney. Gray can clinch the 6 seed with a win over Maroon at 11:30. If Maroon wins, Red can grab the 6 feed by defeating Blue at 12:30. (Red would have a better full-season winning percentage than Gray, .421 to .418.) That game may or may not have meaning for Blue – if Green wins at 10:30, it doesn’t matter what Blue does; if Orange wins the 10:30 game, Blue can secure the 3 seed by winning at 12:30. Will the seedings come down to the final play of the final game of the regular season? One thing is certain: Only time will tell.
Keggy’s Korner:
Salute to the B and C League veterans.