ALMOST NAILED 'EM

Well, we’ve been down this same road many times before and know where it usually ends, in a trickle of regret and a geyser of 16-ounce Pabst Blue Ribbon. Our twice-annual meetings with the Orcs of the Franklin Institute do not describe a gloried past against a team that regards us as a semi-sorta-if-Collar’s-not-available rival.
In fact, it didn’t usually go that well.
From the standpoint of the final score, which is regrettably how they judge these things, Tuesday night under the solstice sky at romantic Dairy 2 didn’t go much better. It didn’t feel that way, though.
The Red Inks of the Pen & Pencil Club gave the Orcs all they wanted before dropping a 14-9 game that was – sportswriter cliché alert – much closer than the score would indicate.
It was a good game against a very good team, Orcs though they are, and then it was time for HOAGIEFEST! Except Ron ate all the goddam hoagies. (More on this later.)
The game. A lot to tell. We scored six runs in the top of the first inning on eight straight hits to start the game against the lovely Pell. I have researched Ron’s team records, dating back to a hot-type roster, and even the papyrus scrolls don’t show a start like that for the P&P/Daily News/Gutenberg franchise.
Well? What could go wrong?
Here’s a clue: We played the rest of the game.
The Franklin chipped back for three runs in the bottom of the first, getting its first four men on base. But that was snuffed out on a pair of fly balls and a nifty groundout turned in by Julie Dugan.
We whiffed in the second and Franklin struck for five more runs to take an 8-6 lead. We gave them an extra out and that opened the door and they took advantage.
The P&P came right back to tie the game 8-8 with two more runs in the third, the last driven home on a sharp single into right by Dan Rubin that plated Chris Yasiejko.
So, tie game heading into the bottom of the fourth and Franklin eked out a run, aided again by an extra out, but starting pitcher Yasiejko minimized the damage by retiring the second and third hitters in the Franklin order – the only outs those two made all night.
The Inkers tied the game at 9-9 in the fifth on an RBI single by Marcus Hayes. George Miller scored on the play, but unfortunately Mark Nevins was gunned down at third to end the inning, even though some people thought, hey, he’s in scoring position at second, why risk it, especially with two outs and, hey, Hickey’s coming up, he’s fucking two-for-two and is rocketing the ball, and, although we didn’t know that then, he did get another fucking hit in his next at bat, three-for-three, but anyway, it doesn’t matter in the grand scheme of things, and it took a perfect throw, and those people who said those things were wrong, dead wrong.
Franklin came back for another run to take a 10-9 lead in the bottom of the fifth. Single, fly ball, single, single, single. Yes, they got one run. Yasiejko, with the bases loaded, found a short fly over third that Tom Hickey gloved nicely and then struck out the final batter.
So, it was, after we come up empty, a 10-9 game going into the bottom of the sixth. That’s a good spot to be. We had our chances and they knew it, too. This is, however, the point in the story in which Franklin scores four in the bottom of the sixth to put the game away. We go down in the seventh and you just shake hands, pack up and head for Hoagiefest!!! Except Ron…
Quick breakdown. We had eight hits in the first inning and eight hits total in innings 2-7. That’s not all that good. But Hickey was 3-for-3 with a run batted in. Russ Krause, Steve Lynch, Nevins, Hayes, Yasiejko and Rubin had two hits. Rubin and Hayes each had two RBIs.
Franklin had a bunch of unearned runs and – this is a killer – scored nine of their 14 runs with two outs. If you look at the scorebook, and I don’t recommend it, there were a lot of chances to get out of those innings that just missed happening. Franklin’s top four hitters in the lineup were 13-for-16. The rest of the team was 9-for-26. If we had been just a little better at limiting their at-bats, it would have been a different game. Their last six hitters of the game were their top six hitters, and four of them scored.
Moving on…to Edgeley 8 and the 1st Annual Hoagiefast.
See what I did there? Fast?
Anyway, the scene changes from a gut shot loss to body shots. Is this a great league or what?
Unfortunately, by the time we packed up and got to Edgeley 8 – in, like 10 minutes – the Fleisher Art Memorial and Ron had eaten all the hoagies. Our illustrious former manager and league commissioner, coming from some bogus neighborhood meeting, chose to monitor league activities at Hoagie Central rather than taking in the final crucial innings of our game.
We’ll leave that one for the jury to decide, but, in any case, there were some hoagies for our more-leadfooted teammates, but not for those with bats and balls and bases and coolers and the fucking two clipboards with the color-coded entries and special felt markers and the S hook. No, not for them. They got only to greet Ron with a sprig of lettuce hanging out of the side of his mouth.
The league went out for pizzas and returned with many of them and Hoagiefest became Pizzapalooza. The details of exactly whom went for the pies and how long it took are irrelevant.
And into the night, with all six of the teams that played on Tuesday and representatives of at least one of the others. The festivities deepened, with tiki lights swung about, and Fleisher forming its ancient prayer circle. Then the body shots started, and Whiskey Frank wasn’t even involved, and perhaps that is enough softball for one day.
We are still in a playoff chase with Bishop’s Collar for the last postseason spot. They have a two-game lead in the loss column, but a testy schedule and they have to play us again. First things first. Next Tuesday against the Zoo. See you then. Get your running in.
(Photos by Jon Snyder)

"I better score because I know that chowderhead is going to get thrown out at third."