B*tches Be Trippin'!

So, me and ole Sweet Tea are dog lovers.  We share our house and our lives with a BEAST of a small, fluffy, white dog named Lucy.  Before meeting Lucy I was a confirmed "big dog" person and couldn't imagine myself ever having a "small dog" run my life.  When I met Lucy, it had been only about six months since my sons and I had said goodbye to our 13-year-old Black Lab and I didn't think I was quite ready to let another dog into my heart yet, much less a small, fluffy one.  But Lucy changed my way of thinking and though she's been with Sweet Tea for much longer, even Sweet Tea will admit that Lucy has become a "Daddy's Girl."

Recently some good friends, "Lockpick" and Sandy, moved to St. Louis with their two dogs, Oscar and Coots.  With Lockpick out of town, Sandy and the dogs joined us for this weekend's match.  This is what we call "foreshadowing."

Sweet Tea with a car full o' dogs

This weekend's match would be played at the Jefferson Barracks historic site and hosted by our good friends, the St. Louis Unions.  This would be our third match with the Unions this season, and we came into the match holding a record of 3 victories and 1 defeat in our head-to-head matches, while also sporting a current nine game winning streak.

Unions 1st Tender, "Mayhem" Moushey goes over the
ground rules with the two club nines.

This would also represent the second week in a row that we had our full outfield together, as both 'Hawkeye' and 'Pitchfork' were available.  We also had our substitute scout, 'Moonlight,' back from an injured leg. Since it was roughly 135 degrees, it would be nice to have an extra scout to rotate.  In other news...I got a new bat ya'll!

Hand crafted by the Pheonix bat company to
my specifications, this Birch wood bat is 35
inches long and weighs 36 ounces.

The Unions' field is a "bowl" with the outfield area on an incline.  This is both a blessing and a curse to outfield scouts.  It allows you to play a little deeper and get more generous bounds on most fly balls, but it also makes it very difficult to retreat on deeply hit balls because you're running up hill.  Something I would learn in the first game when the Unions' scout "Noodles" turned on a ball and drove it over my head in left field.  Even with a generous first bounce, running up hill I could not quite reach the ball to make the out but was able to hold Noodles to a double.

Pitchfork catches a fly ball and returns it to the infield as
the Unions' runner retreats to first.  You can see the "bowl"
that the Unions' field sits in.

Coupled with the bowl effect and a sun-baked, hard ground, our scouts had a more difficult time than normal and the first game was a very tight contest most of the way, with us taking a 6-4 lead into the bottom of the final inning...which was when all hell broke loose.

Lucy and her 'baby-faced assassin' look.  You can't trust this face.

Sweet Tea and Sandy were sitting under some tall shade trees just outside the foul pole down the left field line.  The dogs were sedate.  The ladies were sedate and trying to stay cool on a hot, summer day.  And just then...SQUIRRELS!!!  Before Sweet Tea knew what was happening, Lucy was off in a flash!

"Hair flyin' in the wind...no one can catch me!"

While she initially lept off of Sweet Tea's lap to chase the squirrels, once she realized she was free of anyone's grasp, she made a bee-line for the open field, dodging ballists, cranks, and any other innocent by-standers.  She did laps around the outfield, laps around the infield, totally enjoying her new-found "star" status...all eyes were on her, this small, fluffy, white streak.

Lucy's "star" turn in the ball game, with Sweet Tea in hot pursuit!  

She finally tuckered out and made her way off of the field and was captured by another 'crank' when Lucy went over to greet their dogs.  But she was the talk of the game at that point, and I may hear about it for some time.

The game itself turned at that point as well.  The Unions slapped enough hits together in the final inning to tie the score at 6, held us scoreless in the extra frame, and tallied an ace on a sacrifice fly in the bottom of the inning to claim victory, thus ending our nine-game win streak.

Fielding a ball more cleanly in the second game.

The second game would remain close between the two teams as well, but in the fifth inning, some poor play by the Unions, followed by some timely hitting by us (including a two run double into right-center by yours truly) would allow us to claim an 8-5 victory and split of the double-header.

Mayhem tries to corral a poorly thrown ball.  We would take
advantage to tally four runs in the frame.

With my new birchwood bat I would reach base safely in five of my six times to the plate, so I think it's definitely a keeper.  The team's record now stands at 21-7 going into next week's major tournament, The Ohio Cup.

As for Lucy...well, she spent the rest of the day on lockdown.

Aunt Sandy and Lucy...on lockdown.

Dixie