July 4-5

Wednesday was of course a national holiday, I marked the occasion by having my usual midweek visit for lunch with Jenny. There was a chance of rain in the forecast for the evening hours, in late afternoon it began to get very dark to the south and west. At 6:30 the Barnstormers continued their series with the Road Warriors, after sweeping the doubleheader on Tuesday (game #2 didn't end until almost 11:15) the Stormers on this night suffered a shutout loss the hard way. Shortly after the game started the rain began, by the middle innings it was coming down hard and field conditions were deteriorating. The Warriors scored two in the second and two more in the fourth, at the seventh-inning stretch the umpires halted play and had the field covered. The scheduled holiday fireworks show took place at that point, when they were over the game was called official with Nate Reed taking the tough-luck 4-0 loss. The game is noteworthy because the Barnstormers were held without a hit through the six innings they batted, the club only had three baserunners all coming on walks. Perhaps it has an asterisk next to it because it was abbreviated by rain but it still counts, the only other time the Stormers have been no-hit was in a regulation nine-inning game in 2006 at home (and I was there that night as well). On Thursday the weather was much more conducive to playing baseball, the clubs played the last game of the series and the season's first half. The league usually plays a 140-game schedule, when the Road Warriors are involved the slate is reduced to 126 giving each of the seven other clubs a 72-54 home-road split instead of the usual 70-70. On this night the Warriors took a 1-0 lead in the first, the Stormers matched it in the third when Ryan Casteel walked and scored on Trayvon Robinson's RBI triple. The deadlock continued into the eighth inning where the Barnstormers put together a three-run uprising. Blake Gailen homered onto the picnic deck in right field to put the Stormers ahead, Anderson De La Rosa's two-run double scored Casteel and K.C. Hobson to make it 4-1. Matt Reynolds gave up a run in the ninth but was able to nail down the save for winning pitcher Garrett Granitz, John Anderson came out of the bullpen for the spot start and went the first four innings. The Barnstormers finish the first half at 38-25 and just for the record the Road Warriors finish at 17-46. Say what you will about their won/lost record but the fact is the Warriors are an underrated opponent. The team is not built to be a contender and it exists only out of necessity but the guys on that roster battle every night, if they had the chance to play half their games at home like every other team it could well be a very different story. The Stormers continue their homestand with the start of the second half on Friday the 6th. Take care, thanks for reading.