Cats Cool off Brews

Summer made a cameo in Sea Kittens’ Spring season Thursday night, testing the mettle of the Cats and Brews on First?, who gamely battled  through the sticky 92-degree early evening contest.  When the wind, dust, and sweat settled, Sea Kittens (4-0) came out smelling like a fresh blossomed corpse flower and as owners of a well-earned 8-3 victory.  The win kept the Cats among the ranks of the Thursday night league’s three remaining unbeaten teams, and dropped Brews? (2-2) into a tie for 5th.

With a festive atmosphere on the Cats’ sideline and the stands filled with a number of spectators, the teams engaged in an at times brilliant defensive battle in which every run was scratched out.  Joe Hennessy started for Sea Kittens, and put behind him early-season control issues, and he and the Cats made several amazing escapes through the evening in holding the solid Brews? offense in check.

On the other side, Brews? rose to that challenge.  After holding the opponent scoreless in the top of the first inning, the Sea Kitten offensive machine seemed tuned up and ready to go, putting its first four runners on base and taking a 1-0 lead.  With a strong wind blowing in from left-center field, switch-hitting Cat Stephen Grutzik stepped into the left-handed hitters’ box.  Slash did what he does, and slashed a low laser down the first-base line that resulted in an audible THWACK as it found the first basemen’s glove.  Dan DynamOele made a (big) cat-like dive back to the bag, narrowly avoiding a double play on what seemed destined to be a base-clearing hit. 

“I don’t know how he didn’t blow up his hamstring getting back,” exclaimed Zen Master Rowe upon seeing the move.

One batter later, Mama Cat O’Brien smacked a hot shot up the middle that was speared and spun for that inning-ending twin killing, and the Sea Kitten rally was over as quickly as it began.

Shaking off the surprising result, the defense went right back to work, and deftly disposed of the Brews? in one-two-three fashion, and went back to work with the bats.  Hennessy lobbed a triple to right field to open the bottom of the inning, and dashed home on a productive groundout to short from Roadrunner Jami Hauer to extend the Sea Kitten lead to 2-0, but again, that’s where the scoring ended.

Brews? broke through in the third, stringing hits to score a run and put runners on second and third base with nobody out, but the ball didn’t leave the infield again as Hennessy induced a strikeout, a pop up, and the ended the inning with a strikeout looking on a pitch that could only be described as “dirty.”  Indeed it was maybe 5’11 3/4″ and 30 mph dirty.

Their advantage cut to 2-1, the rally-killing sparked the Kittens.  The Pup led off the bottom of the third with a hit, and with one out Zen Master Rowe added another.  Alex Latzka stepped to the plate and saw nothing he liked, and was sent to second base in very un-Puma like fashion, but it scored what could have been a controversial run, had the other team heeded Mad Dog’s exhortation to memorize every nuanced rule of the league as well as Sea Kittens had.  Schultzy Oele subsequently got robbed of a hit, but DynamOele blasted a double to deep center to plate two runs. He seemed destined for third, but got tangled in his shoe laces and made a very uncat-like dive-crawl back to second, narrowly avoiding an inning-ending tag.

Now trailing 5-1, Brews? answered the bell and struck for two runs to tighten the gap again, and summarily dismissed eight of the next nine Sea Kitten batters.  The pressure mounted for the Kitten defense in the 5-3 contest.  The top of the fifth inning opened with Hennessy inducing a dribbler back towards the mound from the Brews? third baseman, which Hennessy calmly fielded and equally calmly launched down the right-field line, summoning the Ghost of Sea Kitten Innings Past.  A runner on third with nobody out, and once again the Cat defense got nasty-good, with Sunshine Curtis snagging a foul ball- with a smile, of course- another strikeout, and a long, inning-ending fly out.

As the Kitten offense continued to stall, Hennessy incited more drama in the top of the sixth by walking the first two batters he faced.  Again, the defense dialed in, the runners made no advance, and the would-be rally died in the Puma’s paws in deep center field.

“I don’t know if I got tired in the heat or what,” Hennessy said to himself when he interviewed himself after the game, when asked about the walks. “But sometimes I think pitching with runners on base gets my attention and gets me dialed in, especially in a close game.  That was a fun one to pitch.”

Still hoping to get some insurance runs, the Cats seemed destined to be thwarted by Brews? again, as Rowe and Latzka were retired on fly balls- Latzka’s a tailing drive to the deepest part of the ballpark that spun the centerfielder dizzy before he made an almost over-the-shoulder catch.

But Schultzy was not to be denied twice in a row, and she lashed a two-out single to center. DynamOele followed with a walk, and Slash stepped into the right-handed batters’ box.  With the left field line unguarded, he turned on an inside slowpitch, ripping it to the corner to bring home Schultzy.  Oele seemed ticketed for home and rumbled almost to the Line of No Return, before slamming on the brakes and scramble-diving back into third in a somewhat big-cat-like manner to narrowly avoid an inning-ending tag.  Mama Cat dug in and followed with The Dagger- a clean single to left-center to score two more and extend the Sea Kitten advantage to 8-3.  Hennessy followed with a hit, and Hauer popped what appeared to be another hit to center, only to see it snatched just above the tips of the grass by the Brews? rangy outfielder.

Avoiding any further unnecessary drama in the 7th, Sea Kittens worked around a lone base hit to close out the game and retire to a splendid after-party on the sidelines.

Salmon Snacks

• All around- that was really fun and well-played!!!
• Thanks to Sea Kitten LEGEND Tommy Tom Tom Seahorse Shabidu Cichosz, Jr. for coming out to the game and keeping score
• Dan for safely diving back to 1st, 2nd, and 3rd bases in the course of the game
• Katherine for talking a good game behind the plate
• Stephen for a stellar day at 3B
• All the outfielders for a flawless game
• Jess, Dan, Stephen & Erin for the big 2-out rally in the 6th to give us some breathing room
• Joe for a solid game on the mound

Sea Kittens Great Fillet of the Game

You didn’t have to see it to believe it. Vote here for the Sea Kittens Great Fillet of the Game!  Congrats to Z-Force for capturing the week 3 fillet for wearing a remarkable softball tattoo in the Name of the Kittens.  

Game Notes

• Game time temp was 35* F higher than last week
• Sea Kittens are 4-0 for only the second time in team history.  The team’s best start was 6-0 in Fall, 2017.
• For the first time in Sea Kittens 193-game history, the team played back-to-back games with ZERO strikeouts!
• After scoring in the first three innings of this game, SK had scored in 17 consecutive innings, battering the old record of 11 straight innings.
• Sea Kittens are 47-22 when holding an opponent scoreless in the first inning, and 31-9 when holding opponents scoreless in the first two innings.
• Jess’s first-inning walk was the 7th of her career, and significantly tightened the gap between her and Sunshine Curtis as “Sea Kitten least likely yo play lawyer ball.”
• Dave scored his 200th career run in the 3rd inning- he scored his first Sea Kitten run May 18, 2011.  He tripled in his first-ever SK at-bat and came home with his first career run on a Matt “Doc” Kornis single in the first inning of a 22-3 loss to Pedro’s.
• Dan made is 400th career plate appearance in the 1st, and collected a single.  His debut was June 11, 2014.  The details of his first appearance were burned in The Cleansing that ended The Schneid, but he went 1-2 with a double, walk and 3 RBI in his debut.
• Four games into this campaign, Erin collected her 9th & 10th RBI- second-most in any full season- for a SK woman (Erin had 14 runs batted in during the Fall, 2017 season)