Zero to sixty in 0.1 seconds

Yesterday was another of the hated five-game umpiring shifts. It was also at one of the fields that has no shade. It also involved two of my least favorite teams to umpire. They both had doubleheaders. It was a recipe for a meltdown.

As meltdowns go, it was pretty tame; still, I'm not proud of my blowing up and I'm also not saying the players involved didn't deserve some shouting at. Mostly I point to it as a reason five-game shifts are generally not a good idea.

It wasn't really a big deal to start with. There is a notation in the rules of this league that if someone hits an over-the-fence home run, they don't have to run the bases, we just count the runs and move on. That's all well and good in theory, but in practice when there are already runners aboard they too just leave the field rather than come around to score. So in game four of the day, someone on this team I don't like very much hits one out with runners on and doesn't run the bases. Later on they belatedly complain that I have the score wrong, they say they have one more than my tally shows. We trace that to the aforementioned homer, which I tallied as a three-run shot and they claimed was a slam. I let them have the run, because this tends to happen: baserunners see the ball hit and just leave the field, while I watch the ball to make sure it clears the fence, then tally the runs, and if one or more runners is already in the dugout by that point they don't get counted.

I'm six hours-plus into the shift by this point, they're pissy, and I have no patience. "This is what happens when you choose not to run the bases," I say, loudly, in response to more bitching. "Someone leaves the field before they're counted! That's the risk you run!" This is misinterpreted, of course, as me telling them none of their runs-on-homers count and there's arguments about how that's not how it worked last time and it starts going in circles.

After the inning, I go to their dugout again to try and smooth things over and better explain, but instead three of the team's number double down on hostility. "Show me in the rulebook where it says we have to run the bases!" "You should just know how many runners are on all the time!" "None of the other umps ever take runs off the board because of this!" So instead of smoothing things over I shout back. "This is how you want to play it? I've been out here for 6½ hours, imagine how much patience I have for shit like this! Just don't leave the damn field before you're counted and there's no problem, you got it?!"

I considered going to the adjacent field and swapping games with the new guy who's working that field, but dismiss the thought as unprofessional and unfair to him. I stuck it out. One of the problem guys hit another home run later on and turned to me and pointed to the fence and said "that's a home run," condescending as he walked to the dugout. In their second game he was on base when someone else hit one out and did the same thing, and I said, "Dude, are you trying to get thrown out of the game? 'Cause I'll oblige you." He shut up and later came up to me and pretended he was only saying those things to make sure I had the run count right, which is undermined by the fact that he never mentioned the run count, but hey, he's trying to smooth things over in his own CYA kind of way and I just want the game to be fucking over, so I say fine, all good, play on.

There was also shouting and hostility about a play involving the infield fly rule. This same team was batting, runners at 1st and 2nd with no outs, and the batter popped one up. "Infield fly, batter's out!" The defense let the ball drop and the baserunners—not knowing the infield fly rule, apparently—try to advance and the defense—not knowing the infield fly rule, apparently—try to claim a double play because they threw the ball to first and stepped on it, thinking they got an out because the runner didn't tag up. "Not how it works," I said, and explained that all the infield fly rule means is that the batter is out and thus the runners aren't forced to move. That's all. Play is live, runners can do what they like, and tagging up would only apply if the ball had been caught. More yelling, more bitching, more overheard comments from the dugout about how I cheated them out of something. More of my patience worn away forever.

We also ran way late in the latter half of the day because of the other team I don't like to ump, who is incapable of starting on time or moving the game along at a normal pace, which is bad enough when they only have one game and is twice as bad when they play two. This is mostly because of one person, who is on the autism spectrum, but everyone who's been around a while knows that trying to rush them along is counter-productive because you risk a shouty delay of anger and sometimes crying. The opposing team, understandably, wants their whole time and doesn't want me to cut the game short because of the other side; I think that's a fair request, even though I would prefer to end the game on time anyway as a disincentive to that delaying team to keep pretending that it's fine to make things run late. So instead of wrapping things up at 7:30 like my colleague on the other field was, I still had half a game to go and wasn't done and leaving the field until nearly 8:30pm, tired, hungry, frustrated, sunburned, and a little upset with myself for losing my cool.

Wasn't entirely bad, though. The earlier portion of the day involved interactions with teams and players I do like, so for two games I had a good time. Third game was still OK. Wheels fell off after that.

I'm not on again until next Sunday as summer schedules are starting to wrap up, though I do have a message I've yet to answer about filling in for someone for one game tonight. Haven't decided yet. I can always use another $50, and it is just one, but I still have the headache from yesterday going. We'll see.

Tagged Umping, Softball, Posted on August 10, 2026 at 4:42PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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SNW 403: Human Best Friend

Does anyone know what I had tattooed on my face?

This week's episode of Strange New Worlds actually isn't terrible. Part of me does hate it, but it's the part that has been disappointed by the writing in so many streaming era and 21st century film installments of the Star Trek franchise; here we again have an episode that has little to no depth to it, another junk food meal of empty calories. On the other hand, I did find it entertaining despite my qualms. It's very much like last season's "Wedding Bell Blues" in that regard, though not as steeped in the series mythology and a whole lot more derivative.

Had I known in advance what they were going for with this one—it's a stoner comedy that borrows heavily from lowbrow films The Hangover and Harold & Kumar Go Wherever They Went; it could be titled "Dude, Where's My Shuttlecraft?"—expectations would have been lower than low given what came last season, in which case this post would be about how I was pleasantly surprised by the not-terribleness of it. But even though I kind of liked it, it does nothing to assuage my fears that the rest of the series is going to be frustrating. Especially knowing that both this season and the abbreviated next season was all either in production or the can before any of the flawed and troubling season three had aired (dropped? What is the proper terminology for the release of streaming internet TV?). I suspect that no one in this writers' room ever came to any realizations that last year had real problems before it was too late and all was completed. Thematic depth? Nah. Ethical quandaries? Meh, we might touch on them vaguely. Dumb humor? Oh, yeah, that's our jam, and if we can cheapen what comes later in the timeline, so much the better.

There is plenty of dumb humor and cheapening what comes later in this one, to be sure, but in large part—not entirely—I am choosing to overlook it because there's some fun to be had.

Let's get into it.

See full post: "SNW 403: Human Best Friend"...

Tagged Star Trek, TV, Culture, Posted on August 8, 2026 at 8:32PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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Stuff other people said

A few quotes from other places on the interwebs before I head out for the evening...

• "It’s like hiring your divorce lawyer to become the marriage counselor for the entire country. And apparently his confirmation has come down to two departing Republican senators saying, ‘Look... we’re fine with most of the corruption. We just need this one piece of corruption to go away in writing.’"

  —John Fugelsang, on the nomination of Todd Blanche for Attorney General being advanced out of committee in the Senate when Thom Tillis and John Cornyn accepted a meaningless written statement from Blanche saying there was no "slush find" for Felon47 to pay people off with.

• "The two senators are likely to puff out their chests and claim that they extracted a material concession. They held out, they made the White House sweat, they got it in writing. It is a tidy story, and every part of it that matters is wrong. They got nothing. Blanche gave up nothing. And the fund they think they killed is no less alive today than it was the day before Blanche put his name to that order."

  —Harry Litman, on the same subject.

• "It’s just one more thing that the next Democratic president’s Secretary of Un-Fucking All That Shit is going to have to deal with."

  —Jeff Tiedrich, on something that completely escaped my notice before today: Felon47’s further destruction of White House grounds to build a helipad, and then ordering the work to be redone because he didn't like the look of it, in another absurd waste of taxpayer money on a vanity project.

• "There are days when it genuinely feels almost masochistic to keep exposing ourselves to the relentless barrage of terrible news. At the same time, if we are members of a functioning society, we have to remain connected to what’s happening because that’s the only way we can respond in meaningful ways."

  —Mary Trump, articulating why I and others continue to follow the news when it's so goddamn maddening and depressing.

• "The fascinating question isn’t just who the Republican nominee might be. It’s whether Donald will ever acknowledge that anyone else deserves to lead. I don’t believe he can. His identity depends entirely on convincing himself that he’s indispensable."

  —Mary Trump again, responding to a question about whether Felon47 will support someone else running for the Republican nomination in 2028.

• "It reminds me of an old Star Trek episode. A historian attempts to stabilize a troubled planet by modeling it after Nazi Germany. Eventually he realizes what he’s created is monstrous and wants to stop it, but the people around him drug him, prop him up behind a microphone, and simply replay old recordings while pretending he’s still leading. As absurd as that sounds, I can imagine something similar happening with Donald. Whether it’s a fake Oval Office, carefully staged appearances, or simply limiting his public exposure, the people around him have every incentive to preserve the illusion for as long as possible because their own power depends on maintaining it."

  —Mary Trump one more time, scratching the nerd itch while talking politics, responding to the idea that Felon47 is becoming a mere figurehead as his dementia worsens.

• "The American League Central is like its own pocket universe. You’ve got five flawed teams bouncing around like lottery balls in that glass ball."

  —Joe Posnanski, writing about the just-passed Major League Baseball trade deadline and how that division is anyone's to win. Same could be said for the AL West, BTW, though there it's three underachieving teams instead of five.

• "I don’t think there was an Iranian cyberattack."

  —Felon47, the alleged President of the United States, after being shown voluminous evidence that there has been a cyberattack across the infrastructure of multiple states by Iran. Rest easy, America.

• "They’re Bizarro-world spidermen, whose great power confers no responsibility."

  —Cory Doctorow, on Google and credit card giants that enable fraud and, in Google's case, aid and abet fraudsters by purposely enshittifying their search algorithms.

• Finally, I give you the entirety of Andy Borowitz's latest bit of satire:

  FRANKFORT, KENTUCKY (The Borowitz Report)—Calling the situation “unacceptable to the people of my state,” on Tuesday Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear demanded to know whether or not Senator Rand Paul was brain-dead.

  “I have viewed disturbing video taken last week in the US Senate in which Senator Paul appears to be brain-dead,” Beshear told reporters. “As governor, I demand that he inform Kentuckians about his status—if, in fact, he is capable of human speech.”

  Beshear said he became “alarmed” when he viewed the video, in which Paul exhibited “brain activity consistent with that of a coma patient or Tommy Tuberville.”

  The governor’s announcement was only the latest controversy to embroil Paul, just days after shocking evidence emerged that he may have been created in a lab leak.

All for now. Gotta run.

Tagged Politics, President VonClownstick, Baseball, Posted on August 5, 2026 at 5:28PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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SNW 402: The Griffin Incident

The latest episode of Strange New Worlds is another "genre of the week" installment, this time the genre is "horror flick." It's not the first time Star Trek has gone this route, exactly, but it is more overtly in-your-face in terms of horror tropes and scenes of mutilation. Generally, I am most definitely not a fan of such things, and while I don't exactly hate it here, it's not good, either.

Which isn't to say the episode itself isn't good taken as a whole. It's...well, it's hit-and-miss, like most SNW efforts. There are some semi-interesting character bits, and some things that may or may not move a season arc along, but once again we have a script that wouldn't have been deemed ready for production under Gene Coon or Ira Behr.

Let’s get into it (spoilers and very nerdy nitpicks ahead):

See full post: "SNW 402: The Griffin Incident"...

Tagged Star Trek, TV, Posted on August 4, 2026 at 5:26PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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Are Republicans actually this stupid, or is it all performative?

Kentucky, always vying to win "Worst Senator Ever" with one seat or the other

I mean, it really could be either at this point.

This past Wednesday, Dr. Anthony Fauci was hauled before the Senate Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs committee because chairman Rand Paul (Kentucky's only known living Senator) wanted to whine at him and call him names because he didn't like that whole pandemic thing. Well, guess what, Senator Hairpiece, neither did anyone on Earth, and Dr. Fauci was heroic in doing whatever was possible to mitigate that crisis in the face of utterly incompetent and counterproductive leadership from President Fraudster and his GOP lemming caucus, of which you were and are one.

Remarkable. The most gargantuan and colossal failure of the Republican party, its leadership, and its cult leader has somehow, some way, been memory-holed by much of the country, but Rand Paul wants to stir that pot again and remind everyone about how his party and his leaders enabled, both by negligence and by overtly obstructive actions, the spread of a deadly virus that killed over 350,000 Americans in 2020 alone and at least 1.2 million by 2022.

Of course, Paul thinks he can use this hearing to shift blame from where it rightfully belongs—the Republican president and his enablers that eliminated most of the country's line of defense against pandemics and emerging illnesses and then completely screwed up every chance they got when those cuts bit them in the ass—to one of the most qualified, principled, honored public health experts ever to serve in government. Paul and his committee lambasted Dr. Fauci for three hours out of sheer petulance.

Fauci, of course, knew that this was substanceless theater and declined to answer a single question, choosing not to give the Republicans any potential ammunition for more slander and misinformation campaigns. President Biden foresaw this sort of fiasco and preemptively gave Dr. Fauci a pardon so these thin-skinned rage factories couldn't prosecute him with made-up charges to cover their own malfeasance. I'm not sure that was the best move, but it made a kind of sense; being pardoned for serving the public as best one can while being led by a cadre of morons and criminals is just wacky, but we see here why the man needed protection.

Paul continually insisted Dr. Fauci apologize, though for what I can't fathom. I mean, I know what Paul wants, he wants someone to validate his own and his party's stances against public health, he wants support for the idea that all of the mitigation efforts to keep people as healthy as possible when COVID was rampant and had no defense were somehow bad. Paul wants to conjure up out of nothing a reality where fighting disease actually caused disease, where the roughly 30 million deaths from COVID-19 worldwide were somehow because Anthony Fauci recommended social distancing, facemasks in public, and other measures to curb viral spread. Moreover, Paul wants to advance his insane hypothesis that COVID-19 was deliberately engineered by the Chinese in a Wuhan laboratory, which really just amplifies that eliminating-our-line-of-defense Republican policy that took U.S. officials away from monitoring such labs. He wants to convince the world that, because the National Institute of Health funded research into novel viruses and how to protect against them, that Dr. Anthony Fauci is to blame for the very existence of COVID-19, again conveniently ignoring the whole eliminating-public-health-infrastructure wrinkle that preceded COVID reaching the U.S.

It's mind-boggling. 

Paul refers to the lockdowns and school closures and suspensions of regular activity during the pandemic as something that was "inflicted," and that Fauci was to blame for "aiding and abetting the crime." Ron Johnson, scourge of Wisconsin, pushed conspiracy theories against COVID vaccines and favoring medications that are wholly inappropriate, like hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin, and accused Fauci of "sabotaging" their use, as if a learned public health expert would favor anti-parasitic medicines that weaken the immune system as a viral treatment. Florida Man Rick Scott tried to create a conspiracy between Fauci and other officials to quash the "true origins" of COVID-19 and outright accused Dr. Fauci of lying to the public and causing people to distrust vaccines. Rick Scott actually said this to Dr. Fauci, with a straight face no less: "The haphazard information you released and pushed on the American people with little research is appalling and why there's so much distrust in our institutions today. That trust is crucial to public health and you more than any person or event in my lifetime have destroyed that trust for millions of Americans."

Fuck. You. Rick. Scott.

Republicans, from Felon47 to his White House cadre to, yes, Senators and Representatives including RICK FUCKING SCOTT, are the source of mistrust in institutions, are the reason said institutions are a shadow of their former selves, are the purveyors of propaganda that convinces the rubes that vote for them that, even though the Republicans are the ones standing in the drive with gasoline cans and torches, the house was set on fire not by them, but by the people trying to SERVE THE PUBLIC.

Josh Hawley, that piece of crap, was even more childish than Rand Paul, and took "every accusation is a confession" to new heights by claiming Dr. Fauci was corrupt and used the pandemic to make money off the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans. Bernie Moreno, yet another pustule on the butt of humanity, was so outraged by Anthony Fauci trying to keep people from dying from COVID that he could not "stand idly on the side and watch this happen," ran for the Senate, and said, without a trace of irony, "Here I am sitting in front of you six years later saying who the fuck do you think you were for doing that?" He demanded apologies—apologies!—be given to people who took COVID vaccines! What does that idiot Moreno think would be appropriate wording, do you think? "I'm so sorry for urging you to get a perfectly safe vaccine that protects you from this deadly virus. It was wrong of me, I should have instead urged you to go out and bathe in contaminated hospital waste and invite the virus in so you would die."

It went on and on. Ashley Moody, Florida's other embarrassment Senator, touted her state's refusal to do anything to fight the spread of COVID and insulted Fauci for correctly calling Florida's governor a "complete disgrace." Joni Ernst, representing Iowa's dumbest, accused Fauci of somehow funding abortions to harvest body parts for evil experiments. 

Rand Paul engineered this showcase of bullshit, maybe because he thinks it'll curry favor with Felon47, but I think mostly because he hates public service and public servants. His unhinged remarks to both open and close the hearing were psychotic.

Yet, this whole thing will be nothing but a blip in the news. Our worthless corporate news media will not point out how deranged Rand Paul's words were. They will not spotlight Rick Scott's hypocrisy. They will not report on the myriad reasons Josh Hawley and Bernie Moreno and Ashley Moody should be treated as cranks and investigated for their own wrongdoings.

Midterms are just over three months away. Vote these anti-science, anti-democracy, anti-healthcare, pro-death, pro-corruption, sociopathic assholes out.

Tagged Politics, Republicans, COVID-19, Congress, Posted on July 31, 2026 at 4:01AM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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SNW 401: Valles Marineris

Can you stun a T. Rex? Let's find out.

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds returned last week for its fourth season premiere, and, wouldn't you know, I have thoughts.

After the painfully flawed mess of the third season, I was prepared to be disappointed. However, I was also hopeful that, without the rush-job environment that produced the season three scripts, we'd get back to at least the level of quality we saw in SNW's first two seasons. The premiere landed smack in the middle of those poles—there's stuff that doesn't make sense, there's some lazy shortcut writing, there's avoidable science mistakes; but there are also really funny moments, a clever premise, and good character stuff that almost makes me give them a pass on the bad character stuff.

Let's get into it (spoilers ahead):

See full post: "SNW 401: Valles Marineris"...

Tagged Star Trek, TV, Culture, Posted on July 30, 2026 at 3:20AM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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Return to Cap Hill

I've been busy with actual client work the last week-plus, so I'm a bit behind on the blogging. But I'm taking a break here, so here is the tale of the Return to Capitol Hill.

As mentioned earlier, Bobby Morris Field at Cal Anderson Park (not quite as catchy as "Oriole Park at Camden Yards," but way better than the convoluted and corporate "Uniqlo Field at Dodger Stadium") had been unplayable for a while following a July 4th vandalism spree involving fireworks and a bonfire of Lime scooters. People are stupid. So games were relocated until repairs could be made, but as of Monday we were back in action on the hill, the city parks department having made numerous patch repairs to the synthetic turf.

Apparently, the absence of softball for a while was welcomed by the soccer contingent, who had, when not impeded by turf repair crews, taken to dominating the space at will. When I arrived to set up the diamond Monday evening, the biggest impediment was getting both the large soccer goal and the large bunch of soccer players out of the way. They weren't overly hostile about it, but it did take some time and we didn't get underway until about 15 minutes behind scheduled start time. I didn't miss the soccer hooligans while we were relocated to Interbay. Nor did I miss having the sun in my eyes for much of the 7:00 games—I once again curse the city planner who laid out BMFaCAP with home plate in the southeast corner of the park at this lattitude—nor did I miss the many sirens, the spikeballers, or the frequent interruptions by various intrerlopers.

I had three games Monday, scheduled at 7:00, 8:15, and 9:30, so having been delayed at the start, then interrupted a few times midgame by errant soccer balls and oblivious wandering folk, my 8:15 game got going around 8:45, the 9:30 game around 10:00, and then we had the interruption apex perpetrator, some guy on a clunky bicycle who rode back and forth through the field for the sole purpose of disrupting our game. Whenever he got out of the way and we restarted, he'd come right back, yelling fake apologies as he went as if it was an hilarious prank. Eventually he'd had enough or other people took him away, not sure which, but we didn't finish until about 11:20, and with lights going off at 11:30 it was a bit nerve-wracking.

As for the games themselves, the only bit of drama came about when one of the teams began the game with an illegal lineup—too many consecutive dudes—and when I and the other team called it out they said no, no, it's not three men, there's a non-binary person in there. Wait, really? That guy? Or that pick-your-preferred-designation? Seemed pretty suspect to me, but I'm not about to get into that sort of an argument with someone, so I let it go, which the other team wasn't happy about. I was already parsing out in my head how to report this potential abuse of the rules when, much later in the game, ambient conversation clued me in on the fact that they were actually talking about a different person on their team, one not in that batch of batters in the lineup. So I took it back to their captain. To his credit, he was embarrassed, he had ID'd the wrong player on his team when filling out the lineup, a generically-presenting beer-bellied hairy dude rather than the actual trans player. We corrected things, but by then there would only be one more turn through the lineup at best and the other team was still annoyed with me for not figuring it out sooner (not that they did either). And there was no clear effect on the game outcome, it's not like the third dude in a row batting had parked home runs or anything, I think he popped up and grounded into a double play.

Yesterday's shift was only two games, but it was playoffs, so you know there'll be more intensity. Setting up the field was comparatively easy, no soccer hooligans around until later, so we didn't have delays to contend with. The first game was a semifinal, winner moves on, and it was a nailbiter. The eventual losing team was staging a comeback, and in the 7th (final) inning put the tying run on third with only one out. It sure seemed like they were going to at the very least force a bottom half of the inning, but a couple of weak dribblers ended it there. Afterward, I approached the losing side to commiserate, and one of them got in my face. "What have you got against us?" I thought he was kidding, in a sort of "hey, you could have somehow tilted the scale in our favor so we could win this one" sarcasm, but he was serious, he went on about calls I'd made in prior games that he thought were bad and that he said cost them runs, and I had no idea what he was talking about. I don't even recall the last time I had those guys for a game. It was pretty weird, but I had to move along and start the next game, so I did and they left. Then came the championship game, which was also close but not nailbiter-close, which was played with good humor all around by players I generally like, but there was one bit of conflict when a guy with the appropriate initials KG hit one to deepest right field, which is a much farther reach than deepest left field and had to cross the soccer players, that hit the ground very near the boundary of the turf, which is the demarcation for home-run or not-home-run. Not having seen it clearly (damn soccer), I initially called it a ground rule double, but I got pushback from players I generally trust, so I listened, asked both the batter's dugout and the first baseman what they thought, and before I had a chance to conclude anything the pitcher got mad, saying I couldn't change the call. Well, aside from her, the consensus was home run, so I ruled home run. I didn't know for sure and reps from both sides saw it better and said it hit past the turf. This pitcher is actually someone I like a lot, so I was a little annoyed, but let it go. Next time she came up to bat, though, she apologized, so no harm no foul, as it were.

For once a Cap Hill shift ended on time, even though bicycle guy was back again. He only did one lap around with his Joker laugh before leaving, though, so no appreciable delay.

I'm back at that field again on Sunday afternoon. Hopefully things will be more like yesterday than Monday in terms of interlopers.

Meantime, the bingo card form yesterday was fuller than the one for Monday, which doesn't make sense. I blame the randomizer for what squares were chosen and how they were placed.

 

Posted on July 29, 2026 at 4:55PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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Yer outtaheah!!

Umpiring has been fairly routine of late, with fewer shifts than the plethora that I was assigned in May and June and those I did have being mostly unremarkable. But yesterday deviated from the norm when I ejected a player.

This makes four times that I've thrown someone out of a game in, what, eight years, I guess, if we don't count that year when nobody did much of anything. That's not many, and I probably should have tossed a couple of others that I let continue despite bad behavior. Point is, there is rarely cause for that sort of thing, and in this case, if the incident had occurred earlier in the day I might have let it go.

It was late in game four of the day, I'd been there for going on six hours, and it was playoffs (ergo a little more intensity on the part of some players). My patience had worn thin. We were playing at a field that has unusual boundaries, which is to say that in lieu of a fence the outfield is bordered by foliage. For the most part, this is manageable; we lose a lot more softballs there than elsewhere, but there's understanding among all involved what happens when a ball goes into the bushes. But there is also a huge tree that is mostly in foul ground but overhangs into fair territory in deepest left field, which has been a point of contention from time to time because umps who get assigned there that haven't worked that field before don't know how to handle it when a ball is hit and that tree deflects a fair ball. The written rule says that anything that hits the tree is a foul ball, but nobody likes that. (There's a similar rule at another field, but in that case the tree hangs over first base, it isn't deep in the outfield, so it's easier to tell from home plate what a ball might hit; also, it's thicker, so more likely that there'll be actual interference. It's easier to accept such a rule there.) Every new season at this field—and the majority of teams that play there are returnees from way way back—it gets a mention, and my solution has been to say to everyone, "OK, no one likes the idea of a ball hit into the fair side of the tree being called foul, so here's what we'll do: First, the tree will not be a factor unless it interferes with a ball in play. If a ball is hit at/near it and nothing is changed by the existence of the tree, it's a non-factor. On the other had, if a batted ball hits the tree and changes direction or otherwise impedes a fielder from making a play, it will be called dead and either ruled a ground-rule double or foul ball depending on what side of the line the ball is on when it hits." That gets uniform approval every time.

So here we are, late in game four—which I was not initially scheduled to be at, it was supposed to be a split-shift between me and another ump, but he'd called in sick—and this guy, I'll call him Vance (not his name), was on deck when his teammate hit one that barely grazed the tree and came down in left field to be played cleanly by the outfielder. I let it play on as a live ball as grazing the branch didn't affect anything. Vance insisted that it should be a dead ball, and got kind of worked up about it even though it would have changed nothing, the batter ended up with a double. I explained that there was no effect on the ball or the play, no need to invoke any weird tree rule. He didn't like that. Then he stepped in to hit, and between pitches he continued to complain about it; I told him, "STOP. We're done with that." Vance then hit an almost identical fly ball that may or may not have also nicked a leaf of the tree, proceeded unhindered, and was caught by the left fielder. I called Vance out and he lost his shit.

"IT HIT THE DAMN TREE!"

Instantly, I tossed him. "OUT OF THE GAME!" Van started to argue, I didn't let him, I repeated, "OUT. OF. THE. GAME." He collected his stuff from the dugout and stormed off to his car and drove away at speed. One factor in my instantaneous reaction may have been that Vance had been in my face a bit the week before for an utterly stupid reason, complaining that I hadn't given him enough time between innings to practice throws; I never give time for that purpose, if teams do infield practice between innings it's because for some reason not everyone else is ready to go yet. Once everyone is on field at their positions, it's time to go. I dismissed Vance without comment on that day, just ignored him rather than fuel an argument, but it was in the back of my mind when he was bitching about the tree. Not that the tree-bitching wasn't enough. Still, had it happened at, say, 1:30, before I'd been out in the sun all afternoon and before I'd had a number of players complain about balls and strikes or whathaveyou and before my feet started to hurt, it's likely I would have just given Vance a more formal warning rather than eject him. Things build up, you know.

Fortunately, his teammates were apologetic and didn't try to excuse Vance's behavior. For the rest of the shift I was antsy, gnashing my teeth a little, and just willing outs to be made so the game would end. When we were finally done, everyone was nice, a fairly standard end-of-game parting of ways. I started packing up the gear when some players from the third game of the day, who had stuck around to watch and drink beer and keep their social day going, came up to me wide-eyed and wanted to know what happened with Vance.

I like these folks, they're among my favorites to ump; a few of them even play against the Spuds in the Ballard Wednesday night league, so I kind of know them from different angles, if you will. So after I finished packing up I sat down on the bleachers and gave them the details, which also allowed me some valuable decompression. I could vent remaining steam and get some good feedback and support, and half an hour or so later I was much more relaxed and could head home sans teeth-gnashing.

For good or ill, Vance's team won that game in an upset, so they'll be there next Sunday for the playoff finals. I'm not looking forward to it, but I'll just ignore Vance as much as is reasonable and hope he doesn't make any more trouble.

Also, it was another full Sunday on the field and thus today was another of me being wiped out, nursing a headache, and not getting as much done as I wanted to. Alas.

Tagged Umping, Posted on July 20, 2026 at 11:36PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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Bits and pieces

All-Star Game AQI: Very Unhealthy

So, there've been a few things I've been meaning to post about, but time and energy haven't been forthcoming for it. So a disjointed one today and hopefully back to real posts over the weekend(?).

• ITEM: The MLB All-Star Game was a dud for the 7th consecutive year. I don't know exactly what to suggest for de-dudifying the All-Star Game, other than doing away with the unconscionable home-run derby tiebreaker that marred last year's ASG (some of the best ASGs have been extra-inning affairs, which can never happen again so long as that stupid rule exists). But it would be in baseball's interest to tweak some things. As a friend of mine put it last night, in a way it's amazing anyone gets any hits at all in these games, since every pitcher is elite and they're only in the game very briefly. And this time around, the National League team barely had any, with Juan Soto notching a base hit in the 4th and nothing else until PCA got a hit in the 8th and Otto Lopez lined one in the 9th. One walk in the first, one in the seventh. Zippo otherwise in a year when the NL is far and away the superior league in terms of team strength (of course, the ASG is all about individuals, where there's more parity). Meanwhile, the American League team plated three in the first inning and that was effectively it for the game, after that just a solo homer from Miguel Vargas in the 8th that went by in a blink. We were wondering if this game would set a record for most strikeouts, but no; that happened a few years back in another dud.

  Other than changing the selection process to better choose the participants, I don't know how to fix this, or even if it needs to be fixed, but there are a couple of things I'd like to see beyond obliterating the HR Derby tiebreaker. One, mandate that the starting pitcher pitch at least two innings unless he gets hurt or unless he gets lit up. Then it's actually a bigger deal to be named starter than to just be an opener in a bullpen game. Two, no more mid-game interruptions—in Bud Selig's day we'd get mid-game delays to make a speech or something, these days it's a delay for some sort of stunt or performance like it's a miniature football halftime show. This year it was a video of a bunch of kids riding their bikes to a ballgame followed by real kids riding bikes onto the field, I think as some sort of homage to the film The Sandlot. Also midgame fireworks that flooded the ballpark with particulates and haze. Do that shit before the game or don't do it at all.

  Maybe the biggest problem, though, isn't the game itself but the broadcast of the game. It's hard to follow the game as it's being presented to us. Fox Sports has taken to interviewing players—including, this time, both the pitcher and catcher at the same time—while they are actively playing the game, which, OK, can be entertaining in spots but generally is pointless and has to be distracting for the players, in addition to being a sideshow from the game itself. The commentators have interviewed players after they come out of the game forever, that's fine (so long as we can still see what's happening on the field) and less intrusive. But I'd do away with players taking earpieces with them out to the field to chat with Joe Davis and John Smoltz, or whomever takes over play-by-play duty in the future. Not unrelatedly, the Fox crew doesn't reliably let us know when players come into the game, and there are a ton of substitutions going on after the third inning of an ASG (elected starters have to play three frames); many fans are wanting to see "their guy" play, and sometimes we don't know until a ball is hit to his position and we see the guy make a play. "Hey, my guy is in! Wonder how long he's been out there. Could've been two or three innings for all we know." The broadcasters are too into doing their goofy/inane Q&A with players as they're trying to play to really pay attention to much else. We also should get more in the way of graphics and info on the All-Star players; you get some with the starters as the lineups are announced, but a lot of these guys are unfamiliar to the audience outside of their home markets, it'd be nice for the casual fan to see why, say, rookie Tristian Peters made the squad instead of just wondering amongst themselves as we did, "hey who's that White Sox guy, what's his deal?" Do a little graphical info dump when new players enter the game. And John Smoltz is his own category of problem, he's just terrible as a commentator whether it's the ASG or a playoff game or anything else.

  We enjoyed mocking the thing here, though.

• ITEM (related): Another quote from Craig. From the "this date in baseball history" section of Craig Calcaterra's newsletter today: "1909 — Ed Summers of the Detroit Tigers allows only seven hits and pitches all 18 innings of a 0-0 tie—the game was called due to darkness—with the Washington Senators. It's the longest scoreless game in AL history. Yet, somehow, it was still far more compelling than the 2026 All-Star Game."
• ITEM: People are dumb, and people with fireworks are super dumb. My umpiring shifts for Capitol Hill games have been/are being moved elsewhere because some idiot set off fireworks on the Cap Hill field's synthetic infield and damaged it to the point of unplayability. That whole set of athletic fields is in need of resurfacing, yes, but until a week-and-a-half ago it was still plenty usable. This happened to a lesser extent last year at the Ballard fields where the Spuds play and we had to navigate our play around a hole between first and second base. Can we just be done with fireworks? They're pretty, but the particulates, the smoke, the noise, the fire hazard, is it really worth it? Drone shows are less damaging.
• ITEM: Spuds done for ’26: Speaking of the Spuddies, we played our playoff game yesterday and it did not go well. Full post on that coming later on, but we were trounced.
• ITEM: The health care system in this country is a joke, part 2,352,091. I had my annual checkup today, and I had to go to a new doctor for it. My prior doc doesn't take the insurance I have now, which I switched to because Republicans made the premiums on the insurance I had the last couple of years unaffordable. So I had to go through the rigamarole of again finding a new primary care doc, which I did a couple months ago and today was the next available appointment I could comfortably swing. So I find my way to the new place, go to check in, and am told this doctor isn't taking new patients, but we can do my annual check. "Wait, what?" This didn't compute with me. "If she isn't taking new patients, why am I here? Why did this appointment even get accepted in the first place?" The reply was gobbledygook that made no sense to me, but I was already there and my Rx is going to run out in a couple weeks, so I said fine, we'll do this and then I'll go through the whole process yet again next time I need to see someone. The nurse/med tech guy was sympathetic when he was getting my vitals and such, and after he left the exam room I heard him explain to the doctor in detail about the scheduling fuckup, and in the end the doc agreed to take me on anyway. It may or may not work out well, I don't really have a sense of her as someone I can relate to. The prior doctor was a good fit, I wish I could've kept seeing her, but we live in the US of A, where everything medical is dictated by what insurance you can afford, because people are stupid and keep electing Republicans.
• ITEM: Felon47 went on TV with his tin-foil hat. The alleged President of the United States, a convicted felon and perpetrator of several frauds that were settled out of court as well as many that have yet to be charged, the most grandiose and prolific liar on Earth, made a "speech" about made-up election conspiracies tonight. He distorted intelligence that we already knew about to make it sound (to him, anyway) like there were rampant issues with foreign operatives that are not the actual issues with foreign operatives which benefit him, he made already-debunked claims of mass-voting by non-citizens. He whined and grievanced his way through a pathetic spectacle intended to do two things: Create support for his pet voter-suppression bill that as it stands has no chance of passing either house of Congress, because he wants to be able to cheat in elections with impunity; and take the news media's focus off of the Iran debacle, gas prices, oncoming economic calamity, the outrageous things said by his unqualified criminal lackey nominees in confirmation hearings going on this week, his Air Force One fuckups, the reflecting pool bullshit, ICE murdering people and getting away with it, RFK Jr.'s direct responsibility for both screwworm and parasites in our lettuce (and the need for me to have gotten a measles vaccination today), deaths in DHS custody, the embarrassing NATO summit, his petulant refusal to sign a bipartisan housing bill that became law anyway (which he may not know), his staff getting caught using inside info to make Kalshi bets, his flip-flopping Strait of Hormuz "policies", a judge slapping him down hard on his "settlement" with the IRS, the Republican push for an unconscionable increase in military funding, his and Pete Hegseth's various war crimes, his illegal harassment of journalists, and the evergreen scandal of the Epstein Files. We can't wait for this maniac's term to run out, we need to elect as may Democrats to Congress as possible, by margins too big for him to cheat against, and remove him ASAP.

Tagged Baseball, MLB, Umping, Softball, Politics, Republicans, President VonClownstick, Health, Craig Calcaterra, Posted on July 16, 2026 at 8:51PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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Quote of the day

From our pal Craig Calcaterra, in response to a few condolence posts on social media from Democratic Senators mourning Lindsey Graham:

We're all conditioned to avoid speaking ill of the dead. But when a Democratic official praises someone like Lindsey Graham and ignores his vital role in enabling an autocratic takeover of American government that has killed thousands and immiserated millions, it goes beyond the niceties that typically apply at the hour of a person's death. It reveals that all of this is a game to them. It reveals that they view Congress as a private members club and that they are immune from the consequences of government action, rendering them uncaring about such consequences. That's what grants them the luxury of praising those who inflict unspeakable harm on the country and the world. It's someone else's problem, not theirs. Besides, he told some great jokes in the Senate dining room. 

We should speak ill of the dead. At least the dead who, in life, held and exercised power over the lives of others. And as long as the things we say are true. 

Why no tears for Lindsey? Well, here's a quote from the man himself, from just a few months ago:

I feel good about the Republican Party. I feel good about where we're going as a nation. We're killing all the right people and we're cutting your taxes.

In years gone by, I actually had sympathy for Graham. He was clearly a broken, damaged man looking for validation wherever he could find it and I thought if he found peace within himself he could maybe be a force for good, or at least a content private citizen no longer screwing up the government. Then he lost his 2016 presidential primary campaign to he who would become President Felonious I and promptly abandoned all of his righteous (and accurate) criticisms of who he called "the world's biggest jackass," among many other things, in order to be that jackass's biggest and most pathetic suckup toady. It was the same broken psyche in desperate search for validation, but when he—or anyone—sought to belong with Felon47, he lost any respect that may have previously existed.

Don't let the door hit you on the way out, Lindsey.

Posted on July 13, 2026 at 4:45PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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I'd have preferred they resigned in disgrace, but...

Good riddance to bad senators

So, Lindsey Graham is dead. I don't celebrate that. I mean, it's good that he's out of the Senate, it's good that he can't go on promoting stupid wars and serving as Felon47’s most loyal/most effectively blackmailed mouthpiece. The world is probably better off overall. But this isn't how I wanted to see the fall of Lindsey Graham, I'd have preferred that whatever he was (probably) being blackmailed with had become public and prompted him to resign and go into hiding. But things are what they are and this pathetic, spineless, amoral warhawk is gone from the Earth.

On the other hand, there's Mitch McConnell—Schrödinger's Senator, at once alive and dead in isolation, the true state to be determined only when he can once more be observed. There was a social media post attributed to him today, with a photograph allegedly real and from the same day, that his staff would like us to accept as proof of life. And maybe it is. But I doubt it. After all, this is the political party that has shown itself to be much too comfortable with disinformation and propaganda, in support of one of the most evil men to ever hold elected office.

 The statement in the social media post attributed to McConnell was clearly not written by McConnell, but that doesn't mean anything as politicians have other people write remarks for them all the time. The photograph has been alleged to be a retouched version of a photo from several years ago, but that's as likely as not so means nothing. Other senators claimed to have spoken on the phone with McConnell in recent days "for about 20 minutes" each, which begins to sound like a scripted talking point after the second one.

The photo might be real, the statement might have been approved by him, he might be alive and recuperating as the statement suggests. Or, he could be brain-dead and being kept alive on life-support machinery until a political deadline passes that would preclude a special election to replace him from happening. Or, he could already be gone and the Republicans are perpetuating a sham in order to... what? The conspiracy theory kind of falls apart, the only benefit to covering up a death here would be to avoid that special election and the alternative is just a vacant seat. Is that better? Maybe, maybe not, but it seems extreme even for these idiots.

No matter what, though, it seems highly unlikely that Mitch McConnell will ever return to work. So, again, net gain for humanity. From his theft of a Supreme Court seat from President Obama to his refusal to support conviction of Felon47 while he was still Fraudster45 in both impeachments (as minority leader he had enough clout to get the conviction, he decided to let the insurrectionist skate instead), McConnell is more responsible for our current dystopia than any other individual person is. He is/was an evil fuck and the world will be better off without him. 

So the Senate losing these two pustules of humanity is good. The Senate now stands at 51 Republicans and 47 Democrats in practical terms, and a few of those Republicans lost their primaries and are potentially less controllable by leadership. No appointeds are getting confirmed for the rest of the year, I'd wager, and without Graham to be Felon47’s Senate Enforcer, any chance of GOP legislation getting passed is also near zero. This is positive.

Still, in a way these two asshats escaped. They don't have to face justice. They got to live their lives without ever being held accountable for their myriad misdeeds as alleged public servants.

This is one time when I think it would be nice to be a religious person. Then I could take some satisfaction in the belief that these two would be facing karmic punishments in the afterlife. Instead, I can't help but feel like they got away with it.

Tagged Politics, Republicans, Posted on July 12, 2026 at 11:58PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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Spuds fight valiantly but drop twinbill to Bat's, Frogs

BALLARD (STN)—The Smiling Potatoes of Death capped their 2026 regular season with a doubleheader at Ballard Playfields last night, dropping both games by identical scores of 12-8. The Spuds finish the campaign with a record of one victory and eight losses, yet still have an opportunity to advance; the team will play first-place finisher Seattle Cattle next Wednesday in the Ballard Division playoffs.

The 1-8 season is a regression from last year's 2-7 mark, though that record does come with an asterisk. "We did have two wins last year," said co-captain Stacey Starr, "but one of them was by forfeit. Seattle Cattle didn't show up to play. So, really we matched what we did in ’25."

In yesterday's first game, the taters took on Bat's Amore in a rematch of the season's opening day game, which Bat's Amore won 21-10. "We improved on that one, anyway," said shortstop/pitcher Dan Stevens. "I think we might have won with a decent ump, though. That guy might've cost us a couple of runs."

Stevens was referring to the bearded umpire working Field 1, who has what might charitably be called a fungible strike zone. Said starting pitcher Tim Harrison, "I asked [the umpire] what his zone even was after the second inning. Maybe my tone wasn't too friendly, I don't really know, but basically I wanted to know where he was marking the top and bottom of the zone, because I threw three consecutive strike threes to a batter that were called balls 2, 3, and 4. He didn't like being asked. He just said 'a strike is a strike and a ball is a ball.' I didn't continue the argument, but he kept on, saying he would call things 'deep' if he wanted to. That was actually informative, or at least suggested he knew what I was talking about. I think it means he thought those three pitches were all high." Catcher Carly Eberts disagreed. "They were not high. One of them was down the fucking middle, you couldn't ask for a more textbook strike."

Though Bat's Amore didn't plate any runs as a consequence of that particular walk, the poor pitch calling continued throughout the game, prompting Stevens to assume anything not perfectly placed would be called a ball. "I know from batting, too," he said. "He called balls on a couple pitched to me that I thought I should've swung at." Outfielder/first baseman Brian Tschider concurred, admitting he benefited from bad calls. "Oh, I was struck out, no doubt about it. Called ball four. I'll take it, though." In the end, the umpiring likely didn't make much difference. "Really, as frustrating as it was as a pitcher, it was probably a wash," Harrison said. "And I just have to remember that it only helps the league that I ump for when these guys are so unbelievably bad."

The Spuds nevertheless took a promising 4-0 lead in the third inning. After emergency callup Ben Amster led off with a possibly suspect walk, outfielder Amna Mirza cracked the first of her three hits of the game. Dan Stevens followed with a base hit to score Amster, then after a groundout Chris Eaton blasted a deep fly into left-center field that was misplayed for a costly four-base error. "I need to have a word with the official scorer," Eaton said. "I mean, OK, the guy could have caught the ball, sure, he was right under it, but it's not like he kicked it away or something. I want those three RBIs, I don't want to see 'four-base error.'"

The lead would prove short-lived, as Bat's Amore came back with five in their half of the third, connecting for five hits and taking advantage of a pair of costly errors. The Spuds threatened again in the fourth, but Kim Stevens lined into a bad-luck double play to shift the momentum; Bat's Amore then tacked on three more in the home fourth. Down by four, the tubers again put runners on to start the fifth. Eberts led off with a walk—"legit, for a change," she said—then Amster and Mirza both singled and Dan Stevens reached on an error that scored Eberts. Outfielder Jess Palmer plated Amster with an RBI groundout, but the threat died when Eaton popped to short and Starr lined into another hard-luck double-play.

Bat's Amore would get one more in the home fifth to make it 9-6, then again the Spuds closed the gap. Harrison led off the sixth with his second hit of the day, then C/OF Rachel Fryan lined a single up the middle. First baseman Mack McCoy followed with a double to the left-center-field gap to plate both runners, making it a one-run game, but then 2B KM Crawford struck out and Tschider chopped a slow grounder to shortstop. Harrison, running for McCoy at second base, made a rookie baserunning mistake and took off for third on a ground ball hit to his right and was easily tagged out, which proved to be key as the next batter, Kim Stevens, lined a base hit to center that might have tied the game had Harrison stayed at second base. "It was just dumb,"  Harrison said. "I mean, that's baseball 101. I just wasn't thinking. We might have been better off if Bones had run for himself." The side was retired on the next play, a liner to short.

Perhaps dispirited by the unfortunate top of the frame, relief pitcher Dan Stevens gave up three more runs in the bottom half on a long home run with two aboard to put the game away. "I don't know," Stevens said, "counts don't mean that much at this level of ball, but when you get behind in the count even though you're throwing strikes it just seems like your going to eventually put one on a tee. That homer was on a pretty fat pitch, but I didn't want to walk the guy." The bomb extended the Bat's Amore lead from one to four, but the Spuds weren't able to plate even one in the seventh, so it was ultimately academic. "Whether we lose by four or lose by one, we still lose," Harrison said with a shrug.

For game two the Spuds shifted to Field 2, where they got a pleasant surprise. "Hey," Harrison said as they approached the other diamond, "is that J.T.?!" Indeed it was J.T., the only good umpire in the entire Seattle Parks & Rec staple of officials and the only one whose demeanor and engagement is welcome by all and adds to the fun of the game. "I went up to him before our second game got going. 'Are we glad to see you,' I told him, though I didn't get into the problems we just had with the other guy. Seriously, I wish we had J.T. for every game."

Having a superior umpire may have added to the overall enjoyment, but the end result of the nightcap was the same. "Both games were 12-8, but this one seemed a lot worse somehow," said Starr. That likely was because the opposition, the Little Frogs, scored first and were never behind at any point in the game.

"Clearly, they were out for revenge," Tschider said, referring to last week's Spuddie victory over the Frogs.

Thirst for vengeance or not ("I say not," Starr remarked, noting the general friendliness of the Frog squad), the petite amphibians scored two in the first on three singles and a sacrifice fly. Though the Spuds answered with two of their own in the home half, the Frogs got them back in the second thanks to a pair of walks and two more singles. "I can't blame the umpiring for those walks," starting  pitcher Harrison said. "I mean, J.T. was even giving me strikes on the corners—no other SPR ump ever gives you the corners. I just didn't have the good stuff this game." The Frogs would add an unearned run in the third, then three runs in the fourth and three more in the fifth. That made the score 11-2, a pounding more reminiscent of typical Smiling Potato games that end with a premature mercy-rule finish.

Not quite at that threshold, though, the Spuds showed some life in their half of the fifth. Mirza led off the frame with her fourth hit of the day, then Harrison walked and both advanced on Palmer's groundout. Tschider made the second out on a harmless comebacker, but Starr singled to left to drive in two, Amster singled, and then Fryan clubbed a double to left-center field that scored Starr.

The score remained 11-4 until the seventh, when the Frogs got one more on a double and an error to cap their scoring. In the home half, the Spuds chose not to go quietly—Harrison led off with an infield single, Palmer grounded into a forceout, and Tschider singled to right. Starr forced Palmer at third, but then Amster laced a base hit to center to load the bases. Fryan tapped back to the pitcher, but instead of an easy second out, the pitcher threw the ball past second base into the outfield, allowing Tschider to cross the plate and keeping the sacks full. Dan Stevens followed with a sharp single to score two more before Kim Stevens went down on strikes and McCoy ended the game on an out of some kind that no one recorded on the scorecard.

"Eh, could have been worse," Harrison said. "I mean, what were the odds that we would get two wins in a season? All in all, finishing with a couple of relatively close games, getting through the season with fewer than half our games mercy-ruled, you know, it feels OK."

Eaton was less philosophical about the night. "I hit like shit today," he said. "If I'd gotten some hits we would have won these." Crawford reminded him of the three runs scoring on his deep fly in the first game, but it didn't soothe the shortstop. "That was an error, KM! An error! That. Doesn't. Count."

Reflecting on the night at the bar afterward, McCoy saw things in a positive light. "Doubleheaders are great," he said between beers. "It's the only way everyone gets enough at-bats to feel like they contributed."

Eberts chimed in, "Especially Amna! Four-hit hot girl! Whoo!"

The Smiling Potatoes of Death return to the field Wednesday evening for playoffs, taking on the heavily-favored Cattle in a longshot attempt to continue in the postseason.

 

SMILING POTATOES OF DEATH								Bat's AMORE
Batter	AB	R	H	BI	BB	K		Batter	AB	R	H	BI	BB	K
C. Eaton, ss	3	1	0	0	0	0		The Moon, p	4	1	1	0	1	0
S. Starr, 3b	3	0	0	0	0	0		Your Eye, c	5	1	1	0	0	1
T. Harrison, p/1b	3	1	2	1	0	0		Big Pizza Pie, 1b	4	2	2	0	1	1
R. Fryan, 3b/c/2b	2	1	2	0	1	0		Napoli, 2b	4	3	2	3	0	0
M. McCoy, 1b	3	0	1	1	0	0		The World, 3b	4	1	1	1	0	0
K. Crawford, 2b	2	0	0	0	1	1		Shine, ss	4	1	3	4	0	0
B. Tscheider, rf/1b	1	0	0	1	2	0		Too Much Wine, lf	4	0	2	2	0	1
K. Stevens, rcf/lf/rf	3	0	1	0	0	0		Vita Bella, lcf	4	1	1	0	0	0
M. Bodmer, rcf/lcf	3	0	1	0	0	0		Gay Trantella, rcf	3	0	2	1	0	1
C. Eberts, c	2	1	0	0	1	0		Tippy Tippy Tay, rf	3	2	2	0	0	0
B. Amster, lcf	2	0	2	1	1	0
A. Mizra, rf/rcf	3	1	3	0	0	0
D. Stevens, ss/p	3	1	1	2	0	0
J. Palmer, lf	3	0	0	2	0	0
Totals	36	8	12	7	6	1		Totals	39	12	17	11	2	4
SPUDS      0  0  4  0  2  2  0  -  8   BAT'S        0  0  5  3  1  3  x  -  12
2B: McCoy. E: Starr, Eaton, Bodmer, Eberts. LDP: K.Stevens, Starr. Team LOB: 13.								2B: Napoli, Gay Trantella, Shine, Tippy Tippy Tay. HR: Shine. E: The World, Vita Bella, Napoli, The Moon. DP: The World-Napoli, The World-Big Pizza Pie. Team LOB: 11.
Pitcher	IP	H	R	ER	BB	K		Pitcher	IP	H	R	ER	BB	K
T. Harrison (L)	4	11	8	3	2	3		The Moon (W)	7	12	8	5	6	1
D. Stevens	2	6	4	4	0	0

 

Little Frogs								Smiling Potatoes of Death
Batter	AB	R	H	BI	BB	K		Batter	AB	R	H	BI	BB	K
Flysnatcher, p	4	3	3	2	1	0		R. Fryan, c/2b	4	1	2	1	0	0
Hypnotoad, c	5	2	1	0	0	0		D. Stevens, ss/p	4	0	3	2	0	0
Tomato Frog, 1b	5	0	1	2	0	0		K. Stevens, 2b/lf/rcf	4	0	0	1	0	2
Kermit, 2b	4	1	4	3	0	0		M. McCoy, 1b	3	0	2	1	0	0
Tadpole, 3b	4	0	1	2	0	0		C. Eberts, c/2b	3	0	0	0	0	0
Croaker, ss	4	1	0	0	0	1		C. Eaton, lcf/ss	2	0	0	0	1	0
Lilypad, lf	3	1	1	0	1	0		A. Mirza, rcf/rf	3	1	1	0	0	0
Xenopus, lcf	4	1	2	2	0	1		T. Harrison, p/1b	2	1	2	0	1	0
Ribbit, rcf	3	1	0	0	1	1		J. Palmer, lf	3	0	0	0	0	0
Jeremiah, rf	4	2	2	1	0	0		B. Tschider, rf	3	1	1	0	0	0
								S. Starr, 3b	3	2	1	2	0	0
								B. Amster, lcf/rcf	3	1	2	0	0	0
Totals	41	12	15	12	3	3		Totals	37	8	14	7	2	2
FROGS      2  2  1  3  3  0  1  -  12 SPUDS      2  0  0  0  3  0  3  -  8
2B: Flysnatcher. 3B: Xenopus. HR: Kermit. SF: Kermit. E: Tadpole, Flysnatcher. DP: Flysnatcher-Croaker-Tomato Frog. Team LOB: 13.								2B: Fryan, D. Stevens. E: Eaton 3, Starr 2, D. Stevens 2. GDP: Palmer. Team LOB: 10.
Pitcher	IP	H	R	ER	BB	K		Pitcher	IP	H	R	ER	BB	K
Flysnatcher (W)	7	14	8	6	2	2		T. Harrison (L)	4	10	8	7	3	2
								D. Stevens	3	5	4	3	0	1

Tagged Softball, Posted on July 9, 2026 at 11:01PM   |   Permalink   |     |  

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