The showdown ended up being the closest game of the 2018 coed tournament, and although Sea Kittens never led, they battled until their final bittersweet swings before falling 14-13.
Mama Cat O’Brien knocks a hit to right early in the Cats’ 1-run loss to Harmony Royals.
Sea Kittens- runners-up in the past two Harmony Tournaments- opened 2018 play with a showdown against a big-swinging Harmony Royals squad. The showdown ended up being the closest game of the 2018 coed tournament, and although Sea Kittens never led, they battled until their final bittersweet swings.
Royals opened with a 3-run first behind the strength of the longball, and Dan DynamOele answered with a two-run shot for Sea Kittens in the bottom of the inning. And so the game progressed, inning after inning. Sea Kittens produced only a single run in the game without the benefit of one of its five home runs, and Royals didn’t score many- if any- without a dinger. And all was accomplished despite a tournament one-home run per inning rule.
The free-swinging Royals built a 7-2 lead midway through the third inning, but again DynamOele answered with a two-run blast. In between his homers, however, the Royals defense gobbled up what the Cats could muster, picking off well-hit balls from Mama Cat O’Brien, Roadrunner Hauer, and Flash Marsicek in the early innings.
Royals again built a 5-run lead, and again Los Gatitos answered with a two-run dong, this time Joe Hennessy providing the offense.
A door finally opened for the Cats in the fifth inning. After holding Royals to a lone run, Zen Master Rowe opened the Kitten half of the inning with a single. Hauer followed with a hit, and when a throw to first eluded the first baseman, Rowe hustled all the way around the bases. After Marsicek drew a one-out walk, Stephen Grutzik- of Pitches Be Tripping’ fame, and able to swing freely for the first time in the game- launched a no-doubter to left and drew Sea Kittens even at 10.
Royals jumped when opportunity knocked in the sixth, however, cashing a hit and two-out walk for a three-run go-ahead homer, and extended the advantage to 14-10 with a leadoff blast in the 7th after their catcher single-handedly squashed the Kittens in the bottom of the sixth, snaring two foul balls after Hennessy opened the inning with a double.
But DynamOele and Marsicek got the Sea Kitten seventh going with a walk and a hit, and Grutzik answered the bell again, drawing Sea Kittens within one with his second- and the team’s record fifth- home run of the game.
Now trailing 14-13, O’Brien followed with a knock, and Heidibadger Nelson set the stage with a clutch one-out hit to place Sweet Thing Harkins on second base as the tying run. Hennessy dug in, looking for a pitch to send to the right-center gap. He got it, and alas, he got all of it. A hard liner that cleared the fence by mere feet- for an out, as the Cats had already used their 7th inning quota.
Helplessly watching and hoping the ball would hit the fence, a dispirited Hennessy sighed a bad word as he walked off the diamond. Two out, Red Shoes Hewitt nearly kept the dream alive with an unplayable roller up third, but it curled foul, and the Cats’ dreams settled into the dust with it.
Game Notes
The loss ended the Cats’ record 8-game winning streak (but the MSCR league play streak remains alive at 7…)
Sea Kittens have a brief but lively history with Harmony Royals:
June 20, 2012, Sea Kittens rallied from a 13-4 deficit, scoring 10 runs while holding Royals scoreless for the final four innings and hanging on for a 14-13 victory. The Cats did not homer, but recorded 4 triples in that game- including one from O’Brien that drove in the decisive run and ended with her a step shy of an inside-the-park home run
August 18, 2013 Royals defeated Sea Kittens 12-8 in the first round of the Harmony Tournament, and launched The Schneid
Five home runs is a Sea Kitten record, topping four hit October 19, 2016 (Mercury Stevens 2, DynamOele, Hennessy) in a 21-5 win over Infield Flies. That game was on the Olbrich 1 275′ diamond, and this one was played with power hitters having to govern themselves multiple times!
Dave recorded hits in his first three at-bats before the Royals’ catcher snatched a could ball off his bat at the fence in the 6th, ending his consecutive on-base streak at 14, tied for third-longest in team history
Consecutive Times on Base: Longest Streaks in Team History (hits + walks)
Joe Hennessy 19 (7/20/2016- 8/21/2016)
Dan DynamOele 16 (9/13/2017- 6/6/2018)
Zen Master Rowe 14 (6/27/2018- 8/19/2018)
Dan DynamOele 14 (8/20/2017 – 9/6/2017)
Joe Hennessy 14 (8/31/2016 – 10/19/2016)
Doc Kornis 13 (6/25/2010 – 9/9/2010)
***
Mama Cat O’Brien 8 (9/6/2017- 9/13/2017)
Roadrunner Hauer 7 (8/1/2018- 8/8/2018)
Salmon Snacks
Stephen for playing with us, suffering through two at-bats after Dan homered, and giving us a wing and a prayer with 6 RBI in the final three innings. And taking a ball of the upper inner thigh in the name of the Sea Kittens. That is a dedicated sub, folks!
Brenna, Erin, and Jami, who all crushed balls that turned up as nothing but outs in the box score
Dan for keeping us in the game early with his two homers and play in the outfield
Sea Kittens
