Clearly Moguls kept their winning ways going with a sweep of the “M” teams — McGrath’s Sushi and Max Team — but both were hard fought see-saw battles. C.M. welcomed back veteran ace pitcher “Ronzoni” Hacker to the mound, having been away for the past two games while scouting prospects down in Florida. His team got off to a good start, scoring three runs in the top of the first. They had a chance for more, loading the bases but Hunter Pike hit into an inning ending double-play. M.S. answered right back, scoring three of their own to tie the game. Neither team could get anything going in the second inning. Angel Shannon broke the tie in the third, driving in Neal “The Cal Ripken of No CBKs” Giberti to give C.S. a one-run lead, 4-3. M.S. took their first lead of the game, 6-4, after Nate “Cookie” Cook and “Big” Josh Tarleton both had big run scoring doubles. C.M. tied it up in the fourth with Tucker “Short Hair Trendsetter” Zink and Jared “F’d Up Is More Fun” Hall both scoring. “Ronzoni” delivered his first Cold Beer K of the game to Cliff Melendy and Shannon had a sweet web gem when he threw out Nate Mispel at third, all part of a 1-2-3 inning to keep the score tied 6-6. M.S.’s new ace pitcher Jeremy Prior had a big fifth inning, getting all three of the outs including rare CBKs to Giberti and “Tall” Tom Gilligan. This was Giberti’s first CBK since June 20, 2012 versus The Heavy Hitters. Prior wasn’t able to get Shannon, though, and he broke the tie with a solo home run. M.S. tied it back up 7-7 off a “Bus” Bob Schaffner single that Zink was not able to hold onto long enough for the out. Prior delivered a lead-off CBK to Jackie “Blue” Livesey in the sixth, but C.M. regained the lead (8-7) when “Ronzoni” took a bases loaded walk to score Zink. C.M. turned up the defense in the final two innings keeping M.S. off the scoreboard and Judd “All Fired Up” Washburn cemented the victory with a three run blast in the seventh for the 11-7 win.
Washburn stayed hot in the next game vs. Max Team, blasting a two-run shot in the first and scoring Will “The Retirement King of Killington” Burdick to give his team a 2-0 lead. The defense stayed hot, too, shutting down M.T. 1-2-3. Pike had a nice looking sac in the second, scoring Jackie “Blue” to go up 3-0. Chris Major scored for M.T. to cut the lead 3-1 after two innings. Shannon drove in “DJ” Dave Hoffenberg to put C.M. back up three runs. Max “Down Under” Rowe went to work and punched in for a three-run game-tying home run, 4-4. Jackie “Blue” and Washburn had quite the connection that inning combining for all three outs. Zink drove in Gilligan and C.M. regained the lead 5-4. “Ronzoni” delivered a lead-off CBK to Braden Kietzman and his team failed to score to stay down one run. What goes around, comes around, and “Ronzoni” suffered a lead-off CBK of his own. The difference, though, is he went down looking and it was his first CBK since June 20, 2012, the very same game as Giberti’s last one. C.M. put runners on the corners with “DJ” Dave and Burdick but they were left stranded. Collin “Hungry Like The” Wolf knocked in two runs to give his team their first lead of the game, 6-5. Pitcher Johnny “Not So” Sharpe could not figure Washburn out and gave up his second homerun of the game to him to tie it 6-6. With two outs, Russell “The Love Muscle” Dalglish broke that tie, taking a bases loaded walk to regain the lead 7-6. His team had a chance for more but “Ronzoni” suffered his second CBK looking and left the bases loaded. A guy that has not struck out since 2012 now suffers back-to-back CBKs looking for the first time in his 20-year career. He was able to CBK Carl Greeley and keep M.T. scoreless in the sixth. “DJ” Dave led off the seventh with a single, just keeping it fair. His team followed suit with six hits and six runs to jump out to a 13-6 lead. Three of those were off a hammering home run by Gilligan. M.T. kept it interesting in the bottom of the seventh when Rowe hit a three-run, inside-the-park home run to cut the lead 13-9. Burdick gave it his all and crashed through the fence trying to make the catch. As he was taken out of the game, that and Hornitos fired up the team to get the remaining outs for the hard fought win.
Killington Resort played perfect and stayed perfect, shutting out the Outback 21-0. Speaking of perfect, Evan Anderson, Paul Blodorn and the “King of Spring” himself, Chandler Burgess were all four-for-four and combined for eight runs scored. Pitcher Matt Kinsman was en fuego limiting the Outback to five hits and delivering five CBKs. Nick “The Bat is Not on Fire” Melotti suffered two of them and he CBKd the side in the fourth to “Big” Shawn Morse, Scott “Scooter” Watelet and Alexis King. The Outback was able to deliver to CBKs to Justin Guth and Phil Dwyer. The lone bright spot for the Outback was Max Elles who had the team’s first hit. Elles broke his back snowboarding just four years ago and has made a remarkable recovery.
The Wobbly Barn stayed perfect too, but that’s perfectly losing every game so far this season. The latest team to deliver another loss to them was the OmyaRamas. The Wobbly only scored one run in this game and that was by all-star catcher Doreen Prisco-Araujo, mother of third basewoman Kayla Sarajian. Araujo was called up from the Medford Maulers for this game only. You would think the Wobbly would have scored more, seeing how they also borrowed Guth, Burgess and Dylan “D Money” Johnson for this game. Between the three of them, they could only muster three hits. The Wobbly only has five more tries for a win this season.
Standings:
1st – Killington Resort 8-0
2nd – McGrath’s Sushi 7-2
3rd – Clearly Moguls 6-2-1
4th – Max Team 4-3
5th – OmyaRamas 2-6
6th – Outback Pizza 2-7
7th – Wobbly Barn 0-9-1
Schedule:
Wednesday, July 5
Clearly Moguls vs Max Team at Killington 5:50 p.m.
Max Team vs Outback Pizza at Killington 7 p.m
Killington Resort vs McGrath’s Sushi at Bridgewater 5:50 p.m
Omyaramas vs Wobbly Barn at Bridgewater 7 p.m
Post-game party at the Clear River Tavern 8-11 p.m
Monday, July 10
Killington Resort vs Clearly Moguls at Killington 5:50 p.m
McGrath’s Sushi vs Max Team at Killington 7 p.m
Omyaramas vs Outback Pizza at Bridgewater 6:30 p.m
Wednesday, July 12
Outback Pizza vs McGrath’s Sushi atKillington 5:50 p.m
Wobbly Barn vs Clearly Moguls at Killington 7 p.m
Omyaramas vs Max Team at Bridgewater 5:50 p.m
Killington Resort vs Max Team at Bridgewater 7 p.m
Photo by Robin Alberti
A third base catcher gets airborne as a player slides into the base.
