December 20, 2007 - Game Recap & Banquet Report

Players/Attendees: Pops, Crato, Mark, James, Joe Friend, Johnathan, Pace

WP: Crato (Gm 1); James (Gm 2)
LP: Pace (Gm 1); Mark (Gm 2)

HR: Crato (1)




This event was called for by our league historian, Mark, who noted that this would be the 10-year anniversary of the inaugural wiffle banquet marked by Pops's retirement. And it was to be of special importance because it coincided with Joe Friend's marriage eve eve.

We started off with a casual dinner at Pei Wei where, miraculously, all 6 of us ordered white rice instead of brown rice with our plates. Only Joe and I followed the implicit dress code of wearing our "old trusty nasties". James made a joke about Kurk Cameron's "groin pains" and Mark made hot-girl dance moves aimed at Joe; this was about the extent of the raucous bachelor behavior for the evening.

After dinner we made our way over to the church gym for the first ever league indoor game. We had to change the rules dramatically for the new venue and about half of the games' outs came as a result of hitting the ball at the roof before it cleared the first obstacle (roughly 5 feet in front of the pitcher's mound. We also imposed the rule that if anyone from the building (be it bishopric member or practicing ward choir singer) poked their head in the door, then the person up to bat would be penalized one strike; this occured to me and Mark only. The second game ended in controversy when Mark tried to hit a ball off the bounceback from the ceiling divider (based on a previously stated ruling) but it was ruled that since it bounced twice it was "unclean" and a compromise was reached that if he could make a 3-pointer the play would stand as a single. But he missed.

After that we commenced with the banquet portion of the evening. Pops kicked it off as the MC with a wiffle glove "wot wot" chant or something. Nobody understood its significance. Then Mark made a brief introduction and I presented awards to all in attendance.

• Pops - The FoxCam Award
• James - Yellow Vest
• Joe - Joe-i-fied Award
• Johnathan - Most likely to suddenly break John's "Longest Homerun" record
• Crato - Double Threat
• Mark - The Passion of Lambert Field
• Pace - MVP (Self-appointed)

Afterwards Mark organized a spin the bottle variation with a wiffleball bat. First Joe spun and then we didn't know who it was pointing at cause we weren't sure if the barrel or the handle ruled in this situation. So we had Johnathan spin it but we still hadn't resolved the barrel/handle issue. Then Mark suggested that Joe, Johnathan, and James run a race with their hips connected but nobody did it so we transitioned over to Wiffle truth or dare. Some truth or dare highlights:

• John acts out a scene from Bladerunner
• James does a topless summersault
• Crato accepts, and succeeds in, the challenge to fart
• Pace can't think of a high-priest joke
• Johnathan comes clean and confesses: "Pops is strange"

This was followed by a 10-year sketch presented by the English literate, James. We discussed posting a copy on the blog but realized that too many names and incidents would have to be redacted that it wouldn't make any sense. We then had a heartfelt Joe Friend tribute ceremony capped off by a framed photo of the famous Joe friend pitching motion. Then one of the high-ups in the stake opened the door and stared at us for a while in disbelief before contenting himself that we had committed to turn off the lights before leaving.

Game & Banquet Report by Pace Barker

October 13, 2007 - Game Recap

Crato, Pace, and Spade Whittemore (Paul’s Father-In-Law) vs. Mark and Paul

WP: Crato
LP: Mark
Score: 11-6
HR: Spade W (2); Mark (2); Crato [1 (GS)]; Pace (1); Paul (0)

Mark looked sharp in the early going pitching his way out of a bases-loaded jam with no damage in the top of the 1st. Crato started out looking wild giving up 3 or 4 runs in the bottom half of the inning by issuing some walks and giving up some extra base hits to Mark (who continues to hit the ball well since he changed over to the Easton bat given him by Golden Boy). Then in the 2nd our bats started to come to life and Spade hit the first homer for our team (his first career HR) by depositing the ball into the bushy tree just beyond the foul pole over the left field fence. He followed it up with one of the best unwitting “disses” in league history (though I seem to remember an unwitting diss on John’s hitting coming from Jane Lambert that may beat this one) by telling Mark it was a “nice pitch”. Later, both Crato and I hit homeruns that were just outside of Paul’s reach, mine over the wooden gate in deep left with Paul crashing into (and bending) the fence with his two arms outstretched like a mummy, and Crato’s in the bushes in right center with Paul setting and jumping backwards creating a gorilla-size stir in the bushes.

The luck would just get worse for Mark on the mound as the game wore on. Mark tried to chase down a Crato foul ball along the driveway and just missed it and ended up losing his footing on the loose gravel and sustaining some cuts to his push-off leg. Later, Crato dinked a ball over the pitcher’s head in shallow right. With Mark taking no thought for his body, and Paul barreling in from the outfield, they met in what has to be the nastiest wiffle collision of all time. The blow caused Mark to fly backwards and his shattered glasses upwards. He lay in the dirt for a good while kicking his legs back and forth and moaning (so we could tell he wasn’t faking) and then he got up, sipped some water, and finished the inning. Turns out most of the blow was absorbed in his left eye and he was apparently coughing up blood later in the day. He’s currently listed as day-to-day. We called the game after the 3rd inning on account of needing to help everyone else set up for the wedding reception. In calling the game we all huddled around the pitcher’s mound and recalled our favorite Mark injuries. Mine was when he dove backwards on a sprint for a fly ball on the sidewalk in right field of Lambert Memorial and you could hear his hips clank against the concrete. Paul & Crato liked the time when he went head-first into the prickly bushes and had to have surgery to get a pricker out of his hand. Spade declined to comment.

Also, based on his recent struggles up in the Provo league*, we were all interested to see how Paul would play at Lambert Original in his first appearance as a married man. He ended up something like 1-for-5 or 1-for-6 with a Chavez y Chavez y Chavez single in his last AB.

Game Report by Pace Barker

*From the Provo Sports Bureau, Paul’s married-man stats at Lambert Memorial this season:
Player: Lambert, Paul; Hits: 0, Avg: .000; Slg%: .000; OBP: .000; OPS: .000; 2B: 0; 3B: 0; HR: 0; RBI: 0; K: 2

September 15, 2007 - Game Recap

Crato, Pace, and Mark vs. James and Jason

WP: Mark
LP: James
HR: Crato (6), Mark (10), Pace (3), James (1), Jason (1)

This was a matchup of the has-recently-played team against the hasn't-played-in-a-long-time-and-it-showed team. James started for his team and labored from the get-go. By the 2nd inning he appealed to some unwritten rule that if you give up 3 straight dingers you have to let someone else pitch. Jason came in to relieve and gave it a yeoman's effort, pitching despite severe elbow, knee, back, and shoulder injuries. He got the first 4 batters he faced out with a tantalizing high curve ball...but then we hit 4 straight homers. James came back in to relieve and gave up 2 more homers extending the streak to 6. I came in to close it out in the 5th and surrendered a solo shot to Jason, and a strike em' out bat toss to James.

Game Highlights:

• Mark, Crato, and I tied the record set by Crato (in a 1-on-1-on-1 game) hitting 6 straight homers
• One game after his miraculous 2x homer through the window, Crato, batting lefty, dinked one into right field and came within 1 or 2 inches of repeating the feat through the same back window of the same car. He was credited with a solo homerun.
• Jason, also batting lefty, came within inches of sending the bat through the same window on an inadvertent bat toss. He was credited with a strike. Mark suffered momentary confusion and briefly ran towards the ball that lay near the garage door since the tossed bat made him think that the ball was in play. As a preventative measure I put some tennis grip on the bat handle.
  
• One game after enforcing the "the ball is still live after it hits a part of the field" rule, James robbed Mark of a homer off the centerfield bushes.
• Crato, on his "all or nothing" campaign, recorded only homeruns or outs, nothing in between.
• Various flashy defensive plays led us to declare, "Defense is Back."

Game Report by Pace Barker

September 1, 2007 - Game Recap

Crato, Joseph, and Mark vs. Desi, Pops, and Pace

Crato felt pitching running through his blood that morning, so he took the mound and threw a hitless first inning. Take note that it was three strikeouts and three walks, so the control wasn’t all there, but it was still reminiscent of the old Crato. Then he assigned the batting order for our team, which turned out to be a good call too; our first 8 runs were all from 2 run homers. Desi started for the other team and actually pitched a decent game, even though he kept giving up ding dongs. Pace came in to relieve Desi in the 4th inning, and quickly gave up a double home run to Crato, which was the highlight of the game. With one man on, Crato sliced the ball to right field. Just as the ball was diving for a bounce, some wicked wiffle action lifted it just high enough to enter Crato’s own car through the back open window (half open, mind you), and suddenly the game was out of reach. We all felt weird after we held hands and danced in a circle for the celebration, but the damage was done. The final score was something like 12-8.

There were some allegations that Crato cheated. First, he hit the double homer into his own car which was parked suspiciously close. Second, he kept summoning Owen to the mound when he was getting frazzled. Third, Desi found a “foreign substance” on the ball Crato was pitching with. All of these allegations came from Pace, who throughout his life has dealt with an inferiority complex, and this is the way he deals with it. So that’s cool.

Game highlights:

• First ever double home run through an open car window
• Game had already ended when Mark conceded that, as center fielder, he had not made the final call on a disputed pitch to Desi, whose at bat ended in an out. So the game was restarted and Crato walked Desi. Then Pace grounded out, or was that Pops? I can’t remember. Anyway, the end of the game being recalled and play resuming is a record.
• Pops had an at bat where he Tony Womacked one into the bush on 3-2 and then drew a walk on the very next pitch.

Game Report by Mark Lambert

August 11, 2007 - Game Recap

Desi and Crato vs. Paul and Pace

This was Paul's first start as an engaged/married man. Crato hinted at a special day at the mound but it ended after I hit a leadoff homer. The score escalated on both sides pretty fast so we changed it to 2 outs per inning. We padded the lead in the 5th headed to the bottom half with a 24-13 lead (or as Desi put it, "we only need to hit 3 grand slams to win"). Paul started struggling on the mound and opted not to call in relief. I'm not sure we even recorded one out before they put up a 12-spot and won the game. Let the record show I didn't choke. I guess I mishandled a fast grounder off the Cesar E. Chavez y Chavez y Chavez Ravine, but I think the official score was a "hit".

Game highlights:

• The outfielder/SS didn't record a single out the entire game.
• The rill in the shortstop position at Lambert Field was officially named Cesar E. Chavez y Chavez y Chavez Ravine. The name comes from a few different sources. First, the Dodgers Play in Chavez Ravine, which is named after Cesar E. Chavez who was a civil rights leader who loved wiffleball. Second, the character Jose Chavez y Chavez from Young Guns was played by Lou Diamond Phillips, who was Pop’s favorite actor after he saw Stand and Deliver. The final Chavez is in honor of Chavez Walker, a great and dedicated wiffleball player from 1998 – 1999, best known for his high batting average and good nature.

Game Report by Pace Barker