B League Picayune
Often in error, never in doubt.
Volume 5, Issue 58 – November 9, 2023
Weather: Overcast and humid (89%) during the first two games, temperature in the mid-70s. It started raining midway through the 11:30 game, and was a steady downpour as that game ended. Maroon and Gold agreed it wasn’t sensible to try to play the third game.
Games of Thursday November 9:
10:30 a.m., Red (6-4) at Green (2-8):
1 2 3 4 5 BUFFET FINAL Red 0 4 0 0 0 0 4 Green 5 4 1 5 X X 15 Pitchers: Red – Jack Kelly; Green – Tommy Deleon. Mercenaries: Green – Tom Brownfield, Eddy Murillo, and Mike Velaney. Umpires: home plate – Anthony Galindo and Spike Davidson; bases – Peter Sundquist and Larry Fiorentino. Perfect at the plate: Red – Ken Mockler (3 for 3 with a double); Green – Tom Brownfield (3 for 3 with a triple), Donnie Janac (3 for 3), and Ray Pilgrim (3 for 3 with a double).
Classic Tommy Deleon pitching performance in this one, blanking Red in five of the six innings and getting seven outs on balls in the air, letting his excellent outfield do a lot of the work. Red got four runs on five singles and Paul Rubin’s double in the second, but managed just six hits total in the other innings, only Ken Mockler having consistent success – 3 for 3 with a double, all the balls hit very hard.
Red can’t use the weather as an excuse: under the same conditions, Green went a combined 21 for 30 with a walk, scoring five times in the first (on five singles and Ray Pilgrim’s rally-capping double) and five more in the fourth (on the walk to Jeff Fisher, four singles, and Tom Brownfield’s rally-capping triple to right-center). They scored four times in the second on five singles, Eddy Murillo’s double, and Clint Fletcher’s sacrifice fly. And the only reason Green managed just one run in the third is that they ran into two outs on the bases: Eddy Murillo was out for running past the commit line on his single up the middle (fielded by rover Mike Mordecai; Mike’s throw to first wasn’t in time to get the runner from home), and the inning ended when Adam Reddell made a terrific play on Clint Fletcher’s hard grounder down the third-base line, waited for Tom Brownfield, running from third, to cross the commit line (one foot stepped past), then threw Tom out at home.
With just a minute left on the clock and Red trailing by 11 after going out in the fifth, the teams double-flip-flopped and proceeded to the buffet. Ken Mockler singled. Rover Clint Fletcher ranged into short center field to track down Terry Thompson’s flare for the first out. Donald Drummer beat out an infield hit, bang-bang play at first. Scott Sovereen hit a hard grounder to third base that Eddy Murillo made a good play on, fielding it cleanly and tagging third to retire Ken for the second out; Eddy then threw to first, but wildly; Donald had run through second, and proceeded to third without returning to tag the base; on appeal he was called out, for a game-ending 5u., 5-3-6 double play. (When Donald started for third, a couple guys in the Red dugout shouted for him to go back and touch second, and then somebody said, “Don’t say anything, maybe Green won’t notice.” Which was hilarious, because Green was playing five infielders and I’m pretty certain they ALL noticed, without any need of our pointing it out.) Final score: Green 15, Red 4, Green snapping its five-game losing streak.
11:30 a.m., Gray (4-6) at Blue (8-2):
1 2 3 4 5 BUFFET FINAL Gray 0 4 2 0 0 1 7 Blue 5 2 4 0 3 X 14 Pitchers: Gray – Greg Lloyd; Blue – Spike Davidson. Mercenaries: Gray – Peter Atkins, Jeff Fisher, Johnny Lee, Adam Reddell, and Peter Sundquist; Blue – Tommy Gillis and Scott Wright. Umpires: home plate – Jack Kelly; bases – Donald Drummer; scoreboard – Dave Berra. Perfect at the plate: Gray – Jeff Fisher (3 for 3 with a double), Adam Reddell (3 for 3), and Peter Sundquist (3 for 3 with a homerun). Homeruns: Mark Dolan (two) and Peter Sundquist, all inside the park.
Blue got off to a strong start and really never let up, leading the game pillar to post. After Tony Viera walked leading off the game, Spike Davidson retired Jerry Mulius on a pop to shortstop Larry Fiorentino, then got Greg Lloyd to ground into a 6-4 force. Tom Brownfield knocked a single past third baseman Eddy Murillo; Greg tried for third on the play and was thrown out 7-5-1, Tommy Gillis to Eddy to Spike Davidson alertly covering the bag. Blue then took the lead for good with five runs in the home half. Larry Fiorentino doubled, Anthony Galindo reached on a pop-fly single, Morgan Witthoft ripped an RBI double on a drive to deep left-center, and Eddy Murillo knocked a two-run single to left. Fritz Hensel hit a ball hard up the middle that Greg Lloyd got some glove on, deflecting it to second baseman Tom Brownfield, who got a force at second. When Spike Davidson popped out to shortstop Peter Atkins, Greg looked like he might escape the jam, but Mark Dolan scorched a drive to left-center that went to the fence, Mark circling the bases for a two-run, inning-ending inside-the-park homerun.
Blue manager Anthony Galindo presents Mark Dolan with 2023’s final (probably) Pluckers Coupon following his homerun in the bottom of the first.
Gray got back in the game with four runs in the top of the second. Peter Atkins started the rally with a triple to right-center that was followed by three singles, Jeff Fisher’s RBI double down to left field, and Tony Viera’s RBI single. Blue got two back in the home half, Larry Fiorentino’s double to right field setting up Anthony Galindo’s two-run single.
With a runner on first and two out in the top of the third, Peter Sundquist drove a ball between the right and right-center fielders that rolled to the fence, Peter easily circling the bases for an inside-the-park homerun.
Peter Sundquist’s two-run homer in the top of the third got Gray to within a run of Blue.
Johnny Lee followed with a single through the 5-6 hole, but there was a pinch-running snafu and the third out was called – I was in the visitors dugout at the time and didn’t see what happened, but as I understand it, one player came up to run for Johnny Lee and stepped on first base, and then a different player was called in to run instead, which is a no-go – barring injury, you can’t pinch-run for a pinch-runner. I’m not sure I agree with the out call – I’d just send the second runner away and have the first be the pinch-runner – but chalk it up to umpire’s discretion/delay of game.
Blue won the inning with four runs in the bottom half. With one out, Fritz Hensel and Spike Davidson singled. Mark Dolan then stepped up and crushed a line drive over the head of right-center fielder Jeff Fisher and to the fence, for his second inside-the-park homerun in as many at bats. Blue got its fourth run on three straight two-out singles by Scott Wright, Tommy Gillis (line drive to left-center that popped out of Peter Sundquist’s glove), and Larry Fiorentino.
Mark Dolan completes his second inside-the-parker of the game, moments after Larry Fiorentino, running for Fritz Hensel, scored ahead of him.
Neither team scored in the fourth, Gray turning a 6-4-3 double play in the bottom half, Peter Atkins to Tom Brownfield to Johnny Lee, on Eddy Murillo’s ground ball, Eddy’s runner from home out on a very close play at first. Spike Davidson kept Gray off the board again in the fifth, getting two outs on 5-4 force plays to Eddy Murillo, who took a lot of grief (Tom Brownfield: “We’re scoring that E-for-Edward-5!”), but in fact played very good third base in both of today’s games. (Don’t tell him, though – I wouldn’t want Eddy thinking he’s showing up in the Picayune.)
It was raining pretty steadily by this point, but the teams played on. Blue scored two runs in the bottom of the fifth on four singles, the inning ending with a terrific play by third baseman Adam Reddell on Eddy Murillo’s hard shot, Adam throwing to second for the force, moments after time had run out.
Gray entered the buffet chasing eight runs. Adam Reddell and Jeff Fisher completed their perfect days at the plate with singles to start the frame. Spike Davidson got Tony Viera to foul off a two-strike pitch for the first out. Jerry Mylius hit a hard grounder down the first-base side that Scott Wright got a piece of, deflecting to second baseman Mark Dolan, but there was no play to be made. Greg Lloyd came up and hit a one-hopper back to the box that Spike turned into a game-ending 1-6-3 double play, Larry Fiorentino on the pivot; the play at first was very close, but with the rain coming down hard, nobody argued too hard about calling the game over. Final score: Blue 14, Gray 7
12:30 p.m., Maroon (6-4) at Gold (4-6): Game cancelled due to the steady rain.
Standings – Session Four:
Games Runs Runs Run W/L
W L Win %: behind: for: allowed: differential: streak:
Blue 9 2 .818 — 154 111 +43 W5
Maroon 6 4 .600 2.5 132 117 +15 L2
Red 6 5 .545 3 145 139 + 6 L1
Gold 4 6 .400 4.5 123 136 -13 L2
Gray 4 7 .364 5 117 147 -30 L1
Green 3 8 .273 6 135 156 -21 W1
Home Visitor Walk-off Extra-inning Flip-flop 1-run games
W-L: W-L: Wins: W-L: W-L: W-L:
Blue 5-0 4-2 1 0-0 2-0 2-1
Maroon 3-3 3-1 2 0-1 1-0 3-1
Red 2-2 4-3 2 0-0 2-1 2-2
Gold 3-2 1-4 0 0-0 1-0 0-2
Gray 1-4 3-3 0 0-0 0-4 1-1
Green 2-5 1-3 0 1-0 1-2 0-1
2023 total victories (read across) and losses (read down):
Blue Gold Gray Green Maroon Purple Red TOTAL
Blue X 6 7 8 4 2.5 6 33.5
Gold 3 X 4 7 4 1 4 23
Gray 2 6 X 5 4 2 6 25
Green 3 4 4 X 4 4 5 24
Maroon 5 6 4 4 X 3 6 28
Purple 1.5 1 2 0 1 X 1 6.5
Red 4 4 4 5 4 3 X 24
______________________________________________________________
TOTAL: 18.5 27 25 29 21 15.5 29 164
Schedule for Monday November 13:
10:30 a.m.: Green (3-8) at Gold (4-6), Gray umpiring
11:30 a.m.: Maroon (6-4) at Gray (4-7), Red umpiring
12:30 p.m.: Blue (9-2) at Red (6-5), Maroon umpiring
Preview: Only three dates left in the regular season! Blue can clinch first place for the session with one more victory, and will get its first crack at that against Red, still mathematically in contention, at 12:30. Maroon will need to defeat Gray at 11:30 to stay alive. Green looks to build on its momentum versus Gold at 10:30. A Monday rainout – my app says there’s a 50% chance of rain during the day – will result in Blue clinching. Will we get all three games in? Only one thing is certain: Time will tell.
Keggy’s Korner:
Scott Sovereen submits this great picture:
I thought you might want to use this in a throwback Thursday add to your column. I call it “Pity The Poor Fool” who tries to outrun Ken Brown in a pickle. Yesterday’s fool was Rick Jensen.
Happy birthday, Keggy Junior!