FIRST PITCH OF THE SEASON...

HIBERNATION IS OVER...

It seems like a long, long time since the playoffs. This winter may have been quite good as far as weather goes, but it was still a long stretch between baseball games.

The last game the Hurtin' Units played was way, way, way back on September 20th, in the semi-finals, vs. the Hottub Woodys, when we lost to by a score of 14-12.

The Hottub Woodys would go on to play the Dogcatchers in the finals, the Dogcatchers would prevail and claim the T.O.T championship for 2015.

TIME FOR CHANGE.

At the end of the 2013 season, I was ready to call it quits with the Hurtin' Units. The season had really drained me, both physically and mentally. By the time the playoffs had rolled around I had serious thoughts about not returning as a captain in 2014. After the season ended, I gave myself a couple of months to think about it and I finally decided to come back for another season.

In 2014, the Hurtin' Units had the worst season we had ever had. We got off to a bad start and rode that wave all the way to the end.  Our record was 3-22-1 with a plus/minus of -178. As with every other year, we had a great group of guys, but we just could not get the team to gel. And even with all of those losses and beat downs, I never heard any bitching or whining or even much negative talk. Some nights we even laughed at how bad we really were. But the truth be told, nobody enjoys losing that much and most of us were glad to see the season come to an end.

If ever there was a reason to hang up the captain's hats and call it quits it was the 2014 season. Mike and I were at that point. Mike was already talking about not being a captain in 2015, but I convinced him to stay on another season, saying that we could not go out that way with such a bad season.

In 2015, Mike and I returned for our 6th season. The 2014 season was still in the back of our minds as we started to prepare for 2015.

Before the 2015 even started, we agreed that we had to make some changes to rid ourselves and our team of this jinx or bad karma that had been hanging over the Units for the last number of seasons.

Our first change was to change the colour of our shirts. Over the last 2 seasons we were in black shirts with yellow piping, in 2015 we went to navy blue shirt with white piping. And for the last 4 seasons we have had Bender as our logo, in 2015 we changed this to Stewie Griffin.

One other thing we did was, on draft day 2015, Mike would pick the entire roster for the Units. I did not pick a single player, I sat in the shadows of the Legion taking care of the paperwork. Mike chose an awesome team!

RECAP OF 2015.

I thought that  the 2015 season was a huge success for the Units, and a tremendous step forward from the 2014 disaster.

For the first time in 5 years the Hurtin' Units team finished with over a .500 record in the regular season with a record of 13-12-1. We also won on opening night game which put us on the winning path. We would finish the season in 7th place, only 2 points out of 4th.

In the playoffs, we did not start off well; In the round robin we only won a single game, but managed to squeak in to the elimination game vs. the Draft Kings.

The Draft Kings finished 2nd in the regular season, only a single point out of 1st. It was in the elimination game that the Units started to play well. Our confidence began to build and the offensive and defense both came together. The Units would play an excellent game, defeating the Kings.

In the quarter finals the Units would go up against the Master Batters. The Batters were the league champions. The Units defense in this game was stellar, and with some timely Unit's hitting, the Units would take an early lead and hold on for a victory.

In the semi-finals, Units were up against the Hottub Woodys, who were having a great playoff run also. 

This game was a close one, and in the bottom of the 7th inning, with the Woodys leading 14-12, Units batting with 2 out, runners on 2nd and 3rd, Darrell H. hit a screaming linedrive to the Woody's shortstop to the end the game. The Units playoff run had come to an end. " Missed it by that much"- Agent 86, Maxwell Smart.

NEW CAPTAIN(S).

The Hurtin' Units 2015 season had come to an end and it was a good one. The Units had come back from the nightmare that was 2014. Mike and I were in a better state of mind about the Hurtin' Units team.

During the entire 2015 season, I was not feeling well. I had picked up some kind of parasite which gave me stomach issues for most of the year. I started feeling better in November 2015 and I decided I wanted another kick at the title.

Mike was out... he had been telling me this most of the 2015 season and I was hoping he would change his mind, but there was a point when I realized he was not coming back. I knew it was time to move on.

I had mentioned to Peter Hollmann, on several occasions, that I may be looking for a new captain and Peter said he would be interested. Bringing Pete in as a new co-captain was a no brainer for me, we work together, we practise together and we talk sports most of time. The perfect fit!! Welcome aboard Pete!

Peter H. is not the only new captain in the T.O.T league this season. The league has gone back to 15 teams and Will Goodin and Peter Hayward are the newest captains in the league. The new team is called the Inglourious Batsters. I'm going to assume that the team name is adapted from a Quentin Tarintino film called Inglourious Bastards. I got thinking about how most of Tarintino movie titles could be adapted to baseball names... Pulp Pitchin', Kill Ball, Kill Ball 2, The Hateful 12, Bango Unchained... You get the idea. 

DRAFT DAY.

I love the excitement of draft day. The day when each team selects their summer family and we can finally put the names on the roster.

The Hurtin' Units were 12th pick in the draft this season, which meant we were 4th to pick our shirt colour (dark green with yellow lettering), so we got that going for us.

The Units would not draft anyone in the first 2 rounds, because the first 2 rounds were for pitchers and with me being the P1 and Pete being the P2, we already had our pitchers.

In the third round, Peter finally made his first official draft pick and we were off to the races. The first official pick was our #12 player and " the Hurtin' Units select BRAD SMITH"...good start Petey Boy!! 

Peter would select every player but 1, (Peter was socializing with someone, when to were slated to pick, so I made the pick), but the others were picked by Pete. The draft took about 2 hours.

To view the 2016 Hurtin'Units roster click on roster in the left hand column or click on any highlighted roster to link to the page.

Now that the rosters and the schedule have been taken care of, it's time to get on the field. Let's play some ball!!