Have I talked about the Cardinals getting knocked out yet? No, I don’t think I have. We did talk about the glorious choke job they did in Game 1, but the birds went ahead and followed that up with an offensive output of 0 runs the following game; bye bye birdies. So glad I don’t have to see the “old 3” on the field any more for St. Louis…
Actually, all the teams I wanted to win, won this weekend, except the Mets. The Guardians, Mariners, Phillies, and Padres all advanced in what I thought, was an excellent Wild Card weekend. Although not necessarily a fan of letting more teams in the postseason, I AM a fan of your season being decided by more than 1 game. Having a 3 game series, hosted by the 2 division winners with the lowest winning percentage, makes a lot of sense. This was one change I wasn’t hot for initially, but now that it’s here, really like it. The Divisional Series are up next.
Speaking about playoff baseball… our fall baseball team’s season came to an end on Sunday. We finished with a 3-5 record. Sunday was that 3rd win of the year, a great game that we pulled out 10-9. My son has been heating up at the plate, getting his 2 best hits the past 2 weeks. Last week was a double in the right center gap; this week was a double in the left center gap. In this last game, we had a really nice development.
Early on in the season, we realized we had a problem; we had nobody to catch behind the plate. The one kid who volunteered lasted a couple innings; another kid who joined after the first couple practices gave it a shot. He’s done OK; he really gritted out last week. My son’s first warm up pitch to him hit him in the left bicep; he was writhing in pain…. he gutted it out though; much props to him for that. Yet, he still can’t catch my son; that’s the problem we’re having. For all the other pitchers, the catcher is my son; he’s stepped into that role like a natural. By doing so, he solidified our defense. With him at catcher and our starting pitcher on the mound, we’re really solid. Again, when it’s time to take him out, and bring in my son, the fireballer, nobody can handle it. Enter a new kid this week. He’s been awesome with the glove wherever we put him, so why not catcher? Sure, it took us 7 weeks to give it a try, but it was a huge success! He was a little worried… asking me why he has to catch the fastest pitcher in the league… haha. He did it though. There was a play at the plate; he recovered the wild pitch, flipped to my son for the out. There was a dropped third strike, which he gathered up, and stepped on home plate to end the inning. The result was a clean inning for my son; no runs, closing out the 10-9 victory.
Onto the second season for us… ALL teams make the playoffs. Did you know there are 24 10U teams in this fall baseball league? Insane! They break it out into 3 divisions, a gold, sliver, and bronze; they try to make it the most competitive, which makes a ton of sense. Because of that, the 2 teams that really took it to us this year, have moved up; because of that, there is not a team that remains in our bracket that we cannot beat. The other 3 losses were really close games, 2 of which were without my son there… and the 3rd, we were missing a couple other kids. So… yeah, now I’m thinking championship… haha. Why not? Playoffs start Saturday, but first, one more practice… if the weather cooperates.
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