SBL 2008, WEEK 3
JUNE 1
FREE AIR ARENA
VOLTRON
6
THE
Week three of the 2008 sbl
season kicked off with an intriguing matchup between
undefeated voltron and the desperately-seeking-a-win
queens. When the smoke cleared, the
queens had finally snapped their 3-game skid and the league was
left with only two undefeated teams.
After earning last at-bats in the scrum, the queens
quickly took the lead, plating 2 in the bottom of the first on Stud Frankovich’s 2-run homer.
From there, the balanced attack of Aryn Christman, Bryan Frankovich,
Johnny Davidson, Lou Shernisky and Stud would score
in every inning but the 8th, slowly turning their two-run lead into
a commanding win. The queen defense,
powered as always by B.Frank, would turn a double
play in every inning to keep the normally potent voltron
offense to a season-low 6 runs.
Stud, in his 2008 debut, paced his squad with
a 7 for 11, 5 homer, 10 rbi
performance. B.Frank
added 7 hits, 1 homer, 6 rbi
and a quintet of double plays.
In a losing effort, Billy Weisberg went 3 for
8 with 2 rbi, 3 double plays
and an assist. Jamie Fabian came off the
bench for his first action of 2008 in the final inning. He put up an air ball. We still cheered.
THE FLESHY FUNBRIDGES 2
THE LASER CATS 26 (6 INNINGS)
For the second time in as many games, the
laser cats decimated their opponents in 6 innings, as the league’s best team
improved to 5-0 behind solid play from everyone in their lineup.
Bob Spohn continued
his early bid for most improved player, hitting 7 of 11 shots with a homer and
7 rbi. Tim Martin got hits in 7 of 10 at-bats with a
homer and 3 rbi, as well as four double plays and a
pair of assists to take a surprising lead over the rest of the sbl in that category.
Terry Shernisky had his usual performance- 8
for 11, 6 longballs, 14 rbi and 2 double plays. Even rookie Billy Deforest got into the
action, hitting 5 times in 10 at-bats.
Nate Tomko didn’t suit up fo
th cats.
Playing without any of their starting four,
the overmatched funbridges nevertheless fought
admirably. Their only runs came in the
fourth inning when Opie Neff drove in Danielle Hennon, then Wes Davis notched his
first hit of the young season to plate Neff.
JUKEBOX HERO 2
THE FLESHY FUNBRIDGES 3
Though they played with the same lineup that had been
crushed with before, the funbridges faced a much less
talented team in this one and were able to pull out the improbable win in honor
of their absent captain.
Danielle Hennon led
the way for the winners, hitting in 3 of her 7 at-bats with 2 ribbies and a psyche-out. Opie
Neff added 2 hits, and Wes Davis collected the other funbridge
rbi on a seventh inning
double.
Jukebox, whose roster included the kamikazees Lee Nespor and Rob
Whiting, John Offutt of the banana democracy, Jamie Fabian of voltron and first-time sbl’er
Dave Gillshire, collected only four hits in this one,
half coming off the fingertips of Fabian.
As a result, the yellow mesh was unable to get any sort of offense
going, and suffered their fourth consecutive loss after opening the season with
a win over these very funbridges.
Fabian tipped in 3 double plays for the
losers. Offutt connected on an 8th
inning solo shot to make the game interesting heading into the ninth.
THE OATCAKE HATE MONSTERS 3
THE BANANA DEMOCRACY 6
After averaging 17.5 runs per contest in each
of their first four games, all wins, the oatcake
defense just couldn’t get rolling in this one and, as a result, found its way
into the L column for the firs time.
Playing without starters Matt Mcclelland and Katie Kelly obviously affected the games of
the rest of the monsters, especially Shelley Goodpastor. The near .700 lifetime batter found the
bottom of the net in only 3 of her 11 attempts in this one, which one would
have to assume is a career low. I’m not going to look it up, mostly because I
don’t want to know if my favorite sbl player of all
time has ever actually played a worse game.
With his leadoff hitter struggling, captain
Terry Hall fell right in line, connecting only 4 times all contest and driving
in two runs, both on solo homers. The
other hate monster to play was rookie David Gillshire.
The banana democracy, meanwhile, rebounded
nicely from their 17-0 pummeling last time out.
Though they were also shorthanded, playing with only one starter, a
solid game from recently acquired Brandon Gillshire
was a surprising bonus. Gillshire nailed half of 10 shots with a pair of
rbi and 2 double plays. John Offutt saw his first p.t.
of ’08, doping home 4 of ten shots with four runs batted in. Defensively, captain Kip Corbett tipped in a
pair of double plays.
THE
JUKEBOX HERO 2
For the second time in one sunny afternoon,
jukebox hero came out on the losing end of a 3-2 defensive struggle, this time
falling to previously winless
After waiting much of the afternoon for Mike Moroco to return from the right side of the state,
JBH got off to an auspicious start in this
one, failing to have a runner reach base until the fifth inning, when Tara Shawley finally dropped in a single. Three batters later Nespor
cleared the bases with his first homer of the season to give his squad a 2-0
lead.
KK answered right back in the top of the 6th,
with Moroco driving in Mentrek
with a triple then tipping in a Rob Whiting single attempt to plate himself an knot up the game.
Then, in the very next inning, Mentrek
returned the favor to Moroco, driving in him with a
huge 2-out single to give us out final score.
The game did have some drama at the end, when
with 2-outs and a pair of runners on Nate Tomko came off the jukebox bench to
put up a grand slam attempt that ultimately bounced off the rim to secure KK’s first win of the season.
Shawley and Fabian
each collected 2 hits for jukebocks. Jeanne Mentrek was
tops at the plate for the winners, hitting 5 of 11. Moroco finished
with a 3 for 12, 1 assist, 3 double play, 2 psyche-out
showing.
VOLTRON 7
THE LASER CATS 19
Voltron had not
tasted defeat at all over the first two weeks of the season. In week three, they got a double dose, this
time at the hands of the laser cats.
The two league-leading squads battled it out
in the early part of the game, trading runs back and fourth and leaving the
game knotted at 5 heading into the fourth inning. From their, the laser cat lineup slowly took
over, building a small cushion that eventually exploded into a giant lead
thanks to a 7-run seventh that was capped by a Tomko 3-run jack.
Voltron’s offense,
conversely, went to sleep after the third, scoring only a pair of runs from
that point on. The result was the
lopsided final score and a sudden 2-game hole that voltron
will need to climb out of if they desire the all-important bye to the finals
that gets awarded to the SBL squad with the best regular-season record.
Tomko paved the way for the victors, drilling
8 of 10 with a pair of homers and 8 rbi,
as well as a pair of double plays. Tim
Martin continued his stellar early season play with 7 of 10
marksmanship with 4 ribbies and 3 double plays. Terry Shernisky
added a 6 for 10 outing with 5 rbi.
Voltron got a 6 for
9, 3 rbi, 2 double play from
captain Billy Weisberg. Mike Frankovich had a homer and 4 rbi in four innings of work before being yanked.
THE OATCAKE HATE MONSTERS 14
THE
The queens got a measure of revenge on
oatcake, who had knocked off B.Frank’s charges 20-14
in week one. The win pulls the queens to
3-3 and into fourth place in the SBl, while the loss
makes it two in a row for oatcake as they fall two full games behind the laser
cats for first in the American conference.
Oatcake got Katie Kelly and her .650 average
back for this one, and for most of the game that looked as if it would be
enough to get the win. The hate monsters
scored at least a pair in each of the first three innings to take an early 7-2
lead, and the queen offense
got only six hits over the first 5 innings and looked totally
lost on the offensive side of the ball.
Things changed in the sixth, when Frankovich went to his bench in favor of Lou Shernisky. With the
elder Sherry in the lineup, things did a 180 for the QRR. They tallied 4 runs in the 6th,
then came right back with 6 each in the 7th and 8th to
flip an 11-2 hole into an 18-14 lead.
The defense held on in the ninth when, after a Kelly leadoff double,
Terry Hall missed on his shot, then talked Pat Nespor
out of a homer attempt and into a single.
Pat’s single was, of course, missed, and Stud Frankovich
tipped in the carom for a game-ending D.P.
Goodpastor rebounded
nicely from her shitty game with a strong showing in this one, hitting 8 of 11
with 3 rbi, but it wasn’t enough .
Aryn Christman notched hits in 8 of 13 at-bats with a pair of ribbies. Stud
continued his studly play, banging home 8 of 12 with
2 homers and 9 rbi. Off the bench, Shernisky
knocked down 5 of 7 with 3 rbi
and an assist.
THE
THE BANANA DEMOCRACY 6
Before the final game of week three started,
it was decided that Rando Knight, who had just
arrived after getting off work, and Lee Nespor, who
had seen little action for his squad, would each be allowed to play in this
one. A coin flip decided that, for one
game only, Nespor would be a Kamikaze and Knight a
member of the Democracy. Man, that is just weird to type. Rando Knight, long
the bearer of the flag of communism in the SBl,
played an entire game wearing a shirt with “democracy” on the front. I hope someone got a picture of that.
Anyway, the game was a snoozer. Lee nespor did hit
a solo homer tho.
Unfortunately, Rando played really, really
well so his temporary team beat Lee’s.
For the B.D., who got all but one of their 6
runs in the first, Knight went a very un-Rando 5 for
8 with 2 rbi, 2 double plays
and no dumb things. And he probably
should have had more rbi,
but nobody else on his team bothered getting a hit after the first.
Mike Moroco’s 2 for
8, 1 homer, 2 rbi, 6 double
play, 1 psyche-out line was tops for his team.
Jeanne Mentrek added 3 hits.
PLAYER OF THE WEEK: Stud Frankovich,
15 for 27, 7 homers, 19 rbi
and 6 double plays
TEAM OF THE WEEK: tie: the funbridges and
the kamikazees.
(I don’t care if they were against jukebox, winning a game with either
of those lineups is damn impressive.)
GAME OF THE WEEK: kamikazees/jukebox
(I don’t know why- this one was just fun)