B League Picayune
Often in error, never in doubt.
Volume 8, Issue 53 – September 28, 2026
Department of Corrections: I credited catches in left field in Purple’s game this past Thursday to Peter Sundquist, but actually it was Patrick Schmidt who was patrolling left field and making those plays, while Peter was playing left-center. I played in this game and saw these plays, just flat-out misreported them. The Picayune regrets the errors.
President’s Corner – George Brindley checks in:
October 5th we will be returning to regular start times 10:30, 11:30, and 12:30 and ending the Extreme Hot Weather Rule of drawing up to 12 players.
The Orange team had two players that had season-ending injuries, so we are assigning David Schneider and Jeff Grandcolas to the Orange team.
Please save the date October 26, 2026 (a Monday) for the ASSL Annual Lunch, which will be provided by Lupe Tortilla Catering. More information on the lunch and game schedule later.
One more thing: The Board approved a donation to the Pflugerville Elementary School to help stock the classroom supplies books and electronics. This is a one-time thing that we thought would be a great gesture to help our number one fan – Lisa McDermott, B division team Mom – grandson’s school. Most of us have seen Goku at the fields practically since birth and consider him part of our softball family.
Games of Monday September 28:
10:00 a.m.: Red (3-4) at Maroon (6-1):
1 2 3 4 5 BUFFET FINAL Red 2 4 3 0 0 2 11 Maroon 1 0 1 0 1 5 8 Pitchers: Red – Trent Peacock; Maroon – Jeff Stone. Mercenaries: Red – Jim Foelker and Bobby Miller; Maroon – Jack Spellman. Umpires: home – Clint Fletcher and Jim McAnelly; bases – Daniel Carvajal and Paul Rubin. Perfect at the plate: Red – Ralph Villela (4 for 4). Home run: Bobby Miller (inside the park) (2).
Dave Berra’s weather report: 84°F, feels like 90°, 70% humidity, wind from the SSW at 2 MPH, sunny – humid, no breeze, not good.
Red built a 9-1 lead through the top of the third, and Maroon wasn’t able to escape the hole, is the one-sentence summary of this one.
Red scored twice in the first inning. Three of its first four batters hit singles, Tim Coles driving in Ralph Villela with the game’s first run. A walk to Trent Peacock loaded the bases, and Johnny Lee’s single drove in Anthony Galindo. Jeff Stone escaped further damage by getting Richard Battle to ground to third baseman David Pittard, who fielded the ball cleanly, stepped on third for the force there, then threw to catcher Fritz Hensel to complete the 5u., 5-2 double play.
Maroon got a single run back in the home half, as Steve Browne led off with a double and scored on Ken Brown’s one-out single. Scott Wright followed with a hit, but Luis Sanchez ended the threat by starting an inning-ending 1-6-3 double play on Jeff Stone’s grounder back to the box, Ralph Villela on the pivot.
Red’s first four batters singled and scored in the top of the second. Ralph Villela drove in the first two runs with his hit, and Mark Dolan delivered the third with a sacrifice fly to Steve Browne in left field. Anthony Galindo’s double drove in Ralph with the fourth run. Jeff Stone stranded Anthony, getting Tim Coles to ground to shortstop (Anthony unable to advance as the play was right in front of him) and Trent Peacock to fly out to Ken Brown in right-center, moving to his left as Alan Phillips came toward the ball from right field. (Alan directed Ken to make the catch, calling “You got it!”, though from the infield it sounded more like a question: “You got it?” Ken did.)
Trent Peacock held Maroon scoreless in the bottom of the second. He allowed back-to-back one-out singles to Alan Phillips and David Pittard, then retired Dale Fugate on an infield fly to shortstop Ralph Villela and Jack Spellman on a fly to Jim Foelker in right field, moving smoothly to his right.
Red increased its lead to 9-1 on a three-run inside-the-park home run in the top of the third by Bobby Miller, a drive to right-center field following one-out singles by Richard Battle and Marvin Krabbenhoft.
It was Bobby’s second homer of the season.
Maroon got one run back in the home half on three singles, Jeff Stone driving in George Brindley with a two-out knock.
Jeff then shut out Red in the top of the fourth, working around two-out singles by Trent Peacock and Johnny Lee, but Red was unable to take advantage, Trent holding them scoreless in the bottom half. David Pittard walked with one out and Jack Spellman singled with two out, but Trent got Steve Browne to bounce back to the box for the third out.
Maroon finally won an inning, barely, in the fifth. Jeff Stone got both Marvin Krabbenhoft and Bobby Miller to fly out to open the frame, Alan Phillips making an excellent catch of Marvin’s drive to right field. Jim Foelker and Ralph Villela followed with singles, Ralph completing a 4-for-4 game (he was the only player in the game to not make an out), but Jeff got Mark Dolan to pop out to shortstop for the third out.
George Brindley led off the bottom of the fifth with a walk. Trent Peacock got both Ken Brown (grounder to shortstop Ralph Villela) and Scott Wright (grounder to second baseman Mark Dolan) to hit into force plays. Jeff Stone singled, Scott halting at second. Fritz Hensel knocked a single up the middle (I believe), and Scott Wright successfully employed the Jensen Gambit (®) to steal a run – Scott took a wide turn at third, almost to the commit line, while the relay came to Trent, in the middle of the diamond; Trent ran toward Scott, who made a deke back toward third, then, just before Trent reached him, started for home and got over the commit line just before Trent tagged him – too late! Scott was correctly called safe. A single by Alan Phillips loaded the bases, but Trent got David Pittard to fly out to Jim Foelker in right field, stranding three.
Red led by six entering the buffet. Singles by Anthony Galindo and Tim Coles put runners on the corners. Trent brought in Anthony with a sacrifice fly to Ken Brown in right field, Tim alertly tagging up and taking second. A base hit by Johnny Lee drove in Tim and extended Red’s lead to 11-3, and the flip-flop was called.
Trent Peacock got Dale Fugate to ground out to third baseman Tim Coles to start the bottom of the buffet. The next five batters hit safely, four singles and an RBI double by Steve Browne, three runs scoring. A fourth came in on Jeff Stone’s sacrifice fly to Jim Foelker in right field. Down to their last out, Maroon got singles by Fritz Hensel and Alan Phillips, Scott Wright coming around to score. David Pittard came up representing the tying run, but the game ended with David flying out to Anthony Galindo in right-center field.
Final score: Red 11, Maroon 8, Red posting its first win of the season against Maroon, which won the first seven meetings between the two teams.
11:00 a.m.: Gray (4-2) at Purple (2-4):
1 2 3 BUFFET FINAL Gray 5 5 5 0 15 Purple 4 5 5 0 14 Pitchers: Gray – Luis Sanchez; Purple – Tommy Deleon. Mercenaries: Gray – Daniel Baladez, Alan Phillips, and Jeff Stone; Purple – Steve Browne, Tim Coles, Hal Darman, and Tommy Deleon. Umpires: home – Scott Wright and Dave Berra; bases – Dave Berra and Marvin Krabbenhoft. Perfect at the plate: Gray – Daniel Carvajal, Bobby Miller, Paul Rubin, and Luis Sanchez (all 3 for 3; Luis earns an Ohtani Award); Purple – Tommy Deleon and Rick Jensen (both 3 for 3).
This was a crazy game. Both teams came out hitting, and came within a run of completing the G-2 Bingo square (“Both teams score 5 runs in each of the first 3 innings”). Gray batters went 21 for 24 (.875 average) over the first three innings, Purple’s went 19 for 26 (.731). Everyone expected fireworks in the buffet, but instead the spigot was turned off, neither team scored, and Gray came away with an improbable one-run victory.
Gray scored five runs on seven hits in each of the first three innings, making two outs in the first (one on Jeff Stone’s sacrifice fly to Rick Kahn in right-center field), none in the second (seven straight singles, plus a couple of base-runner advances on overthrows), and two in the third (all five runs scoring on two-out singles by the 1-5 hitters, four of whom – Paul Rubin, Bobby Miller, Daniel Carvajal, and Luis Sanchez – completed perfect 3-for-3 days at the plate.
Purple scored four runs on six singles in the bottom of the first, the runs all scoring after two were out. Purple’s two-out heroics continued in the bottom of the second (Tommy Deleon and Tim Coles singled in the fourth and fifth runs with two out, after the 1-5 hitters all reached with one out – Mike Malay doubled, Peter Sundquist walked, and Rick Kahn, Shane Hill, and Rick Jensen singled) and third (four of five runs scoring with two out, on four consecutive singles).
Gray led 15-14 entering the buffet, only to go down quietly in the top half: Jim Foelker flied out to Rick Kahn in right-center, Jim McAnelly struck out swinging, and, after Jeff Stone singled, Alan Phillips flied out, also to Rick Kahn.
Purple needed just one run to tie, two to win, with three mercenaries leading off the inning. Tim Coles popped out to second baseman Jeff Stone. Steve Browne singled up the middle. Hal Darman grounded to shortstop Paul Rubin, who threw to Jeff covering second for the force there; Patrick Schmidt ran for Hal from home and easily beat the relay to first. Mike Malay came up, looking for his fourth hit, but he popped out to Paul to anticlimactically end the game.
Final score: Gray 15, Purple 14
Luis Sanchez earned his second Ohtani Award of the season, pitching Gray to victory while going 3 for 3. He drove in Gray’s final run, in the top of the third, with a drive to right field that would have been good for extra bases except that Daniel Carvajal scored the fifth run of the inning from third base.
Tommy Deleon also was perfect at the plate, going 3 for 3 with three RBI, but had to settle for a No-Tahni Award.
Noon: Green (2-4) at Blue (3-4):
1 2 3 4 5 BUFFET FINAL Green 0 0 3 0 2 2 7 Blue 0 2 0 0 5 1 8 Pitchers: Green – Spike Davidson; Blue – Joe Bernal. Mercenaries: Green – Anthony Galindo and Jack Spellman; Blue – George Brindley, Trent Peacock, Patrick Schmidt, Jeff Stone, Peter Sundquist, and Scott Wright. Umpires: home – Rick Jensen; bases – Mike Malay. Perfect at the plate: Green – Jack Spellman (3 for 3); Blue – Patrick Schmidt (3 for 3). Home run: Mike Garrison (inside the park) (4).
Dave Berra’s weather update: 91°, feels like 98°, humidity in 49%, wind from the SSE at 7 MPH (the breeze picked up), sunny – better.
After the fireworks at 11:00, two of the league’s best pitchers engaged in an old-fashioned pitchers duel at noon, working so efficiently that the game nearly went seven innings, Blue’s five-run outburst in the bottom of the fifth using up the last of the clock.
Neither team scored in the first. Joe Bernal retired Green in order on Doc Hobar’s grounder back to the box, Steve Sandall’s pop to third baseman Jeff Stone, and Mike Garrison’s fly to left fielder Patrick Schmidt. Donnie Janac singled leading off the bottom of the first, but Spike Davidson got both George Romo and Joe Bernal to ground into 6-4 forces, and J.C. Schmeil to fly out to Mike Garrison in left field.
Joe Bernal retired the first two batters in the second inning, Larry Fiorentino on a pop to first baseman Donnie Janac and Ivan Budiselic on another grounder back to the box, before Green finally got its first hits of the game, consecutive singles by Spike Davidson and Tom Brownfield. Chunky Wright hit a hard grounder down the third-base side, but Jeff Stone made a good play to his backhand and only had to take a stride or two to step on the bag for the third out.
Blue broke through in the bottom of the second. Daniel Baladez led off with a single, but was erased when Jeff Stone started a 1-6-3 double play on George Brindley’s one-hop comebacker – Jeff made a quick, accurate throw to second, and the relay to first just beat George, a bang-bang play. Blue’s next five batters – the bottom of its lineup, all mercenaries – singled, two runs scoring. With two in and two on, Trent Peacock hit a sharp grounder to the 3-4 hole; Doc Hobar made a terrific play to his left to get to the ball, and turned and fired to shortstop Jack Spellman covering second, but Patrick Schmidt beat the play; George Romo, pinch-running for Jeff Stone and starting the play from second, took a wide turn and was caught almost at the commit line. Spellman ran at him, George couldn’t turn back, the day’s second Jensen Gambit (®) wasn’t going to work, so George headed for home and was easily thrown out, 4-6-2 (Doc to Spellman to Chunky Wright), ending the inning. (I credit Trent with a single on the play.)
Green took the lead with three runs in the top of the third, these also coming after two were out. Jack Spellman led off with a ground single up the middle. Joe Bernal got Anthony Galindo to foul off a two-strike pitch and Doc Hobar to ground into a 3-6 force. Steve Sandall doubled Doc to third. Mike Garrison then came up and drove a ball to the fence in right-center field and legged out a three-run inside-the-park homer, his fourth of the season.
Mike Garrison puts Green in the lead with a three-run inside-the-parker in the top of the third.
More offensive futility in the fourth, neither team scoring. Spike Davidson led off the top half with a single, but his runner was forced out 6-4 on Tom Brownfield’s grounder to George Romo, and Joe Bernal started a 1-6-3 double play on Chunky Wright’s grounder up the middle. Spike retired Danny Baladez on a 6-3 grounder and George Brindley on a fly to Steve Sandall in left-center to start the home half; Scott Wright singled, but Peter Sundquist also flied out to Steve.
Green looked poised for a big inning when its first three batters hit safely to open the fifth: Jack Spellman poked a single to right-center on a 3-1 pitch, and Anthony Galindo followed with a triple to left-center, Spellman scoring. Doc Hobar’s single brought in Anthony. Steve Sandall squared up on a pitch, but his liner was hit right at Jeff Stone, who made the catch. Mike Garrison flied out to Peter Sundquist in left-center, and Larry Fiorentino swung through a two-strike pitch.
Jeff Stone grounded out to start the bottom of the fifth. If Blue’s next two batters had also gone out, this would have been a seven-inning game, but instead, seven of eight batters singled, five runs coming across, the last three on two-out hits by J.C. Schmeil, Daniel Baladez, and George Brindley, well after time had run out.
That gave Blue a 7-5 lead entering the buffet. Joe Bernal got two quick outs to start the inning, retiring Ivan Budiselic on a grounder to second baseman J.C. Schmeil and Spike Davidson on a pop in front of the mound that Joe grabbed himself. Tom Brownfield and Chunky Wright singled, extending the inning. Jack Spellman drove a ball to right-center, right at George Brindley, who looked poised to make the game-ending catch, but the ball glanced off the heel of his mitt and popped into the air; George tried to make a secondary catch, but the ball fell to the ground for a hit, Tom scoring. Anthony Galindo smacked a double, driving in Chunky’s pinch-runner with the tying run and bringing up the top of the order. J.C. Schmeil made an excellent catch, back and to his left, of Doc Hobar’s pop into short right field, to end the inning and maintain the 7-7 tie.
Blue needed one run to win. Scott Wright led off the bottom of the buffet with a pop to the right side that Doc Hobar drifted back to catch in the grass for the first out. That was the only out Blue would make in the inning. Peter Sundquist hit a pop-fly single over second base and took second on Jeff Stone’s single, also up the middle (as I recall). Patrick Schmidt hit a ball that I think must have been off the handle of his bat, his inside-out swing resulting in a soft liner that landed just to the left of dead center field, Peter racing home with the winning run, Blue walking off the victory.
Final score: Blue 8, Green 7 – Blue is now 9-1 on the season versus Green.
Session 4 standings:
| Session 4 standings: | Games | Runs | Runs | Run dif- | W/L | |||
| Wins | Losses | Win %: | behind: | for: | allowed: | ferential: | streak: | |
| Maroon | 6 | 2 | .750 | 0 | 113 | 84 | 29 | L1 |
| Gray | 5 | 2 | .714 | 0.5 | 112 | 91 | 21 | W2 |
| Blue | 4 | 4 | .500 | 2 | 92 | 80 | 12 | W1 |
| Red | 4 | 4 | .500 | 2 | 109 | 114 | -5 | W1 |
| Orange | 3 | 4 | .429 | 2.5 | 51 | 88 | -37 | W2 |
| Green | 2 | 5 | .286 | 3.5 | 85 | 94 | -9 | L2 |
| Purple | 2 | 5 | .286 | 3.5 | 94 | 105 | -11 | L1 |
| Home | Visitor | Walk-off | Extra-inning | Flip-flop | 1-run games | Last 5 | ||
| W-L: | W-L: | wins | W-L: | W-L: | W-L: | games: | ||
| Maroon | 3-2 | 3-0 | 0 | 0-0 | 2-2 | 0-0 | WWLWL | |
| Gray | 3-0 | 2-2 | 1 | 0-0 | 1-0 | 2-1 | LWLWW | |
| Blue | 4-1 | 0-3 | 2 | 0-0 | 2-0 | 2-1 | LLWLW | |
| Red | 2-1 | 2-3 | 1 | 0-0 | 2-1 | 1-2 | WLLLW | |
| Orange | 2-1 | 1-3 | 1 | 0-0 | 0-3 | 1-0 | LLLWW | |
| Green | 2-1 | 0-4 | 0 | 0-0 | 0-1 | 1-2 | LWWLL | |
| Purple | 0-4 | 2-1 | 0 | 0-0 | 1-1 | 0-1 | LLWWL | |
2026 total victories (read across) and losses (read down):
| Blue | Gray | Green | Maroon | Orange | Purple | Red | TOTAL | |
| Blue | 4 | 9 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 4 | 29 | |
| Gray | 3 | 2 | 3 | 3 | 6 | 2 | 19 | |
| Green | 1 | 4 | 2 | 6 | 5 | 5 | 23 | |
| Maroon | 3 | 4 | 6 | 3 | 7 | 7 | 30 | |
| Orange | 4 | 5 | 1 | 4 | 4 | 3 | 21 | |
| Purple | 3 | 3 | 2 | 1 | 3 | 4 | 16 | |
| Red | 3 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 4 | 20 | |
| TOTAL: | 17 | 25 | 23 | 15 | 23 | 30 | 25 | 158 |
2026 season home run leaders:
Terry O’Brien – 10
Ralph Villela – 9
Steve Browne – 6
Trent Peacock – 5
Tony Garcia – 4
Mike Garrison – 4
David Brown – 3
Tim Coles – 3
Jack McDermott – 3
Alan Phillips – 3
Jack Spellman – 3
Scott Wright – 3
Richard Battle – 2
George Brindley – 2
Larry Fiorentino – 2
Tommy Gillis – 2
Rick Kahn – 2
Bobby Miller – 2
Scott Rokita – 2
Paul Rubin – 2
Pat Scott – 2
Jimmy Sneed – 2
Peter Atkins – 1
Tom Bellavia – 1
Joe Bernal – 1
Ivan Budiselic – 1
Mark Dolan – 1
Jim Foelker – 1
Anthony Galindo – 1
Doc Hobar – 1
Mike Malay – 1
David Pittard – 1
George Romo – 1
Luis Sanchez – 1
Steve Sandall – 1
Patrick Schmidt – 1
Hit for the cycle:
Ralph Villela – May 26
Ohtani Awards (winning pitcher + perfect at the plate):
Joe Bernal: 8 (March 2, March 19, March 30, April 16, June 22, June 25, June 29, July 9)
Ray Pilgrim: 8 (March 5, March 23, March 26, June 1, July 2, July 9, August 17, August 27)
Spike Davidson: 6 (May 4, July 2, July 20, August 6, August 20, September 17)
Tommy Deleon: 6 (April 6, April 30, June 11, July 6, July 30, September 24)
Jeff Stone: 3 (March 2, July 9, September 8)
Trent Peacock: 2 (March 9, August 3)
Luis Sanchez: 2 (September 8, September 28)
Rex Horvath: 1 (March 30)
Jack Kelly: 1 (August 3)
Lawrence Page: 1 (March 26)
Schedule for Thursday October 1:
10:00 a.m.: Purple (2-5) at Orange (3-4), Maroon umpiring
11:00 a.m.: Maroon (6-2) at Blue (4-4), Orange umpiring
Noon: Gray (5-2) at Green (2-5), Blue umpiring
Red has the bye, with priority for its players out of the bucket.
Preview: With Maroon’s loss and its own hard-fought win today, Gray moves to just half a game off the session lead. The other five teams are bunched up behind them, collectively separated by just a game and a half. Maroon faces Blue at 11:00; Blue leads the season series 4-3 and can draw to within a game of Maroon with a victory, which they may once again need mercenary help to accomplish. (Rumors abound concerning injuries to Blue’s core.) If Maroon falls, Gray can take over first place with a win over Green at noon. Though Green has lost its last two games and Gray has won its last two, Green leads the season series 4-2 and may be getting league home-run leader Terry O’Brien back – if not Thursday, then probably next week. The 10:00 game will have Purple taking on Orange, reinforced by its two new players; Orange leads the season series 4-3. This preview more likely than not is worthless, however, as the forecast for Wednesday night and Thursday is calling for pretty substantial rain. (The good news is, we’ll probably come out the other side with lower temperatures and humidity.) Will Krieg 6 be scoured by an anticyclonic tornado before we play again? One thing is certain: Only time will tell.
Keggy’s Korner:
Podcast review: Legacy
This British history podcast is hosted by journalist/author/former barrister Afua Hirsch and historian Peter Frankopan. Originally they devoted four-episode series to a famous person, recounting the life and assessing how that person’s reputation looks in the present day – often not great, for the likes of Pablo Picasso, Margaret Thatcher, Charles Dickens. More recently, they’ve moved beyond individual biographies into historical events and contemporary questions viewed through history. They try to combine history with biography, cultural criticism, and historiography, with somewhat mixed results – it’s history for dummies, but a decent introduction to figures I don’t know much about (Genghis Khan, Cecil Rhodes, Marie Antoinette). New England content: Very little; it’s very Anglo-centric. Canadian content: Ditto. Listening speed: 1X. Rating: 🎧 🎧 🎧