The Avalon Park Wolves played two tournaments recently.  The play could not have been different.  In the first tournament, in the horse fields of Ocala, Florida, the Wolves won one game and lost two.  The Wolves, candidly, did not play well in the field and lost two games, that easily could have been won.

However, in the second tournament, our boys regrouped and we avenged our losses.  We beat both the Orlando Panthers and Central Florida Extreme. In Sunday play, our boys also beat the Elite Performance.  In the semi final, we lost to the Panthers. Simply put, the Panthers consistently hit the ball, in one inning, and managed to pile up a bunch of runs.  Effectively, our team lost one inning in the entire tournament.

We left with our heads held high and, by every measure, our team has consistently gotten better this seasons.

Here is some commentary from Manager Ray Elwell:

 

1) There's no more exciting play in baseball than an inside-the-park home run. At any point at any time, Alec has the ability to light up the crowd like he did this weekend.

 

2) Paul did a fantastic job eating innings for us this weekend. I will admit that wasn't the plan, but we'll certainly take it. It is huge advantage to have 8 pitchers who are capable of throwing in bracket play games. One day very soon we will savor that fruit in a championship game.

 

3) Big Mac played outstanding shortstop all weekend. He is the second coming of Cal Ripken Jr.

 

4) Trevor came through with very clutch hits. No other team has a clean-up quality hitter strategically positioned in the lower third of the batting order.

 

5) Caleb threw very well this weekend and always seemed to be on base. Nice layout in left field.

 

6) Everyone has figured out we have the best center fielded at 11U and not many balls were hit there this weekend. However, Kenny had several huge blasts to the outfield and he provided spunk in the dugout.

 

7) Peyton pitched very well in our last game. He was hitting all four corners of the strike zone... unfortunately the umpire had a round strike zone about the size of a dime. It was also very good to see him putting a charge in the ball at the plate.

 

8) Andrew came through with a couple of very big hits. He stings the ball and it was very good to see several of those finding daylight. Most notable was the excitement he brought to the base paths.

 

9) Christian did an outstanding job behind the plate and threw very well Sunday night to keep the game close..

 

10) Connor (aka Mr Spirit) had several very key hits on Saturday and played outstanding 1B.

 

11) David "The Human Rain Delay" Steinfeldt. Willing to do anything for the team, including untying his shoes before he goes to the plate And if questioned under oath, we will both deny we ever discussed milking time off the clock so we don't have to play unnecessary extra innings.

 

12) Bradley "Vaccum" Elwell and the key play to end game 1 on Saturday. The common reaction amongst the coaches was "where the h*ll did he come from?". Also a very well placed bunt.

 

Any time you can walk away from a tournament 3-1 you should feel really good about the effort and we do.

Here are some pictures, compliments of Warren Bane.