HURTIN' UNITS SQUEAK BY THE BEER BROS...

HURTIN' UNITS vs. BEER BROS...


Cooling down with a cold beer...


Game # 17- July 20, 2011

Hurtin' Units win 14-10

Team Record 6-10-1

Keogh Park- It's stinkin' hot outside!!The weather seems to be the hot (no pun intended) topic this week. At 6:30pm on game night the temperature was at 33 degrees and feeling like 39 with the humidity... I seem to work up a sweat in mild temperatures, so tonight I expect to be soaked...

At game time we had 10 players eager (okay, maybe not eager, but ready) to play this game and the only missing bodies were Cal R and Bill J.

The was game # 17 on our schedule and as I mentioned in the last post, we don't have any chance to win the league, which means the pressure is off us. The pressure may been off to win the league, but there was still the pressure of the case of beer bet made with the Beer Bros earlier in the season. The Hurtin' Units won the first game on May 16, 2011 and the best the Bros could do would be to tie...

44 days between wins...

 44 days, this is my estimate since the last time we won a the regular season game. Our last win came way, way back in game # 7, on June 6, when we defeated the Rusty Rebels by a score of 14-13. Since that time we have a record of 0-8-1, probably the coldest team in the league. Our record when this slide started was 5-2-0 and going into this game our team record was 5-10-1. Ouch!! The good news is we could play .500 baseball by the end of the season, either way we all make the playoffs and it's usually the team that gets hot going in, that gets on a roll...

The long losing streak was finally over when we tied the Dislocated Joints on July 12 and despite a loss in our last game , we have played much better since the HTKP tournament . The tournament certainly restored our confidence and showed us that we have a competitive team that is capable of winning against anyone...

The game against the Beer Bros. had a lot of things going on, not in the game, but more around the game. Before the game there were discussions about the case of beer bet, we had the Sambuca ( yes, I finally remembered to bring it) shooters set up for pre-game and Mike was taking orders for chicken wings for the post game wing feast at the legion.

We were the visitors in this game. Similar to the last two games, we got off to a good start offensively, scoring 3 runs in each of the first, second and forth innings and only allowed the Beer Bros 2 runs in the first and shut them down in second, third and forth. After 4 innings, the Units had a 9-2 lead.

In the fifth and sixth innings the Hurtin' Units only scored a single run, but the we only allowed the Bros to score 2 more runs. The score after 6 completed innings, 10-4 for the Units...

Boxscore:        1    2    3     4     5     6     7       Total 

Hurtin' Units    3     3    0     3     0     1     4         14   

Beer Bros.       2     0    0     0     2     0     6         10          

The was my third start in a row at pitcher and I like believe that I'm improving, but I still don't like to walk guys, love to strike or foul ball them out ( right Pieman?), but the walks bug me... Last night I walked more batters than I would like (one is more than I like), but sometimes walking a batter is not such a bad thing, especially if the batter can hurt you.

Last night I struggled at times to find the plate and as a result I walked several batters... I really don't mind walking the good batters, it's a single on a guys that could hurt us, but I have to get the weaker batters, I have to throw them strikes. In the bottom of the seventh inning we had a 14-4 lead, I couldn't seem to throw for strikes, it was time for relief... How do you spell relief ?? B.O.B. Bob came in with one out and managed to close the door. The Beer Bros scored 6 runs in the seventh and got a little closer, but in the end it was the Hurtin' Units with the victory. Final score 14-10 Units.

Before the last two games, I have stopped by Coventry Park and thrown a couple of buckets (25+ balls per bucket) of baseballs for practise pitching. I'm now wondering if this routine could be hurting me later in our games. If I'm throwing 50+ pitches before a game, and at least 12 pitches per inning in a game, that would be over a 120 pitches by the seventh inning. I'm not a robot or a pitching machine, perhaps it's time to stop practising the day of a game...

Highlights of the night: Bob was a vacuum on the field in this game, scooping up ground balls, he also made the guys playing first base earn their paycheques by stretching them like Rubberman... Chris L. made a nice stretch and hold, on a play at home plate, for an out, on a throw from Mooner... Richard made a nice catch in left field and was hitting the ball hard at bat... Most of the Hurtin' Unit players were hitting the ball really well... Good solid team effort....Units Universal!!