Torture Test - 30 degree ball tourneys
Stardate 6017.80
Well that was one hot and tiring long weekend. I had mentioned earlier about the ball tournament. Well when we showed up friday night, we were expecting to see a few local teams. However, it was actually a Nationals qualifying tournament, complete with ham-fisted players each with their own personal bat bags and all that drivel.
We lost the first game handily on friday night, and I ended up spending the rest of the night drinking around our camp fire with friends and family until 4:30 am. this was fun, but I had to get up and be ready for a game at 9:30 am. I think I woke up around 7:00. We lost that game handily as well, and already, the heat was up around 26 or so. We played again at 12:30 and won, which was really nice but by now, the heat was even higher out. We had a third game at 6:30 and at this point, the night before was really kicking my butt. We lost the last game of the day (and round robin) ensuring a spot in the "C" group for the next day's knockout phase.
Sunday was just as hot, and after a much quieter saturday night, we played and won at 9:00 am. This was cool, moving us a step closer to the "C" championship. The funniest thing, in that game, I was backing up in center field as a guy was coming up to bat, and I stepped on something that squeaked and felt like a dog's chew toy. It scared the crap out of me, and it turns out it was a gopher. Yeah, a real live gopher. Must have thought he could sneak by, but he failed to anticipate my agility it would seem. He lay there, ont he ground, squeaking at me, with his two-inch fangs, and I thought I was done for. After a few tense moments, he flipped over and scurried down a hole. It was the darndest thing I have seen in a ball game. Only a couple more wins and we could win the side. However, tragedy struck at 12:00 when a team barely beat us to knock us out in the semis...
It was sure a lot of fun however, and though my legs and elbow are in rough shape, I would do it again. I believe our team drank about 600 liters of water each, so some bottled water companies should be visiting with endorsement offers soon enough. We ended up playing 6 games in around 42 hours.
The ball wasn't over for the weekend though. After a rest, I had to return to normal league play last night. A strange twist of fate had us playing against a team that was half of the team that knocked us out, so we had to get some revenge. By the bottom of the 6th inning (we play 7), we were down 14-7 so we had to really get cranking to stand a chance. We scored the maximum 7 runs in that inning, shut them down completely in the top of the 7th and drove in the winning run in the bottom. 15-14. Sweet come-from-behind victory!
Rigorous weekend, but there was lots of ball, fun, sun and beer!
Well that was one hot and tiring long weekend. I had mentioned earlier about the ball tournament. Well when we showed up friday night, we were expecting to see a few local teams. However, it was actually a Nationals qualifying tournament, complete with ham-fisted players each with their own personal bat bags and all that drivel.
We lost the first game handily on friday night, and I ended up spending the rest of the night drinking around our camp fire with friends and family until 4:30 am. this was fun, but I had to get up and be ready for a game at 9:30 am. I think I woke up around 7:00. We lost that game handily as well, and already, the heat was up around 26 or so. We played again at 12:30 and won, which was really nice but by now, the heat was even higher out. We had a third game at 6:30 and at this point, the night before was really kicking my butt. We lost the last game of the day (and round robin) ensuring a spot in the "C" group for the next day's knockout phase.
Sunday was just as hot, and after a much quieter saturday night, we played and won at 9:00 am. This was cool, moving us a step closer to the "C" championship. The funniest thing, in that game, I was backing up in center field as a guy was coming up to bat, and I stepped on something that squeaked and felt like a dog's chew toy. It scared the crap out of me, and it turns out it was a gopher. Yeah, a real live gopher. Must have thought he could sneak by, but he failed to anticipate my agility it would seem. He lay there, ont he ground, squeaking at me, with his two-inch fangs, and I thought I was done for. After a few tense moments, he flipped over and scurried down a hole. It was the darndest thing I have seen in a ball game. Only a couple more wins and we could win the side. However, tragedy struck at 12:00 when a team barely beat us to knock us out in the semis...
It was sure a lot of fun however, and though my legs and elbow are in rough shape, I would do it again. I believe our team drank about 600 liters of water each, so some bottled water companies should be visiting with endorsement offers soon enough. We ended up playing 6 games in around 42 hours.
The ball wasn't over for the weekend though. After a rest, I had to return to normal league play last night. A strange twist of fate had us playing against a team that was half of the team that knocked us out, so we had to get some revenge. By the bottom of the 6th inning (we play 7), we were down 14-7 so we had to really get cranking to stand a chance. We scored the maximum 7 runs in that inning, shut them down completely in the top of the 7th and drove in the winning run in the bottom. 15-14. Sweet come-from-behind victory!
Rigorous weekend, but there was lots of ball, fun, sun and beer!
posted by Zaphod at 8:20 AM
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