Kind of a Laugher

Sure, yuk it up. Check the email.

Yeah, after Yaz set down Fleisher Art Memorial for another scoreless inning and the Pen & Pencil cruised into the top of the fifth holding a 14-3 lead, there was pretty much nothing that could go wrong, was there?



Krause: He wants to swing this way.



Well, except everything, of course, and what could have been, perhaps should have been, an easier win turned into a nail-biter against the up-and-coming Sammys. It ended up as a 15-14 win for P&P and even that barely describes the onion skin that separated the two teams. (I love that line, even if they do keep taking it out of my Inquirer copy.)

Those of you with sharp memories will recall we beat Fleisher by a single run in extra innings earlier this season. So, a hit here and a catch there, and Fleisher gets by us twice and is 6-6 on the season…and so are we…and fighting to make the playoffs.

George indicates where he hit Tina the last time we saw her pitch.

As it is, we got the job done twice and that’s the difference between the P&P team this season and in other seasons. Now, we’ve got one more regular season game left, Tuesday against Bishop’s Collar, and it’s a playoff preview. If we win the game, we are home team in the first round of the postseason against the Collar. If not, we are visitors. It would be nice to show the Prelate’s Neckband that we mean business. So get your running in for the regular-season finale.

Now, back to the postgame show. We won the first four innings, 14-3, and lost the last three innings, 11-1. I’m not entirely sure how that happened, but it took some doing. In those opening innings, we had 16 hits and brought 33 batters to the plate. In the skid toward the end, we had four hits and batted 13.



Head down, full extension, weight shifting back to front.
 Three-run home run. Simple game.



One explanation is that we let down a little or something, but that would be disrespecting the Sammys, who kept playing and gutted their way back into the game. They stopped throwing the ball around, which hurt them early, and they started finding gaps with their hits. We made a couple of gaffes and hit our way out of innings and, well, it happened.

First the good. We batted around, plus three, in hanging a 10-spot on the board in the third inning. The frame was highlighted by an RBI double from Mark Nevins, a two-run triple by Jon Snyder, and a monstrous three-run home run into the bench area of Edgeley 3 by Brian Donlen. A player in the other field helpfully picked up the ball and flipped it to the Fleisher leftfielder who relayed it home, where it struck Donlen squarely in the back as he crossed the plate. Nice.



Key Moment. Ed has just told Krause, "Listen, kid. I know it's 14-8,
but we might need this run. If Nevins lines out to second base
here and they try to double Miller off first, you take off. You never
know, it might turn out to be the winning run." And here's the pitch.



Donlen had three hits and was one triple away from the cycle when the Management wisely pulled him from the game. Save it for the playoffs, big guy. George Miller also had three hits, none of which gave Tina another titectomy. Three hits for Chris Brennan, and two hits each for Russ Krause, Dan McElhatton, Keith Craig, Chris Yasiejko, and Dan Rubin. Ellen Kenney knocked home a run in that big third inning.

Ok, Krause’s day. He threw a guy out at third in the first inning by about 20 feet and Fleisher never tried to take another extra base. That helped. Krause also scored the winning run from third base – our only run in the final three innings -- on a line drive to second, which didn’t hurt, either.

The play of the game came in the bottom of the seventh with the tie run on second base and the winning run on first. Fleisher Drew, who was 3-for-4 at that point, drilled a shot down the left field line that appeared certain to land fairly and end the game, and not in a good way.

Krause ran down the ball and gloved it to his backhand side on the full run, causing Ron to scream in the Management’s ear as if we had just gotten a bagful of free hoagies. Ron, of course, had no idea how loud he screamed, so we will forgive that little outburst.

There you have it. Just another routine win on our road to glory. Let’s get after the Collar now and beat them twice. Just like the hoagies, we’re on a roll.