Battle of Swampscott

Swampscott is a town of many things.  Temples, yamakas, malakas, beaches, and most of all, youth baseball.  It is mandatory to get your offspring at least 10 innings of soft-toss work before their third birthday.  Swampscott is the self-proclaimed meca of both jewish people and Little League Baseball.  Swampscott has produced many individual stars and teams  in this baseball arena, most of whom have finally hit paydirt, in the Nahant Softball League.  The Barbarians and Gulls are two of the biggest draws in the NSL and have mostly bread their talent overseas in Swampscott.  The Barbarians, a perenial NSL powerhouse, has mixed a group of grizzled veterans and new young talent, whom they have sapped away from the Gulls squad in an effort to monopolize Swampscott's softball talent.  The Gulls are a mishmash of former standouts from the mainland, behind a new look ace, D. Barile, who hails from the island, home of the NSL.  The Barbarains and Gulls faced off in a fierce battle on Friday night that ended with the Gulls on the winning side, downing the Barbarians 14 - 11.

The Gulls were blanked by B. Serino in the top half of the first who worked out of a jam.  The Gulls were without their ace and decided to throw G. Wattendorf on the mound, in the first start of his career.  Wattendorf had a unique if not awkward delivery, that resembled a women's bowling technique.  The young righty had major problems in the early going.  The only thing that was even remotely in the strikezone was a 55-mile an hour changeup with little to no movement.  The Barbarians responded with  homeruns by all three of their big bats, M. Pressman, C. Capinigro, and A. Stone all put softballs into the stands in deep left.  The Barbarians had a 4-0 cushion at the end of a half inning.

The Gulls were told to go pound sand, and replied "Aww, Naw, Hell Naw, Y'all went out an' done it", grabbing a pair of runs in the top of the second courtesy of the Kelliher brothers. The Gulls exploded again in the top of the third with help from a G. Wattendorf two run homerun which scored the lightning fast M. Lausier, who spends his offseason bartending at the famous watering hole Maddies, in old town Marblehead.  K. Kelliher struck again with a two out RBI to stretch the Gulls lead to 6-4.

The Barbarians however, would not go away and continued to hit G. Wattendorf early and often as the meat he was offering was being sent all over the Lowlands Field.  A. Stone took Wattendorf's first offering to pound town in his second at-bat, his second homerun of the contest, this one a two run shot.  J. Capinigro laced a double to right and scored on a B. Serino sac fly to put the Barbarians up 8-6.

The Kelliher brothers would strike gold again in the top of the sixth, both scoring to even the score at eight.  In the bottom of the sixth Wattendorf buckled down, but a double by T. Nicosia and a deep fly ball led to a two base tag and score, putting the Barbarians out in front 9-8.

The Gulls rallied the troops in the top of the seventh and final inning with an offensive explosion.  With one out, Wattendorf, fighting for a spot in the rotation rounded third as the ball came into the infield.  Wattendorf dove and slid safely into home with the second run of the inning to put the Gulls on top.   Unfortunetly headfirst slides into home were banned from the NSL to protect players from possible head and neck injuries.  Wattendorf should have been called out for the second out of the inning.  However, rookie umpire T. Lorenza was unaware of the rule change and couldn't implement the ruling.  The league investigated the incident and put Lorenza on suspension for not fulfilling his professional umpiring credit requirements for 2010.

The Gulls would go on to score six runs in the inning, creeping out in front, 14-9.  The Barbarians drew three straight walks and scored a pair in the final frame, but ultimately fall to the Gulls, 14-11.

CURRENT STANDINGS

1.NFL        11 - 0
2.BARB        8 - 3
3.GULLS       5 - 2
4.GEA         5 - 5
5.KNIGHTS     3 - 5
6.LYNN        3 - 5
7.GALAXY      1 - 8
8.OB LAND     0 - 7 
Lynn vs. Knights was rained out on Monday.