Kickball Season 2 [Fall 2007], Game 2: More Carnage

This week, my team (Cobra Kai) took on Scarlet Fever.  We were familiar with Scarlet Fever; last season they were called Red Rovers.  They wear the bright red t-shirts, and all of them are really cool.  I partied with them, and I would hang out with them on crossover weeks and division parties.  I almost ended up on their team, and probably would have if I hadn't insisted on playing on Wednesdays last season.   Just a great group, with more team spirit than any other team I can think of. 

However, they are terrible at kickball.  Not that they care, it's just the truth.  Last season, they set a league record for fewest runs scored in a season, or biggest run differential, or something like that.  They didn't win a single game.  I must confess, when I saw we were playing them this week, I mentally said "well, I guess we're gonna be 2-0." 

We had another strong turnout, though not quite as strong as the first game.  Since Dave wasn't there, I led off the kicking.  Their fielding was so bad that when Justin came up to kick third, I thought "Cool -- looks like a 3-run homer."  And it was.  I came up to kick later in the game with 2 outs and the bases loaded.  They switched pitchers on me, and this pitcher was better, so I ended up grounding out.  It was the first time I was unsuccessful reaching base since our semifinal game last season against league powerhouse Thick Femur.

Scarlet Fever took it all in stride.  We had a kickball rookie (Landon) try pitching for us.  He conceded a run, which thrilled our opponents (they aren't accustomed to scoring often).  But by that point, the game was already decided.  In only his second game, my roommate even kicked a home run.  The final score: Cobra Kai 13, Scarlet Fever 1. 

I can't figure out why we are listed as being in 4th place overall in the Capital Division rankings.  We have scored (at least) 29 runs in only 2 games, with only 2 runs scored against us.  And this in spite of the fact that we have to juggle multiple lineups and 18-20 players, including 5 or so rookies.  But we keep rolling.

Next week, we'll be playing against the team that we beat for our first 'real' win last season during crossover week.  We beat them 7-3 -- but it turns out that Wednesday teams tend to do better than Thursday teams, and we were the Wednesday team in last season's match-up.  It will be interesting to see what happens this time around.  In the meantime, our evil dojo claimed another victim.   At happy hour, some girl asked my teammate Duffy why he was arguing last week when we were winning.  He said, "See this?" and pointed to the custom Cobra Kai logo on the right sleeve of our team shirt: Strike First - Strike Hard - No Mercy.  It's funny how winning makes jokes like that work better. 

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