They say good pitching beats good hitting, well plenty of both were on display last Monday night in Domeball action. Supe’s Artful Dodgers remain unbeaten as they beat Kenny’s G’Diks 6-4 in a well-played game.
The only thing to mar the crisply played game was the smattering of injuries produced by it. Duke went down early with a massively swollen knee reminiscent of Hasim Rochman’s lump on his head while sliding into third. Hammer took a tumble off the mound in the 7 th and left with a turned ankle. Todd Neuman, for the second consecutive week, was drilled in the ribs. All three should be fine in time for next weeks Baseball International Tournament in Sarasota, Florida. Even the umpire Pesci took part in the “fun” as he took a stray fastball from Neuman off his inner thigh (ouch).
The Dodgers took an early 2-0 lead in the bottom of the first with RBIs from Mon Cap (3-4), and Duke (2-2) off of G.D. Kenny.
Mon cap threw 2 strong innings for the Dodgers giving up only on hit to Ice, walking one, and striking one out.
Newcomer Matt Avery scored his second run of the game in the 3 rd (unearned) off of flamethrower Kris Gaida, to increase the Dodgers lead to 3-0.
Matt would then take over for Mon Cap and despite giving up singles to Greg Elbaum (in his domeball debut), and the always tough Lich, he still struck out the side.
Icehouse relived Kris in the 4 th, and sandwich hits by Duke and Mike Miller around a Joey Dushane walk, allowing 2 more Dodger runs to score before he K’d Hammer and induced Matt to groundout to end the inning.
The G’Diks finally scored a lone run in the top 5 th in Ski’s first inning of work. Duse would single, steak second and score on a frozen rope from Nails.
The Dodgers got the run right back in the bottom of the frame with hot hitting Harchik singling, and scoring on Joey’s first dome RBI. Ski would also single, but was stranded as Chap got MM to strike out.
The G’diks wouldn’t allow another run, or even another hit after that as Fluff, Neuman, and Lich put on a nice pitching display. Fluff walked Dan to start his inning, but got Bob Graham to ground into a double play, and Hammer to ground out to second. Neuman was just plain sick recording 2 weak groundouts, and a K, Lich was equally impressive allowing only Joey to reach base via an error.
The G’Diks scored another run in the 6 th off of Ski, as Lich singled, stole second and scored on Kenny’s single. Notable in the inning was another stolen base for all time stolen base leader Mediocre Jay.
MM pitched a strong 7 th recording K’s of Ice & Nails.
Hammer did his Boy George impersonation in the 8 th, I’ll Tumble for You, as he took a nasty spill off the dome’s artificial mound. Supe would take over form him, and provide little relief for him allowing an inherited run to score (Neuman huge single), and Elbaum (walk) coming on a clutch, controversial base hit down the third base line. Supe was helped out by a sweet 6-4-3 double play, with a nice turn by Matt.
Joey D made his debut as the Dodgers closer pitching a perfect 9 th, striking out one to add to the Dodger total of 8 on the night. As The Dodgers held on to win the game
