Softball: A Fiercely Pensive Reaction under the Stress of Heartbreaking Loss

[raymond...@gmail.com]

Dear People,

 

Let the record show that my team took on the dominating Eoin O’Conner’s in his long-awaited debut as captain, and it was all the more stressful because it took place on an icy and overcast post-storm morn’ filled with multiple layers of pre-game chaos (from late player churn to the indispensable scoreboard that I forgot at my house, apparently because my tiny little synapses are no longer so neurologically spry). No matter though, since we did indeed play, and when it was all over, this towering superstar of the Irish National Softball Team and arguably the greatest slugger in the history of this league led his peeps back from a mid-inning 14 run deficit to a breathtaking 30-29 10-inning walk-off victory that I assume most will fondly remember as a managerial masterpiece.*

 

*And yet. 

 

The fact is that his team was generally listless and uninspired throughout the first 7/10th of the game, and truth be told, they played so poorly that for 5½ innings, they were floundering under the inherent disgrace of the 10-run mercy rule (Four outs to bat, two outs to defend). Sure, like all forms of athletic support, it’s there for a reason, and as a tender aerobic folk, we obviously accept the tradeoffs between basic compassion and the risks of grave moral hazard. 

 

 Still, let’s be honest. I have no doubt that they were celebrating from Dublin to Galway, but it should not be lost to history that Eoin’s team trailed the entire match until Kira blasted an exquisite 2-out 1-on game-tying RBI hopper past 2nd in the bottom of the 9th, and they never led until the inimitable Michael Hersh slammed a precisely targeted 2-on 2-out game-winning RBI laser to deep center left in the bottom of the 10th. In other words, my peeps crushed it 99.02% of the time, and while you may see ‘sour grapes’ in merely noting this for posterity, I actually see a rich vein of query, ontological incertitude, sun-dried raisins, and fresh red blood.

 

Indeed, the whole experience left me questioning the homo sapien fetish for endings qua endings, and while I’m not going to invoke Kafka or Nietzsche or Lombardi at this late date, I’d like to think that a rigorous critique of the cleaving of triumph from dominance should shake us to the very marrow in our ceaseless search for what it truly means to be a winner, a loser, and most obviously, a direct descendant of whatever ghastly common ancestor we share with the stupid rhesus monkeys. I honestly don’t know, and therefore there will be a game at Codornices—the last one until March ’26!— If I get enough commits by this Friday morning . . . Raymond