Ice cream truck? No, church bells...

I don't know what was hotter... the weather or the ump's wife (*rimshot*). I can't take credit for that gem, that came to you courtesy of Derek. Again, today provided another fascinating look into the world of the rec league umpire (although our guy has been umping for 28 years, in all combinations of leagues). Nothing like screaming across the field to your wife who is walking through the outfield while the game is live... all because she forgot the dog biscuits. Moving along...

The Thirds showed up to Harrington field in Lexington, MA at 9am sharp, only to find the entire Team With No Name warming up on the field. So much for winning by forfeit.

After waiting for the umpire to show up, IGMW2SA3 took to the field as the home team. Newcomer Brian Serafin took the mound, allowing two runs due to early inning jitters. The Thirds gave Brian some heavy run support in the bottom of the first, going through the lineup and knocking in 11 runs.

A couple quick innings went by with the score remaining nearly unchanged with no truly memorable plays except for Meredyth hitting the batter in the back as she was attempting to advance to first on a squib hit. In Meredyth's defense, the runner was in fair territory. But that doesn't make it any less funny.

The No Namers made up some ground in the fifth when the left-side team of Eagle and me combined for a handful of errors, including a double error on a worm burner that Eagle nimbly avoided, in a style reminiscent of Manolete ("Ole!"), that I then Bucknered. Fortunately player-manager Sean "John" McElroy instituted a shift to break up the defensive hole, and we ended the inning without too much further damage. To be fair, Eagle did make a nice play today, tagging a base runner in the face who tried to take third following an out at first. Way to show them what's what, Eagle.

In the bottom of the sixth, the bats knocked in four runs, bringing it to 16-10. In the top of the seventh, the Marooners rallied, bringing it to 16-15. With two outs, Serafin grabbed an infield grounder and threw to Eagle to end the inning. A loud cheer went up, and we celebrated our second win--no, that was what was supposed to happen. Instead, Eagle decided to prolong the drama by dropping the ball, allowing the batter to reach safely. Fortunately, Ryan took a grounder to second to end the inning, and the game.

That was the recap, here's some color commentary...

• Sean gets points for his Manny-esque belly-flop slide into third, when there was absolutely no chance of the play being made
• Sean loses points for screaming like a little girl when the Maroons threw to third as he tried advancing... "Don't throw it! C'MON!"
• Derek gets points for sliding twice, into third and home. Some day he'll slide into second, third, and home, and we'll call that a cycle
• Eagle loses points for deciding it wasn't enough to have Ryan as third-base coach, and sending Emily home on a very close play
• Emily gets points for scoring safely after Eagle's miscue, and for her impressive blast in the sixth
• Ryan loses points for going in the bushes to try to make himself throw up, and in the process almost making the rest of us throw up
• The Ump gets points for giving Brian a healthy serving of smack talk, and for referring to Ryan as Warren... though he probably didn't understand the relevance

As much as I hate to do anything to grow Brian's ego, he gets a game ball for pitching a complete game victory and making some nice 1-3 outs. A game ball also goes to Katie for deciding to join our roster just to give us the four girls we needed to avoid tacking on two runs to the other team's score.

We are now 2-2 on the season... so far, it seems that the difference maker has been Ryan. He shows up, we win. That's something to think about.

Fun fact:

• The lyrics to that Bubba Sparxxx song we heard on 94.5 on the way over go "Booty, booty, booty, booty, rockin' everywhere." Profound.