Defenders--Game 7

Anthony pitching

Early Saturday morning, May 19, 2007--the clover is in full bloom and the grass is growing at a fabulous pace; if it continues, it will be a good hay season when it comes to cutting time. Wait, don't think you signed onto the wrong blog, this is merely a description of the field conditions our squad is having to endure. Our indomitable groundskeeper (name withheld for security reasons), had announced to me a few weeks earlier that he was in a tiff (a tiff is a male equivalent to a hissy-fit) with his boss over his actual duties and accomplishments. So, he announced to me, "I'm not gonna do any work on the fields and then they will see how much work I actually do for them." I withheld the urge to discuss the merits of his labor-management dispute and who the real losers are (those who use the fields) and that the fact that none of his bosses ever come to the damn fields may have an affect on the efficacy of his work stoppage stunt. I really wish I had my rake back right about now.

Undaunted, I slowly played in the dirt to reconstruct the batters box and pitchers 'mound' (it is not really a mound since the softball leagues [see earlier posts for accurate descriptions of said leagues] can't handle a mound. Apparently all those aging, fat, kid-kicker-offers have trouble tossing their softballs off a mound) before we placed our 2 game winning streak on the line against Southern Trucking. It had rained off and on the past two days so the dirt was malleable enough to get it into a semblance of a playing field. There is still the occasional glass on the field, but the number of crack vials, empty beer cans and used condoms littering the fields and dugouts has dropped drastically from when we first started our league. Leonel (Giants coach and local resident) told me the cops are always checking on the fields and don't allow people to hang out there late at night. Early Saturday games always have me a bit apprehensive about how many kids will show and what time they will show. So as I get the field ready and get the equipment sorted out, I am always straining to see if little green-capped kids are slowly making their way towards me. The night before our game I get a call from Kenny.

Kenny at practice

"Coach, we're not playing tomorrow, right?"

"Why do you think that, Kenny?"

"It's supposed to rain."

"It's not going to rain til later in the day, we will be playing."

Silent pause.

"Well...., I am in Pennsylvania right now, I thought it was going to rain, so I won't be there tomorrow."

"Well Kenny, maybe you could have told me that at practice yesterday, now what are we gonna do for a catcher?"

"Anthony can catch."
"Anthony is pitching, he can't catch."

Silence.

"Oh."

"What are you doing in Pennsylvania, and why didn't you tell me about this before Kenny?"

"Coach..."

"Yeah?"

"Ahhh, Coach Brett..., you just got punk'd." Lots of laughter from his side of the phone.

"I'll see you in the morning Kenny and don't be a minute late or you will be sorry."

And that ended our daily chat.

Earlier in the week at practice, Kenny and I had a little encounter. As I mentioned last week, he has been acting up a bit and feeling a bit too confident. He also has not been trying as hard in practice. At one point in practice, he jumped on my back and challenged me.

"Come on old man, you can't handle me."
"You want to wrestle, Kenny?"
"Yeah!" he yelled with enthusiasm.
I immediately dropped to the ground with him on my back. He let out a little yell of joy, thinking somehow he had caused the fall. He was completely unaware that I had been a wrestler for 6 years. While still reveling in his apparent victory, I did a quick hip roll and arm-barred him into the ground face first and put a fancy little leg move on him that had him on his back in a banana-split. This took all of about 4 seconds. He quickly yelled out that he gave up. He stood up, with dirt on his face, shirt and pants and had a wide-eyed look of shock on his face.
"Wanna go another round?"
"NO!"
"We cool?"
"We cool."
We both shook hands and proceeded with practice. Kenny's granddad Victor was close by watching and said nothing about the tussle. The kids, were totally nonplussed by the ordeal and these are the moments I am glad I am not coaching in the suburbs. I would have been arrested with my face all over the papers, instead I just heard Victor saying in his thick-accent, "Good for him, he is a pain in the ass." Victor has previously told me, numerous times, that I could do whatever I felt necessary to discipline the boy. For the last few practices, it has been fun challenging Kenny every time he grabs me from behind with a quick, "You wanna wrestle again?" He quickly lets go and backs away with a fast "No!", and we resume our drills.

As we warmed up for the game, Quincy's 8 year-old little brother showed up again. I admire the little guys spirit and spunk and total fearlessness. I found out his name is Quindell, not Dwindell, and it is appropriate that he is a little Q-man since he is the spittin' image of his older brother.
"I'm gonna help you again."
"O.K."
"You gonna pay me for this?"
"No."
"I think you should pay me for helping you."
"Do you?'
"Yeah."
"Well, when I get paid for doing this, little man, I'll pay you."
He wandered off for a minute or two before returning.
"I want $300."
"For what?" I said rather incredulously.
"For helping you. I should get paid for helping you." he stated locking a gaze into my eyes.
Somewhat amused, I asked him how he was able to walk. He gave me a quizzical look without saying anything.
"I just want to know how you are able to walk around with balls that big?" A couple of the older kids laughed and I am not sure if little Q understood it all but he knew he wasn't getting $300.

The game started early since we both had our squads ready. Our opponents owner, the Steinbrenner of our league, was acting a bit too much like ol' King George and was in Florida for the game (no word if he was actually in Tampa), but rumor had it he was following the game by satellite phone. They were pitching Gian and we countered with Anthony. We had a new ump and we batted first.

Gian threw strikes and got through the first inning with only a walk blemishing his performance. Christian did not help matters when he, defying coaches orders, bunted with two strikes and was promptly called out for fouling off the pitch. Anthony ended the inning with a deep fly out to center. Anthony walked the first 2 batters, but we were not concerned because he usually starts slowly the first inning. However, the second walk was a bit of a tight call on a full count and you could see it flustered our boy. We got out of the inning on a classic little league play of a grounder to the pitcher, a throw to first, a throw home, a throw to third and then the third baseman, taking coaches orders a bit further than intended regarding throwing too early in a run-down, chased the runner all the way to second and tagged him right before the runner got back to the bag. We were down 1-0 after 1.

Second inning had us strand two runners around a trio of strikeouts and Anthony went back to the mound to face the lower half of their batting order. 4 straight walks, a hit batter and another walk was not what we were expecting from our ace. The ump squeezed him on a couple of pitches, but Anthony allowed the calls to get in his head. They followed with two hits from the top of their order and we were fortunate to get out of the inning with only giving up 4 runs thanks to some plays at the plate. Anthony was a basket case at this point and didn't want any consoling. Upon reflection, this was where we missed our wonderful bench coach, Sonia. Sonia is a very quite presence on the bench, but she is always talking to the kids and chills them out when they are getting tuned up and the rest of the coaches are caught up in the details of the game. It truly was a case of you don't know what you have until it is gone moments. We had to remove Ralph from the field after the second inning because he was transfixed on something occurring nearby. As the game was proceeding, Ralph was staring towards the street. "Ralph!" No response. "Ralph!" No response. After 4 yells, he turned towards us. 2 pitches later, the same thing occurred. He had not been benched all year, so he took a seat for the rest of the game.

Down 5-0 after 2, we started the third with a baserunner (Quincy walked) and then Kenny roped a shot to right-center. I was waving Q-man around third, he hesitated, then continued and was out by half a foot. We have been stressing to the kids to follow coaches instructions and to not hesitate. In fact we went over that point in our pre-game chat. Kenny eventually scored and Southern Trucking got the run back in their half of the inning. Gian mowed us down for two straight innings, and we went into our last at-bats down 8-1.

Quincy struck out swinging, Kenny doubled and stole third while Jeremy struck out. Christian was our last batter and he had a 2-2 count and things were looking bleak. A passed ball occurred and I sent Kenny. He hesitated just a second and was thrown out in a bang-bang play, and all havoc broke loose. Apparently Kenny's granddad, watching behind the backstop made a derisive comment to Kenny and he exploded. Threw his helmet, ripped off his uni top and tossed it and left the field. This all happened before I could get from third base coached box to our first base dugout. I got the rest of the crew lined up for the handshake line and Christian, pissed at everything, refused to shake hands and was disrespectful to the coaches. I grabbed little man and forcibly made him apologize to the coaches as I made him shake their hands. I then apologized to the coaches and informed them that he would be disciplined for his behavior.

I gathered the team for our post-game breakdown. Christian had stormed off saying, for about the fourth time this year, that he was quitting. Kenny was across the street fuming in his t-shirt and baseball pants. A couple of the kids asked if they should get them.
"No!" I said with a tone that would have made my dad proud. "They left the team, we didn't leave them." I then did a head count. We had 10 kids still there.
"We got 10, we still have a team. Is everyone cool with that?"
"Yeah." they said in unison, not really believing the two would not be back.
"We just need to find a catcher." Clayvon, Kevin, Josh and Quincy all raised their hands.
"I'll back-catch, coach." Quincy yelled.

Back-catching is a unique term that I have only heard in Red Hook. Somehow it survives without any assistance from any of the coaches. They also call the glove a 'back-catcher's glove'. I told them we would have tryouts next week.

Tytee, asking rather concernedly, "Coach, are Christian and Kenny off the team?"
"Well, they quit us and unless they return and apologize and ask to be back on the team, as far as I am concerned, you guys are my team for now."
I then addressed Anthony letting the ump get to his head (he walked 10, matching his total for the year), Ralph for not paying attention at third, and Quincy for hesitating on the basepaths. I than told them I took some responsibility for running too aggressively by getting 2 out of our 6 baserunners tossed out at the plate. But we also had to give credit to our opponents. We put the ball in play every inning and their defense was stellar to say the least. Not one error, and that is unheard of in little league.

Taylor, Tytee and Clayvon asked if they could go speak to Kenny as I was putting up the equipment. I told them that was fine and that I was going to watch the rest of the Heroes-LICH game being played on the other field. I had to grab the bases after their game was over. Not wanting my team to disperse right away, I told them whoever waited around til the end of the other game would be rewarded with ice cream. That brought some smiles and the kids hung around and played ball with each other and a couple of the kids from the other team.

The Heroes beat LICH 14-4 and had won the previous day over Sunset Park 8-2. The Giants crushed Sunset Park on Saturday 18-5. The standings going into the Memorial Day break were:
Giants 5-1
SoTruck 5-1
Heroes 3-3
Defenders 3-4
Sunset 1-4
LICH 0-4

Kenny apologized to me and said he had apologized to the team. He asked for his jersey back and I told him it was in my trunk and he could get it at practice the next week. I also told him he was not getting any ice cream for his behavior regardless of how pissed off his granddad made him. I walked over to the ice cream truck with about 4 kids and Coach Chris was returning with about 4 kids, all eating ice cream. Coach Chris and Anthony

"There is something strange about this ice cream." the coach told me. He then expounded on the fact that nothing on the truck even said 'ice cream'. They continued back to the fields eating their treats and dispite all the warnings, we got in line. The kids, diving into their cones, declared something was strange about the ice cream. I got my cone and after the first bite, I concurred with everyones analysis that something was wrong. We continued to eat it and laughed about how we would all get sick from it and I figured it was a fitting end to a once-promising day: eating sour ice cream.

Next game is June 2 vs. Hynes' Heroes. As always, updates to follow.

Defenders--Game 6

red hook baseball fields--spring training

I had told the coaches to call a 5:30 pm practice for the Monday after our big 17-3 victory because I had a speaking engagement that would not let me get to the fields until around that time. I was still late in getting to practice and I quickly discovered that there had been some tension on the fields before I arrived. It appears that Kevin had gotten into a name-calling match with some kids and it escalated to rock throwing and the eventual bashing of Kevin's scooter (which as a general rule, I discourage kids from bringing any bike/basketballs/scooters/goldfish etc. to any practice). Coach Chris described his foray of going into the melee and valiantly rescuing our players as the warring factions shook aluminum bats at each other and hurled copious amounts of false bravado across the divide. I believe this was Coach Chris' first serious encounter with the extra-curricular side of Red Hook baseball. Coach Lou ended the nonsense by marching in the middle of the group and grabbed the afore-mentioned scooter. This was actually mild on the overall scale and pales in comparison to the brawl amongst a group of high school kids that broke out in right field during one of our games last year. I was ticked off about it because we had guys on base and were rallying in a close game against the undefeated Sunset Park team. The momentum of the crowd surge came in through the gates and stopped in right field. I ran out and tried to keep the momentum moving past centerfield and past our territorial hitting range. My efforts failed, but the ump of the game, a local guy, came running out yelling. I thought he was trying to stop the fight, but he was yelling,

"It's gonna be a fair fight! It's gonna be a fair fight! No jumping in!"
I was aghast to say the least.
"No. No. No fighting" I yelled before realizing I was in the middle of 20 brawling teenagers.


By some unknown force (or maybe is was the distant wailing of approaching sirens), the crowd surged to the other field and we continued our game. Our rally petered out and we ended up losing by 3. Outcome of the fight remains unknown.

As I said earlier, I was late arriving for the practice and was still in a suit. I walked around and chatted with the players, asking each of them how they were doing. Josh, fighting to keep his shortstop position, was intently fielding grounders. Clayvon, who is as close to a nebish as a 13 year-old boy can be, was holding court in centerfield with Taylor and Tytee. Those three are major league gossipers and Anthony can get caught up in it as well. They are good sources for information as well as good stories. The current drama centered on Anthony allegedly telling someone to tell a girl he liked her when he really didn't and the girls were not impressed with that action. Anthony fiercely denied any such things ( I will not use the term the kids, accurately, called it) and more of the Leo-Tytee rumors started swirling. I tired of this particular gossip vein so I ambled on over to Jeremy. I learned Jeremy had fat-catted it on his second home run as he neared home plate and I admonished him for that behavior, but congratulated him on a great job overall. Kenny was annoying and a little too hyper-active. He is acting like Big-Balls Willie since he has a girlfriend now. Anthony was quieter than normal and I told him I thought he should have received a game-ball. Not sure how to handle that one though without having it appear to be a contrived moment. Tytee, in for bp, told me how Leo was acting like a big shot in my absence and that her and Taylor, both early for the game, were dissatisfied with his line-up batting order decisions. Tytee also told me she thought we scored more runs and that Leo had screwed the book up and missed 4 runs. I decided to go with what was in the book and let history be our judge on that decision. I pitched a little bp and felt strangely satisfied with being able to throw strikes even in a suit and dress shoes.



sign up day, Taylor, Commish (James), Omar (Heroes coach), Victor, Kenny's head

We had a second practice on Tuesday and focused on throwing the ball around the infield and hitting the cut-off man. I switched players around many positions and it is amazing how the baseball gods bless some players with certain skills but leave them totally devoid of others. Ralphie is a good example of this axiom. He is a solid third baseman and always looks good when fielding his position. Put him in the outfield and is as looks like a spastic flamingo--arms in one direction and legs in another. He comes running and the ball goes flying by him or he breaks to his left as the ball sails to the right. After watching him fall on a high pop-up (and maybe even after snickering a moment or two), I mercifully put him back at third. We had some more speed-drill bp and we called it a day in preparation for Thursday's game.

We were set to play LICH, arguably the worst team in the league. They are the sausage team of this league. All the scraps and left-overs (mostly late-comers) merged into one team. Joel and Kevin's Uncle Alex (although I have also been told he is their Grandfather) is the coach of the team. Alex likes to tip the cups a bit too much and can be seen muttering, at times nonsensically, to his nephews or his team or even himself. On one particular recent instance I thought he was in the middle of a 10 minute rant in spanish on Joel. Leonel, coach of the Giants came by shaking his head saying that Alex was whacked out and to ignore him. I asked Leonel, who is fluent in spanish, what Alex was saying to Joel.


"I don't know."
"Wasn't he yelling in spanish?"
"He was yelling, but whatever language he was yelling in, it wasn't spanish."
We both just shook our heads and laughed.

I had eight kids at the field and it was uncertain if Clayvon, who had been absent from both practices, would be at the game. He appeared and approached me saying he had an explanation of why he missed practice.

"Look." he said tilting his forehead into my space.
"What am I looking at?"
"This!" and he pointed to some type of bite mark right between his eyes. It may have even been a shanker-sized zit that had already drained.
"I don't know what this is," he continued. " I think it is a mosquito bite, I wanted to go to the hospital but my mom has my Medicaid card with her in Virginia. Isn't that stupid? She left the cards for my sisters who never get hurt and she has mine in Virginia. I want to get this checked for the West Nile virus!"


I couldn't contain myself at this point and burst out laughing.
"I'm serious!" he pleaded.
But he could see ol' coach wasn't buying into his medical diagnosis.
"You got your glasses?"
"Yes."
"You think you can hit like you did last game?"
"Yeah."
"Good. I need you in center and you're batting 6th."

And that ended the West Nile virus discussion. Clayvon did bring an old-school Defender jersey and hung it from the dugout fence. Christian pitched and was aided by a complete lack of plate discipline by the opposing team. He walked the first batter and then struck out the side. Kenny came up, beyond cocky, and promptly struck out. It deflated him. I was secretly glad, well not too secretly since I told the squad I was hoping for them to lose as they acted arrogant and cocky prior to the game. Anyway, it was his first strikeout of the season and it shocked everyone.

We scored 4 runs that inning on walks and aggressive baserunning. Christian shut them down again and by the third inning we had a 7-0 lead based mostly on walks and running. Kenny had one nice opposite-field triple (and a 1-base error) and Anthony had the only other hit. Christian wanted to let them score a few runs so we would not mercy them, but I obviously kiboshed that idea. However he started letting guys get on base and they pushed 1 run across. The ump called the game on account of darkness and we evened our record at 3-3 with the 7-1 victory. Christian walked a couple that last inning and knowing his proclivity towards ignoring instruction (concerning his wanting to allow runs to extend the game), I called time and walked out to the mound.

Christian practicing pitching

"You keep dicking around with these guys, they're gonna get back in this game."

"I know, I'm trying to throw strikes." he said, but wouldn't look at me. We both knew he was dicking around and we both knew I knew it.

Then I hit him with the big hammer:

"You walk one more guy, I'm yanking you."


The game was over in 4 pitches with a nice strikeout. Joe Torre can learn how to handle a staff from me. Kenny had the play of the game when he rifled a throw to second to get a potential basethief off the basepaths. It was a classic bang-bang play and impressed the onlookers behind the backstop. Christian pitched a good game despite his attempt to prolong the contest so he could pitch more. Everyone got on base except for Joel. We had to bench Quincy during the game for telling the ump he was cheating (I refuse to tolerate that sentiment at all by my team) after Q-man took a called third strike and then was stooping out in the field the next half inning in some sort of pouting protest. Our baserunning drills are paying off and everyone on our team is running well and sliding well. Our leads off the base are being done fairly well, although we will work on them more. Our biggest offender was Tytee who just stood on first and chatted away with the smitten Leo, who was coaching first since we had a shortage of coaches that game. Leo normally would be urging runners to lead and run aggressively, however his obvious ulterior motives were displayed in this instance. Clayvon announced he would bring the old school shirt to hang in the dugout for our next game.

Our next game is against Southern Trucking and I told our squad we owe that team a bit of payback for our earlier 16-3 whuppin' at their hands. Anthony is rested and eligible for 6 strong innings. I believe they are countering with Noel D. or Gian. We will be ready and we will be aggressive. As always, updates to follow.

Defenders--Game 5

Fresh off our heartbreaking loss to Hynes' Heroes, we embarked on a strenuous week of practice for two reasons: one, to get the squad focused on the upcoming games and work out their glaring shortcomings, and to also have a lot of time with them as the upcoming Saturday would see coach being absent so I wanted to imprint a few things in their impressionable minds. First on that list was aggressiveness at the plate. Apparently immune from my incessant yelling of "It's HITTING practice, not LOOKING practice", I instituted a new batting practice regiment.

Our new bp routine is to take 2-3 kids (depends on the number of kids at practice) and have them bat as if it were a game. I call strikes and they bat through the order 2-3 times, including running out hits, and then we switch out those batters for a couple of more kids. It also keeps the fielders more intent and it forces the kids to act as if it is game conditions. The only downside is when they try to make every play a rundown on the bases, so we keep a tight eye on that situation by penalizing offenders with loss of ab's. I also have a tactic for forcing them to comply with the 'look at the base, not the ball' rule of legging out a grounder. If the ball is hit to me and they start looking for the ball instead of running hard, I 'accidentally' plunk them with the ball in the back or legs. When they look over to complain they see the 'don't even think of saying something to me' look and they go back for another ab. Christian is our biggest offender of this rule (he will look even when I tell him I will hit him with the ball if he does look) followed closely by Kevin and Anthony. The rest of the crew does not want to test me on this rule.

On to the weeks gossip. Clayvon (the broom kid) made a surprise appearance and announced that he was back from suspension. He was a little vague when I asked if his mom actually rescinded the suspension (she is in the midst of moving the family and has been in Virginia the past couple weeks). Deciding not to push the cross-exam too far, I went with the 'I did not not hear that he wasn't allowed to play' defense and figured he was safe to play. Sonia accused me of using kid logic to come to that conclusion and I told her she was 100% correct. I figured that the biggest danger of his mom actually appearing and causing a scene would be game day and I was not going to be there so I saw no harm in approving Clayvon for the line-up. Clayvon did, however, forget his glasses for practice, and he can't see a thing without them. After 9 miserable whiffs in a row, I gave him notice that he would never see another bp pitch unless he had his glasses. He hasn't forgot them once since then.

Kenny called me late after the Heroes loss and wanted to know who I liked in the De La Hoya / Mayweather fight that night. I told him Mayweather. He wanted to bet me on the fight, but he wanted Mayweather. He wanted to bet $10. I told him I would bet him an ice cream cone.
"I ain't betting for ice cream." said the indignant Kenny.
"I'm not betting you money, Kenny."
"It's just money."
"How about ice cream with a dip?"
"And crunchies?"
"And crunchies."
"It's a bet! An ice cream with dip AND crunchies."
"Alright Kenny, it's a bet, but I have to go now."
Phone call the next morning:
"Coach, when am I going to get my ice cream?"
"After practice Monday."
Well, Kenny failed to appear for practice Monday, claiming some sort of request/requirement from his mom. Kenny then called Tuesday claiming he had to go to a birthday dinner with his sister. He was late to Wednesday's practice and Anthony busted on him by telling us Kenny had been bragging that he was with his girlfriend the past two days instead of practice. When confronted by this info, Kenny folded like a cheap suit and confessed to his crimes of passion. I told him I wasn't paying off the bet since he hosed the team on practice. He protested this decision and mounted enough of a defense to get me to reconsider my decision. Acknowledging it would be weasly to back out of the bet (I do feel that I have certain moral obligations to impart to these kids), I commuted the punishment to a two-week delay in paying off the bet, 1-week per day of kissy-kissy and blowing off practice. He meekly protested this decision, but I told him I was teaching him the value of blowing off commitments as well as how costly women can be in his life if he is not careful.

Quincy continued to appear at practice and we are grooming him to be an additional pitcher. His little brother showed up and he is the spittin' image of Q-man. Almost like a mini-me. I believe his name is Dwindell or something close to that arrangement of syllables. I thought I had his name figured out until I asked him to spell it, but that just confused me even more. he is 8 years old and completely fearless. He asked if he could practice and the kid will not shy away or back away from any ball hit at any speed. When he got nailed by a ball he looked over at me and said in all seriousness, "That didn't hurt, it tickled." and he refused to rub where it hit him. The second day of him showing up he told me he didn't need a glove to field and went out there and jostled with the rest of the crew for the loose balls. He keeps confronting me with when is he going to be on the team and when will he get his 'baseball suit'. Definitely a future Defender.

We decided to have a scrimmage on Thursday against the Giants. We used speed rules to quicken the pace of the game and too continue with the 'be aggressive at the plate' game plan. Coaches call strikes on their own batters and tell them the strike zone will be huge. Each batter starts with a 1-1 count and it does make the game go quick and the batters do swing away knowing they only have a couple of strikes to play with. The game went well and we may have won, but I was using a new pitcher every inning and I used pitchers that we never pitch in a game and I refused to take any one out in the middle of the inning. The final score was around 11-6 and I say around because there was some dispute over my ciphering by Josh and Kenny. The biggest issue of the day is the apparent rift between Taylor and Tytee. They both claim nothing is up, but both myself and Sonia have sensed a change in their relationship. This will be monitored. I gave the squad a pep talk and told them to swing away and run every chance they got and to make me proud in the upcoming game that I would be missing. For those who are curious, I have an annual baseball weekend pilgrimage that occurs every May with a group of close friends and family. I tell the team about it in the beginning of the year and then let them know for a week and a half before it occurs. Kenny called me Friday afternoon (Kenny calls a lot for many different reasons--I now see Sonia's wisdom in not wanting him to have her number) and wanted to know if the games were going to be played since it looked like it may rain. He wanted permission to go to Staten Island to make a rap video. Permission denied. We argued over it for a while and I used his team counting on him etc. arguments. He countered with the "You're not going to be there so why should I?" argument. Pretty impressive, but not convincing. I explained that my absence was planned and prepared for and that we were not prepared for him to be absent. He bought it and appeared for the game. And what a game it was. Sonia, Coach Lou and Coach Chris were all on hand. Leo, a former Defender who has been helping out at practices also was on hand. Leo, who is 14, is a good player with a huge ego who needs reined in every so often. He has a crush on Tytee so we use that to our advantage. His other weakness, other than Tytee, is milkshakes, so I bribed him with a milkshake if he got through the game without incident. We were playing Sunset Park, the defending champs who we had beat in our earlier meeting this season.

Anthony was on the mound and we only had 11 players as Joel had mysteriously disappeared. Kevin was on partial suspension for a rock throwing incident, so other than batting order, there was not much drama in regards to making out the line-up. We scored 1 in the top of the first and they scored 3, aided by shoddy fielding plays on our part. We scratched out another run after Josh got a hit and scored. King Anthony then blanked them in the second. We were down 3-2 after 2 innings. We put up 3 in the 3rd and 4 in the 4th and Anthony only faced 10 batters in the 2nd 3rd and 4th in shutting them out. We exploded for 8 runs in the 5th and won the game 17-3 with Anthony and Kenny each going 4-4 and Jeremy went 3-3 with a walk. We had 20 hits and Jeremy had 2 hr's, Kenny had 1 and they each hit a grand slam. Clayvon went 3-4 and no incidents of an irate mom appearing were mentioned. Anthony pitched a complete game with 11 k's and although Kenny was given the game ball, I felt they should have given one to Anthony as well. The post game wrap up by Sonia made me very happy even though I was told that the kids voted that I should travel somewhere every Saturday, I knew they weren't serious about that (I think).

All the scores that weekend were footballesque. The results:
Nick.com Defenders 17
Sunset Park 3

Gibbs' Giants 21
LICH 3

Southern Trucking 17
Hynes' Heroes 7

Defenders have a short week as we need to prepare for the Thursday game against LICH followed by Saturday's rematch with Southern Trucking. The standings after last Saturday's games were:

Gibbs' Giants 4-1
Southern Trucking 4-1
Nick.com Defenders 2-3
Sunset Park 1-2
Hynes' Heroes 1-3
LICH 0-2

As always, updates to follow.

Photos from the Dugout

Here is a collage of pictures that were taken by members of the defenders team and the coaches.

Revised Schedule

If you are in the area, come by and cheer us on, or just watch and enjoy. Look for the Green and yellow jersey's. It's never dull...

May 12
8:30am Defenders VS SBYO
10am Giants VS LICH
11am So Trucking VS Hynes’ Heroes

May 17 LICH VS Defenders
6:00 pm

May 18 Hynes’ Heroes VS SBYO
6:00 pm

May 19
8:30am Giants VS SBYO
10am Nick/Defenders VS So Trucking
11am LICH VS Hynes’ Heroes

May 26 NO GAMES MEMORIAL DAY

June 2
8:30am Hynes’ Heroes VS Nick/Defenders
10am SBYO VS So Trucking
11am LICH VS Giants

June 7
6pm LICH VS SBYO
June 8 Giants VS SoTrucking 6 pm

June 9
8:30am Nick/Defenders VS Giants
10am So Trucking VS LICH
11am SBYO VS Hynes’ Heroes

June 14
6pm Heroes VS LICH
June 15
6pm SBYO VS LICH

June 16
8:30am Hynes’ Heroes VS Giants
10am Nick/Defenders VS LICH
11am So Trucking VS SBYO

PLAYOFFS BEGIN – One Game Elimination
June 21
6pm #6 Seed VS #3 Seed

June 22
6pm #5 Seed VS #4 Seed

June 23
9am Lowest Seed VS #1 Seed
10:00am 2nd Lowest Seed VS #2 Seed

CHAMPIONSHIP – Best 2 out of 3
June 28
6pm Game # 1 of Championship (highest seed home)

June 29
6pm Make Up Date
June 30
8:30 am 3rd place game (teams who lost on 6/23)
8:30 am 5th place game (teams who lost on 6/21, 6/22)
9am Game #2 of Championship
11am Game #3 of Championship *if needed

******* TROPHIES WILL BE DISTRIBUTED AFTER THE LAST GAME on JUNE 30th

Defenders--Game 4

Fresh off of our rainout on Saturday, I wandered my way down to the field on Sunday to meet Anthony and to give Taylor and Tytee a note to get them out of cheerleading early so they could make Monday's practice. As I awaited my kids arrival, I was asked to hit some grounders to a brother/sister combo who play in the league but for a different team. After about 10 minutes of hitting the ball (I was hitting from left field towards centerfield on field 7), two officious, uptight looking umps come yelling at me from the game they were playing on field 8 (their right field abuts our left field). They were umping a game of a bunch of whiny-looking liberals in a mixed league format. There are generally two types of mixed format leagues--the beer league where a bunch of fat guys masquerade as athletes while they try and hit on the rather hot mandatory 3 females per team. The amount of beer consumed can at times dictate the 'friendliness' quotient of any particular game. These games are played in the evening. The other type of mixed-league is the early-morning leagues with a bunch of whimpy, malnourished-looking slacker dudes (the type who wear black socks, sneakers and shorts) and patronizingly-voiced women (the ones who form the 'there are no losers, we are all winners!' happy-assed youth leagues that exist out in the suburbs) wandering about the field without a clue of what they are doing. They do get traumatized, as evidenced by their nervousness, when young urban youths come in close proximity to them. They are especially intimidated when these youths wear a leather glove on one of their hands.
So the two umps start yelling at me about being in their field.
"I am in MY field, not yours." said the valiant coach.
"You're in OUR field of play." and the ump motioned from their home plate out past right field way beyond the batsman skills any of the granola teams currently playing possessed.
"I am in my quadrant," I said doing my own motioning of field areas, "How about you leave me alone and get back to your game?"
We exchanged some words about permits and permit rights when he said,
"We can't start until you get these kids out of here because if they get hurt you'll be suing us!" He completely tried moving this from a territorial dispute to one of child safety.
"You're trying to change the terms of debate here, we are discussing land rights, not liability issues, my man."
Blank look by ump towards coach.
"So you think one of these kids here can't get hit? Just because Tom Seaver is pitching in Shea, you think nothing is going to get hit to right filed? Well, don't be so sure." the ump finally retorted.
I chose to not escalate the argument, partly because he was hurting my brain with his faulty logic and partly because I am saving my getting the cops called on me moments for times when I actually have a permit. It is interesting to note though how ruthless adults will be in trying to move kids off of playing fields so the adults can play amongst themselves and how often they are willing to do so.

So we had a practice Monday and that was to be it until game-time Saturday since coach was going to be out of town the whole week and the other coaches could not get any free time. The fields were taken by four high-school games, including one game between two bad girls softball squads. We were able to squeeze onto their left and left centerfield and we just played a game of catch where I give them 3 points for a grounder, 5 points for a fly and 7 for a 1-hopper. Minus points if they miss the ball or throw wild. It gets fairly spirited and I assigned Coach Chris as scorer when Josh asked how many points he had. Coach Chris quickly learned any point total given with a sound of conviction would satiate the kids demand for who was winning this new contest. They started complaining about everyone knocking each other over, but after I ascertained that they all had signed injury waivers, I found nothing wrong with continuing the game. We try to stress responsibility to our coaches in this league.

Kenny called twice and Christian once while I was gone trying to get numbers of kids so they could practice. The second time Kenny called he also let me know that he was practicing pitching but had to cut his session short because he set off the alarm at Defonte's (a local sandwich shop).
"How did you set off the alarm? "
"Well, I was throwing the ball against their wall and I threw one really hard and it set off the alarm."
"What happened when the alarm went off?"
"I don't know, I ran home."
Although impressed with his instincts, I had to ask the evidentiary question, "Did you remember to get the ball?"
"Yes."
So for now, I think we are in the clear on this matter.
Right as my plane landed Friday, my phone rang as we were still sitting on the plane. It was Kenny. He called to report that Jeremy was indeed ready to pitch on Saturday and was pumping himself up. Kenny also informed me that he had not been in much trouble that week and we both just let it go at that, neither of us feeling like we needed a precise definition of 'much' at that particular point in time. However, he informed me that silent John was suspended by his mom for 'something' that happened at school.

Saturday morning came and I quickly found out that a total of 3 of my players, John, Clayvon and Christian were all suspended by their parents for school transgressions. Christian was allowed to come to the field, but could only play 'if we needed him.' One could interpret 'needed' in many ways, but ours was to hold him out as long as 9 showed up. All these suspensions make me want to reconsider our Code of Conduct policy and maybe loosen the reins on our standards (kinda like certain college football teams do to compete), but we are sticking to our policy(so far). Quincy re-appeared and we got him in a uni and our two divas showed up 25 minutes late, (still arriving earlier than the Cinco de Mayo celebrating Sonia) but early enough to be in the line-up. I forgave their tardiness because they had been celebrating Tytee's birthday the night before. Coach had to stop them from getting too detail oriented when the story started reaching into the 2:00am stages of celebrating. Both Taylor and Tytee have been working hard and Taylor was rewarded by batting fifth--a risk at some level but one that paid off and had me wishing I had batted her higher.

Jeremy was on the mound for his first-ever pitching assignment and Anthony had a 2 inning limit on him because of his pitching in our last game. We played Hynes' Heroes, the team sponsored by the local District Attorney's office. They have a lot of young kids, but they have one really good player, Carlos, and another decent kid, named Jose. Jose is the kid who quit the Gibbs' Giants on uniform day because he didn't like their uniforms and wanted to play for the yellow team. Leonel, coach of the Giants, had an incredulous look on his face when told of this request, and the change took place after determining Jose was completely serious. Jose wears the popular designer glasses that all the women are wearing and coifs his hair meticulously and is constantly worried about his appearance. The other kids have taken to calling him pretty boy, and even his team joins in on the action. When he was at bat Saturday, their coach yelled out that he would take pretty boy to the salon if he got a hit. He seems to take the ribbing in good stride and is generally unaffected by it all.

We batted first and Kenny roped the first pitch deep into left field. The ump called him back to the plate (new ump to us) I could not believe he would even think of calling this a foul since the ball landed 30 feet inside the line.
"I wasn't ready." and he chastised the pitcher for pitching before the ump was set. Kenny then milked out a walk, stole second and third. Josh, batting second, walked and we promptly sent him to second hoping to draw a throw. They didn't take our bait, but Kenny scored on the next pitch as Anthony was at the plate. Josh made it to third and we were looking at a big inning. However, Anthony struck out for the first time all season. It shocked our squad and we quickly reverted to being in a rally to posting a racist inning (k,k,k). Jeremy walked the first two batters and they both scored on wild throws to second by Kenny. We settled down and got out of the inning with the final two outs coming from Kenny tossing out a runner at second. Our next four innings were goose eggs with only a couple of runners. Particularly galling was the third inning where Kenny led off with a legit triple and ended up stranded as we posted a third straight k,k,k inning. Carlos pitched a really good game against us. Kevin got plunked for the first time in his career, and coach decided to bust out an ice pack after hearing Sonia telling Kevin that his arm turning purple was not really a good sign at that particular moment. See, we do stress responsibility amongst our coaching brethren. When asked if he needed to rest an inning, Kevin's response was, "Are you crazy, I'm going to play the field, man!" and he ran out to his position.

In the bottom of the third, they loaded the bases with two outs, including a nice snag of a pop bunt by our catching whiz Kenny. They hit a grounder to Josh at shortstop and the runner, ball and fielder converged all at the same spot and unfortunately the ball booted off his glove and into center field. We caught a minor break when their third runner failed to slide during a play at the plate and got us out of the inning. (little league rules do not allow barreling over fielders) It was 4-1 going into our last at-bat. Jeremy roped a hit down the line, but it was only a single because the rightfielder, playing out of position, was actually in position to make a nice stop of the hit. Taylor got a hit (her second of the game and 3rd in her last 4 at bats). Ralph whiffed and Kevin worked an 0-2 count into a walk. Tytee, Joel and Quincy were due up. Between them they had 6 at bats and 6 k's. But I knew Tytee was due and sure enough she laced a 2 run single through the infield. They were self-destructing in the field, arguing amongst themselves, and I called for Kevin to come to third as the team was arguing and then the classic little league chaos took over. At one point Tytee and Kevin were on first and almost third and then they were both on second at the same time. By the time the dust settled, it was 4-3 with Tytee back on first and Kevin called out for leaving the baseline as he wandered between second and third. Tytee stole second as Joel was in the midst of a 1-2 count. He is a free swinger and I had no hope for either a hit or a walk. This is where I wish we had interpreted Christian's mom's edict of "needed him' a bit looser. They threw a high ball 2 and Tytee, on coaches urging, broke for third, slid under the tag (which was promptly dropped by the 3b anyway) and was called OUT by the ump. End of game. Tytee was distraught and would not take any consoling from the coach. Right as she got in the batter's box she had told me she was really nervous. I just smiled and told her to give herself a birthday hit and to just relax. I was so proud of her hitting, running and sliding, but nonetheless it was a heartbreaking loss which coach took 70% of the blame for by running us out of the inning.

Jeremy pitched a good game, walked too many, but all the runs he gave up were unearned. Anthony hurled 1 solid inning and the loss of Christian really hurt us since he would have been inserted in Joel's spot later in the game. Kenny threw out 4 runners, Josh did well in his first game at SS and Taylor and Tytee impressed the coach with their hitting. Taylor seemed surprised when I told her she would move up in the line-up again next week and I asked her if she thought I was only doing this because I liked her. Smiling, she said, "Yeah, a little bit." but I reassured her that batting order was sacrosanct and all spots were earned. Tytee hit well and slid well and will be our secret weapon come play-off time. She is moving up a spot or two as well. She also earned brownie points by yelling at a couple of kids who were playing catch near the Defendermobile and were getting too close for her comfort. Gotta love a kid who looks out for the car with such fervor.

We are back to a 6 team league and will have a revised schedule out this week. The new team will be Long Island College Hospital (LICH). All teams will play each other twice and all 6 teams make the playoffs. This weeks scores were:

Southern Trucking 14 LICH 2

Hynes' Heroes 4 Nick.com Defenders 3

Gibbs' Giants 14 Southern Trucking 1

As always, updates to follow (and standings as well).


PHOTOS (from top of page to bottom):
Coach Brett, smiling for some reason (a score or a humorous error)
Kenny, being a hambone
Quincy, the brother from another planet
Taylor, trying to look bad-ass
Anthony, being all serious