Another week in Shalom, another split for the loveable beer makers.  With divisional play kicking off the Brewers were hoping to gain ground in the super tight Winfield division, but the softball gods had other ideas.  

Game 1 Clowns vs Brewers 

The good guys should've known it would be an interesting day when we rolled up and our fearless leader Mrs. Prim was sidelined with the always pesky lower body injury.  Super sub–Doug Storm filled in admirably for her with some solid D and earning 3 free passes from the opposing pitchers.  If missing our leader wasn't enough the Beer makers were delivered a shot in the gut when the Clowns (love the fact that we are highlighting the games rich history) leadoff guy hit a bomb that almost hit a car.  Not the way we wanted to start off our division play, but we fought back with 3 or 4 of our own in our half of the inning (not quite sure, remember I'm just an intern) lead by our doubles machine Clint Hathcock.  I could say a lot more about this game but game 2 was more fun so here is a quick recap.

Ryan Prim is fast, Donald can hit the ball real hard, Carlos Cruz is a stud at the plate &  even better at 3b, the middle of our lineup is scary accounting for all but 2 of our RBI's & It's great to have a couple of Hall of Famers on your team to show how important it is to start off with a 12 - 8 win.

Players of the game:  
Brad Earls:  3 for 3, 1-2b, 1-HR, 2 runs & 3 RBI's
Ryan Prim: 3 for 3, 2-3b
Bryan & Matt Roth going a combined 3 for 5 with 2 RBIs with all 3 hits coming in clutch spots

Game 2 - Legends vs Brewers

"THE FUNNEST GAME OF THE YEAR"

After our reboot of the season the Brew Crew swaggered over to field #4 with visions of Ws in their heads but the Legends had other plans.  The game started off with Ryan Prim forgetting he was the youngest guy on our team and followed in the footsteps of the Brewer's assistant to the assistant manager and stretched an easy double into a single.  Eventually the doubles machine known as Clint Hathlock heard all the BOOOOOO'S coming from the Brewers dugout and placed the 1st of his 3 extra base hits into the green.  With Ryan on 3rd & Clint on 2nd Mr. Brewer comes up and splits the speedy Legends outfield to put us on the board.  We scratched a couple more runs across the plate and it was game on or at least we thought.  After a few innings of back & forth softball the wind decided to play havoc with perennial all-star pitcher Michael Barth and that strike zone shrunk to the size of a grain of yeast.  Too bad for the Brew Crew the change of pitchers didn't help much bc before you could drink a craft beer the Legends had taken control of the game.  When you add a couple of let's say "lack luster" offensive innings by the golden boys to the power of the mustachioed green monsters one could say that the 10-run lead was pretty safe with just 3 outs left.  But Clint Hathlock had a different opinion.  Our vocal leader comes into the dugout saying, "this is going to be the funnest game of the year" "We got this boys, it's only 10 runs".  I'm not going to lie; I know we have a potent offense but scoring 10 runs in an inning is something that sounds easier than it actually is.  The Legends brought in their closer to finish us off but then stepped-up Matt Roth who had other plans.  He was a perfect leadoff and drew what at the time could be looked at as a meaningless walk but who knows right?  Barth followed with a hard single then the super sub used his eagle eye to load the bags with a walk. Gareth then hit a single that scored Roth, but Barth's aggressive base running didn't pay off and he was forced out at the plate.  This is where the beer makers turned their season around. Being down by 8 with 1 out and the bottom of the lineup coming up is where most teams would just give up and take the split but not the 2021 Brewers!  Bryan Roth hustles out a fielder’s choice that keeps the inning alive with runners on 1st & 3rd with 2 outs.  Up strides Hall of Famer Rick Halperin facing a 7-run deficit that felt like 17.  Rick used his Hall of Fame plate discipline to load the bases with a clutch walk.  Up strides rookie speedster rookie Ryan Prim with bases loaded that could only be slower if Grant was on 1st ;-) The rookie stepped up and shortened his swing and hit a hard ground ball to center to knock in 2 huge runs.  At this point you can see Bernie starting to get ready to slide into the mug of frosty goodness when up steps the man saw it all coming in Clint Hathlock and boy did, he deliver.  He calmly stepped into the box and smashed his 2nd home run of the game & his 7th RBI to bring the game to 20 - 17 with 3-, 4- & 5-hole looming in the dugout.  Donald then takes 1 swing and is back in the dugout before his ball even lands bc he crushed his 2nd home run of the game to ensure that Mr. Momentum had officially changed his address to Brewerville.  And what happens next?  That's right Brad Earls went back-to-back to back home runs to bring the tying to the plate in the form of rookie Carlos Cruz. Could it happen?  Could the Brewers fulfill Clint's prophecy of making this the FUNNEST GAME EVER, well yes & no.  We did make it the funnest game ever, but we were not able to extend the game bc Carlos hit a lazy pop up that only traveled 298 feet that was caught on the warning track for the 3rd out to end the game.

Players of the game:
Clint Hathcock: 3 for 4, 1 - 2b, 2 HR & 7 RBI's
Prim brothers: 5 for 6, 1-2b, 2 HR, 2 walks, 6 runs & 6 RBI's
Bryan Roth: 2 for 3, 2 runs & huge clutch hustle play to extend that big inning 

Although the Brewers ended up with another split & are still under 500 Mr. Momentum officially has a bright yellow jersey.

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