How Blue Can You Get?

Eighteen months ago, a great softball player and one helluva determined coach had some words of wisdom for a team he was about to leave behind. "Run hard to first base," he said, "call out the pop flys, have fun, listen to Tanya, and raise a glass to toast the team whenever possible." For the most part, the scrappy little group of part-time athletes took his advice to heart, and as a result, pulled off some impressive wins in their fifth season for the Yorkville Sports Association. On the whole, we had fun, and yes, there was plenty of glass-raising too, most recently at the banquet.

The details of our evening in Astoria are a little fuzzy this far down the road, but fortunately someone had the good sense to write down last year's awards before distributing them to the appropriate member of the Blues. They appear below as a reminder of our achievements—collective and individual—and to inspire everyone to bring the same effort and attitude back to the softball diamond this summer. Season Six is knocking, and we've got a mediocre record to defend. My advice: get some shoe polish on your cleats, start eating like a champion, and keep listening to Tanya.

Fifth Annual Oxford Blues Coed Slow-Pitch Softball Awards
Catherine "Beer Pong" Rae—Best Postgame Performance
Rachael "Tubthumping" Zimmermann—Bench Player of the Year
Michelle "Not to brag, but I'm kind of an expert when it comes to douchebags" Lipinski—Position Player of the Year
Ned "I got digits" Sears—Slide of the Year
Joe "When's the next game?" Cognard—Grand Slam Crown
Brian "I'd rather be reading" Hurley—Utility Player Award
Dan "Where's the damn team van?" Ozzi—Team Player of the Year
Andy "Cal Ripken the 3rd" Fargnoli—MVP
Ebin "Beardo" Sandler—Silver Slugger
Iain "I thought you meant swing at the first pitch" Finlayson—The Al Cascio Memorial Award
Martin "Just call me Mike Piazza" Coleman—Gold Glove
Joe "Guess who didn't lose the bat bag?" Jackson—On Base Award
Elyse "Screw the outfield, I'm joining the circus" Turr—Most Improved Player
Ninelle "Make that a beer" Silberberg—Personal Achievement Award
Dayne "Is it football season yet?" Poshusta—Rookie of the Year
Robert "Laser vision" Repino—True Blue Award
Ben "Obama's speechwriter's got nothing on me" Keene—Heart Bleeds Blue
Tanya "Wait for your pitch" Laplante—Irrepressible Optimist Award

Flashbacks and Predictions

Waiting can be an agonizing activity. Often, to spare ourselves mental anguish, we use distractions to help pass the time. So, as we wait for yet another storm front to move across the New York metro area, I thought I'd post a couple of things to take our minds off of rain outs. First, a quick stroll down memory lane, all the way back to August 2008. The setting: Astoria's Bohemian Hall & Beer Garden. The occasion: A Blues Banquet. Because of a medical emergency, Andy couldn't attend last summer's celebration and the following speech had to be delivered in absentia.

Before I say anything else, I’d like to give a shout out to Brooklyn. Secondly, I hope that many good kielbasa jokes are made this evening—I’m disappointed to be missing them. To begin, I’m grateful to receive this award and the public recognition of my tremendous talent as well as the unparalleled contributions I’ve made to the team. But for the sake of next season, I had to go to Nashville for some experimental surgery on my injured wrist.

I was going to wait to tell everyone, but then I thought it was best to inform you all now: I'm getting a Terminator arm. Although the damage didn’t seem serious at first, doctors informed me that I was close to dying. Fortunately for the Blues, the prospect of playing one more season was all the hope I needed to live long enough to become part machine.

I will be donating my award to charity to contribute to this extremely important cause because with enough awards like this one, we'll be able to see an end to broken wrists within our lifetimes. Imagine a world where your grandchild says, “Pop-pop, what's a broken wrist?” and you reply, “What the deuce?!?! No, wait… sorry, that's history.”

Remember, TIME magazine called softball injuries this millennium's bubonic plague; I’m proud to be a spokesperson in the battle against this scourge. And sure, I’m fighting the good fight one-handed at the moment, but I still think that together we can win handily. Also without getting too partisan, everyone should know that if elected to office, John McCain plans on cutting all funding for broken-wrist research. What a bastard. Finally, I’d like to thank myself for my exceptional athleticism. I’d also like to thank my parents for giving me shoddy genes and God, for making my bones so very, very brittle. Oh, and if it weren’t for Ben, I wouldn’t have broken anything in the first place.

Shifting focus to the season ahead of us, I'd like to put to rest a rumor that's been overheard in the locker room on more than one occasion. In spite of any flimsy evidence to the contrary, the Blues Organization does in fact care about the well-being of its players. No, we don't have a team van, a trainer, or even a clubhouse, but I'm very proud to announce that we've nearly secured an official baker. She's an award-winning pastry chef and, as of Monday, the proud owner of a Cuisinart Stand Mixer, complete with 1,000 watts of mixing power! Because frankly, cupcakes (OK, OK and beer) are the only fitting way to commemorate our first win of 2009.

Oh What a Night...

The 4th Annual 2008 Oxford Blues Coed Slow-Pitch Softball Banquet is in the books. It was a classic evening, following in the tradition of past banquets. As usual, a storm was brewing on the horizon while we traveled to Queens. Tanya and Catherine were the early heroes though and arrived in time to snatch up some dry tables.

We drank countless pitchers of Staropramen and munched on European grill fare until it was time for the awards. For those of you that missed it, here is the complete list of awards for this season. If you haven't received your award yet, I'll be dropping it off soon.

Kate "Chaw Time" Brown - Position Player Award
Joe "The Gator" Cognard - Comeback Player of the Year
Martin "M-Cole" Coleman - Al Cascio Memorial Award
Andrew "Flowing Locks" Fargnoli - Slide of the Year Award
Iain "Rounders" Finlayson - True Blue Award
Brian "Prison Break"Hurley - Gold Glove Award
Joe "Uh Oh" Jackson - Best Dressed Award
Ben "Banned from Bar" Keene - Most Improved Player Award
Tanya "Cakes" Laplante - Step Into the Spotlight Award
Michelle "Chelly Chell" Lipinski - Rookie of the Year Award
Dan "The Intimidator" Ozzi - Mr. Hustle Award
Catherine "What Should I Do?" Rae - Team Player of the Year Award
Robert "The Rocket" Repino - Cy Young Award
Ebin "Voice From Heaven" Sandler - Utility Player of the Year Award
Ned "St. Louis Slugger" Sears - Home Run Crown Award
Ninell "Silver Mountain in German is called…" Silberberg - Eagle Eye Award
Kyle "Hawaii Five-0" Taylor - Web Gem Award
Elyse "Turr-minator" Turr - On Base Award
Rachael "Did you know Bob Dylan's real last name is..." Zimmerman - Bench Player of the Year Award
Jared "Closing Time" Wright - Most Improved post-game Player Award

Although Andy was out of the state, he collaborated with Ben Keene to create an acceptance speech and Mr. Keene delivered it on his behalf. It was the funniest acceptance speech ever written and nearly killed Dan Ozzi. At the end of the awards, I was presented with a large frame of some lovely Blues photos from the past four seasons and autographs of actual Blues players (past and present). It was a great gift and I'd like to thank everyone that contributed to it.

After the awards ceremony, things went up a notch. There were loud Swingers quotes, wet shirts, the leaning tower of Ben Keene, dancing, and the epic trial of the People vs. Catherine Rae, who was indicted with soliciting relationship advice from a homeless man. She would later be acquitted of the charges as the jury found insufficient evidence that the man was homeless. For my emphatic feelings on the verdict, be sure to check out the video in Jared's photos.

Michelle also ended up with a fun batch of pictures. Ben claims to have some good photos but four days after the event they are still not available. It was a great night.

As for the future, there are rumors of another chance to play ARTstor next week in a post-season exhibition game. I'm flying out that day so I won't be able to attend. Although I won't be at the helm I'm compelled to leave you with a few last bits of advice in my final blog post for next week and beyond; run hard to first base, call out the pop flys, have fun, listen to Tanya, and raise a glass to toast the team whenever possible. Go Blues!