ORANGE CRUSH RALLIES FOR THRILLING 6-5 VICTORY OVER BIG RED MACHINE

The Great Lawn was abuzz on Monday evening as a pair of SLAM’s elite renewed their friendly rivalry in Central Park. In three of the previous four seasons, the outcome of this game has been decided by one run (with each team splitting the four contests) so it should have come to no one’s surprise that this game was also a 1-run game.

Just six days after the birth of his daughter, David Solomon took the mound against the vaunted Gensler lineup and was rudely greeted by a leadoff single by Roger Lee, who later came around to score the first run of the game. After the first inning, both pitchers settled in nicely as the score remained 1-0 until the bottom of the 4th inning.

After extending the lead to 3-0 in the 4th inning, Gensler tacked on another pair of runs in the 5th inning thanks in part to a pair of errors by shortstop Doug Houstoun who had an absolutely miserable defensive day in the field. (I don’t want to say exactly how many errors he had on the afternoon but I think it rhymed with “jive”). On the flipside, Gensler’s pitcher Joe Sopiak was nothing short of masterful through five innings, shutting down the HMA/RAMSA offense and limiting them to only 4 hits.


But you can keep a good offense down for so long as the Orange Crush mounted an epic rally for the ages in the 6th inning, with 6 outs to play, scoring 6 runs to take the lead. The devilish rally began with a little hustle as Mike Sargent doubled to LF which seemingly energized the team. After a defensive error and strikeout, Pete Garofalo worked a savvy walk to load the bases. Dan Sykes started the first of 4 consecutive singles to continue the one out rally. Proving his mental toughness, SS Doug Houstoun redeemed himself by roping the last single up the middle to bring home the fifth run and tie the game. HMA/RAMSA took a lead they would never relinquish when Mike Ryan hit a groundball to short to drive in the 6th run of the inning.

Seemingly energized from the offensive outburst, HMA/RAMSA shutdown Gensler in the 6th and 7th innings to secure a thrilling 6-5 victory – thrilling at least for the team in orange. When asked to comment on his team’s performance, SS Roger Lee could only text “Gonna take a week to get over this loss....see you punks in the postseason."


Come get some.