Hunters 2, Challengers 3

WINNING UGLY: Bats go cold as pitching pushes C's past Hunters 3-2

The Thun Hunters can be a hard team to take seriously: Their field is literally a field, and restroom facilities are few and far between; Their players don't all wear matching uniforms; We scored 12 runs in one inning against them the last time we played. When my wife dropped me off before the game, I pointed to the Hunters warming up on the field and said to her, These keys stink. Hopefully we can just mercy them again and I can get home early. After the Challengers barely held on to beat Thun in the last game of the regular season, all I can say is - well whatever, I still say all players should at least wear the same color uniforms. True, Renzo's away pants don't match the away jersey, but at least they are the same color.

Kurt Kovac took the hill for the Challengers and was absolutely on fire, facing the minimum number of batters through the first three innings - with some assistance from yours truly who, delighted to be back in Center-field, doubled off a runner from first to end the top of the third. The C's drew first blood with two runs in the top of the second. Nick Lehmann reached on an error, then took second on a single by Adderly Sarmiento. Greggy Zingg, sporting a new, clean-shaven look, dropped a hit just on the third base line, which brought Lehmann around to score and sent Sarmiento to second. Andreas Rudishuli, making the start for a now-ineligible-for-NLB-please-don't-ask-me-about-it Carlos Nepomuceno (who may have absorbed Zingg's beard into his own, I'm not sure), singled through the hole into left, scoring Sarmiento for a 2-0 lead. Hopes for a bigger inning fizzled, however, when Alex Gordon - who couldn't hit water if he fell out of a boat right now - fouled out to the catcher, before Kovac and Yusuke Azuma each flew out to end the frame.

The Challengers added another run in the bottom of the third, with the bottom of the order again providing the spark. With one out, Renzo Falcone reached second on an error, before foolishly getting picked off. The best part was watching Falcone, who was out by at least three feet, after fruitlessly protesting on the field, start to argue his case to his teammates and then being uniformly told that he was out. With two out, Lehmann came to the dish and took a pitch directly off his noggin - I mean he basically just turned his skull into the pitch without any effort to get out of the way. On the plus side, seeing Nick take a ball to the head without much reaction goes a long way to explaining some of the more bizarre statements he tends to make - this week's gem was that if you're going to kill someone with a car, it's better - from a legal perspective - to be drunk while you do it. For the record, there is no way that is true. Anyway, Sarmiento singled Lehmann to second, and then Zingg blooped one into center for another RBI and a 3-0 lead for the home team.

Things stayed that way until the top of the 6th, when Lehmann, who had come on in relief of Kovac, ran into some trouble: Two walks and a HBP loaded the bases for the Hunters with none out. Lehmann came back with a strike out, but the next batter drove a long fly to deep center that dropped just over Gordon's glove. Honestly, I still can't believe that I didn't catch that ball. Nick says it was because I wasn't running my hardest, but I disagree - I was just playing too shallow. That's the problem with relying on Rob Sedin to position the outfielders - it doesn't work so well when Rob is in Canada and the game is in Zurich! Two runs scored, and suddenly it was 3-2 with runners on first and second. The Challengers caught a break when the runner on second idiotically tried to steal third and was gunned out by Sarmiento. The gaffe was amplified when the batter followed with a single, which would've likely tied the score. Instead, Lehmann struck out the next batter to keep the lead at one.

After the Challengers failed to score in the bottom of the 6th, Kovac came back out to the mound to try to save the game for the C's. With one out and a runner on first, Kovac tried a pick-off throw to first that tipped off Juan de la Rosa's glove and allowed the runner to go to second. Following the error, the Thun batter lined a ball to center that Gordon was able to snag - although the ball was hit so hard it was basically moving sideways by the time it got into my glove. With two outs and the tying run on second, Kovac was able to induce a soft liner to short, that Sarmiento snared for the final out.

So yeah...the Challengers won, to finish up the regular season at 15-1, but they did not look good doing it. The game marked the fourth in a row where the C's were simply not sharp for prolonged periods of play - from the two game set against the Mustangs, to the loss against the Barracudas, and then the lackluster showing against Thun. With the playoffs starting on Saturday, the Challengers need to snap out of their funk and get back to playing dominating baseball from the first pitch to the last out.

by Alex Gordon