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
South Oakland (1-7) lost an 9-7 heartbreaker to defending champion Elliot (3-1-1) Wednesday night in Spring Hill.
Trailing 1-0 in the bottom of the first the Ducks broke out of their season long slump and put four runs across to take an early lead. Fago doubled in Gwin and Owens, Ciccone drove in Fago, and scored on a single by Ferko, I think.
Elliot answered with a six-run second, and added a run in the fourth.
South Oakland chipped away scoring one run in the third, fourth and fifth, and trailed 8-7 going into the bottom of the sixth when the Ducks had runners on second and third with no outs and couldn’t get a run across. Elliot’s relief pitcher struck out the side after a walk and a hit and a wild pitch started the inning.
Elliot added a run in the top of the seventh.
South Oakland had the tying run at the plate in the bottom of the seventh.
The Ducks next game is saturday at 5pm against the Militia at Beedle Park.
This was a tough one. We played a real good team close, but came up short.
We’re playing better, but we’re running out of time to get wins.
We have to go at least 10-6 in our last sixteen games at this point.
It’s possible.
One game at a time.
quack.
South Oakland needs a win today. There’s not much more to it. Hopefully everyone shows up and we can put our best lineup on the field.
I think it’s going to start coming together for us, and if this team we’re playing can’t even come up with a team name they don’t deserve to win. Seriously just pick something.
Randy is probably starting, but who knows.
Bad News for Cranberry.
I left before it went final, but we were down 7-0 in the top of the seventh, and were being one-hit.
The Bulldogs scored five in the top of the fifth to blow it open.
So many walks.
There is some fantastic facial hair on the Bulldogs this year.
We’ve got to start hitting.
I’ve been using this generic icy hot, because i’m old, and my joints don’t work and this goop turns the inside of my uniform a brilliant bright blue and it doesn’t really help my shoulder and elbow that much but that blue color makes me wonder how toxic it is and if i’m perhaps going to have some kind of blood disease now. Man, would that be something.
The Ducks need some kind of spark real bad right now.
We need to play the Black Sox soon, because you can’t help but get fired up for those games when you walk across the broken cement bleachers, through the cigarette smoke hanging everywhere and drop your gear by the mud pit full of mosquitoes that smells like a dead dog that’s been rotting there since the last frost of winter. And maybe a Sox fan hitting one of our players with a half-empty empty gin bottle could provide that spark.
It seems like none of the teams in our league have any character anymore. There’s no more shit talking and hatred and I miss it. Teams are too classy, at least outwardly. Even the Cherokee are only shady in the front office, and really i liked it when their catcher was giving us shit and we threw at him. Of course he scored and we lost but at least it was something exciting other than the blue stain on my shirt. The Ducks certainly don’t have an identity right now, other than a team that doesn’t hit and usually gets good enough starting pitching to keep us in games, and that is a poor identity for a baseball team.
We’ll see what kind of heart we have in the upcoming games as we edge closer to must-win territory. We’ll either come together and turn it around or it’s gonna be a long summer. I’m optimistic because that’s my nature and we have the talent, but sans gin bottle we need something/someone to light a fire under us.
South Oakland plays at Cranberry this Sunday at 5pm.
Quack.
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.
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.
The Duck Pond is retired. The South Oakland Ducks of the North Side will not have a home field this season. I’ll miss it, but not really. bad hops on that field allowed me to hit over .400 for six of the last seven seasons and Spring View was host to some of the most dominating pitching performances in Ducks history. Hopefully i’ll have time to give it a proper send off at some point. I’m sure we’ll get a random rainout game scheduled there. the Ducks can’t thank the league enough for working with us to help keep the team swimming, and allow me to reuse all the sweet Baconator photoshops from a couple years ago. The Black Sox almost became the team to beat this season…
***
The TJ Morgan lead-South Oakland Ducks will open the season this Saturday 4/13
5pm
at Beedle Park
vs Day Toyota.
Buy American.
Quack.
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.
Anthony DeFilippo drove in the winning run in the bottom of the seventh and James Fago pitched a complete game for the victory. scattering 4 hits and one walk to lead South Oakland to the victory over the Monroeville Militia Sunday night.
The Militia led 1-0 when Dan Stell scored on an RBI triple by Lombardi in the top of the fourth.
The Ducks answered in the bottom half of the inning when Jesse Ferko reached after a strikeout and a dropped third strike, stole second, advanced to third on a past ball, and then stole home.
it was technically a past ball, but that backstop is six inches behind the plate. Still a great hustle play.
The Ducks pushed the lead to 3-1 in the bottom of the sixth: Bob Swartwout hustled out a ground ball to deep short and reached on an error by the first baseman, Fago singled, and after both runners advanced on a past ball, TJ Morgan delivered a 2-run single.
The Militia tied the game at 3 in the top of the seventh on a two-run, two out double by Banner.
In the bottom of the seventh Gwin led off with a bunt single, advanced to second on a past ball, and scored the winning run on DeFilippo’s single to center.
The Militia’s starting pitcher Joe Stupka left South Oakland earlier in the season due to scheduling conflicts, and struck out 15 Ducks in the loss.
What a game.
This recap in no way does justice to how tense and well played the game was.
South Oakland will play Elliot in a best of three series in the league semifinals starting this weekend.
Quack.
Fago
Bad News for the Militia.
South Oakland Ducks Baseball 