pittsburgh bulldogs

Game Six Recap: Dr. Strangeglove or: How I learned to stop worrying and love Brian Strom.

2014 South Oakland Ducks, pittsburgh NABA, South Oakland Ducks Baseball

Ducks starter Brian Strom (w, 2-1) scattered 8 hits, walking 3 and beaning 4 batters over six strong innings of 2-run ball Sunday night in Moore Park, helping South Oakland (4-2) diffuse the Allegheny offense en route to an 8-2 Ducks victory.

Playing without the strong-bearded veteran leadership of the Commish, the Bombers (3-1) looked flustered out of the gate.

This guy took the hill for Allegheny*.

Bomberman_by_Gaston25

He allowed back to back doubles to Gwin and Culp and the Ducks jumped out to an early 1-0 lead. Culp stole third, Strom drew a walk. Matt Swetz collected his unofficial, team-leading 7th RBI of the season with a single to right.

2014-05-04 20.19.58

 one at a time. sometimes two at a time

Sorosky, formerly of the militia has been waiting for a chance to take out the Bombers for three years. He delivered a single to left to put the Ducks up 3-0.

Garrett Moore drove in a run with a single up the middle. 4-0 Ducks.

-Soul-Eater-Excalibur-Fresh-New-Hd-Wallpaper--

This is the best exclaimer image I could find.

With one out and runners on first and second, Alex Riley hit a ground ball to the shortstop who got the force at second. Moore sacrificed his pants with a hard slide and forced an arrant throw. Sorosky tried to score from second on the play, but the ball bounced hard off the wall behind first and came right back to the first baseman who blew up Sorosky at the plate. Classic 6-4-3-2 Double play.

communion pants

Who’s laughing now? Those communion pants were durable.

Strom faced 5 batters in the first and stranded runners on second and third after striking out some guy to end the inning.

The Bombers scored 2 in the second, but Strom pitched out of another jam and the Bombers left the bases loaded.

The Bombers third baseman can hit a little.

Timmy

Meanwhile, the Bombers pitcher had settled in and was in the process of retiring 9 straight Ducks with the help of a 4-6-3 double play. Judging by the Allegheny reaction, it was the first good play their infield ever made.

Fetter singled to lead off the fifth. He actually defused bombs in the military. After a Casale sac bunt, Gwin singled in pinch runner Shawn Dorsek to make the score 5-2 in the fifth.

In the bottom of the fifth, Strom allowed a triple a walk and struck out the side.  The Bombers could not get a big hit.

In the bottom of the sixth, with Bombers on first and second, Tony Casale made a sick diving play in the hole between third and short to get the force at third. Best play by a shortstop made in the game. Two groundouts later, the Bombers again left two men on base with nothing to show for it.

In the top of the seventh, The Ducks scored three runs on five hits to put it out of reach. Strom, Sorosky and Moore had RBI.

Fetter pitched the bottom of the 7th and struck out the Bomber’s 3rd baseman looking, then induced a double play to end the game.

donaldduckbomb

***

  • Big early season win for the Ducks, missing a handful of regulars.
  • That ump called strikes a foot off the plate.
  • I love playing at Moore Park.
  • I think there will be 3 more good games between the Ducks and Bombers.
  • For a bunch of kids who have no idea how cruel and grim the world after college will be, the Bombers carry themselves well, and are probably laughing at my dated references on some weird, next-level social media platform that I will never understand.
  • I found an orange and gray hoodie someone left after the game.
  • Stanley Kubrick.
  • Don’t google “suicide bomber images.” It will make you sick.

South Oakland’s next game is Wednsday night 8pm at Springview Field vs. the Senators.

quack.

Quack Quack. Two Ducks Teams in 2014?

2014 South Oakland Ducks, NABA, pittsburgh NABA, South Oakland Ducks Baseball, who names their team the Rebels?

Fuck this winter.

It looks like TJ Morgan is running the AA Ducks, and I’m running the single A Ducks. I’m still trying to find a loophole to allow me to play on both teams, but I’m not sure that’s going to happen.

The split should’ve happened in 2010, but no one on that team was going to step down and play in a lower division. Instead, a bunch of guys quit rather than take reduced roles. And, really, who wants a reduced role in a fucking summer league? No one. I strained some friendships over that mess, and I probably deserve it. Maybe I shouldn’t give as much of a shit four years later, but I’m obsessed with narrative–the story in this mess, and without conflict there’s no story. So I think about it.

This weather is making me sound depressed. Here’s a photoshop to lighten things up. Some of my best work!

2007WorldChamps-Rebels_photo_poop_2 copy

The A Ducks are shaping up pretty well. We have a bunch of guys from the Militia, and a few ghosts of South Oakland past returning. I think it’ll be fun. We will be competitive. If the pitching holds up, we should contend with the other sandbagging teams for a title. I think those are realistic expectations.

Morgan’s Ducks, will be nasty this year, too, if the pitching holds up. The Fightin’ Ducks, is what it looks like since everyone still has Ducks jerseys. Morgan does things the right way, and helped the franchise through a rough patch last season that saw a near folding of the team, and a collapse down the stretch and a ton of games in the middle of nowhere. It sucks to run a team without a pitching staff, and guys who won’t commit.

Teams that left in the offseason: The Militia. Elliot. Maybe one other one. This will be the Ducks 12th season.

If it wasn’t for Elliot, we could conceivably have won two or three titles in the last four years. We’d have won in ’11 maybe ’12. What would have been awesome, is if we played the Cherokee in the finals or semis two years ago. But this is some space time continuum shit. Whatever. Elliot made the league better. Not upset I don’t have to face Barnes again. They beat us 20-3 one game, the year where only divisional games counted towards our record so we punted that one and got slaughtered.

The Militia broke up, the team that was the Orioles, Knights, Gray Bats, and Rebels who left the Black Sox who were the Stampeders.

militia

With Monroeville disbanded, who will defend the league?

Not Captain America.

Guthrie retired. The last holdover from the TC Jones era, Guth beat the Black Sox to win our most recent championship. Guth went 6 1/3 innings on the mound in a 5-3 win in the clinching game then blacked out and split his chin open that night celebrating. Blood and cheap whiskey everywhere. That’s always how it ends.

Goodnight Captain.

Quack.

Gamday 21: Ducks at Elliot

2013 South Oakland Ducks Baseball

Ducks

at

Elliot

6pm

Herschel Park

Screen Shot 2013-07-13 at 12.35.06 PM

Pittsburgh Standings as of  Sunday afternoon

We play 3 games in two days starting tonight against 2-time defending champion Elliot in Elliot.

We will have a forfeit win for one of our west end games, and play the other tomorrow night in a game that could be huge.

The Pirates have clinched a spot.

Carrick is technically still alive, but barely. (note: Carrick comes up as carsick in spell check)

Cranberry is falling fast.

The Militia went on a nice run as of late, but lost a tough one this morning.

The Black Sox play Carrick tonight, and still have to reschedule a game against the Bulldogs, before they play us tomorrow.

If we win-out we’re in.

Despite our respective records, we played Elliot close early this season, losing 9-7 and leaving a ton of guys on base.

Patten’s on the hill tonight.

Bad News for Elliot

Ducks Sweep Bulldogs: 7-5, 10-1

2013 South Oakland Ducks Baseball, Ducks win, South Oakland Ducks Baseball

Ducks Pitcher, Mark Guthrie, earned his first victory of the season Saturday going five and a third strong innings, before giving way to James Fago to recorded the 1 and 2/3 inning save.

Matt Johnston had 4 hits to lead the resurgent Ducks’ offense. Stahl and Skovron both hit doubles and had multi-hit games, and there were a lot of singles and walks. Goering drove in a run. 8 Ducks starters recorded hits, and everyone in the lineup reached safely at least once. I wish I could offer more specifics, but i don’t have the book and I was half asleep during the game. We got out to an early lead and held on. The Bulldogs had the winning run at the plate in the bottom of the 7th.

James Fago pitched a complete game for the victory in game 2. South Oakland scored 2 in the top of the first. The Bulldogs answered with a run in the bottom half of the inning. The score remained 2-1 until the top of the fifth or sixth, when South Oakland scored six runs. Skovron and Fago walked, Gwin singled to load the bases and Matt Limbach doubled to make the score 4-1. Then Guthrie, Fetter and Goering singled in succession. Garret Moore drove in a run with an rbi ground out. Fago doubled in the top of the seventh and scored on an rbi ground out by Limbach.

The Bulldogs were 10-2 coming into the double header. With the victories, South Oakland raised it’s record to 6-11, and is a half game behind  Monroeville (5-9) and Carrick (6-10) who sit in 8th and 7th place respectively.

After a 1-9 start, the Ducks have won 5 of  7.

quack, quack.

Standings, Playoff Push, etc

2013 South Oakland Ducks Baseball

South Oakland has a tough 3-game stretch coming up in which we play the artists formerly known as Day Toyota, and then a double header against the Bulldogs at John Herb the following weekend.

Standings as of 6/3:

Screen Shot 2013-06-03 at 12.59.21 PM

Upcoming games:

Screen Shot 2013-06-03 at 1.04.48 PM

(click to enlarge or just go to the league site.)

There is some serious separation going on here between the haves and have-nots.

It’s going to be a shit show at the bottom of the bracket. Conceivably we could see the militia, Carrick and pour house drop a few games coming up.

right now, Elliot, Clinton, the Bulldogs and Ashley Shaffer are battling for position in the top four and then it’s everyone else.

Elliot is good.

Cranberry sucks.

that’s my expert analysis.

Unfortunately our team is constructed as such that we can lose 15-1 to teams that suck because we lack pitching depth and infield depth, and sometimes our players don’t show up.

The winable  games we dropped to Carrick, Pour House and Cranberry and the forfeit to the Militia really hurt right now, but at least we’re finally putting up runs and winning games.

We have to steal a couple against teams that are above us in the standings, which is almost everyone.

We might be able to jump in the standings before we play this sunday.

We need all hands on deck Sunday. Jefferson Davis Hills is good. If we have to throw out a patchwork lineup with random single A players we will get embarrassed.

We can give them a game if everyone shows up.

This is most likely the last season of the Ducks as a Double A team, we at least need to make the playoffs and give it one final run.

quack.

Look at all those Ducks!

2013 South Oakland Ducks Baseball

South Oakland looks to turn its season around with a stretch of four games in four days starting this Thursday night in Brookline.

Upcoming Schedule:

Thurs 9pm vs. Black Sox at Brookline
Sat 1pm Doubleheader at Cranberry
Sun 12:30pm vs. Militia at Woodland Hills HS

quack

Game Day 6: Ducks vs. Bulldogs

2013 South Oakland Ducks Baseball

South Oakland Ducks (1-4)

vs

Pittsburgh Bulldogs (4-0)

9pm

SpringView Field

South Oakland returns to the Duck Pond looking to end a 2-game losing streak against the first place Bulldogs.

The Bulldogs are coming off an 8-4 win against Cranberry, in which Jeff Trojan’s mustache was named player of the game after intimidating Cranberry’s coach into several questionable in-game decisions including an ill-advised double switch that left them without a left fielder for two innings.

The Ducks are still learning the names of all their teammates.

We have rostered players, still away at school, who haven’t taken the field for us yet. This makes it hard to get a good read on where we stand depth wise, but isn’t an excuse for a pretty poor start.

Plenty of teams are missing guys this time of year.

We need to string a few wins together. No better place to start than against a top-tier opponent.

Let’s turn it around tonight.

Rumor has it, Jesse Ferko will make an appearance for South Oakland.

Baconator’s on the hill.

Bad News for the Bulldogs.

Clinton Sweeps South Oakland, 10-0, 8-5.

2013 South Oakland Ducks Baseball, pittsburgh NABA

Cherokee starting pitcher Jim Tessyier threw complete game, one-hit shutout in game one, allowing only 2 base runners. Clinton scored 6 runs in the bottom of the 5th to ten-run the Ducks.

South Oakland dropped a frustrating game two by a score of 8-5, and the team’s record now stands at 1-4.

During the game, Clinton’s manager’s back windshield was smashed out by a foul ball.

Despite the loss, the Ducks remain optimistic the team can put it together in time for a run at the playoffs.

We’ve got the pieces, we just need to keep grinding it out and the wins will come.

South Oakland plays next vs. the Bulldogs (2-1),  Monday night 9pm at Springview Field.

quack.

Playoff Gameday [2]: Ducks at Elliot

2012 South Oakland Ducks Baseball

South Oakland Ducks

at

Elliot

6pm

Herschel Park

***

We’re 1-7 all time against Elliot. The only win coming in game 2 of last year’s finals before we lost the series in three games.

As far as I’m concerned we’re playing with house money at this point.

Given the injuries we’ve suffered this season and all the unnecessary drama that has gone down, we can go out and play like we have nothing to lose. No one expects us to get out of this round. A win this evening will put us in great position.

Bad News for Elliot.