Posts Tagged ‘rackballers’

Rackballers Game #4 Recap

June 22nd, 2010

This recap is going to be short.  It’s going to be short because I’m still a little bitter about the game.  First I’ll start off by saying that the Umps had a serious attitude problem.  I don’t know what happened to them before the game, but it would be an understatement to say that I was shocked that one of the umps threatened to call the game if I didn’t change my attitude.  I have never had a problem with any ump.  I would’ve liked nothing more than to have told off that ump.  What good would that have done?  I wouldn’t have played, the rest of the guys wouldn’t have played, and the other team wouldn’t have played.  The whole point of playing softball is to have fun.

On to the actual game play.  Well we managed to top ourselves last week as far as poor defensive play goes.  Every player, except Dan, had an error.  Some players had several.  I won’t go into who did what, but let’s just say that it was horrible to watch us shoot ourselves in the foot.

Offensively we played solid, although some of us struggled.  I’m looking at you Kyle, … oh wait that’s me.  I went 0-2 with an RBI Sac Fly.  But let’s not dwell on the negative.  The team is coming together nicely offensively, however the constant errors our making the Rackballers beat themselves.

The Rackballers lost 13-9 and their next game is on 6/28 at 7 versus the Turks.  This week’s player of the game is Dan because he didn’t have an error.  Oh and Gene went hitless for the first time all season.

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Rackballers Game #3 Recap

June 15th, 2010

Here is where you would’ve seen a picture of Jack (www.rackballer.com) and myself standing face to face with our fists up.  Unfortunately we didn’t do that.  This game was OU vs. UT, Michigan vs. OSU, Rampage vs. Evans, Lakers vs. Celtics, and Yankees vs. Red Sox all rolled into one.  Well maybe that is a bit of an exaggeration, but it was for bragging rights.  The Rackballers vs. the Ex-Rackballers a.k.a. the Snakefarmers.

The Rackballers came out of the gate pumped up.  Their blood was pumping and the energy was high.  Being the “home” team the Rackballers started out in the field first and managed to give up four runs on two errors from Harrison and Anthony.  Both missed catchable fly balls in the outfield.  After that inning the Rackballers settled down and gave up only six more runs the rest of the way.  Three of those runs came in the last inning.  This was by far the Rackballers worst defensive performance.  There was two errors from Harrison, one from Anthony, one from Jason, one from Dan, one from myself, and one ridiculous base running error from Tim.  More on Tim’s game later in the recap.  The Rackballers locked down near the end of the game and started to perform at the level that their use to.

Offensively the Rackballers finally worked as a team and put together and impressive two out rally that widened their lead and eventually proved to be the difference.  The bottom of the lineup’s bats woke up and started to get into the act.  Andrew, David, Anthony, and Jason all found themselves on the bases and rounding home.  Dan had another great game and ended up being a very powerful one two punch with Gene at the top of the lineup.  Did I mention that Dan hit an inside the park home run?  Well now I have.  The offense with their timely hits and smart base running carried the Rackballers to victory this week.

The game did have its fair share of “controversy”.  The Snakefarmers had three players called out for various infractions.  Todd was called out for stepping in front of home plate while taking his swing.  This is a little known rule, but one that’s in place so batters won’t move up closer to the pitcher.  Brandon ended up being called out twice which resulted in an automatic ejection for throwing his bat after hitting the ball.  This rule is in place to protect the catcher and the umpire from being hit by a flying bat.  The funny part about that is that Brandon was playing catcher for the Snakefarmers so you’d figure he would be a little more respectful of the opposing catcher.  Then the Rackballers had one player called out on an infraction.  Apparently Tim needed to be reminded that he’s not allowed to run until the pitch has crossed the plate.  The unfortunate part about that out was that it ended a rally and it caused the best hit from a Rackballer (Gene) to be null and void.  Tim in general had a rough night since he forgot to bring his jersey and had two nice bloop singles taken away from him due to the fact that the Snakefarmers were playing an outfielder in short center field.

The player of the game is actually the whole Rackballers team.  Each player showed up and contributed in some way.  This was Gene’s last game with the Rackballers and in honor we’ll retire his jersey number for the rest of the season.  The Rackballers next game is Monday June 21st at 7 PM on field 3 against the 3-0 Ballbusters.

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Rackballers Summer Game #2 Recap

June 8th, 2010

In what seemed like a month long break the Rackballers were back on the City of Plano Softball field last night facing off against the 1-0 Sigs team.  The game time temperature was somewhere in the 90s with the Sun blazing down on the field.  The full 11 man Rackballer roster came out to play a game and hopefully go home with a win.  The Rackballers won their first game 15-0 against El Tri, and earlier that same night the Sigs beat the Snakefarmers 13-6.

Defensively the Rackballers played solid.  There were a couple of mistakes throughout the game, but no errors.  The left side of the outfield saw a lot of action, but Harrison and Gene were up to the challenge.  Any ball that was catchable was caught, and anything that wasn’t was at least kept in play.  Harrison made a double play by catching  a fly ball and throwing out an itchy runner at second.  On top of that Harrison also managed to make a pin point throw to home that would’ve seen the runner thrown out had the thrown not been dropped.  Honestly that’s a hard play to make when you have fifty billion things going on in your head.  The infield played solid all night in spite of a couple of crazy bounces that saw David get hit in his shoulder and Sherman’s head nearly getting taken off.  The Sigs ended the game with 11 runs total.

On the flip side of things the Rackballers struggled offensively.  The 1-4 hitters went 3-12 for the game.  That right there should tell you how things went, but really the top 4 hitters just had a hard time finding the gaps.  The later part of the game saw the Rackballers bats heated up and started to put some runs on the board.  The ball was flying off the Rackballers bats right into the gloves of the Sigs.  Give the Sigs credit they played solid defensively the whole game.

This week’s player of the game honor goes to Dan who played a solid game a short and went 2-3 with a triple and an RBI.  The Rackballers next game is Monday night at 8 on field 3 against the 1-1 Snakefarmers.

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Summer League Softball: Rackballers Game #1 Recap

May 25th, 2010

The Summer softball season started last night and it started with a bang.  Let me first recap what has happened between the end of the Spring season to the start of  the Summer.  Eight guys returned from the Spring softball team.  The return players are myself, Tim, Kevin, Gene, Jonathan, Sherman, Anthony, and David.  Two guys left the team and haven’t been seen from since.  Then there’s five guys who left and started their own team.  This new team is called the Snakefarmers and has Michael, Jack, Geno, Brandon, and Logan on the team.  Thanks to a call to the City of Plano it was arranged that the Rackballers are in the same division as the Snakefarmers.  To make up for the lose of those seven players four more guys were added to the roster.  Everyone say hello to Andrew, Harrison, Jason, and Dan.

Now that the formalities are out of the way, let’s move on to the recap of game #1.  The Rackballers played last night at 9 PM on field 3 against El Tri.  It was evident early on in the game that El Tri had an extremely little amount of experience playing softball.  Normally in the recap I would talk about how the Rackballers played offensively and defensively.  Unfortunately, there’s really not much to write about.  El Tri was a very bad team with barely any experience.  The Rackballers run ruled El Tri in four innings 15-0.

The real story of the game came in the bottom of the fourth inning with one out in a 12-0 ball game.  Kevin came to bat and hit a ground ball over to the short stop.  The short stop scooped the grounder up and threw a bullet over to first base.  The first basemen couldn’t reach the ball and it deflected off the tip of the first basemen’s glove and hit Kevin square on the forehead.  Kevin hit the ground shortly after that.  Thankfully Kevin didn’t black out and his forehead started to swell.  Kevin didn’t have a concussion and wasn’t bleeding internally.  Kevin is now sporting a big lump and an imprint of the softball on his head.  For taking one for the team Kevin is this week’s Player of the Game.

The Rackballers next game is on June 7th at 8 PM on field 3 against the 1-0 Sigs.

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Rackballers Recap Game #6

May 11th, 2010

Let’s start this recap off with the worst news of the game.  Yours truly struck out last night.  It wasn’t just a strike out, but it was a strike out where I swung at a pitch that didn’t reach home plate.  It was a situation where the bases were loaded with one out and I was swinging for a hit.  The problem was I should’ve been swinging at a good pitch and not a crappy pitch.  You happy now Anthony?  Huh?

The sun had gone down, the lights were on, and the wind was blowing 100 MPH.  The wind wasn’t moving that fast, but it sure did feel like it was.  The Rackballers took the field at 9 PM last night against the Rally Monkeys.  Is was the battle of the one win teams.  The Rackballers were missing 5 guys last night due to illness, work, or personal reasons.  The wind made it very difficult to throw strikes which Anthony figured out while pitching the first inning.  In the end Anthony lasted one inning and gave up 5 runs on a handful of walks.  Anthony was then replace by me and I preceded to not give up a walk for the rest of the game.  Granted I also gave up 7 runs in the second inning on a crap load of hits.  The Rackballers defense was surprisingly solid in the gusting winds of the Plano night.  There were a few mistakes out in the field but nothing too major.  Tim, Jack, and Jonathan did a great job of either catching the ball or keeping the ball in front of them out in the outfield.  Without their play in the outfield the Rackballers would’ve given up more than 16 runs for the game.

Offensively the Rackballers had an up and down kind of game.  They started and ended the game with 3 up 3 out innings.  In between those two innings the Rackballers seemed to find a good offensive groove where they put 8 runs on the board.  The wind allowed for several walks but also turned normal bloop singles into shallow pop ups.  Some of the guys who have struggled this year found their swing for the first time.  There was only one steal which was made by Jack who jogged to second base on a passed ball.  Just like every other game there were no homers and at least one strike out (DAMN IT!).

All things considering the Rackballers put up a good fight but couldn’t overcome the 12 runs that they gave up in the first two innings.  Last night’s player of the game goes to Anthony who tried to pitch, was solid at catcher, and broke out of his season long batting slump by going 2-3.  The Rackballers go up against the Sons of Pitches tonight at 8 on field 8.

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Rackballers Game #5

April 27th, 2010

It was a beautiful sunny day yesterday.  The birds were chirping and the dogs were humping.  It was clear that it was going to be a great day.  Once the Rackballers 7 PM game started up it was cold, windy, and overcast.  It did not set the tone one would expect for such a glorious night.

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Rackballer game #4

April 20th, 2010

The Rackballers were at it again after a bye week and faced Dogs Love Trucks.  Yes you read that correctly, their team name is Dogs Love Trucks.  Not sure who came up with the brilliant name, but I didn’t see any dogs at the game.  Where were the truck loving dogs?  I want answers!

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Rackballer Game #2

March 30th, 2010

After another cancelled game last week, the Rackballers were back on the softball field ready to play.  This week’s game had the Rackballers facing off against the Mizfits.  The Rackballers 15 man roster was cut down to 11 guys due to the fact that Logan and Sherman were out with injuries.  The other member of Fantasy Champ missed the game for personal reasons and David missed the game because he had to work.  There was a new guy named Dusty who was playing a fill in role for us.

As the visiting team the Rackballers got to bat first.  Gene led off with an out, followed by me getting a single.  Jack hit a fly ball into center field that was dropped which put me a second.  I then “stole” third base with a passed ball.  Eventually I got the Rackballers’ first run of the regular season! The Rackballers ended up with 2 runs in the top of the first.  The Mizfits ended up countering with 2 runs in the bottom of the first.  The next two innings went back in forth with not much offense but some really good defense by both teams.  The Rackballers broke through the offensive wall with 3 more runs to push the game to a 5-2 lead heading into the bottom of the fifth inning.  The Mizfits countered with 3 runs of their own to tie the game.  Game tied with 10 minutes left on the clock going into the sixth inning.  The Rackballers responded by tacking on 2 runs in the top of the inning.  Unfortunately I was the last out.  In the bottom of the next inning the Rackballers ended up starting to make mistakes that hadn’t been made all game.  Cody ended up dropping a hard line drive to left field, which was a really hard catch to make.  Anthony who hadn’t given up a stolen base all game ended up letting a pitch get passed him and a guy stole home.  There was a couple of questionable calls from the umps in the bottom of the sixth that ended up helping the Mizfits.  The game ended on a single to right field which sent a guy from second base home for the winning run.  Final score Mizfits 8 Rackballers 7.

Is there such a thing as a good loss?  I don’t necessarily believe so, but I do know that this Rackballer team is consistently getting better.  The Rackballer MVP of this game is Jack who was solid in LCF all game and found his stroke at the plate.  Next week’s game pits the Rackballers against the 1-1 Girth Attack.

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Recap of Rackballers Game 1 on 3/15/10

March 16th, 2010

After two weeks in a row of being rained out, God finally decided that the Rackballers should play softball.  It was a beautiful night for softball.  The temp was in the high 50s, the sky was clear, and I didn’t hurt myself while stretching.  Already I’m doing better than David Beckham.  The Rackballers took on Prestoncrest Crush at 8 PM last night on field 7 at the Heritage Yards fields in Plano.  The 15 man Rackballer roster was down 3 men do to spring break vacations.  The always solid Gene and the up and comer Jonathan were somewhere in Mississippi (did I spell that right?) visiting family.  Meanwhile, the team president was vacationing with his family in Maui.  The rest of the 12 Rackballers showed up regardless of injury or illness.  The Prestoncrest Crush had only 9 men show up for the game.  Per league rules the Crush were able to play the Rackballers and not have to forfeit.

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Softball Tourney Update

March 1st, 2010

Well the Fantasy Champ guys played in a double elimination softball tournament on Saturday.  The weather has been pretty crappy the past few weeks in Plano, TX, but it seemed like the softball gods wanted us to play on Saturday.  The sun was out and there was not a cloud in the sky.  Everything was setting up for a great day of softball.  Our first game was at 9 AM against a team called the Kami Kaze.  They were fast and wirey, at least that’s what they seemed like to me.  They game started off with us giving up one hit but no runs in the first inning.  We then got 3 runs in the bottom of the first inning to give us an early 3-0 lead.  Little did we know that was going to be the only 3 runs we were going to score all day.  The Kami Kaze took advantage of our inexperience in the field and preceded to pile on the runs.  By the end of the game the final score was 20-3.  Determined to make some changes, and to get other guys some playing time , I changed up the lineup.  I guess you can say the fielding got better since we only gave up 18 runs, but the offense didn’t score a single run.  Final score of our second and last game of the day was 18-0.  You would think being on a team that lost 20-3 and 18-0 would put my confidence in the team down.  Instead, I feel pretty good about our team.  We were rusty, inexperienced, and not quite a team for those first two games.  I feel like there’s plenty of talent and ability and we’re just going to get better as the season goes along.  The one thing we were really get at though was getting injuries.  Jack managed to take a nice tumble and get a raspberry field on his back.  Gene slid face first into third and picked up two scrapped knees and a scrapped arm.  Then Jack followed that up with throwing the ball to Gene and somehow managed to jam his pinkie to hell.  Our next game is suppose to be tonight, if it’s not postponed, against the Sons of Pitches.  Throw that Rackball!

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