Even the Brooklyn Dodgers Finally Beat the Yankees

Fresh off our thrilling victory over the Terrors of Coffee Flats, If You Want My Bocce suited up last Monday against the 4 time champions -- Boccelism.

We've played them well in the past (other than the terrible championship match) but went into the game an abysmal 0-4 against them.

But so far this season, the U.S. Steel of bocce have not been dominant. Whether they suffer from winner's fatigue, are confused by the new court, or are merely toying with the rest of the league, who knows? But they entered the game a highly mediocre 2-2. They were ripe for the picking.

But not at first. They took a quick 4-0 lead and things were looking dicey really quickly for Team Rod.

But then ... but then ... The tide turned to all Rod!

Jim and SHR put up a three spot and all of a sudden it was close.

And before they knew what hit them, Mike and Beth finished them off with four big points!

Game 2 was ugly and better not discussed.

Game 3 started in the same similar fashion as the first game - with Boccelism taking it to us. We found ourselves in a 3-0 hole before we even knew what hit us.

And what would a match against Boccelism be without a little controversy? At one point, Mike was measuring and accidentally moved the pallino further away from our ball and closer to theirs. The captain of Boccelism admitted that the pallino moved slightly but one team member who our team already had a run-in with in the past insisted that the pallino never moved. I'm not sure of all the details but it ended up not mattering much. And to be honest, what are the rules if your team is the one who moved the ball by accident? Regardless of when this happened during Game 3, it had no bearing on the outcome of the match because Mike had a great shot to give us a point anyway.

We scored two in the first frame of the comeback and we were on our way again. Mitch and Jim tied it at 3. Mike and I added two more points to give us a 5-3 lead.

And then it came down to Jim and Mitch. Jim led off with a perfect first roll. So perfect that Boccelism missed the next four shots. So we had three balls left to try to beat Boccelism for the first time ever! Mitch missed. Jim missed. But they were only missing to set up the dramatic final shot. In my hysteria, I forgot who rolled the winning shot (even though I knew who was taking it mere seconds before) and had to verify during the celebration who had actually rolled it.

We raised our winning percentage against the champs to a sparkling .200.
Game 1
SHR and Jim
Beth and Mike

Game 2
Mitch and me
Beth and Sarah

Game 3
Mitch and Jim
Mike and me
Mitch texted Dave (Boccelism's number one fan) this message.
It was a great night all around. I even made peace with Bashley of Po-Town.
Final regular season record: 4-2

The celebration continued onto the streets of Brooklyn. This is next year!

Hot Legs Angers Po-Town

First of all, much like I refuse to call the third baseman for the Yankees by the name of A-Rod, I refuse to call our Monday Night opponents Po-Po. With that out of the way, I've got to say that I have nothing against this team. I mean, other than the fact that we were the only team who beat them in the regular season last year but they pretended that they had no idea who we were. And, of course, losing to them in the playoffs was no fun either.

However, at this point, I think that they hate me. Or at least the captain does. Oh well. I wasn't trying to get in their heads or nothing when I suggested that we start the game as we waited for their 4th member to show up. Captain Po-Town did not seem excited by the idea but was willing to do it. My reasoning was that there were two more games after ours so we should just get going. I never suggested a forfeit or nothing. But since it was already 5 minutes past start time, I figured why not just start the first frame? We did and perhaps I unintentionally got in their heads? Mitch and I took an immediate 3-0 lead.

And then we waited for their 4th team member to show. It was only a few minutes more which was okay with me. At least we had started and given him a chance to show up on time and not delay the match further. He was completely out of breath from running which I guess helped our cause. SHR and Beth continued the run of excellence. Actually, all four of us did and we took Game 1 by a score of 7-0.

Game 2 saw us take a quick 5-0 lead. There was talk about where to get dinner. I began to feel guilty for rushing things since it was barely past 8 and we were about to dispatch the enemy in quick order.

Um, not so quick. Things began to fall apart quickly as they sometimes do when we try to get too fancy rather than play nice and easy, Rod-style. Rod knows you can't rush a good thing and sometimes our squad forgets that.

With a 6-3 lead, the Po-Town squad had a chance to put us away with a four-spot. Luckily, they could only put up three and it was up to Mike and Sarah to give us the win.

But Po-Town was too strong and they prevailed by a score of 7-6. So much for an early dinner.

Game 3 was tense. We took a quick 4-1 lead before things got scary again. It was back and forth until finally we set it up for victory. Po-Town needed to knock our ball out of the way to avert defeat.

I set up to take a movie. Captain Po-Town was not happy with me. I understand the way she feels and I'm sure she thought I was going to take a picture with the flash. Still, it was funny to be chastised by her and then by my squad.

So I moved back and documented the last shot. Victory to Rod!

Game 1
Mitch and me
SHR and Beth
Rod 7-0

Game 2
Mitch and Dave
Mike and Sarah
Po-Town 7-6

Game 3
Mitch and Mike
SHR and Beth
Rod 7-5

Summer Record: 1-1

Later in the evening saw the Coffee Flats Terrors play Boccelism for the first time ever. The game was an intriguing one as it pitted the last non Boccelism champ (more or less) vs. the fourpeaters.

It wasn't even close. Boccelism got rattled and fell to the Terrors in two games.

The winning shot by Balgavy.

And when it comes right down to it, how could a team with a member with such a fine 'stache lose?
By the way, I have officially named this new fixture at Floyd. His name is Rod.
Finally, as we all know, our team hasn't been playing all that well recently. But last week, while I was at a math workshop I stumbled upon a very good omen.

We were learning about different activities on how to use Cuisenaire Rods. The instructor put up this sign.

Who cares about the Virgin Mary appearing on toast and other such nonsense? I've never believed in that stuff. But when I saw this lovely creation, I knew that the Bocce Gods had spoken. And it spoke the name of Rod.

Summer Season!

If You Want My Bocce Stalls in the Final 8 for the Second Straight Season

The day was bad. Real bad. We got spanked by the Po-Town Po-llinos. Nothing against them considering they were the number two seed but we really showed nothing. We beat them handily back in the glory days of our undefeated early part of the season.

After beating them, we ran our record to 3-0. After that, we lost 4 of our final 6 matches to finish with a mediocre 5-4 record, easily our worst mark since our first season of Spring '06.

In game 1, we got swamped 7-1. In Game 2, after falling behind 5-1, we came back to tie it at 5 before succumbing to an ignoble 7-5 defeat. I have nothing against our fine opponents but I definitely got the sense from some of them that they completely thought that we had no chance against them. Unfortunately, we didn't show them otherwise. So it goes ...

But at least a former Rodster showed up with his baby son Henry. In fact, it was a double Henry day as Dave also brought baby Rod veteran, Henry, who witnessed his fourth or so If You Want My Bocce match.
Ugly scoreboard to the right, cute baby to the left.

Mitch and I took off immediately after the ugliness to go see a movie. We came back in time to watch the number one seed and vaunted rivals Coffee Flats Terrors blow a 5-0 3rd game lead to Watch Your Balls. The Terrors might have been the last best chance to take out Boccelism.

The scene during the Watch Your Balls vs. Boccelism match. Unfortunately the "Stop Boccelism" shirts didn't do much. Thanks again to Cobra Kai for the shirt.

Boccelism destroyed Po-Town in the finals. Oh well, at least it wasn't Boccelism vs. ODB yet once again. Watch the movie of the last shot of the season - a movie that I like to call Fuck Boccelism.

Ezra Terror (not to be confused with Ezra Lism) excitedly points out that the Coffee Flats Terrors trophy is still bigger than any of the FOUR Boccelism trophies. Oh Ezra.
And what can only be described as the perfect description of the disorganized and half assed way that the whole league is run (is it too much to ask for the 20 bucks we were forced to spend to actually have chalk provided so we don't have to go out and buy some? Or how about new balls that aren't chipped?), Cobra Kai won the award for Best Blog of the Spring '07 season. Nevermind that their last post is from November 2006. Did Floyd even bother to check the blog? I suppose it makes perfect sense since Floyd doesn't exactly update its website all that much. I swear it will read "Coming Soon" in the photos section on their site forever. Kaci had the best heckle of the proceedings when she cried out, "Ross doesn't even remember the password to his blog!"

To be honest I think it is pretty funny that Cobra Kai won this award. It really cracks me up. Still, I wouldn't have minded having the award proudly displayed next to my Coffee Flats Terrors championship trophy. For the record, this blog has documented every SINGLE match we have played over the course of four seasons.

Ross shows off the goods.
Summer season is just around the corner. Stay tuned to this space over the next week, I have two more posts in me as I try to catch up on old business.

Rod Now 3-0; Prepare to Get Hit with Train Analogy

Rod is 3-0 in the season after defeating the Po-town Po-llinos last night. But victory didn't come easy.

Have you ever entered a subway station only to hear the announcement that, in order to go your stop of choice, you'll first have to take an uptown train to the next express station and catch a downtown train going back?

That's what last night was like. First, we kept blowing our initial shots. But like true hot Rods schlepping to the uptown express stations, we went long distance on our subsequent rolls. So much so that we handily won the first set 7 to 1.

The crap-first-shot-but-great-subsequent-shot routine carried through to our second set, where we racked up 5 points quite quickly.

But then our downtown train got stuck in a tunnel and we had to watch as the Po-llinos crept past us on the other track. And oh, how their triumphant faces annoyed us as they stared through the scrachiti-etched windows of their victory train.

But we were patient, and soon the conductor, Cap'n "Hot Legs" Dan, had us heading in the right direction, ekeing out victory one point at a time, holding the Po-Towners off by playing it close and conservative.

RVP: Jim "Ball Trap"
Final (Rod vs. Po-town): 7-1, 5-7, 7-2