Five-O's Take Down McKFD In 10 Innings

The GPD Five-O's were in action on Thursday night when they faced the McKownville Fire Department at Strawberry Park. It took 10 innings and nearly two and a half hours to decide the winner. When the dust settled, an eight run 10th inning by the Five-O's would be too much for McKownville to overcome and GPD would walk away the winner.

It has been a long time since the Five-O's took the field and sometimes it takes some time to shake the rust off which was the case on Saturday when the Five-O's lost to the Our Lady of Mercy team after nearly a three week layoff. The Five-O's would have to cancel their game on Sunday due to lack of numbers so they were about due to right their wrongs.

A few hours before gametime, Five-O's management weren't sure if the weather was going to cooperate and didn't even know if they would be able to field a team. With only one name on the signup sheet, the game was in doubt and the rest of the season was hanging in the balance. John Ginder decided to take matters into his own hands and worked the phones like a true general manager to get enough players to play. "I just wanted to play today. We had a horrible game on Saturday and I wanted to get this thing going in the right direction". The Five-O's had three regulars in the lineup on Thursday, but yet had ten on the field.

"We had to piece together a team at the last minute and it paid off", J.J. Mazzone said. "We got outstanding starting pitching from one of the band-aides (Kevin Krosky, UPD) and we had a solid outfield by three others (Jordan Carnibucci, Brian Williams, and Travis Stevens)".

The Five-O's shutdown the MckFD Team and were able to score a couple of runs in the early going to take a small lead. Kevin Krosky was outstanding on the hill and was able to get the opposition to put balls in play and allow his fielders to make the outs which they did. The Five-O's aren't used to solid defense but received it today from everyone.

With the game going at a blistering pace, the Five-O's got an outstanding play from second basewoman Amy "Cirque du Soliel" Boyt. Boyt charged in on a popup and stuck her glove and arm out to make the catch, and displayed her excitement with some loud cheers and perhaps some jumping up and down. The rest of the Five-O's seemed to take notice of her defense and got back into the game......for the time being. "Next time I might even keep my eyes open", said Boyt of her heroics.

The one thing that this writer has kept having to write is the comedy of errors and inability of the Five-O's to close out games. I am not sure what the cause of the meltdowns are, but be sure if you come out and see a game there is a chance for the opposition to have a big inning. Tonight was no different. John "Bill Buckner" Cordi had his struggles at the hot corner with some ground balls which led to some runs by McKFD but he wasn't the only one. Firstbasen John Ginder had some decision making farts and instead of throwing home to get one of the runners out he decided to hold on to the ball and watch the run score. "All I could think about was...here we go again." Ginder said "We play great at times and sometimes it looks as if we have never played before. There was no excuse as to why I held on to the ball" he added. The Five-O's squandered a four run lead in the bottom of the sixth inning and had to play from behind in the seventh.

Cordi would make up for the fielding hiccups and would score the game-tying run in the top of the seventh inning. He would end his season debut going 6-6 with 2 RBI's and 2 runs scored.

The play of the game came in the bottom of the seventh inning when McKFD had a runner on second with two outs. One of the firemen hit a line drive single beyond the reach of shortfielder Mazzone and the runner that was at second was rounding third and was headed home for the game-winning run. Mazzone wouldn't have any of that. He would pick up the rolling ball and fire a bullet to home where Todd Roberts was waiting and got the runner out by two steps to save the game. It was the best play of the season so far.

The Five-O's would put the game out of reach in the tenth inning by batting around and scoring 8 runs to secure Krosky's first victory. The O's needed this win to get back within rach of .500. "It was a great victory. We really missed some of our regulars but we had some different players step in and step up to make the victory possible" Ginder said.

For the first time this season, the CapitalRegionSports.com Player of the Game isn't going to the best offensive player. Instead it is going to the player who saved the game with a great defensive play. J.J. Mazzone is the CapitalRegionSports.com player of the game.

The Five-O's are back in action this Saturday at 11am at Strawberry Park. Maybe some of the band-aides will become regular players. Time will tell.