Only In Baseball (Softball Too)

For as much as we love it, baseball and softball has a tendency to drive us a little batty. It keeps us on our toes. And no matter how many games you go to, there is always something new.

Sunday held a number of first for me, both on the baseball and softball side. That contributes to a already crazy weekend with games moved to The Dalles and Tri-Cities.

Here's what made Sunday even more unique...
• Sunday's softball head was "winded out." Yes, you read that right. After one batter this afternoon, the Pacific and UPS coaches and umpires decided that the sustained 35 MPH winds in Pasco (gusts of 40-50 MPH) was too much. So...games called on account.

• I have never umpired a game, but today I called a batter out. In the eighth inning on the first game against Whitworth, the plate umpire missed a swinging strike by Nate Rasmussen on a first pitch steal attempt by Andy Tolbert (Tolbert was called out). We post the strike, but after the next pitch the umpires signals one ball, one strike. After the second strike, Whitworth's coach comes out to argue that ball one was actually a strike.

After a minute, the umpire looks up to me and asks what the first pitch was. He couldn't hear me yell strike, so I raise my arm, fist clinched, signaling the strike. Essentially, I called Rasmussen out. Sorry Nate.

• In the fourth inning of our second baseball game, a prevailing west wind of 30 miles per hour pushed three homers out for the Boxers. Rasmussen, Nick McNeely and Corby Makin all hit back-to-back-to-back solo shots over the left center field wall. It is an amazing sight to see three go out in a row.

Not to be outdone, Whitworth's Mitch Ramsay clubbed a home run to the same spot in the fifth. ramsay's, however, bounces off the road behind the left field wall, take a high bounce and rolls over the roof of a nearby house.

• At one point of game two, it was rainy and gray on the first base side of the open-air press box and sunny and dry on the third base side.

Only in baseball...and softball.