Sunday, July 12, 2009
Good news!
Marshalltown lost both games in the finals (it is a double elimination tourney). So they had 2 losses, and were done. Ankeny was still playing today, though based on scores, it looks like Urbandale is going to come out of District 3 with the championship.
Saturday, July 11, 2009
North Story 12s
Dan and I got cut off, but this is what you get for now. Let me know if you need pics, we can get them emailed to you.
Post Season Party
Logan's grandma offered us a post season party at her bowling alley, Carousel Lanes in Story City. I am truly thankful for such a nice offer. Players and immediate family are invited to come, with free bowling and shoes. If you want something to drink or eat (like those tasty bowling alley/bar frozen pizzas) you will have to buy that on your own, but I certainly don't expect that with the bowling offer. So anyway food/drink is dutch, but the rest is on the house.
I realize it is the vacation season, and I doubt we can get all 14 guys there. But we will make best effort. So I have chosen Wednesday July 15 at 7PM at Carousel Lanes, on the west side of Story City.
So please reply if you can or cannot make that, and a tentative head count if you can. If we can only get a couple people, I will pick another day. But I know all the coaches kids can make it that day, so for now, we will make it Wednesday.
So again, please reply, with a yeah or nay.
I realize it is the vacation season, and I doubt we can get all 14 guys there. But we will make best effort. So I have chosen Wednesday July 15 at 7PM at Carousel Lanes, on the west side of Story City.
So please reply if you can or cannot make that, and a tentative head count if you can. If we can only get a couple people, I will pick another day. But I know all the coaches kids can make it that day, so for now, we will make it Wednesday.
So again, please reply, with a yeah or nay.
finally some time
I actually made a post about our last game, but I don't know what happened to it. Been on the go a lot here lately. But the family left me for the weekend, and I have the run of the house, so I can get around to typing again.
So I will give an abbreviated commentary about the last game. Super fun night with the big crowd, and playing under the lights, and all that. I talked to the Ames coach afterward, and they had a good time as well, obviously more fun for them by winning.
The big difference in the game was their outfield play. They did a great job of hitting the cutoff man with solid throws. He said they practiced that, and executed as well as they ever had. Stinks for us I guess.
Our 5th inning was a goodie. All of our 5 runs came with two outs. Kudos to the guys for not giving up. Taylor had a good night with the bat going 3-4, Jerald went 2-4 with a double and a dong, and Alex went 3-3.
Mick had a rough pitching start, but did his job catching 2 flies in right, right after being taken from the mound. Jerald and Andy did a good job of keeping Ames off balance.
As for the gang as a whole, this was a super bunch to be around. You don't think of it with 12 year old boys, but this is a very quiet bunch for the most part. They got along well, but weren't running their mouths and annoying the coaches, which is good.
It was a different team to run, with 14 guys on the team. They are used to being on teams with 10 or 11 kids, and getting a lot of playing time. Obviously they want to play, but I didn't see anybody having a big black cloud about it, affecting the rest of the team. As I told the guys, their days of being on teams with one or two players above what is on the field are about over, as they move into Jr High, and HS.
Because I like stats, here are some. We had a .339 team batting average, which is pretty good. The stats look a lot different than my regular season team. The batters walked and struck out a lot less. I equate that to better opponent pitching, and better batters on our part.
Our pitching wasn't the greatest. We had some good efforts mixed in there, but a couple of bad innings really did us in. I am not even considering or worrying about Marshalltown tho.
I also want to thank those of you that volunteered for various jobs, be it in the concession stand, doing book or pitch counts, umpiring, being TD, or anything else that I have currently forgotten. There is a lot of stuff to make this all fly in the short amount of time, and I couldn't do it all myself. I also want to thank my assistants, Doug and Dan. It is a good experience to work with different coaches, and I learned some stuff from them as well, and they are good guys to boot.
Have a good rest of the summer!
So I will give an abbreviated commentary about the last game. Super fun night with the big crowd, and playing under the lights, and all that. I talked to the Ames coach afterward, and they had a good time as well, obviously more fun for them by winning.
The big difference in the game was their outfield play. They did a great job of hitting the cutoff man with solid throws. He said they practiced that, and executed as well as they ever had. Stinks for us I guess.
Our 5th inning was a goodie. All of our 5 runs came with two outs. Kudos to the guys for not giving up. Taylor had a good night with the bat going 3-4, Jerald went 2-4 with a double and a dong, and Alex went 3-3.
Mick had a rough pitching start, but did his job catching 2 flies in right, right after being taken from the mound. Jerald and Andy did a good job of keeping Ames off balance.
As for the gang as a whole, this was a super bunch to be around. You don't think of it with 12 year old boys, but this is a very quiet bunch for the most part. They got along well, but weren't running their mouths and annoying the coaches, which is good.
It was a different team to run, with 14 guys on the team. They are used to being on teams with 10 or 11 kids, and getting a lot of playing time. Obviously they want to play, but I didn't see anybody having a big black cloud about it, affecting the rest of the team. As I told the guys, their days of being on teams with one or two players above what is on the field are about over, as they move into Jr High, and HS.
Because I like stats, here are some. We had a .339 team batting average, which is pretty good. The stats look a lot different than my regular season team. The batters walked and struck out a lot less. I equate that to better opponent pitching, and better batters on our part.
Our pitching wasn't the greatest. We had some good efforts mixed in there, but a couple of bad innings really did us in. I am not even considering or worrying about Marshalltown tho.
I also want to thank those of you that volunteered for various jobs, be it in the concession stand, doing book or pitch counts, umpiring, being TD, or anything else that I have currently forgotten. There is a lot of stuff to make this all fly in the short amount of time, and I couldn't do it all myself. I also want to thank my assistants, Doug and Dan. It is a good experience to work with different coaches, and I learned some stuff from them as well, and they are good guys to boot.
Have a good rest of the summer!
Wednesday, July 8, 2009
No commentary tonite
With the late game, and I have to go to work now, I am not gonna have time to comment on the game right now. But come back, I will do so tomorrow some time, and offer a wrap.
Also, we are going to have a year end party at Carousel Lanes in Story City, thanks to Logan's grandma. Not sure of the date, and I know we probably can't get everybody there because of vacation time, so stand by on that.
Also, we are going to have a year end party at Carousel Lanes in Story City, thanks to Logan's grandma. Not sure of the date, and I know we probably can't get everybody there because of vacation time, so stand by on that.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
Well, not tonite
Despite the loss, that may have been our best played game of the tourney so far. That first inning was ugly--just a lot of unfortunate stuff for us. I thought Taylor was throwing well. There weren't many solid hits--2 in right field, 30 ft past first and about a foot fair. Then these little bloops just past our pitcher. Such is life.
Really the only thing I had a problem with tonite was our outfield play. We missed some cutoffs, and couldn't hold the batters back at first. Ankeny's outfielders did a pretty good job with that.
We also left too many runners on base tonite. Unlike last night, our 3, 4, 5 batters did not come through when given the chance. We had the bases loaded in the top of 6, but left them there. But I'm not picking on them, because we win as a team, and we lose as a team.
We brought 32 batters to the plate and struck out 8 times, walked 4, so that means we put 20 balls in play, 7 of them base hits.
Ankeny brought 28 batters to the plate, struck out twice, we surrendered 6 walks/hbp. So they put 20 balls in play, with 9 base hits.
So very even on the offensive side, but we left 9 guys on. They didn't have as many left on, partially because we had good defense getting them out on the bases. Alex had a nice throw down to pick off a runner at 3rd. And actually we had a caught stealing down there too.
Ozzie caught a ball in CF without running his face into anything, so that is a plus. One thing I thought our outfield was better with tonite was backing stuff up. In particular Carter, Logan, and Caleb were all moving into position to back stuff up. And Taylor and Jason did a good job from the 2nd inning on, allowing no more runs.
So tomorrow will be our last game, win or lose. 8PM STORY CITY. Come early and watch the 11s at 6PM. But if you can't please have your son there by 7:15. I expect minimal screwing around if they are there earlier than that. They can watch some baseball, cheer on their buddies, and then get loosened up.
If you can work in the concession stand for a little bit of the 11 game, that would be nice. I already have 2 volunteers.
Really the only thing I had a problem with tonite was our outfield play. We missed some cutoffs, and couldn't hold the batters back at first. Ankeny's outfielders did a pretty good job with that.
We also left too many runners on base tonite. Unlike last night, our 3, 4, 5 batters did not come through when given the chance. We had the bases loaded in the top of 6, but left them there. But I'm not picking on them, because we win as a team, and we lose as a team.
We brought 32 batters to the plate and struck out 8 times, walked 4, so that means we put 20 balls in play, 7 of them base hits.
Ankeny brought 28 batters to the plate, struck out twice, we surrendered 6 walks/hbp. So they put 20 balls in play, with 9 base hits.
So very even on the offensive side, but we left 9 guys on. They didn't have as many left on, partially because we had good defense getting them out on the bases. Alex had a nice throw down to pick off a runner at 3rd. And actually we had a caught stealing down there too.
Ozzie caught a ball in CF without running his face into anything, so that is a plus. One thing I thought our outfield was better with tonite was backing stuff up. In particular Carter, Logan, and Caleb were all moving into position to back stuff up. And Taylor and Jason did a good job from the 2nd inning on, allowing no more runs.
So tomorrow will be our last game, win or lose. 8PM STORY CITY. Come early and watch the 11s at 6PM. But if you can't please have your son there by 7:15. I expect minimal screwing around if they are there earlier than that. They can watch some baseball, cheer on their buddies, and then get loosened up.
If you can work in the concession stand for a little bit of the 11 game, that would be nice. I already have 2 volunteers.
Monday, July 6, 2009
Not to bed yet
And another thing. We only gave up 1 walk tonite. Awesome. Amazing how a team can go from 17 walks to 1 walk in one game. Hmmmmm. We were walked/hit 4 times, so their pitchers did a good job. I thought Austin did a good job behind the plate as umpire. The zone was an appropriate size, and it made for a better ball game than the atrocity the other day.
Our batting was nice too. We had 33 plate appearances (to their 34) and put the ball in play 22 times. That is a pretty good night at the plate. We struck out 7 times, we struck them out 9 times (all by Alex)
Our batting was nice too. We had 33 plate appearances (to their 34) and put the ball in play 22 times. That is a pretty good night at the plate. We struck out 7 times, we struck them out 9 times (all by Alex)
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