MCSN: July 10th

Less Saltier

Week 5 Recap

Tue, July 10, 2007

Defenders' Adrienne Anderson
chipped in 2 RBIs to help beat
previously unbeaten Saltier And then there was none.

Saltier entered the final game of Week 5 at Clarendon Park as the lone unbeaten team in the league, sporting a lofty 4-0 record. But the YMYF Defenders handed Saltier their first loss of the season by a score of 14-8.

"The Defenders played great and deserved to win," said Saltier manager Bill Van Tuinen. "Not counting their loss and tie coming into the game, they were also undefeated so we knew we were in for a battle."

Saltier actually outhit the Defenders but stranded 10 runners. Van Tuinen went 3-for-4 but the league's current home run king did not add to his home run total.

"I'm not really sure what happened to my home run streak," Van Tuinen said. "I felt like I was still hitting the hard grounders and lazy fly balls that have typified my homers, but, unfortunately, Chris Carter wasn't around to misplay them into home runs. I was excited when I saw Rob Tong's kids at the game, but then realized they would not be playing the outfield for the Defenders and I needed to refocus on just getting the ball past Steve 'Olde English' Adie."

Meanwhile, the Defenders had their own problems.

"Saltier pitcher Sam Baturoni is a force," said Defenders manager Rob Tong. "Trying to filter out the flat pitches from the good pitches at the plate is an enormous challenge. We are not the caliber of team that can think and play at the same time. I don't know how we did it."

Saltier still felt it had a great week, though.

"One of our outfielders got engaged to our scorekeeper, another outfielder performed a wedding right after the game, our 1st baseman left Corporate America so he can hang out at Dairy Queen all summer, and another infielder was on a missions trip in Mexico," explained Van Tuinen. "So we feel like we lived up to our Saltier name, despite our less-than-perfect performance on the field. When a team is so busy making the world a better place it can be a little difficult to focus on softball, too."

Tong felt married players have difficulty focusing on softball too.

"Every week actually," Tong replied. "Amorous spouses do that to you. I think 1 Cor 7:33 confirms that, no? I mean, we tell our spouses them to stay home so we can focus but they just won't listen. For some bizarre reason, they insist on coming to our games."

Van Tuinen sees a silver lining to his team's first loss.

"Hopefully, this loss will take some of the pressure off our team," he said. "We aren't superheroes. I mean, yeah, we are better than most in both athletics and living a biblical lifestyle, but that's just other people's opinion. We try not to talk about it too much."

Rock Salt manager Tim Kurtz also saw a silver lining in Saltier's first loss.

"I am saddened that Saltier lost its first game," he said. "However, I think it's for the best. You could begin to hear the weariness in Steve Mason's voice recounting how he carried his team week after week."

Saltier fell to 4-1 while the Defenders improved to 3-1-1.

Prior to this game, In Focus Classic upset a short-handed Crossroads team 10-9 in another intense game. It was Classic's second consecutive game playing an opponent that had only 8 players, both wins for Classic.

Despite the player shortage, Crossroads still led 9-7 heading into the last half-inning of the game when Classic put up 3 runs to steal the victory.

"I had a really good feeling going into the game," said Classic manager Anne Marie Misovich. "Then after the first inning when we were tied 2-2, I knew we were off to a good start. As the game went on, both teams continued to score, keeping the game quite competitive and exciting. Everyone felt the excitement. That fueled everyone to give it their all even more so. I was really thrilled when we won, because it was a last inning win where we came back from being down by 2."

"In Focus played a great game," said Crossroads manager Anthony Halpin. "I wish I could say we lost because we only had eight players or because it was too hot, but the truth is that we just got out played."

"Everyone gave it their all," Misovich agreed. "Everyone was very passionate. That was major. David Cho provided a 'quiet motivation' for the team as he slid into home with such grace in the bottom of the 2nd, putting us ahead 5-3. In the top of the 3rd, left fielder Alex Bridges hustled the ball to shortstop Mike Houston, holding Mike Thate to a double. And then in the bottom of the third, Brad Hansen injured his hamstring as he made his way from 2nd to home. Despite that, he kept on running and scored. Such dedication! Everyone wanted the win. And as we kept ourselves in the game, everyone saw that win coming and simply continued giving their best."

Thate cranked his first over-the-fence home run of the season. Thate gave no comment, although his big smile is comment enough.

"Thate rookie cards were declining in value until that moment," said Tong. "Now people expect a big rash of Thate bombs so if you have a Thate rookie card, I strongly suggest holding on to them."

"I'm glad that Michael hit is first HR out of the park," said a relieved Halpin. "I'm guessing that there will be many more this year. We should change the stats to [note] Thate homers that go out of the park [versus] Van Tuinen homers that are purposely hit to weak players on the other team resulting in inflated home run figures."

Crossroads dropped to 2-3 while Classic is now 2-2-1.

At 10 AM, Rock Salt staked a claim to the best team in the league with a 12-4 win over the YMYF Mustard Seeds.

Rock Salt put up 3 quick runs in the first and the Seeds answered with 3 of their own in the bottom half of the inning. But after Brian White clubbed a two-run home run over the fence in the 3rd inning, capping Rock Salt's 5-run inning, the Seeds managed only 1 more run the rest of the way. White became the 6th different person to go yard this year.

"My initial reaction was frustration...frustration that defensively we were not the same team we have been the rest of the year," said Seeds manager Joshua Hall. "We made a lot of mistakes and we weren't communicating very well. I still feel we have a good team; if we work on some fundamentals and improve the communication, we'll be able to provide competition to anyone!!"

While Hall felt frustrated, Rock Salt manager Tim Kurtz had a different feeling.

"Relieved," he said. "Mat 'The Puppetmaster' Smith had us swinging at everything. He pitched a great game... striking 6 of us out and ending the 1.000 batting averages of two of our players."

For Hall, bad things for the Seeds started on defense and affected the offense. "Personally, I need to work on fielding grounders, this has always been my Achille's Heel and I let a couple balls that should've been routine get by me...so instead of holding runners to a single or a double, they were able to get to 3rd without any problems," Hall said of what he might've done differently. "Soonwook Kwon, our anchor at 3rd, was not available this week. While I think Jeremy Bautista and Matthew Jung did a good job in his absence, I'm wondering what would've happened had I put Marcus at 3rd. Marcus's speed might've been more of a factor and enabled us to hold batters to singles.

"As a team, I think we got spoiled playing the two In Focus teams back-to-back in weeks 2 and 3 (no offense to your teams, Phil and Ann Marie)," Hall continued. "Those two weeks we had great games offensively. I think these last two weeks we've been functioning with the mindset that we're going to put 15 or more hits and at least 10 runs on the board every week, and that just isn't possible in this league. In order to be successful this week, we're going to have to work on our patience at the plate and be willing to take some pitches. This is something that would've helped us the last two weeks. I'm also going to encourage my team to shorten up our swings...a bunch of singles is much better than a few doubles, triples, etc."

“The Cowboys are just a few plays away from their first win.”

- Chris Carter on the Cowboys after beating them 12-0

At 4-1, Rock Salt is now tied with Saltier for the league's top record. Saltier has a slight tiebreaker edge in runs scored. The Seeds are now 2-3.

"It feels great [to be tied for the best record]," Kurtz said. "But I'm not surprised that the Salt teams lead the league. Honestly, have you seen the Salt group? It's filled with big, hulking, muscular beasts...and the guys are pretty tough too."

In the 9 AM game, something had to give. Winless Covenant took on the winless In Focus Cowboys, and in the end, Covenant easily downed the Cowboys.

Covenant manager Chris Carter didn't take much stock on his team's first win this season.

"As a team, we feel like winners anytime we walk on or off the field," Carter said. "We know that we have the talent to beat anyone. It was just a matter of time before we put all of the pieces of the puzzle together. I feel sorry for any of the teams that have to face us from here on."

Covenent, whose boxscore is late every week (editor to Carter: not-so-subtle hint), reportedly beat the Cowboys 12-0.

Carter didn't think his opponents' 0-5 record detracted from his team's first win.

"Cowboy Phil and his team played a great game on Saturday," Carter said. "Just to be on the same field as Phil was an honor and a pleasure. I would give back all my RBIs to wear his hat for one day. Fortunately, we had a strong first inning and a big hit late in the game from Kristen Huntington that propelled us to a victory. The Cowboys are just a few plays away from their first win."

In fact, Carter foresees the Cowboys winning their first game against the Defenders to kick off this Saturday's slate of games at 8 AM.

"I like their odds against the Defenders on Saturday," he said. "I see it all the time when a team comes off a big win: their tanks run empty the next week."

Other games next Saturday include Covenant facing the Seeds, and Rock Salt challenging a Thate-less Crossroads team. Thate will be on a special missions trip to North Africa for the next two weeks.

Thate noted that Crossroads plays Covenant the following week...whose team includes a certain missions pastor, Bill Bertsche.

"How convenient that he sends me during the week that my team plays his team," Thate noticed.