Hurtin' Units lose 22-21
Team Record - 0-4-1
Coventry Park- This week we find ourselves playing two games in the week, for the first time this season... This game against the Brew Jays and Thursday evening against the Dodge City Rounders. We play the Dodge City Rounders on Thursday evening at 9:30pm, the last game of the week and then we play the Dodge City Rounders again on Monday evening at 7:00pm the first game of the week... Well at least we finish up with the Rounders early in the season...
In 2010 there were two new teams introduced in to the Tottenham Oldtimers League, the first was the Hurtin' Units and the second was the Brew Jays. Mike and I had been on the new captains list for quite some time, we actually thought we were going to captain in 2009, but the registration was low and the league chose to go with 13 teams. " Missed it by that much"- Maxwell Smart -secret agent. Leading up to the 2010 season, one of the 2009 teams decided to fold (could have been the Hole Asses, but I'm not really sure), creating an opening for new captains in 2010. In 2010, Mike and I were awarded a franchise and the Hurtin' Units were hatched or assembled or born, all depending on how look at it...
Just before registration had begun in the spring of 2010, I had mentioned to Chris Ross (the Tottenham Oldtimer's former president) that I had a portable display sign and the league was welcome to use it to help boost registration if they wanted. Chris took me up on the offer and the sign was erected coming into town. The registration results were quite good for the 2010 season, so good actually that the league decided to add an additional team... The Brew Jays were hatched (hatched definitely works here) with new captains Bo N. and Roddy D. at the helm.
The first season for these two new teams would be a overwhelming success. The Brew Jays and the Hurtin' Units would battle the entire season for first place and the title of League Champions. The race came down to the final two games and the Hurtin' Units squeaked by the Jays by only two points to win the title, even if the Jays had tied the Units the Units would have won. The Hurtin' Units won both head to head games against the Brew Jays in the regular season. The Hurtin' Units would go on to struggle in the playoffs and the Brew Jays would not fair much better... The Wild would go on repeat as playoff Champions.
0-4-1 in the weeds...
Prior to this game, I was looking at the standings again and it's funny how the times have changed since our first season in 2010. In 2010 both the Hurtin' Units and the Brew Jays were battling for first over all, this season the two teams are at the bottom of the standings. After 4 games, the Hurtin' Units are the only team without a win and a record of 0-3-1 and the Brew Jays have a record of 1-3-0. We have only played 4 games and we have 20 more to go until the regular season is complete and even if we were 0-23-1, we all make the playoffs. Only one of our games has been a blowout, the other 3 have been close, 1 tie and 2 games decided by a single run...If we lost 22 games by a single run going into the playoffs, I would feel we are due for a win and we are capable of playing with any team in the league... We have a great team we just need a confidence building win or two to get it turned around.
Boxscore: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Total
Hurtin' Units 1 1 5 7 7 0 0 21
Brew Jays 5 3 6 4 1 3 0 22
This game seven innings were played.
I looked at the team stats again and the one number that keeps on jumping off the page is the Hurtin' Units runs for column. We have only scored 41 runs up until this game, now there are some teams that have played 6 games, most of the league has played 5 games, so this statistic is probably not as bad as it seems... In the runs against column we are tied for 4th with 56 runs against, again there are teams with more games played so this stat is also a little bit deceiving... A couple of high scoring games for us, low scoring games for our opponents and win in our column would change these numbers very quickly...
Hurtin' Units 1 1 5 7 7 0 0 21
Brew Jays 5 3 6 4 1 3 0 22
This game seven innings were played.
I looked at the team stats again and the one number that keeps on jumping off the page is the Hurtin' Units runs for column. We have only scored 41 runs up until this game, now there are some teams that have played 6 games, most of the league has played 5 games, so this statistic is probably not as bad as it seems... In the runs against column we are tied for 4th with 56 runs against, again there are teams with more games played so this stat is also a little bit deceiving... A couple of high scoring games for us, low scoring games for our opponents and win in our column would change these numbers very quickly...
Early on game day (around noon), I was on my way to pick up some sodas for the game, there was a real threat of thunderstorms and rain, the skies were dark and to the west I could hear thunder rumbling (not Rob) and getting closer to town. The Weather Network wasn't calling for a storm, but the skies over Tottenham were telling another story. At around 12:40pm, the rain began to fall, not heavily, but in was steady for 45 minutes. By 5:00pm, the skies had cleared, a few fluffy clouds still remained in the sky and it was shaping up to be a great evening for baseball...
At game time we had 11 players ready for our fifth game of the season. The only missing body for this game was Gord R. (third base guy). Mike played this game (even with the sore knee, he's a trooper) sharing first and catch with Kidder.
One thing I like to do is compare the Hurtin' Unit teams from the past with the team of the present. In the first five game games in the 2010 the Units record was 3-1-1 and we finished with a team record of 19-5-2 on a 26 game schedule. In 2011, in our first 5 games, we were 4-1-0, winning the first 4 games and we finished with a 10-12-2 team record... I remember in 2011, when we were at 4-0, that Doug D. had a poll on his blog asking who do you think would lose a game first? Naturally, I voted for the Hurtin' Units and from that point, we went spiraling down to a under .500 record to finish the season... There is real parity in the league this season and the games are close, anyone can win or in our case lose, on any given night... I really have to give some credit to the ratings commitee for balancing out the teams this season.
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| Hurtin' Units Scoresheet |
This game was our third 1 run loss on the season and as a result we still remain at the bottom of the standings. It does however increase our runs for stat, so we got that going for us...Which is nice. Our only real blowout was to the Woodys by a 22-9 score.
Our bats seem to be getting off to a slow start almost every game and we seem to score in bunches, if we ever get off to a quick start watch for a high scoring game...
Keepin' the streak alive!!!
Our next game is on Sweet Onion Chicken Teriyaki Day, sorry my mistake, it is onTurkey Day... See ya there.... hope we don't need a sub.
0-4-1 in the weeds...
Pitch Bits: I really liked the way I pitched in this game. We really got nickled and dimed in the early innings of the game, but we seemed to slow the bleeding while we tried to mount a comeback. I walked two batters again in this game, one walked in a run (hate walking guys), I'm still nibbling too much, need to go right after batters... The balls I was throwing were all around the board and I really think my control is getting better by the week...
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