KiKI, DO YOU LOVE ME?

The Dreamers were all in their feelings on a beautiful breezy night at the corner of Dundas and Bellwoods.  The lights were lit and the 6moon was out with its radiance as the CN Tower glowed electric on the field of play.  It was the dog days of summer for sure as the lineups were bolstered by dog-pals Appa, Cassius, Wampum, and baby Humber.  As the regular season woofs its way to a close, two incredible games were in store.  Would the Rouge River Blush be kissin, kissin in the Wraith? Or would the Credit River Comrades be asking what’s your net-net-net worth? Would the Don River Valley Cats be down for you always? Or would the Humber River Humdingers be scoring from the block like Jenny?

If you wanna know the results…

You’ll have to keep reading to find out!

CREDIT RIVER COMRADES vs. ROUGE RIVER BLUSH

It must have been that both the Comrades and the Blush were rushing to get this thing done so that they could attend the Soviet Union’s annual Fashion Week because after 20 minutes these teams had played a combined 3 innings with a score of 1-0.  As you might expect in an affair with so few runs, this was a case of sparkling defence by the Blush and a concerted effort by the Comrades to ration hits.  Notable highlights include Yogi Acharya’s velvet glove at 3rd base on a hard ground ball, Terrance Luscombe’s nifty double play duet with Joseph Bautista, and an inning where the Comrades decided to hit EVERY SINGLE BALL at Craig Fortier who was able to add some cover up and blush to a potentially sweaty situation.

But with fear that the Central Television Station was going to lose viewers (despite only allowing one single channel to air), Central Command sent a message to the Comrades to start getting some hits. And so they did. Scoring 4 in 4th and 5 in the 6th the Sharers of Baseball were led by Robyn Letson’s 4 hits, Ness Dixon’s resounding double and  a few key runs batted in by Darren Puscas, Rachele Gottardi, Johann Juarez, and Valley Cats Amanda Saunders and Andrew Stokes who had learned the material realities of the workers’ struggle and with renewed consciousness led the vanguard to a resounding 10-2 lead.

The Blush, however, were not going to be out-sassed, and so after a red-light-district meeting and a renewed B-L-U-S-H chant, the belles began to sweetly slug some mush balls.  Led by a big hit off the bat of Noah Adams, a red mark off the thigh of Andy Smith and some super subbing from Valley Cat Katie German, baserunners were no longer concealing anything as it was time to take off those masks and start plucking away at the lead.  And so they did, scoring 5 runs in the 6th the Blush were vaulted onto the runway with a key 2 RBI hit by Rocio Velasquez Guzman. The opportunity to lay the kiss of death was upon them, but the inning ended with a 5 run max.

It is here where mother time caught up to the Blush, as the 7th inning was powered by Jan Braun’s first career home run…and then the Comrades simply slowed down workflow and production until it was too late to resume…the score reverted to the 6th inning final as Credit River took the opener 10-7 against Rouge River.

DON RIVER VALLEY CATS vs. HUMBER RIVER HUMDINGERS

The Valley Cats met the Humdingers during the late game with both teams sporting identical 5-5-1 records.  The Valley Cats were panting for a chance to rise above .500 once again while the Humdingers were ho-humming their winning streak of 4 games awaiting the opportunity to themselves finally pull above the treble clef of sporting.  From the onset it was a cat’s game with the Don River squad preferring canned food over kibble as they gnawed their way through the Humdingers. They were led by Janine Caster’s sterling defence as she bounded on every bouncy ball in a single inning!

Kate Uffelman and Andrew Norton each scratched out 4 hits while subs Susannah Mulvale, Krysta Williams, and Kaleigh McGregor-Bales sat perched atop the cat tree helping the Don team to a resounding 15-3 advantage.  Andrew Stokes ran around the bases like he was Virtute the Cat chasing a 1.5″ mylar crinkle ball and Phill Morgan pounced on the opportunity to score 3 runs. There was a lot of humming and hawing coming from the other dugout as Humber River seemed to be looking up at a big pile of kitty litter.  But after a resounding chorus of HUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMDINGERSS!!!!! lit up the night sky and turned the dial to 11, the team seemed to respond to a faint radio signal from another planet.

With their namesake, Humber the puppy watching/sleeping in the stands (a common baseball pastime), the Humdingers sent out a warning signal that one should not bring a bunch of cats to a dog fight! Starting with a speedy single by Annelies Cooper, and led by 5 hits off the bat of Jo Jefferson, the Humdingers were playing that funky music and moonwalking around the bases.  There were smashes by Devin Clancy, Rachel Small, and Lisa Wong, there were bops by Ryan Hayes and Kelsey Patton, there were smooth yacht rock vibes off the bats of Brianna Greaves and Meg Wright.  And when the crowd looked up at the scoreboard to check the name of that catch song playing….the title simply read 16-15.  That’s right, the Humdingers with runners on 2nd and 3rd and two outs needed the equivalent of as many hits as Toto had in their entire career to tie and perhaps win the game.

Rachel Small walked up to the plate.  Determined to find those echoes in the night, she waved her exaggerated drum stick in the air and awaited the cue.  The pitch came level but a little inside and Rachel took a step in before swatting at the yellow sphere. A bloop flew into the night’s sky as Andrew Stokes, Kelsey Patton and the softball all seemed to be colliding at the same time in the same exact spot…would Andrew make the catch or would Rachel’s hit find a hole? The crowd was in awe watching as the ball hit Andrews glove, slipped out momentarily and then laid gently and softly in the paw of Andrew’s glove.  A roaring chorus line was stopped a little short of platinum status, but the Humdingers made it an exciting game despite falling to the DRVC by a score of 16-15.

See the game box scores here

See player stats here

See league standings here

See all-time career statistics file (updated for August 1 2018) here

MILESTONES