Ducks

How is this team six and three?* Ducks 10, Bandidos 9

Ducks win, pittsburgh NABA, Recap, South Oakland Ducks Baseball

Mark Lombardi and DJ Dover hit back-to-back home runs in the fifth inning, and Ducks starter Ben Sorosky (W, 3-0) scattered seven hits over six innings to propel the South Oakland Ducks of the North Side to a come from behind, 10-9 win over the Bakery Square Bandidos (6-4) in Spring Hill last night.

With the victory, the Ducks (7-3) pulled within a half game of the Oilers (6-2) for second place.

The Bandidos took a 5-0 lead in the first, but the Ducks answered with four in the bottom of the second. Koshzow singled, John Zuzak doubled off the wall, then Gwin singled in two after the Bandidos right fielder fell down. With two out, Lombardi doubled and then Dover drove in two more with a line drive single to left.

Both teams scored a run in the third to make the score 6-5 ‘didos.

Koshzow singled in two in the fourth to give the Ducks a one-run lead. Then the Bandidos scored two in the fifth to go up 8-7, and Ducks outfielder Bryan Chvarak tore his quad.

In the bottom of the inning, Bryan Chvarek singled, hobbled to first, and was almost thrown out from center field. Two batters later, Lombardi hit a two-run home run to left, and Dover followed with a solo home run to give the Ducks a 10-8 lead.

Ducks reliever, Chris Heisler allowed one run in the seventh, but recorded the save after pulling his hamstring and striking out the last batter of the game.

South Oakland’s next game is Tuesday 6:45pm, at Mellon Park vs. Hebrew Oilers

Gutsy win. With a couple late no-shows, and a bunch of guys on vacation, we scored a lot of runs.

Great effort from Sorosky when he didn’t have his best stuff.

I think everyone in our lineup recorded a hit.

Not the best umpiring.

*The quote in the title was in reference to the Ducks, said by one of our players after one of the many errors we made last night. Both teams were 6-3 going into the game. The Bandidos are solid guys, and I don’t want them to think that was a disparaging remark directed at their franchise. Here’s hoping they can keep the same name, and group of core players for two consecutive seasons.

7-3 is our best start in years.

quack

 

 

Gameday 10: Ducks vs. Bandidos

2017 South Oakland Ducks, Gameday, pittsburgh NABA, South Oakland Ducks Baseball

South Oakland Ducks of the North Side (6-3)

vs

Bakery Square Bandidos (5-3)

9PM

Spring View Field

South Oakland looks to regain sole possession of third place with a win tonight vs Bakery Square. The Oilers (6-2) beat the Eagles (8-1) yesterday, setting up a potential log jam at the top of the division.

The Ducks are only two games out of first with two remaining against the Eagles, and two left against BIG OIL, but the rebooted Dirty Birds figure to be in the hunt down the stretch as well.

The Bandidos franchise won the A title in 2014 as the North AAmerican Lions. Then changed names, dropped some players, and won AA title two years ago as the Mon Valley Dirty Birds, then suffered through a dismal regular season in AAA that culminated in a playoff win over Ken Cool’s brother’s team in the playoffs. Then they split with half the team joining Clinton, and the other half starting the Bakery Square team. It would be funny if they won the title this year and had to keep repeating the process.

The Bandidos franchise arc is one that we may see play out again in the current league format that has the AA winners move up into AAA.

In 2014, the Ducks dropped from AA to A. That season the Rebels, Eagles and Devils moved up. They went a combined 19-52 that season, with the Rebels posting the best record at 9-15. South Oakland went 17-6, and that was the most fun I’ve had playing baseball.

The Devils allowed 196 runs that season. The Bulldogs, who finished first in the regular season, allowed 66.

in 2015, we went to three divisions, which allowed the WOLFPACK to skate by without having to play against the AAA teams after winning the A title over the North American Lions after the Beedle Park incident in Jefferson Hills allowed West View to reschedule the semi-final against the Ducks which lead to one of the most frustrating playoff losses in Ducks history. The following season most of AAA dropped down to AA, leaving 5 teams in the top division, and forcing inter-league play, which was pretty shitty.

In 2016 the Dirty Birds moved up and finished 6-18, which brings us back to this season, and the Rebels in AAA, who should stay there so we don’t have to play on that shit field at 6pm on a weekday.

So that’s some stuff that happened in our league over the last few years.

I hope it doesn’t rain tonight.

Bad News for the Dirty Birds

I Heard Something Pop. Ducks 12, D2 9

2017 South Oakland Ducks

Ducks Catcher, Tom Pulice went 4 for 4 with two doubles and 3 RBI, and starting pitcher, Ben Sorosky (W, 2-0) gutted out four innings on the mound to lead South Oakland of the North Side (6-2) past Pittsburgh D2 (0-4) last night in Spring Hill.

D2 entered the game having gone scoreless in their first three contests. They scored their first run off Sorosky in the first on a bases loaded walk.

The Ducks took an 11-2 lead after four innings. Then D2 got to South Oakland’s middle relievers for five in the fifth, and two in the sixth before Brian Strom entered the game with the tying runs on second and third with  one out in the sixth. Strom struck out some guy and got Walking in Memphis to pop out to first to end the threat.

Ducks outfielder Lonnie Petril’s hamstring exploded on an infield single. Get well, Lonnie. (Let me know if you need me to erase this for workman’s comp purposes)

Dover drove in a run in the Ducks half of the inning.

Then in the seventh:

In the seventh, Ducks closer Jon Moore retired the side in order for his first save of the season.

Notes:

Big game by Strom in his first game back. Great catch against the wall with the bases loaded in the fourth, then worked out of a jam on the mound to get us to the seventh with the lead.

Offense looks pretty good through 8 games

Good fight by D2 to take advantage of some opportunities and get back into the game after being down early. I’m surprised they have not won yet.

From The Lawnmower Man IMDB page

A scientist performs experiments involving intelligence enhancing drugs and virtual reality on a simple-minded gardener. He puts the gardener on an extensive schedule of learning, and quickly he becomes brilliant. But at this point the gardener has a few ideas of his own on how the research should continue, and the scientist begins losing control of his experiments.

Tough four game stretch coming up: Dirty Birds (Bandidos) twice, then the Oilers and Eagles. We will get a good idea of where we are at relative to the rest of the league after these games.

South Oakland’s next game is this Sunday, 9:30AM at Mellon Park vs. the Dirty Birds.

Their website makes this blog look like garbage.

quack.

Gameday 7: Ducks at Sorcerers

2017 South Oakland Ducks, Gameday, pittsburgh NABA

South Oakland Ducks of the North Side (4-2)

at

Wexford Sorcerers (0-0)

12pm

North Allegheny Intermediate High School

South Oakland looks to rebound after a tough loss to the Eagles when they take on Wexford today at noon.

Wexford hasn’t played a game yet, and they’re new to the league this year. Who knows what’s up with this team. I think they’re young. Their coach seems like a decent guy from the league meetings.

If you have the balls to name your team the Sorcerers, you’re either going to go undefeated, or be absolutely terrible. I don’t think there’s much of a middle ground in this regard.

Here’s what comes up when you google sorcerers baseball.

Lots of disney hats and a few girls softball teams. Also a picture of this game:

Who’s still got a Dreamcast? I remember this game for  Sega Genesis. Solid non-EA Sports baseball action. So thank you, Wexford, for allowing me to find this image. Sweet green helmet and batting gloves on that guy, love the two-stripe cleats that don’t violate the Adidas trademark.

Here’s a thirty minute video of this game on youtube:

Bad News for the Sorcerers

Dental Dammed. Ducks 4, Eagles 5

2017 South Oakland Ducks, NABA, pittsburgh NABA, South Oakland Ducks Baseball

This post is brought to you by Ondek Bats.

South Oakland (4-2) dropped a nail biter to the South Side Eagles, 5-4 in Spring Hill Wednesday night. With the win, the Eagles (4-0) retain sole possession of first place.

South Side scored a run in the first off a couple walks, and a single.

The Ducks took a 3-1 lead in the bottom of the fourth but the Eagles tied the game in the top of the fifth, and added runs in the sixth and seventh.

Sorosky struck out seven batters and was cruising until he ran out of gas and walked some guys. Nichols gave us three solid innings in relief. He escaped a bases loaded one out jam in the fifth, and kept the game close. There was a suspect balk call that I didn’t really see which moved a guy to second, and he scored on a single.

Trailing 5-3 in the bottom of the seventh, the Ducks had runners on second and third with no outs, but could only plate one run. The Eagles relief pitcher worked out of trouble, and they threw out two guys at home.

It was a well played game by two evenly matched teams.

We ran ourselves out of a couple innings, but I’d rather we make aggressive mistakes than passive ones. Still, we need to pick our spots a little better.

Our pitching was good enough to win, and we had a shot at it in the seventh. Frustrating way to lose.

I like how we’ve battled in the first six games. 4-2 at the quarter mark is pretty good.

South Oakland’s next game is Saturday at 12pm. vs. the mysterious Wexford Sorcerers at North Allegheny Intermediate School.

quack.

 

 

 

Go to Hell. Ducks 5, Devils 4

2017 South Oakland Ducks, NABA, pittsburgh NABA, Recap

South Oakland of the North Side (4-1) ,came from behind to beat South Hills 5-4 on a walk-off RBI single by Tom Pulice Monday night in Spring Hill.

Ducks super utility player, Joe Graff started the game when South Oakland’s scheduled starter arrived late due to work commitments. Graff allowed 0 earned runs over two innings, but the Devils scored 3 runs on a single, a walk and like seven errors. But Graff battled, and kept us in it until Patton entered the game and went the last five innings, also allowing 0 earned runs, and working out of a few jams created by bad hops on the pristine Spring View infield, and more Ducks errors.

I think the Devils had 3 hard hit balls all night. We need to make fewer errors going forward.

South Oakland trailed 4 -1 going into the bottom of the sixth, as the Devils pitcher was throwing pretty well and we hit a few balls right at their guys.

Bryan Chvarek (sic.) drove in two runs with a long single to right center. His first hit as a Duck, cutting the lead to 4-3.

Pulice threw out some guy at second in the top of the seventh after he bunted for a base hit.

In the bottom of the seventh, all with 2 outs, Casale singled in Gwin from second to tie the game at 4, J. Zuzak worked a walk, and Pulice singled in Casale.

Ducks win.

Last year, what fucked us out of a bye was losing games to teams that finished in the bottom half of the standings. Big time efforts by a bunch of guys who don’t normally start to keep that from happening last night.

The Ducks have won four straight, setting up a big early season match-up with the undefeated Eagles tomorrow at Springview Field.

quack.

 

 

Gameday 3: Ducks vs. Express

2017 South Oakland Ducks

South Oakland Ducks of the North Side (1-1)

vs

Carrick Express (1-3)

9pm

Springview Field

Last night’s game vs the Oilers was rained out. There was just enough rain at just the wrong time to render the field unplayable.

Tonight the Ducks look to win their second straight vs. the Express who apparently have new uniforms. Curious to see how they’ve re-branded the team after a tenuous offseason. If I ran that team, I would just get t-shirts with Nolan Ryan’s face on them.

Should be a good one tonight. Carrick has always had solid pitching, but they’ve historically found ways to lose games in spite of this. South Oakland typically has won with offense, but I like our rotation this season. We have two former militia members ready to go tonight on full rest thanks to yesterday’s rain out.

Bad News for the Express.

Gameday 3: Ducks at Hebrew Oilers LLC

2017 South Oakland Ducks, Gameday, NABA, pittsburgh NABA, South Oakland Ducks Baseball

South Oakland Ducks of the North Side (1-1)

at

Hebrew Oilers (2-1)

6:45pm

Mellon Park

Spring Hill Scooter Series, Game 2.

Last season, a scooter that was thrown on top of our dugout from the area near the basket ball court by a Spring Hill kid. We kept the scooter. Since then, the winner of the Ducks/Oilers regular season series is awarded the scooter and keeps it for the following season. South Oakland took 2 of 3 from BIG OIL in 2016, but we lost to them twice in the playoffs so, maybe it’s not a great indication of post-season success.

The Oilers beat us 7-1 in a rain-shortened game on opening night. If they win tonight, the scooter is theirs.

We are going to be short our entire starting infield tonight. Our depth will be tested.

Bad News for the Oilers

 

Ducks Win: South Oakland of the North Side 11, Cranberry 3

2017 South Oakland Ducks

Ducks pitcher, Chuck Zuzak (W, 1-0) allowed 3 runs, (1 earned) over six innings, striking out 7 and hitting four batters, to lead South Oakland (1-1) to its first win of the season.

Not to be outdone, Cranberry pitchers combined to hit four Ducks. They unfortunately also threw a bunch of wild pitches/past balls, which allowed many Ducks runners to advance and runs to score. The loss drops the newly minted Crusaders to 0-1.

South Oakland scored 4 in the second, 3 in the fifth, and 2 in both the sixth and seventh innings. The Ducks never trailed.

Some stats

Lombardi: 2-5, R, 2 2B

Pulice: 1-2, HBP, BB, CS, R

Morgan: 1-1, R HBP

Petril: 0-0, R, 2 HBP

RBI:

Casale, Gwin (2), Moore, Nichols, Maldonado, Pulice

South Oakland’s next game is Tuesday night, 6:45 at Mellon Park vs BIG OIL.

quack

 

Gameday 2: Ducks vs Oilers

2017 South Oakland Ducks, Gameday, pittsburgh NABA, South Oakland Ducks Baseball

South Oakland Ducks of the North Side

vs

Hebrew Oilers

9pm

Spring View Field

It only took a week for the first player scandal of the season.

Apparently the Oilers brought in a former minor league player to pitch for them this summer. Seems surprising given their managers concern for the competitive balance of the league as expressed in the winter meetings when he complained about the prospect of the WOLFPACK! and the 2 Dirty 2 Birds: Return of the Bandidos rostering Division III college players.

Save the fucking sanctimony about how West View hurt your team’s feelings if you’re gonna bring in some dude who is obviously a ringer.

This is the most BIG OIL move I’ve ever seen. The fucking yuppie, white collar team brings in essentially a Dominican refugee, in an attempt to make up for the fact that their team is soft. Soft as cotton.

This explains why they wouldn’t play us on back to back nights. This dude can only pitch one of those days. I didn’t press the issue as the Pens were on last night.

The Oilers are scared.

Maybe three guys have any heart on that team, as much as I love them as human beings. Seriously though, just embrace being villains as far as the league is concerned because there’s no way around it. Get your fucking neoliberal councilman to throw out the first pitch across from Google in God awful Bakery Square and flout your Asian players and your nice unis, then he can go back to helping our mayor force Pittsburgh’s working poor into Penn Hills so ya’ll can bike to work without having to look at them.

So, where does that leave us?

I am excited for the opportunity. If you’re not pumped about the prospect of playing against a pitcher this good, you should go join PSL, or see if the Oilers will take you.

We have the opportunity to beat a team that thinks it’s going to cruise tonight because they networked their way into a stud pitcher. We are throwing an ex-Black Sox, ex-Oiler, and one time Duck junk baller who is already telling me he doesn’t want to come out of the game.

We haven’t seen live pitching yet, so should be a good test off the bat to see where we are hitting wise.

Here is  GIF in honor of the Undertaker.

Bad news for the Oilers