Sunday Thoughts

Random snippets...

I love this time in the tournament. The matchups for the playoffs are set, all the strategic possibilities are dancing through the coaches' heads. I think the best part is that you are already part of the way along the journey, but still anything is possible.

Best story of the day: Coach wants to appeal that their opponent missed 2nd. Yells to his SS "Go to 2nd, Go to 2nd". So his SS and second baseman switch positions...

11-Major: TABU and Simi Predators both looked great in pool play. Santa Clara Young Guns draw TABU in tomorrow afternoon's playoffs- well, conventional wisdom (mine included) is that TABU is just going to slaughter the YG's. But as I was driving back to the hotel, I got to thinking about it, and what a great opportunity for the Guns, you know? What a classic David vs Goliath sports story. The YG's are a good team. As a Tournament Director, I don't care who wins, but you know in my heart I'm rooting for the underdog...

12-Major: The first two days were just the prelude. Tomorrow is the big day. Pre-tournament faves Backyard Boyz have a long road to get it done. Rivals SV Yankees and SV Bulldogs square off in the quarters. Hard 90 and the Grizzlies earned byes, and the eyewitness reports in Redding say the Grizz look strong.

13-Major: Boy has this division delivered this weekend! A couple of amazing stories: how about the Monterey Bay Pirates? They go 2-0 Saturday including a huge upset win over the Gamers. Then they go out today and drop a game to the East Bay Lookouts. So they have their back to the wall all of a sudden, and they have to play tournament #2 seed Cal Sting Outlaws to get in the playoffs. And they win! Great stuff- beating the #1 and #2 seeds, dropping a game to the #13.

Or the Gamers! At 2-1, the Gamers squared off in the last game of the night against All-American Sports Academy (also 2-1). This game went down to the wire, tied at 8-8 into the bottom of the last. The Gamers squeaked it out to knock out All-American.

For Monday, the draw ends up very very interesting. On the top half, Gamers and Starmaker square off at 8:30, with the winner to play Sting Outlaws. So the top 3 seeds (pre-tournament) will knock each other down to 1 before the Championship! Monterey Bay faces Club All-Star and Hard 90 draws 5280 Baseball. Any of these 7 teams could win this thing tomorrow.

14-Major: Another pretty interesting breakdown of playoff seeds. In the top half, the AZ Landsharks look to be in control. They square off against Bombers in the quarters, and then the winner of Team Triple Crown (3-0) and Club All-Star. The Landsharks have looked outstanding in pool play. In the bottom half of the draw, NorCal and Lamorinda face each other at 10:15. The winner of that game faces the Starmaker/Cal Sting winner.

One thing is for sure- whoever wins these divisions will have earned it. This Super NIT weekend is a marathon...
Time for a good 5 hours of sleep.

Thoughts on Saturday

First, it may have been ambitious for us to think we could blog while the games were going on. Sorry.

Second, our thoughts and prayers go out to umpire Rob Thomas, whose Mom passed away Saturday, causing him to leave the Tracy complex suddenly. Thanks to the teams for being human beings and understanding why for 3 games we had to have a solo ump.

Some amazing results today... In the 14u, what a statement made by the Arizona Landsharks! Big win against NorCal and then a blowout win against Bombers Baseball to start the tournament.

And the 13-Major-- wow. Club All-Star laid down a marker today, with victories over All-American Sports and Hard 90. And Monterey Bay Pirates upset #1 seed Headfirst Gamers National, 3-2. And what an important victory for the Gamers coming back to beat Starmaker Stallions 11-10 tonight.

VYAA Bomberz, Santa Clara Tribe and Hard 90 Phenom look to be on a playoff collision course in the 10-maj.

Simi Predators were impressive today in the 11-Major. They join TABU and NorCal Bombers at 2-0.

12-Maj: Huge win for NorCal Grizzlies over Backyard Boyz this morning.

Congrats to today's top performers. Still, as the saying goes... you can't win the tournament on Saturday.