Butler, Norris & Gold 24 - OSI 5

GLASTONBURY

This one was ugly.

Before Team OSI even got to bat in the bottom of the first, they were down four runs. By the time they came up in the bottom of the third, they had fallen 18 runs behind. The way the balls were blasted all over the field, it was as if the team had been tossed into a war zone. Unfortunately, Butler, Norris & Gold came in with M16s blazing and howitzers booming, while poor OSI had only a few wacky noodles and some beer foam.

On defense, they played the field with gloves made of Swiss cheese and stone. You knew it had gone hopelessly bad when an Open Solutions’ fielder cleanly caught a routine fly ball and the crowd cheered as if they had seen a miracle.

Luckily the 15-run rule—aptly called the “mercy” rule—was invoked. The game was called in the fifth and the heavy drinking began.

The final score was 24 to 5. Ugly.

Jessica Hennigan and Mark Starybrat had two hits each to lead Team OSI. One of Mark's hits was exemplary of the whole evening: He looked good, he took a mighty swing, he gave it his all, but after the drive fell back to earth and rolled to a stop, it had traveled about 18 inches in front of the plate. And so it went.

An impromptu practice broke out after the game and OSI hit and fielded like champions—whistling line drives; long flies to the fence; hot grounders fielded cleanly...

Of course, at that point none of it counted. Besides, the bounty of after-game "refreshments" made it all seem so easy.