Barracudas 7, Challengers 9

NO NICK, NO PROBLEM: Sparkling Outings by Christen, Azuma lead the way to sweep victory over Barracudas

Not to jinx things, but the 2014 NLB Challengers have an embarrassment of riches when it comes to positional depth. Consider: The catcher position, once a veritable black hole in the defense (no offense to those who gamely filled the position, but they were not natural catchers) runs 3 deep. Outfield, which typically contained one, if not two weaker links, runs even deeper. The one potential weak spot in the NLB roster, would appear to be Swiss-eligible pitching. The arrival (or return) of Nick Lehmann (and his van) provided a huge boost, in particular with the departure of Dean Scherbaum to the far east. Behind Nick, however, the options were rather slim. Oli Christen certainly had the ability to provide quality innings, but to date had lacked the ability to consistently locate the strike zone.

When I learned prior to last weekend's games that Nick would not be available to pitch - some BS excuse about something called Mothers Day, which sounds made up to me - I was nervous. The Barracudas typically have several players that are good hitters, and if Oli was unable to locate his pitches, it would be a long game. As it turned out, there was no need for me, or anyone, to be nervous: Christen was outstanding, limiting walks and piling up strike-outs, as the Challengers took Game 1 9-7.

The Barracudas got out to an early lead, scoring two runs in the top of the first. With runners on first and second and one out, the 'Cudas' clean-up hitter dropped down a Sac bunt to move both runners into scoring position with two outs. While the move appeared rather puzzling initially (why bunt with your 4 hitter in the first inning?), it ended up working out, as the next batter drove in both runs with a single. The Challengers got a run back in the bottom of the inning: Kurt Kovac led off with a double, then moved to third on a Sac bunt by Yusuke Azuma, and scored when Juan Bautista's Sac fly was dropped by the rightfielder (somehow, Juan managed to lumber safely into second base despite the entire team yelling no, no stop!!!...it's just how he rolls). The Challengers could've had a bigger inning - a single by Carlos Nepomuceno, who then stole second, put runners in scoring position with two outs - but Alex Gordon, in what would become an unfortunate theme in this game, grounded out to third to end the threat.

With the score 2-1 in the bottom of the third, the Challengers' bats got to work: Juan led off with a double (once again somehow managing to make it safely into second base despite all odds being against it) and reached third on a wild pitch. Consecutive walks to Carlos and Renzo Falcone loaded the bases with no outs. Unfortunately for the Challengers, the next batter was Gordon - an absolute Dumpster Fire at the plate in this game - whose little flare towards short left-center was grabbed by the shortstop. However, the next at-bat marked the key point of the game: With the count 2-2, Roger Burger took a pitch that was absolutely perfect - but since this is Swiss baseball it was of course called a ball. On the next pitch, Burger laced a single to left-center, scoring Juan and Carlos and giving the Challengers a 3-2 lead. Gregg Zingg followed with a 2-RBI single of his own, making it 5-2 (the score sheet also says that Zingg subsequently stole second base, but I refuse to believe that, I'm sorry!! I mean, ok it happened, but still.)

The 'Cudas got one back in the top of the 4th on a two-out passed ball, but the Challenger attack was relentless. Azuma reached on an error by the right fielder, and then took third on a single by Juan (who, yes, made it safely into second on the play, prompting statements that it was simply Juan Day). Consecutive singles by Nepomuceno and Falcone plated two more runs, making it 7-3. In the 5th, the Challengers tacked on another run on an RBI single by rookie Adrian Amoros.

While Burger's at-bat back in the third was, in my view, the turning point of the game, two plays in the 6th inning perfectly illustrated why the Challengers won the game. In the top of the 6th, with one out and a runner on first, Christen coaxed a grounder to Kovac at short that was gracefully turned into a 6-4-3 double play. In the bottom of the 6th, Falcone led off with a weak grounder towards short that neither the shortstop nor the third baseman initially attempted to grab. Once the shortstop (I think) finally got around to picking up the ball, his throw to first was not only late, but got by the first baseman (who was charged with an error, but it looked like a crappy throw to me). Upon realizing that the throw was wild (which did NOT happen right away...you should've seen his reaction, it was pretty funny, although you kinda had to be there), Falcone took off for second and kept right on going to third, where he was safe on another error by the first baseman, whose throw flew into the outfield (somehow both the first AND third basemen were charged with errors on this play, which seems about right). Falcone trotted home, having scored on a ball that barely reached the middle of the infield dirt. The 'Cudas displayed some pretty bad defense in this game (8 errors overall, and that was with the help of some VERY generous scoring), but that play really was impressive for its sheer incompetence.

After allowing a lead-off walk in the top of the 7th, Christen was pulled for Michel Romang, making his 2014 pitching debut. Christen's line to that point: 6.0 IP, 5 hits, 3 ER, 4BB 7Ks. As mentioned previously, simply outstanding. The only disappointing thing about his outing was that it wasn't punctuated by any patented Oli Battle Cries (for e.g., in last year's game against the Barracudas, upon recording the final out of the game, Oli screamed something unintelligible in German, while throwing his glove as hard as he could into the fence. I wish something like that could happen every game). The top of the 7th was an adventure, and could've been a lot more harrowing had the Challengers not gotten the benefit of an atrocious out call at first (although the runner foolishly decided to slide feet first into the base, which means he probably deserved to be called out for stylistic reasons alone). Two walks, a hit batter, and the lone fielding error of the game by the Challengers allowed 4 runs to score, but in the end it wasn't enough. In the dugout after the game, I turned to Oli and said Wow man, that was really some great pitching. I gotta admit, I was not expecting such dominance. To which Oli replied, I know...I'm surprised too!.

by Alex Gordon