Category: 2025 Season

A big shout out to Brad Wagner for his help with the recap of the ASG which was two Sundays ago. Sorry for the delay in getting it out to all of you:

Brad, take it away:

JCC All-Star Game Recap – September 28th at Grooms Field

Under perfect fall skies, Team Wagner defeated Team Grefer 17–8 in this year’s JCC All-Star Game.

Jimmy Lefton took the mound for Team Wagner and battled through a challenging first inning as Team Grefer jumped out to an early lead. Team Wagner’s offense came alive in the middle innings—plating two runs in the third and exploding for nine runs in the fourth to seize control of the game.

Stu Solomon entered in relief and delivered four outstanding innings, allowing just one run and helping secure the victory.

Leading Hitters for Team Wagner:

• Zach Mayer: 3 hits
• AJ Goldhoff: 3 hits
• Joel Fogel: 3 hits
• Ken Groh: 3 hits

Defensive Standouts:
David Wertheim, Jeremy Fogel, Brad Wagner, and Matt Brodoff each made key plays in the field that kept Team Grefer’s offense in check.

Co-MVPs:
AJ Goldhoff and Stu Solomon

Attendance was strong, with the ticket booth noting it was the most well-attended All-Star Game in many years.

A big thank-you to all players, fans, and families who made the evening such a success. We look forward to celebrating together at the upcoming banquet!

League notes:

A lot of birthdays since the end of the season

Evan Gildenblatt

Nick DePiano

“the Special One” Mike Rothstein

Brandon LeBeau 

Brad Wagner

Zach Mayer

Bryce Anslinger

Speaking of Bryce big props to him for rooting on the Redlegs from Milwaukee last weekend. I did not plan ahead and missed the boat on that. 

As for the Reds, I know the Dodgers are the Dodgers and it would have been tough sledding no matter what but man I just can’t figure out why we did what we did with the pitching staff. If Nick Lodolo was good enough to pitch two+ innings in game two, why did he not start or at the very least come in for the 4th inning on Wednesday night. Tito made some really bad moves both on Sunday vs. the Brewers and in game 2 vs. the Dodgers. Would it have mattered? Who knows, but I don’t think he gave us the best chance to win and that is surprising. 

I have nothing to add about the Bengals other than it’s like watching the Lost Decade all over again. 

If any of you guys come down for a UC game let me know. An open invite to our tailgate. Cam, AJ, Brad and Corey Norris have all come by to say hi. Just let me know before hand and I’ll send you the map to where it is. We aren’t OSU but UC is having a nice season thus far, so I hope to see ya at a game.

Reminder the Oy Vey 5K is coming up the week of the Bungles bye week. Please sign up.

We will announce the date and time of the banquet soon so keep your eyes open.

Finally, join us for a special event, a behind-the-scenes look at the Israeli Olympic Baseball team, Israel Swings for Gold, at UC on Friday, October 24.

The event will take place at 7:30 PM in Lindner Center Room 450 and will include the following:

7:30 PM: Shabbat candle lighting (pending approval for real candles; otherwise, we’ll use fake tea lights)

7:45 PM: Film screening (approximately 78 minutes)

Following the film: Q&A with Nate Fish, CEO of Israel Baseball Americas and Israel National Team Manager, and potentially Kevin Youkilis.

Marc

On a sun-splashed Sunday morning Team Solomon took on Team Brafman on Field 2 for a chance to face Ken Groh in the finals.

Unfortunately for me, Captain Stu for the winners:

Team Solomon made JCC Softball history Sunday on Field 2 when we defeated Team Brafman 18-8, advancing to our second championship game of the season.

The winning recipe has been simple for us this year: score early and often. We led off the top of the first inning with five straight hits and runs, capped by an inside the park homer from Dan “Marino” McGrath. Team Brafman returned the favor with 3 runs in the bottom half and 1 in the second before we jumped on Jimmy “Garoppolo” Lefton again with 4 runs to open the third. Stu “King” Solomon showed off his speed around the basepaths on a fourth inning JCC home run, and Will “Keon” Coleman brought in 2 insurance runs on a big fifth inning triple. Matt “Stafford” Brodof, Jeremy “Duck Duck” Dock and Alex “Sauer” Kraus added three hits each in the wire-to-wire win.

Shoutout to Brafman’s Corey “Flying Squirrel” Myers for going full extension in foul territory beyond the left field fence line to come down with an unbelievable diving catch despite being ruled out of play. Captain Brafman would add “this was the single best catch I have seen in my 8+ years in the league, even if it didn’t count.” 

Team Solomon returns to Field 2 on Wednesday at 6pm to meet Groh in the postseason title game.

I’d like to thank my team for a great season. Coming off an 0-16 regular season last year it was great to play and win a lot of games this year. Kudos to Jimmy Lefton for coming back strong from surgery last year to both pitch and finally hit like we know he can. Also good luck to Stu and Kenny this Wednesday.

So there you have it guys. It’s down to Capt. Groh vs. Capt. Solomon for the Youk award on Wednesday night. If you want to come out and watch, please remember it starts at 6:00.

Brief league notes

Happy birthday to:

JCC legend Jeff Cohen

Super-mom Barb Fogel

David “Slim Shady” Wertheim did some research on my claim that OSU had not been #1 in the country in a long time. They have been ranked #1 in the CFP rankings BUT not #1 in the AP poll until last week. So we were both right. Also it’s a shame that colleges charge all of us money to watch OSU play Grambling and Bama play La-Monroe. 

A crazy thing happened yesterday (Sunday) at about 3:45. I was at the Reds game while listening to the Bengals game. When Elly made his 25 E in the top of the 9th and the Bengals went 3 and out again with 2+ minutes to go. I thought I was going to A) see the Reds blow it in the 9th and B) the Bengals lose on a last second FG. Instead you guys know what happened and both teams pulled out the W in a very non-Cincy-Sports-fan way. Do I care that the Bengals played terribly or were “lucky” to win? Nope, not for one second. No such thing as style points in the NFL. And while the Reds are hanging on by a thread, at least we know that Hunter Green is an ace.

Hope to see everyone on Wednesday night at 6PM. 

A picture perfect Wednesday night at TCP last night saw three games being played and the action was hot. But first, a little house cleaning. 

Let’s go back a couple of weeks as Team AJ won the regular season title two weeks ago. Here’s AJ’s recap:

An amazing night at Triple Creek created a great atmosphere for the Goons to walk off Team Solomon 11-10 to win the Regular Season Championship Game.

We jumped on them early with 5 runs in the first off the back of a Griffin Harris triple and a Super Sub Pat Feldman inside-the-parker. We stretched our lead to 8-3 in the 2^nd after a Griffin inside-the-park homer. From there Team Solomon chipped away and got good performances from Camden Kirzner, Dan McGrath, Alex Kraus and many others to come back and take the lead against us 10-8 in the top of the 7^th. In the bottom half of the 7^th I got on, Adam Cronstein brought me in, Jamey Drennan brought him in and we went to the 8^th.

After a couple hits, we got quite a scare when Brandon Lindsay hit an absolute rocket to left center, but Griffin was able to track it and made an incredible catch in order to end the inning with no blood. In the bottom half, Ryan Small got on and the wiley veteran Dee Harris hit one out to right field and Ryan De La Cruz came all the way around to score and end it.

Just another incredible team effort with everyone finding a way to contribute as they have all season.

 Way to go team Goldhoff on winning the regular season title

Now onto last night:

First on Field 1 it was Team Groh taking on Team Simons for a trip to the title game for the Youk Award:

Ken with a recap of both last week and last night:

Groh 8 Grefer 4

Grefer scored 4 in the top of the 1st but Tyler Stansbury led off the bottom of the inning with a home run over the center field fence. Bryce Anslinger drove in 2 with the bases loaded to cut the lead to 4-3 after 1. Jon Ruben, Mathew Kraus, Tyler, Sam Castellini, Jack Cohen, Pete Soltesz and Ken Groh all hit singles and Chris Von Holle had a SF to plate 5 runs in the 2nd to take a 8-4 lead. Mike Gray scattered 2 hits over the final 4 innings but Grefer also didn’t score so Groh advanced.

Groh 25 – Simons 23

Groh thought he was a good pitcher this season until Team Simons was just ripping the ball in this semifinal game. Mike Askin and Mr. GOLD himself, Jeff Weisbrot, I believe each went 5-5. I believe Marc Simons, Scott Friend and Mark Weisser all had 3 hits as well. They batted around in the 1st inning going up 6-0. In the bottom of the 1st, Tyler Stansbury singled, Jack Cohen tripled and Pete Soltesz launched a 2-run homer over the RCF wall to cut the lead to 6-3. Simons went up 9-3 but Bryce Anslingervhomered over the fence and Danny Meisterman hit a 3-run homerun with his line drive down the left field line to cut the lead to 2. In the 3rd, Groh scored 5 with a Soltesz double, Anslinger single, Ruben double and David Solomon single. After Simons went up 16-14 team Groh scored 9 runs in the bottom of the 5th. Simons made it interesting getting the tying batter to the plate who hit it to the DPOY Jack Cohen to end the game.

On Field 3 it was Team Solomon vs. Team Wolf for a trip to the semifinals of the post season:

Stu for the winners:

After nearly two hours of action on Field 3, Team Solomon continued its second half surge with a 15-8 win over Team Wolf to advance to the semifinals.

Stu’s Blues took an early 4-0 lead as the visitors before Weston’s Washed Denims tied it up in the bottom of the second inning. We responded with 3 runs in the third and 6 in the fourth to really put the game out of reach.

Big hits from Matt “Bloody Hell” Brodof, Dan “Tim” McGrath and “Buffalo Ben” Charlton jumpstarted the offense, but nobody had a bigger day than Cam “Mr Boombastic” Kirzner. He was 4-4 with a walk, three runs and his first career homer over the fence. Award-winning reggae musician Shaggy had this to say on Cam’s performance: “Fantastic.”

Team Solomon looks to keep its momentum rolling against Team Brafman to clinch its second championship berth of the season.

And finally on Field sun it was Team Fogel vs. Team Brafman for a trip to the semi finals 

Marc for the winners

In a back and forth game Team Brafman scored 8 runs in the bottom of the 6th to pull ahead and win 19-11. For the first time all year Team Brafman had all 12 guys and everyone contributed in one way shape or form. Mike “The Special One” Rothstein, Jimmy and Ricky Lefton, Zach Mayer, Gary “The Coach” Fisher, Corey Meyers, Mike Margolis and Capt Brafman all had multiple hits. The big blow of the game was a 3-run homer by Rabbi Yitz that really broke the game open. Jeff “Oscar Meyer” Wiener, Harry “Hood” Meisner and Zach “The Wild Horse” Zackem also played well in the field to help Team Brafman advance.

“I love team softball and tonight was a perfect example of that,” Brafman said post game. “All 12 guys came to play and each of us continued for the W.”

For team Fogel Jeremy crushed a two-run homer while Landon Kranz, Ryan “The Hebrew Hammer” Braun and Jamey Kurtzer all had multiple hits in a losing effort. A great game by both teams.

Team Brafman looks to continue their hot streak vs Team Stu on Sunday with the winner playing Team Groh next week

League notes

Believe it or not, I didn’t see a single birthday for this week but if I missed you happy birthday, BUT…

Roger did celebrate his wedding anniversary over the last couple of weeks. Shockingly he didn’t have his XU hat on in any pictures

After the game I was talking to Howie and Mark Weisser and they both commented on how lucky they felt to still be in good enough shape to play and that no matter how sore they are it’s still fun. Considering how sore I am, and I play RF and got on base twice last night, the fact that they pitch and do it well is a testament to them. 

Once again the Oy Vey 5K is coming up the first week of November. Please sign up and support the JCC, the Blue Jays and all of the sports programs.

This week in the Reds is pretty much summed up this way. Last night they scored nine runs for the second game in a row at home and lost. That is the first time that has happened since the early days of the Big Red Machine. Until this team actually wants to win, I don’t know why I care so much. But I do and will continue to. “Playing for the future that never comes.” That should be the Reds slogan moving forward

A number of you asked how my trip to KC was last week. First, if you have never been to the Negro League museum, I would suggest you go. An amazing amount of history and somehow Getty Lee (from the band Rush) has autograph balls signed by hundreds of former players. It really is hard to believe that the Reds didn’t have a black player until 1954! Special bonus points if you can name him. Arrowhead is as big and loud as you would expect. With 72,000 Nebraska fans cheering, it was the loudest stadium I have ever been to. I can see why the Chiefs are so good at home.

As David “Slim Shady” Wertheim pointed out to me last night, it is tough to root for the #22 team in the country in Alabama when OSU is #1. God that makes me sick to my stomach to type, but it’s the fact as of now. But this is an amazing stat. This week is the first time that OSU has been ranked #1 in the country in the regular season since 2015! Crazy! Who would have thought that?

Finally, Roger is posting XU bobbleheads. How much would XU fans pay for a Sean Miller bobblehead? $2-3 bucks? 

Just a reminder Team Stu Vs. Team Marc B on Sunday for a chance to play Team Groh next Wednesday for the Youk Award

Marc

With all the rain on Wednesdays this second half of the season (and dubious rainouts), it was nice we finally got the second half of the season over with. Thanks everyone once again for making this another great regular season and to the Commish for getting all of the games in. It’s not easy, we all know that. 

Now onto the action. 

In the early games Team Simons shocked the softball world by taking down mighty Team AJ.

Marc for the winners:

Team Simons beat team Goldhoff in a bit of a head scratcher on a hot Sunday morning. The game was tight until Griff broke it open with a Grand Slam putting team Goldhoff firmly ahead with a 12-7 lead late. Team Simons had some choices to make so they slowly started grinding its gears because hey, lets face it, we aren’t exactly demons on the basepaths. It wasn’t the 4th of July, but a hit parade began and did not stop until 10 runs crossed the plate. Team Simons did not let another run score, winning the game 17-12. 

Team Simons plays Team Wagner in the Play-in game while Team AJ plays the winner of the play in game as the #1 seed

On the Field 2 it was Team Wagner vs. Team Fogel

Keith Kombrinck here reporting on Team Fogel win #7 with a 9 – 7 win over Team Wagner.
Team Fogel had to play with its regular players while Team Wagner was missing their pitcher Corey Norris, Matt Leader, and Eric Zied.
My recall of the game is very shaky, but Jamey helped with an email. I think Brad Gallop began the scoring in the first with a solid single. Jeremy Fogel followed with a line-drive double. Ryan Baum followed with a hit, and we scored 3 in the first.

Team Wagner came back with hits by Steve Zawatsky, Anton Loon, and sub Marc Brafman, to score two in the top of the second.

The middle innings were a back-and-forth affair that included some fine defense. The lefty
playing 3rd for Team Wagner made some nice catches and throws, and he included a ricochet off his glove right to Joel Buckley at shortstop who then threw the runner out at 1st. The Team Fogel fielding highlight came when Brad Gallop playing 2nd base chased down a bloop hit down the 1st base line and threw a strike to 2nd base to cut down the runner going to 2nd . Nice catch and tag, Nick O’Brien. Jeremy Fogel and Josh Rosen were chasing down balls in the outfield, and Joel Fogel was making the plays at 3rd base.

The big inning for Team Fogel came in the bottom of the 6th when trailing 7-6. Brad Gallop
tomahawked a triple into left-center, Joel singled, and Josh Rosen clubbed one over the left fielder. Three scored in the inning.

In the top of the 7th , Fogel’s infield managed 3 force-outs at 2nd base – game over. But your observant reporter trotted into the bench to prepare for another inning until he saw teams shaking hands in the infield. Again, it was hot!!

Team Fogel takes on Team Brafman in the first round of the Battle for the Youk award while Team Wagner is in the play-in game vs. Team Simons.

In the 11:30 games it was Team Groh vs. Team Wolf.

Kenny for the winners:

Wolf jumped on Groh early batting thru the entire order and producing 6 runs. Howie was vintage early 2000’s for 4 innings only allowing 3 hits and 1 run. Wolf added a few more to lead 9-1 heading into the bottom of the 5th. Coach Groh started it with a bloop double to left then Bryce Anslinger, David Solomon and Jon Ruben each had 2 hits in the inning as Bryce doubled and Jon capped it off with his 1st triple of the year. Tyler Stansbury had a 2-run double, Sam Castellini and Jack Cohen had back-to-back triples and everyone else got a hit or an RBI. Wolf scored 2 more but couldn’t overcome the big inning. Thanks to Jack for playing all 16 games, to Todd Wasserman for coming and coaching and for my team for only needing 3 subs for the entire season. We have 3 MVP candidates in Tyler, Jack and Pete Soltesz and two great rookie years from Chris Von Holle and Mathew Kraus.

Team Groh will play Grefer while Team Wolf will battle Team Solomon in Round 1 of the Tournament.

And it was Team Brafman vs. Team Solomon.

Stu for the winners:

In what was ultimately just another regular season softball game, Team Solomon got the best of Team Brafman 14-2 after locking up the second half title by default earlier Sunday. Special shout out to Team Simons for the win!

Stuart “Little” Solomon conceded a pair of leadoff triples and 2 runs to start the game, then settled in for one of his best pitching performances all year – finding the zone late in at bats when he needed to the most and forcing soft contact. The hardest hit ball all day came right back to Stu for a line drive out off the bat of Yitzi “Golden Boy” Creeger. Tom “Back to Back to Back” Emanski and Fred  “Crime Dog” McGriff would have been very pleased at the defensive fundamentals displayed. 

The bats were hot early and often on this fine Sunday. Cam “Mr. P&G” Kirzner went 3-3 and Jeremy “Dr” Dock was on base 3 times, both scoring 3 times. The Two Lefty Sensations Dan “Coconut Water” Mcgrath and Ben Charlton”Athletic FC” used their speed and tenacity to create mayhem on the basepaths. Lastly, Old Man David Snyder was 2-2 with a double and two runs scored. 

Shoutout to Benny “The Jet” Charlton and Matt “LeBlanc” Brodof for traveling leaps and bounds from Portland, Oregon and New Buffalo, Michigan, respectively, to make it back in time for the game despite the lack of postseason implications. Just for the love of the game. 

Brandon Lindsay had this to say after the game. “It was all about the Melon Electrolytes we all drank before the game. It allowed us to have clear eyes and full hearts.”

So to recap

AJ and Stu will battle it out this Wednesday for the Regular Season Championship 

Wagner and Simons will play in the play-in game.

The post season battle for the Youk award will begin next Wednesday.

Team Goldhoff vs. Winner of play-in game

Wolf vs. Solomon

Brafman vs Fogel

Groh vs. Grefer

League notes:

Happy birthday to:

Griff Harris

Ken Groh

Ryan Baum

The Oy Vey 5K is on November 9th. Please sign up to help support the JCC and all the athletic programing including the softball league.

I saw that the JCC launched a non-kids swim team. I have no clue who else they swim against but I want to see Howie out there living his Maccabiah games memories.

This past weekend was the 56th anniversary of Woodstock. Ryan Silverman and I might be the only guys who care, but since I write the blog I thought I’d share that with you all. And I will continue to say that this footage of Sly and the Family Stone (who were playing at 4:00 AM) is still the single greatest music performance ever captured on film. Here is a snippet Sly and the Family Stone – Final of “I Want To Take You Higher” Woodstock again this was at 4:00 AM!! 

I am not the biggest fan of Reds GM Nick Krall but I do have to give him credit for the three moves he made at the trade deadline. All have paid off. But since he is the same guy that signed both Moose and The Candy Man and did nothing at the 2023 deadline, I only give him some credit. 

I don’t know who the slowest guy in the league is currently but I bet that if they played the Bengals defense last night they would have run for a first down. 

Finally, since Roger is the resident NHL expert in the league he will be giving a detailed power point on Wednesday of all of these guys: All the Jewish NHL players to watch in the 2024-2025 season – Jewish Telegraphic Agency (I know it’s a little old but still) 

Good luck to Team Simons and Wagner in the Play-in game and to Team AJ and Team Stu for the Regular season title this week.