Russ' Softball

In case you don't know....

... the softball field is near 100th and Riley, in Zeeland. If you can find the Family Fare, you'll be able to find our field.

Schedule now available!

Please direct your attention to the right hand side of your screen for the 2010 schedule.
Thanks!

Rain Delay

July 22's game has been postponed to July 29, 9:00 p.m., due to inclement weather.

Video: The last game of the 2009 regular season

For those new to these videos, I do not trim them down into a highlight reel. Instead, I post the raw video. As if you were slipping in and out of consciousness during a game and only caught bits and pieces, so are these videos. When you are 80 and in an assisted living facility, you can watch these videos and better remember the good times you had watching Russ' Softball in 2009.

Next game: Wednesday, 9 p.m. (It might be 9:10, but, be safe... be there at 9:00.)

Photo Spread: Did you know you can only recharge batteries for a limited amount of time?

Photos! My camera's batteries died shortly into this short game. And the extra set of batteries I grabbed, I think, have died for good. We'll see, but, rechargeable batteries do have a limited lifespan. They may be at the end of their life. Which didn't work out too well for me, since I still wanted stills, in addition to moving photos. Nevertheless, I took the best out of what I had. Its still a big post. Its just not the best stuff ever. Enjoy(!)(?).

Jason gets ready to pitch

John gets ready for practice

Waiting for the game to start. We waited a little over ten minutes past our start time.

Another image of waiting around. This time, its vertical, so its different. ;)

Melissa and Grace chat about Grace being done with school.

Sitting all alone... he is such a zero. :P

Brian and a kid. (Hey, if I knew everyone's name, I'd have a different job, m'kay?)

I love the sky and sunlight in this photo! So cool.

Aah... blue skies, bright lights, but everyone's in focus... *sigh* Its so pretty!

Dan the Man.

Its (un)lucky number 13! Seriously, if its both a luck and unlucky number, then isn't it just... a number?

Brian, laughing it up as pitcher.

An umpire. For no other reason than I could. :)

Sarah. (Again, my batteries died, so I'm going with what I've got!)

Cool shadow, cool sky... Just... cool!

"Go after it!" is probably what they were saying... in the peanut gallery! Oh, snap.

Melissa, trying to be all cool with her hat and shades, hiding from the cameras.

Not a good picture of Mike, but, I'd rather have some Mike than no Mike at all. :)

Sarah laughs, disbelieving that she swung when she knew she shouldn't.

Jason goes up to bat. This is apparently taken during the second inning.

Normally, I don't publish photos of the pets that make an appearance. However, since this is the Jurries family dog, I'll allow an exception. This is Fred, a Basset Hound.

Good thing I'm almost out of photos... I'm getting to the point where I write really weird, nonsensical captions just for the sake of taking up space. Like this caption, for example.

And... that's it! The last picture my camera took for the 2009 Softball regular season.

Next week: Tournaments start! Wednesday at 9 p.m. Be there, or... not be there. If you are on the team, be there. If you are a fan, be there. If you are not either one of those... I can't imagine this blog holds much interest for you (nor the other two groups, but especially you!), so... I guess you can skip.

Recap: Mercy me! That's the last game of regular season

Hello, readers! It has been a while. In addition to our week off, your not-so-humble writer has been working. Ergo, blog content has been light. Not this week! (Well, kind of this week.) I was able to get away and go to the game, which went down like this:

1st Inning

Top: Nate gets to second base. (NOT LIKE THAT. Unless you were thinking about softball. Then, like that.) Becki gets to first base. Which, how many other sports are there where if you get to the third of something, its a compliment? Anyways. Becki gets out, same with Julie. Nate runs home, shows emotion. Dan gets to first. Kelli strikes out, bringing Russ' to three outs.
Bottom: Brian pitches the first inning. Kyle and Julie work together to make a good play for the first out. Kyle makes a great catch. However, the ball was going so fast, Kyle said that it "might have broke my glove."
Score: 2-1, Buntes favor

2st Inning
Top: Mike goes to first. And then he's tagged out, Sarah gets out as well. Jason makes it to first base (insert "and he'll only ever make it to first base" joke here), Melissa strikes out. Our half of the inning goes remarkably fast -- a lesson the other team could have heeded later on...
Bottom: Jason takes the pitcher's mound. Nate makes a good try to get someone out at first. Dan catches a high and pretty.
Score: 6-1, Buntes favor

3rd Inning
Top: Jason goes to first. Same with Becki and John. Brian strikes out. Becki gets out, same with John. Two runs are scored in-between.
Bottom: The third inning, otherwise known as the inning where WE GOT THE POINT ALREADY STOP SCORING RUNS. They honestly reached the limit for home runs in an inning. That's how bad the inning went. Ten runs were made. Becki and Julie worked together to get the first out. As Grace pointed out, throughout the season, Julie has gotten very good at doing the splits!
Score: 16-1, Buntes favor

4th Inning
Top: Nate walks to second. Kelli gets out. Nate makes it all the way home. Kyle gets home, Sarah gets to second, Dan and Melissa get out. And... that kind of ends the game. We got mercied. And we got mercied good. What a way to end the regular season.

Next week begins Tournaments, which lasts for three weeks. Its always odd, because you never know if the team will last one, two, or all three weeks. The first game for us is next week, July 22, at 9 p.m. ET. Beyond that, I don't know the times... times will be posted on a as-I-find-them-out basis. :)

(Thanks to recent cosmetology school-graduate Grace for the notes!)

Play like Mickey Mantle

During my 18 years I came to bat almost 10,000 times. I struck out about 1,700 times and walked maybe 1,800 times. You figure a ballplayer will average about 500 at bats a season. That means I played seven years without ever hitting the ball.
-- Mickey Mantle

VIDEO: June 17, 2009

Here are assorted video clips from the June 17, 2009 softball game. A little over 22 minutes total of video is represented here.

You may notice the videos are not in widescreen, like the last ones. I was experimenting with another shooting mode my pocket camcorder has. Instead of taking HD video at 60 frames per second, I used the VGA mode, which is supposed to be more web-friendly, but at lesser quality. (By the time I got done exporting and uploading to YouTube, my HD videos looked less than stellar... trust me, the source files looked better.)

Next week's game is June 24, at 6:15 p.m. Eastern Time. We are the visitors that week.

Photo Spread: June 17, 2009 game

The morning saw rain, and the afternoon was very gray and dreary. However, by the time we got to practice, it started to clear up a little, and was a little bit sunny for the game.

Coach Nate supervises practice time.

Brian takes some hits. As in, softball practice. Not as in physical abuse.

Hi, slightly-out-of-focus Leslie!

And its off to the main field for the game!

Some unnamed people try to avoid the camera.

Its laughing time!

See? Laughing time.

No one's laughing, Jason. You can stop.

Nate looks on from the bench, as Alyssa writes in the scorebook.

This is my favorite picture of the night. Dan and Kyle look on after a play. Don't ask me which play, I don't know. For all I know, they were looking at a squirrel. Very intensely.