Coral Gables A’s Stories: We’ll Take It!

The Coral Gables A's faced off against our least favorite type of pitcher...

Your Coral Gables A’s, America’s funniest men’s league team, continue to plow through another season of rambunctious and reprehensible baseball action. After the dramatics of our last game against our biggest rivals, Suela, we were set to face the Pirates, who we eliminated in the first round of the playoffs last year. They can hit, especially the top of their order, which is full of big boppers. They’re pitching is suspect, so our games against them usually have no shortage of runs.

Let’s see how things played out. 

Angel

Angel, our starter, throws cheese from the left side. His ankle has been bothering him, however, stemming from an injury he sustained in last season's championship game. It isn’t 100% yet, but good enough to pitch. Still, he didn’t have his A+ fastball and would have to use his off-speed pitches more than he usually does. 

A single and a double brought home a run for them in the top of the 1st. Angel struck out the side otherwise. 1-0, Pirates. 

Lefty Poo Slingers

Poo slinging plays, especially if you’re left-handed. Mark Buehrle, Barry Zito, Rich Hill, Tom Glavine, Warren Spahn, Dallas Keuchel, Jamie Moyer, and many more. The list of lefty poo slingers who’ve excelled at the highest level through guile instead of force is long. 

This concept works at all levels, including men’s league. Lefty poo slingers have long given us fits; give me a hard-throwing righty any day. The slow southpaw makes you abandon your usual approach, which gives him the advantage. Your timing is off, your swing is off, everything is just off. The Pirates have one of these, and we see him basically every time we face them. If we’re disciplined, he’s in for a long day. If we’re not, the game could be over in less than two hours. 

We went scoreless in the bottom of the 1st. Heeeere we go again.

The X-Man

Their starter went 1-2-3 in the 2nd, as did Angel. Angel once again retired the side in order in the top of the 3rd. We entered the bottom half still down 1-zip.

Francisco, who goes by Cisco, led off the bottom of the 3rd with a walk. This is a very good thing. To quote Unger in The Longest Yard (2005), “He’s so fast he makes fast people look…not fast.” That’s Cisco. A walk is effectively a double, perhaps a triple if they’re not paying attention. Sure enough, he was off to the races and made it to second easily on the first pitch. 

X, our leadoff hitter, came up a batter later with one down. He drilled a ball into the right centerfield gap for a double, bringing Cisco around to score easily. I hit after X and couldn’t keep the rally going because this son of a bitch made me roll over on a curveball for the second time. Maddening. 

1-1.

The House That Matt Built

The Pirates pushed across two runs in the 4th inning, though only one of them was earned. We went 1-2-3 in the bottom half. Angel rebounded and threw a scoreless 5th, striking out his seventh batter of the day. We got a few baserunners aboard in the bottom half, on the back of a single by Brayan, our catcher, and a walk by Angel (pitchers hit in this league), but couldn’t drive any of them in. 3-1, them, after 5. 

I led off the bottom of the 5th and, somehow, someway, got jammed by a fastball that couldn’t break a pane of glass. When all you see is curveballs and changeups, even the most non-threatening of fastballs can be effective. I hit a lazy fly ball to left field. Poo slingers, man. 

This brought Matt to the plate. The field we were playing on had just been redone. The project took several months to complete, as they were installing completely new turf, bases, mound, batting cage, the whole nine yards. This game against the Pirates was the very first played on the updated version of the park. In much the same way Babe Ruth famously hit the first home run of the old Yankee Stadium, hence coining the phrase “The House That Ruth Built,” that honor was now up for grabs. 

Matt would seize the moment. 

He crushed a fastball just to the right of centerfield, which caromed off the metal bleachers with a bang. He nearly busted his ass rounding first as he fist-pumped, but that’s neither here nor there. Here, ye! Here, ye! Henceforth our field of play shall be known as “The House That Matt Built.”

We wouldn’t score after Matt’s bomb. 3-2, Pirates. They would tack on one more in the top of the 6th to make it 4-2. They’re lefty, still hanging in there, threw a scoreless bottom half, working around a double from Brayan. 

Bullpen Time

Matt relieved Angel and punched out two in a scoreless 7th inning. He also relieved Angel in the 6th and got the final two outs of that inning, striking out one. His day finished with a line of 1.2 innings, no hits or runs, and three Ks. Lights out. 

Amed came in for the 8th and worked around a double with two strikeouts, finishing the inning not allowing any runs. Due to the time limit, we were notified that we wouldn’t be playing a complete game. The bottom of 8th would be our last chance for romance. Down by two. 

Big Knock

Their starter was done after the 7th; thanks be to God. They brought in a righty who threw much harder to try to nail down the save for them. 

I led off the last inning with a single through the right side. Amed came up two batters later with one out and got hit by a pitch. Man on first and second now. With Amed representing the tying run on first, it was going to take an extra base hit to bring him around to score. On the one hand, I could have played it safe and stayed put at second, knowing my run didn’t mean as much. But getting Amed into scoring position for Fabian, the batter, was too valuable to ignore. Couple that with the fact that the pitcher was slow to the plate, and it was an easy decision for me; I was stealing third, and Amed would take second. I took off on the first pitch, the catcher fired to third, and I was in safely with a feet-first slide. The tying run was on second now. 

Fabian then had the swing of the day, smoking a pitch up the middle into centerfield. I scored and Amed came around to score from second. We got a tie ballgame. 

Yuca came to the plate now. He had hit the ball well his first three at bats, but with nothing to show for it. In his fourth at bat, he once again squared a ball up in the form of a liner to the left side. Their third baseman leaped up and snagged it, then fired over to first base to double up Fabian. Double play, game over. 4-4 final. Brutal luck on a ball that should’ve kept the rally going. 

Stepsister?

A tie here isn’t…bad? I was sure we’d come up short when I saw how we were looking against their soft-tossing lefty, so I guess not losing could be seen as a moral victory. Nice comeback as well. I'll refer you to this Morris Buttermaker (Billy Bob Thornton) quote from the 2005 version of Bad News Bears:

My old coach used to say a tie's like kissing your sister, but the the way we've been playing, it's more like kissing a...really hot stepsister.

Your A’s move to 2-1-1 in our new season. Could be worse!

Snickers-gate

I like to give a little shine to Coral Gables A's legends of old when they come visit us on game day. We were joined by Yasmany on this Sunday morning. He now lives in Texas, but was in town visiting family. Yasmany played shortstop for many years on the A's and made some of the most breathtaking plays I've ever seen. What I'll always know him best for, however, and what no one will ever let me forget, is what happened in a tournament one time.

This was maybe 6-7 years ago. We were in a big tournament and had advanced to the championship game (against Suela, naturally). Although the team was playing well, I was having one of the worst tournaments of my life. Popping everything up, not having good at bats. Just not doing my job. After coming up short in another big spot, it finally boiled over for me. I slammed my helmet on the bench as hard as I could and unleashed a tirade of expletives that would've made Joe Pesci blush. The dugout was deathly silent. It was the kind of blowup you just need to steer clear of until the person calms down.

But Yasmany, who, apart from Yuca, is the absolute king of fucking with people, would not let this opportunity go to waste. He walks over to me from the other end of the dugout without a care in the world, with something in his hand. I'm sitting now, still stewing with anger. He goes, "Comerte un Snickers." Eat a Snickers. Then he hands me an actual goddamn Snickers bar. The dugout lost it at my expense, and an inside joke to last a lifetime was born. It did cheer me up a little, I will say. You have to tip your cap to him for that timing. To this day I can not get upset in our dugout without someone telling me to eat a Snickers.

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