Playing without team MVP, and number one starting pitcher James Fago (and three other regulars) South Oakland dropped its most important game of the season 13-11 to the Clinton Cherokee Wednesday night. We fought hard and came up just short. Clinton led 4-0, after one, 7-1 after two and we brought it to i think 9-8 in the third.  Then they scored three in the fourth, and one in the fifth before we put up three in the bottom of the sixth. I could go get the book out of my car to make sure, but I won’t.

I’m not one for moral victories. We had a chance to win the division and we didn’t. Maybe we still allow 13 runs if we have a couple guys in on defense, but we only made a few errors, a pop-up and two grounders. Everyone who showed up played hard. Guthrie and Strom played especially well, and maybe those two don’t get in if everyone’s there, so who knows. Clinton ran on us all day, if we have another infielder we can maybe make defensive moves to address that. It’s frustrating.

They also hit like fifteen home runs.

We split the season series with Clinton and aside from our first matchup we’ve played them tough every time. I don’t think they expected that.

One positive I take from the loss is that we battled, and we were patient at the plate against that kid who threw at least 120mph and let him walk us.

We had the winning run at the plate in the bottom of the sixth.

The game was called due to time limit. I definitely managed the pitching as if we were playing seven, and that’s my fault for not realizing we were going to come up against the time limit, which I should have figured out when it was 9-8 in the third.

We’ve got to retire the Duck Pond next year. That field is getting dangerous due to neglect by the city, and their reluctance to let us work on it or get us the keys to the equipment shed.

Tessyier removed the rubber in the fifth and both teams pitched without it.

We open the playoffs next Sunday July 22nd, agains the 3 seed in the other division, which will be either the Bulldogs or the Militia.

Commish says the cross-divisional playoff games are a means to not punish the stronger division, which makes sense, but I think it may cause issues in the second round if both two seeds advance there isn’t a way to properly re-seed, since all season we’ve been playing for best division record. No matter what Joe does someone will be unhappy. Playoff seeding won’t be what keeps us from playing for another championship, if we don’t get out of the semis it will be lack of pitching depth necessary to win a 3 game series.  We’ll figure something out.

The Ducks play the Black Sox Sunday night at 9pm at Moore Park.