On the final Wednesday night of the year the Commish, Ryan, not only dialed up another perfect night but also managed a couple of hits and made a nice catch in the field in the ASG last night.
Now, I watched the game last night and beyond the score being 10-1 in favor of Team Wolf/Harris I couldn’t tell you more than a couple of things about the game. Joey Hiudt made two great plays in the field, one in RF and one at 2nd base. Griff Harris (with constant heckling from his sister) pitched a couple of innings (as did Tyler Stansbury) and Stu Solomon, channeling his best Dan Bilardello, dropped a pop-up behind the plate. And like I mentioned somehow Team Wolf/Harris scored 10 runs. It wasn’t a homer or balls in the gap, it was more hits here and there and stellar defense from them to keep Lefton/Eppy off the board. I will say when you have 20 of the best of our guys out there the quality of play is pretty impressive. I’d put our talent vs. any in the city. Jeff Finkelstein, fresh off his impressive performance in the Tournament finals, won MVP of the ASG with 5 innings of one-run softball and a couple of hits.
A great time was had by all and we look forward to next year.
League Notes:
After the game, at the Spring House, we were talking about all the fathers and sons that have played in the league over the years and how special it is for all of us who play with our dads or sons or both. Which leads me to sad news as former player and Dad to our beloved Jason Faust, Marty Faust passed away earlier this week after a long battle with cancer. It shows how much this league meant to him that when Jason died last year, Marty asked for his signed jersey so that he could hang it in his house. Forgetting winning and losing, that is the real legacy of our league.
One of the all time JCC Softball families suffered a loss as the Hiudt’s lost their grandmother last week. We are all thinking about you guys.
Adam Cronstein’s father-in-law also passed away. He seemed like a great guy from what I read and how bad a guy could he be if he accepted Adam into his family?
Ben “Weezy” Lefton’s daughter Ellie is one of the all time leading scorers at her college in Lacrosse. Congrats to her.
A big shout out to rookie, Landon Krantz, for his work on school suicide prevention. That is what he has been studying for over the last couple of years. Keep up the great work, doc.
Roger celebrated both his birthday and his anniversary over the last couple of weeks. Roger’s wife is a bigger saint than any of us know for putting up with him all these years. Let’s hope he gets her a couple of bobbleheads for her birthday.
The Special One, Mike Rothstein, also celebrated an anniversary.
My favorite random headline of the week: Mikvah discovered in basement of former Polish Strip Club. A building that was a Mikvah before WWII was then turned into a strip club and the basement was closed or boarded up for years. New owners found the basement and the water was still in the pool.
I have been writing this blog now for 4-5 years and it finally dawned on me that I should include what’s going on around the JCC: So in a new feature that I will include from now on here is what is coming up around the JCC:
Here are some upcoming things you could highlight:
- Annual Meeting | Thursday, September 7
- Fall Market | Sunday, September 10
- Jewish Community Night at FC Cincinnati | Wednesday, October 4
- Oy Vey 5K | Sunday, November 5 (I am in charge of this again please let me know if you’d like to participate)
- Hanukkah at Fountain Square | Wednesday, December 13 (for those with kids)
And here are some Sports & Rec things that they might be interested in:
- Men’s Basketball League
- Adult Archery (Not sure if this is their jam, but it’s new and could be fun)
- Pickleball Tournament | Sunday, October 22 (There is no page with information yet, but it goes straight to registration, which is live)
In another new segment called Marc’s book review I just finished a book called “The Jews of Summer.” No, it’s not about our softball league, but is instead a history of Jewish summer camp. For anyone that ever went to Jewish summer camp I found it more interesting than good if that makes sense. My favorite chapter was on co-ed camp and why most if not all co-ed camps encouraged dating so that Jewish kids would date other Jewish kids. This goes back to the 50’s and continues to this day.
Our final Reds bitch session: It’s amazing that the Reds fell ass-backward into two quality waiver wire pickup’s like Harrison Bader and Hunter Renfro since our cracker jack front office “Liked our team” at the trade deadline so much they didn’t improve the team at all except to wait for Hunter Green and Nick Lodolo, who won’t pitch at all the rest of the way. We need a RH bat, sure, let’s just use Stewie Fairchild, TJ Hopkins or Nick Mr. Tin Senzel. Does it matter that none of them can hit RH or LH pitching? Not to our front office. But, of course, now that we can get guys for nothing, all of a sudden these guys aren’t good enough, which was true two months ago. And last point, if the front office message is we are year ahead of our plans and we don’t care if we make the post season or not, why not shut Abbott down now? I would rather lose this year than hurt his arm. But what do I know? This is an organization that ran Luke Weaver out for 4 months when Howie or Fink are better pitchers.
Once again it’s been a pleasure doing the blog this year. Hard to believe the season is over this quickly. Next year I’m sure once again we will need an Ark to get around Triple Creek. Thanks to Ryan, Rick, Mr. Mike, Jerry Kirzner for the schedule, Eppy for the wings and everyone else who makes our league what it is. Next April can’t get here quick enough. Stay healthy everyone. Talk to you soon…and sign up for the Oy Vey!
Marc