The opportunity to play a game of baseball in the most magnificent weather is a rare thing in Winter baseball, but that is how the season began. Speaking of Howe, he started on the hill. Sean Howe that is, not to be confused with his brother Mark who played his comeback game in the thirds…..welcome back Mark. Then of course there is Jeff….being the father of both Mark and Sean he is just a little bit older than both of them and does not pull on the cleats any more. Speaking of any more, we could have got a few more hits in the early innings on Saturday. Whilst the only time we trailed all day was when they went ahead in the top of the second dig. Sean did a great job on the hill restricting the Cheltenham hitters to just 2 runs in 4 innings. Of course that was Sean Howe the other Sean in the team, Sean Fahey, well he was having a smashing good time with the bat. With 2 singles and 2 doubles he displayed fantastic placement and continually pressured both the pitcher (s) and fielders alike. The Berwick hitting machine took a break for a couple of the middle innings due to the Cheltenham pitchers badly losing the zone. The Berwick hitters were very choosy about picking the right pitch to hit resulting in a number of walks. Speaking of walks, that exactly what Matt Chilcott did, he walked onto the hill and relieved Sean. Chilly was how the Cheltenham hitters felt after seeing the Chilcott breaking ball ! The Rustlers never raised a whimper as the mighty Dodgers won in a clinical display. Hits to Quinny, Dykstra, Bull and Junior Barnett all helped post a 10 – 2 win over last year's premiers.
This week we have the Dingoes at Berwick.
See you on the Diamond
Jeeba
A3 - Berwick 3 lost to Cheltenham 19.
With beach towels and sun tan lotion in hand, we travelled to Cheltenham and were given a baseball lesson going down 19-3. Andrew Hemmes started on the hill and did well for 2 1/2 innings, then Cheltenham turned on their bats and Andrew was replaced by BB for the remainder of the game. In the batting, our bats were quite for most of the day with hits going to Rowan, Lucas, Hilly and the ole' master Rene. Like to welcome two new players to the team, Michael Hill and the return of Mark Howe, hoping you have fun this season. Even though we did got pumped, there were some good signs from the team. Once we get into it, I'm sure we will come away with a few wins.
A4 - Berwick 3 lost to Cheltenham 15.
In perfect conditions we went down to Cheltenham to face last seasons premiers at Kingston Heath Reserve. With most of the “old favourites” in tow we started positively scoring “Porno Chinnock” with solid hits from “PK” and “Beefa”.
Brian then strode to the mound and went to work striking out our first 2 outs. Unfortunately we didn't bring any semblance of a defensive game and the first of 8 errors allowed the Rustlers to take a 3 – 1 lead after the first. We struggled on with the bats but were out gunned in all departments finally going down to Cheltenham 15 -3 after time ran out in the Rustlers 5th. innings with Steve Johnson failing to capture the 3 rd out on the hill in relief. We must develop an aggressive confidence in our batting and a belief that we can match it with whatever we are up against for us to become competitive this season. Lets see if we can take it to Dingley Blue next Saturday. Till then – see you on the diamond.
