RAIN STOPS PLAY - MAY 31ST

No practice tonight. The grounds are soggy and it will be cold and windy. We will practice on Thursday, June 2nd, at 5:30 PM. Pinole Valley Park.

2011 SCHEDULE

The 2011 Schedule is out and can be found here. That's the schedule for the entire league. You can also check the calendar and team schedule on our team's website. The upcoming games listing can also be found on the home page. You can even click on the SCHEDULE tab above.

I'm not going to have fifteen different people call or email me to ask when our next game is, right?

SOFTBALL GEAR FOUND CHEAP ONLINE

I was looking at softballsavings.com and spotted some pretty good deals. They have mens black softball pants by Rawlings (size XXL only) marked down from $25.70 to $5.93. They also have women's batting gloves by Under Armour for $8.48. It's a site that's worth a look.

MAY 19TH BATTING PRACTICE

It was a light turnout for Thursday's practice. Gabrielle, Nina, Gary, Brandon, and myself came out to play. I shot some video during batting practice so we can see how we're swinging. I didn't notice a spider web on the fence where my camera was set up so you'll see it blowing about in the wind. I hope you won't find it too annoying.

Following the videos are some still shots. Among them is a sequence from one of Gabrielle's first at bats followed by a sequence from one of her later at bats. In the first at bat she's just trying to get a feel for what she's doing. She's way out in front of the pitch and out on her front leg by the time the pitch arrives. All she could do was push her hands at it. There's almost no follow-through after contact. In the second sequence, you can see she stayed back on the pitch and put a hard swing on it with a nice follow-through. She made a lot of progress in just one practice session. Very impressive!

NEWS

We have a new addition to our team. Jansa Williams, a BA in Mod 3, has agreed to join our team. She has a class on Thursdays through next week but she will be free to play Thursdays after that. Jansa is available to practice on Mondays so we'll see her at Fernandez Park next week. We now have seven women on our roster which gives us a greatly reduces the chances of a forfeit. It wouldn't hurt us to add one more.

That reminds me, our schedule will be made soon and Paul Martin wants to know if there's a specific week we would prefer to have our bye (a week without a game). We're going to be without Mandi from June 26 through July 21. I will out of the state from June 23 through July 8. Does anyone else have leave scheduled during the summer? If we have a week we know we're going to be missing some players, that's when we should have our bye.

The players from outside SSA we thought we had lined up to play with us had to drop out. So for now, we won't have any players from outside SSA on our roster.

OUTLAW TOURNAMENT - ROUND TWO

Brandon has been working on the second (no longer annual) Outlaw Softball Tournament for SSA offices in California. The games will be played on Saturday, August 6th and the location will be Fresno. I don't have much yet in the way of detail but you can check the tournament link above (you can also find it in the Softball Links to the right).

Assuming this tournament takes place, do we want to enter the PC Bricks in it? For the March tournament we had a mixture of players from our team, the TD's and the Mod Squad. Since this tournament will take place during our league season, we'll already be together and playing regularly. I was thinking me might try to get our own team in it this time. Who wants to play?

UM, WHERE'D YOU GET THAT IDEA?

I just learned that Stra8 Ballin' believed they were invited to our practice tonight (which has been rained out). What? Our former teammate, Gena Noble, was invited to practice with us -- as was Marcus Smith from Mod Sqaud. Since we've been getting no more than six of our players out to our practices thus far, I invited them so we'd have enough players to run some drills. There weren't any teams invited to join us. I know it wasn't Gena who expanded the invitation.

PRACTICE RAINED OUT

No practice tonight (May 16th). Our next practice will be Thursday, 5:00 PM at Pinole Valley Park.

BATTING PRACTICE VIDEO

I had the camera out at Thursday's practice. I got some video of Mariza, Carlos, Derrick, and Richie swinging the bat before my batteries ran out. Had I been paying attention, I could have changed them and got the rest of the team. Unfortunately, these video segments won't play on your computer at work. SSA's security software will block them.

BLACK SOFTBALL PANTS AT BIG 5

I stopped by Big 5 in Pinole earlier this week and saw they had black softball pants on sale for $16.99. If you need a new pair, this might be the time to get them. Their website also had this coupon for 20% off any non-sale item and/or 10% off any sale item.

PRACTICE - THURSDAY, MAY 12

This is a reminder about Thursday's practice at Pinole Valley Park at 5:00. If you don't know how to get there, click here for directions and a map. You can also check the "Park Locations" listing over in the right column. Scroll down a little and you'll find it



MONDAY NIGHT"S PRACTICE SESSION

Last night’s practice under the lights at Fernandez Park was a good one. Those in attendance were Nina, Carlos, Mandi, Gary, Rita, Richie, and myself. We fielded some flies and grounders and had a couple of rounds of batting practice before calling it a night.

We looked pretty solid for our first time out. The only negatives to report are some minor bumps and bruises and the annoyance of the numerous gnats that were drawn to the area by the lights.

I thought it was a good diamond for us to practice on until Nicholl Park opens up. What do you think about practicing here on Monday nights each week until our season starts?

FIRST TWO PRACTICES SCHEDULED

We have two practices scheduled next week. The first will be 8:00 PM Monday night at Fernandez Park in Pinole. Please try to arrive a little early so you'll have time to get your equipment ready and loosen up before we take the field at 8:00. We have the field rented for two hours and it would be a shame to waste any of that time on anything other than playing ball. I expect to arrive around 7:30.

Our second practice will be 5:00 PM Thursday at Pinole Valley Park. Again, please try to arrive early so we can maximize our two hour rental.

ROSTER UPDATE

As most of you have heard by now, James has opted to join the TSC Outlaws this season after three seasons with the PC Bricks. Also, Lena has decided not to play this season.

Chiniqua informed me that she most likely won't be able to play this year because of injuries and time constraints.

We picked up a new player as we added Kedi Seyoum to the team. She works with Nina and Brandon at FO 976 in Berkeley. (How much longer before they boot Brandon back to Richmond?) Welcome to the team, Kedi!

LEAGUE NEWS

There's going to be a vote on some important issues at this week's league meeting. Here are the notes I received from our commissioner, Paul Martin:
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"We have some items to vote on for next week:
1- Allowing each team to have up to 2 outside women play this year.
2- Allowing the “Untouchables” to have 1 outside man this year only.
3- Game days to be on Tuesdays and Thursdays instead of Wednesdays and Thursdays.
4- Allow the City team to participate this year? (If not allowed and we only have 9 teams, each team will have 1 bye week during the season, and the last place team will have to be eliminated from the playoffs.)

During the meeting, 4 teams had a need for about 2 additional women, prompting the vote for next week to allow 2 outside women per team. Darriel’s requesting a woman’s husband be allowed to play as his team is short men due to last minute roster losses. (He states he’s not a “ringer”)

We are looking for registration fees by May 13^th (payday).  The fee is $35 per player.  I’m looking into what days we can have practice fields secured and will get back to everyone.  A few teams were requesting Thursday only games, thus is why we are voting for Tuesday instead of Wednesday game days next week.
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Any thoughts?