Gold Country Buzzards

Game: August 30, 2015

Buzzards stomp Astros again, 23-4

The last game of the regular season was against the last place Astros on a late August afternoon at Playfields Park. That situation could have been yucky with a hot summer day and a high misery index game against a last place team throwing it in or worse. As it turned out the day was fabulous with a nice breeze and a high of 90° in Davis. And, the Astros came in force with a feisty 15 and wives for a fun match and their planned after-game team pizza party at Playfields.

The Buzzards were missing some key players due primarily to injury and the Burning Man Festival. To fill-in, Paul 'General' Lee stayed on active Buzzard duty for an additional week for a strong team of 11 players for the game. On Sunday morning the three Burners got together and called to wish the team good luck and briefly described their early experiences with a monstrous wind storm the day before and sensory overload with bouncing fun bags.

The starting pitcher for the 20th game of the 2015 season for the Astros was veteran righty Roy 'Dutch' Van Kempen #10. On the mound for the Ol' Buzzards was the versatile right-hander, Rick 'Salmo' Salmeri #6. The Buzzards were also determined to have some fun with this game and planned to have Salmo play every defensive position during the course of the game. That would be a Buzzard first and it is still a baseball rarity.

The visiting Buzzards hopped on the scoreboard first with a couple of runs. Salmo opened the game with a lead-off walk. The General followed suit with a base-on-balls. After an out, Mike 'Mickey' Wilson loaded the bases with his full-count walk. During Kelly 'Cagey' Garcia's at-bat, Dutch was called for a balk to send Salmo home and move the other runners up 90 feet. Cagey then bounced into a fielder's choice to put runners on the corners. With two outs and Fred 'Freddie' O' Donoghue at the plate, the steal sign was given to Cagey at first. Garcia left a bit too soon as Dutch threw over to first base to put Cagey in a pickle between first and second. While the run-down proceeded, General Lee scored from third base before the tag-out ended the inning.

The Astros banged out three hits and one run in the bottom half of the first frame for a 2-1 score after the first dig. The Ol' Buzzards tacked on three more runs to keep the pressure on the Astros. Freddie started the scoring rally with a lead-off single to center-field. Cagey ran for the catcher, Freddie. Tom 'Tomahawk' Keatley followed with a laser beam single to left-center to put runners at first and second. Later with two outs and runners in scoring position and Dan 'Wookie' Wukmir at-bat, a wild pitch scored Cagey from third. After Wookie walked and stole second, Taylor 'Welzy' Welz slapped the 3-1 pitch into center-field to score Tomahawk and Wookie before getting trapped in a run-down. The score after two innings was 5-1 Buzzards.

The Buzzards feasted on Astros’ pitching in the top of the third. The gorging included 11 runs and seven hits and further flamed with three errors. Salmo led-off with a sharp single to right-center. The General walked and was forced out at second on a fielder's choice. Mickey followed with a run scoring infield hit. Cagey then swatted the first pitch down the left-field line for a run-scoring double. Up next, Freddie laced a single to center for an RBI. With Tomahawk at-bat, Cagey got a good jump from third and scored on a wild pitch. Tom then sent the best hit of the day to deepest left-center, however, the Astros have a pretty good center-fielder, Corey ‘Black’ Swan (also 3-for-3 with a double) that ran a long way for an excellent reaching-out back-handed catch.

With two outs and one on, Jim ‘Milli’ Milligan earned a walk on a seven-pitch battle with a tiring Dutchman. Next, Evy sent the 1-2 pitch on a low trajectory line into center for a single and load the bases. Batting next, Wookie took the 1-2 pitch on his back foot to push in run number five and reload the bases for Welzy. A salivating Taylor then punched the 1-1 offering into center-field for a two-run single. Batting around in the inning, Salmo was then nicked by a pitch to load 'em up again. The bases loaded opportunity was not wasted by the General. Lee smacked the 0-1 pitch into left-field to score two runs with the base knock. To finish off the scoring, Gregg 'Surf Dawg' Novotny belted the 1-0 fastball down the left-field line for two ribbies to make the score 16-1 Buzzards.

The Astros scored one in their half of the third inning on a couple of hits and a fielder's choice for a 16-2 score.

The greedy Ol' Buzzards put three more on the board in the fourth. After Cagey opened with a full-count walk, Freddie hit a flare to left-center to put two runners on base. Tomahawk, robbed in his last at-bat in deep center, sent another rocket shot to deep left-center, this time, for a run-scoring double. Up next, Milli scorched the second pitch into left-field for a two-run single and a 19-2 game.

The Astros got 13 hits in the game, so they did not give up and they added a run to the score with three hits in between two strike-outs in the bottom of the fourth. The score after a long four innings, nearly two hours, was 19 to 3.

The Buzzies put another run in the score book in the sixth. Cagey led-off with a high chopper through the infield for a base hit. Freddie followed with his fourth hit of the game, a liner into right-field. After a fielder's choice out, Milli knocked in the run with a line-drive to left-field.

The Lastros also tacked on a run in the sixth frame. A little two-out rally with back-to-back doubles and a single produced the one run and a 20-4 score.

The Buzzards could not help themselves and continued to feast on the Astros’ pitching with three runs in their last at-bats of the regular season. Welzy started it off with a full-count walk. Salmo and the General proceeded to get on base via tough grounders to the shortstop and fill the bases with Buzzards. Surf Dawg, batting next, poked a hit to right to score Welzy. Still with full bases, Mickey walked on five pitches to score Salmo with his fourth run of the game. Kelly ended the scoring with a deep fly-out to center-field to bring home General Lee with the last and 284th run of the 2015 regular season.

The final score of the three-hour and five minute, seven inning game was 23-4.

Buzzard pitching was solid, as usual. Rick started the game and pitched the first inning on the trek to successfully play all positions during the game. Salmo threw 22 pitches (13 strikes & 9 balls) in facing six Astros. Salmeri gave up one run on three hits. Welz was the hurler from the second to the fourth frames. T-Welz threw 51 pitches (34 strikes & 17 balls) while facing 15 batters. Taylor gave up two runs on six hits with no walks and five strike-outs. Surf Dawg was on the mound for the last three innings. Gregg faced 13 Astros while throwing 34 pitches (21 strikes & 13 balls). Novotny gave up one run on four hits with one walk and one strike-out.

The Buzzard offense faced four different pitchers during the game and adjusted well to the various styles and speed in pounding out 19 hits to add to the 10 walks for the 23 runs. The hit club for the game included: Cagey-2, Evy, Freddie-4, General, Mickey, Milli-2, Salmo, Surf Dawg-2, Tomahawk-2, and Welzy-3. The ribbies were delivered by: Cagey-2, Freddie, General-2, Mickey-2, Milli-3, Surf Dawg-3, Tomahawk, Welzy-4, and Wookie. The 23 runs were scored (in batting order) by: Salmo-4, General-3, Surf Dawg, Mickey, Cagey-3, Freddie-3, Tomahawk-2, Milli, Evy, Wook-2, and Welzy-2. The Astros' pitchers were wild at times and walked 10 Buzzies. The free passes to first base went to: Cagey, General-2, Mickey-2, Milli, Salmo-2, Welzy, and Wook. The extra base hits (doubles) were slugged by: Cagey in the third and Tomahawk in the fourth.

The Ol' Buzzard defense was tough and committed no errors. Of the 21 defensive outs in the game there were six strike-outs and one double play. The double play occurred in the seventh inning with Astros at the corners and no outs. The runner at first base broke for second on the pitch. The short fly-out to Mickey in left-field put the runner too far away from the bag at the catch. The ball beat the retreating runner easily to first base for a U7-7-3 double out play.

Salmo played every position and had two put-outs and two assists during the game. Rick had a put-out at first base (1-3) to end the second inning and made the first out of the third with an assist play at second base (4-3). As the catcher, Rick had an assist in the sixth on a pop-up on top of home plate with the ball bouncing off of the catcher to the pitcher for a play at first base (2-1-3), and a put-out awarded to the catcher on the strike-out that ended the game.

Cagey was busy at first with 10 put-outs. The General had one assist playing second base in the third and a fly ball out to right-field in the fourth. Surf Dawg had one put-out and one assist playing third in the first inning. The other two assists came from the mound on a come-backer in the fifth and the 2-1-3 pop-up in the sixth. Mickey had his assist and put-out all on the same play in the seventh inning for the DP. Freddie had two put-outs as the catcher and Milli had three behind the plate. Welzy had two put-outs and four assists playing second, pitcher, then shortstop and first base. Evy had just one assist in the game at shortstop. The Astros stayed away from Wookie, who saw no action at third or second base, during the game.

There were three evil pop-ups in the game. Surf Dawg handled the first high pop-up near third base successfully in the first inning with two on. The second one at home plate found the ground after bouncing off the catcher’s glove, but bounced right to Surf Dawg a few feet away, for a throw-out at first and a 2-1-3 play. The third pop-up was the next play and it was caught by Welzy playing shortstop.

Wow, what a bunch of ball playing studs.