The Originals opened the 2002 RCBA schedule with a quick start on Wednesday, crushing the Beasties by a score of 22-13 in 7 innings at Riverdale East. Good work to all.

Next week is at McCleary, which is just southwest of the corner of Lakeshore Rd. and Carlaw Ave. See the map on the parks page. We play in the southeast corner of the park across from the Mayfair Tennis bubble.

Hope to see all of you there, even the ones who couldn't / didn't make it for week one. And anyone with t-shirt manufacturing connections . . . now is the time to speak up.

The Originals continued their torrid hitting pace last nite, blasting the Thunderdawgs in an abbreviated 4 inning game, called because of frigid temperatures at McCleary, and the fact that we didn't have enough women to constitute an official team.

RCBA rule # 1,684 - you need to have 3 women on the field (by the 3rd inning at the latest)
RCBA rule # 1,685 - at least one woman has to be playing in the infield, (doesn't include the catcher position)

Uniforms have been ordered and should arrive by next weekend.

The cost this year has been set at $50/person. This will cover the cost of parks, insurance, uniforms, and equipment. Though we have tried over the years to keep the costs down, we are faced with ever increasing use fees for our parks. We think this is still very reasonable compared to most team costs.

Hope to see you all next week at Jesse Ketchum Public school, where we will play RESports.

Looking forward to some better weather, the cessation of MapleLeaf mania, some players returning from the tropics, some more Original wannabees finding their way to the park, etc.,

The offensive juggernaut known as The Originals continued their torrid hitting pace last night, blasting out a 22-16 win over RE Sports. This game will go down in history as the last game to be played at Jesse Ketchum School, a fact that will not illicit many tears.

The two new parks are Riverdale WEST replacing Ramsden Park, and Wanless Park replacing Jesse Ketchum. See the Parks page for maps and directions.

Next week we are playing at Riverdale EAST, against the Allsorts. If you haven't made it out yet, we hope to see you next week. IT IS STILL NOT TOO LATE TO SHOW UP! Uniforms will be there, cameras, make sure you look good!

The Originals broke spring training this week. The "Little Red Machine" continued their winning ways, easily dispatching their dreaded rivals the Allsorts by a score of 17-16 in 8 1/2 innings of play at Riverdale East.

We finally fielded a full team this week thanks to the welcome addition of some new "Originals". We are still looking forward to the much anticipated return of some of the original "Originals" (you know who you are) and the still rumored debut of some wannabee "Originals".

We play next week the 29th at McCleary vs the Sultans of Swing. See the parks page for directions and maps. The schedule is available on the website.

Last night at McCleary, in another romp, The Originals belted out 15 runs in a five inning contest against a defeated, dejected and dispirited group known as The Sultans of Swing.

The one area that could use some improvement is bar attendance. Now that the weather is warming up the rooftop at the Pilot is filling up . . . there are limited free pitchers of beer and wings. For the few Originals that were there last night there was a surprise mystery guest. ???

Note that next week we are playing at Wanless Park. That is one block north and 3 blocks east of Mt Pleasant and Lawrence.

The Originals faced their biggest threat of the season last night, the weather, and even that couldn't stop them. Meanwhile the opponent, last years champions, the under-manned Thunderdawgs were crushed by the home team in a lopsided 28-4 ballgame. This marked the first game ever played at Wanless Park by The Originals, and hopefully the win was a good omen of games to come at this park.

In the press conference following game 1 of the NBA finals, Shaquille O'Neill the Laker's center responding to a question about how good he considers his team to be, said, " . . . we just want to dominate this league like The Originals dominate theirs", or something to that effect.

Next week we are playing The Gorillas at Riverdale West. They will be the team to beat this year.

Map is on the Parks page. Go east on Carlton past Parliament. Park around the square and walk east down the hill to the baseball fields.

The Originals managed to squeak out a 18-13 victory last night against The Gorillas. We confidently waived off their offer of a default and also didn't request an additional out every time around the order, figuring we could beat them straight up with all the holes in the outfield they gave us.

But the fact that we hit 20 fly balls to the guy standing behind second base, kept the game close and made him look like an All-Star.

When the game was on the line in the bottom of the eighth The Originals put together 6 runs to take the lead for good.

So the question seems to be, "Does this team play just well enough to win, and not an ounce beyond that?"

Next week we are at the same park against The Beasties. Since Gail is away on business (can't she get her priorities straight?) we need all of our womenfolk to show up so that we don't forfeit the game.

We are currently one game out of first place, right behind The Thunderdawgs.

Last week thanks to the help of some kind strangers we laid a 35-10 beating on the poor Beasties.

Unfortunately we had to default the game due to lack of 3 women. But we didn't let that sap our enthusiasm for the game.

Next week we are play the Toronto Athletic Club at McCleary. This will be the first meeting of the season between our teams. They are tied with a bunch of teams for third place, right behind us.

The red-shirted Originals outscored Toronto Athletic Club 15-11 in a summer storm shortened contest that left TAC with last ups in the eighth inning unfulfilled.

Sadly, the game will go down in history not as a postponement but as a defaulted win for TAC because the Originals fielded only two women and a total of eight players.

Many thanks to Bryan and Sean of TAC who were honourary Redshirts for the evening.

Let's hope player number problems will not plague the Redshirts in the second half of the season, so comme on folks, be there or be square. We have the potential to win it all! (And I don't think an Original has ever been able to say THAT ever,ever, before, at least not before bar closing!)

J.T.

The Originals finally were outscored in a game last week, losing for the first time this season to Roger Edwards' Sports.

Although slightly undermanned our biggest mistake was in loaning the other team Alice. For not only did she anchor their defence, but ignited two huge rallies for the reSports, and lead them to a big 28-15 win.

We are playing The Allsorts this week at Riverdale East. That is the park along Broadview Avenue. Hope to see everyone there.

The Originals suffered their second straight loss this week in a tight game against The Allsorts. The game was not without the annual hard feelings that usually are a staple of an Originals vs Allsorts matchup.

The hilight of the game was a couple of monster shots by Alfonso that the oldtimers around Riverdale are still talking about, and will be noted for the first time anyone has ever seen an outfielder play at the top of the hill under the trees!

At any rate it is time to get back to our winning ways this week against The Sultans at Wanless Park. At least since the city strike is over the grass should be cut.

This week we took to the field with 10 Originals and 4 loaners from the Sultans. Even though we gave up another game to default, we cranked out 30 runs (with a little help from our temps) to 10 for the Sultans.

There was a league meeting at the Pilot, the hilight of which was the adoption of NO NEW RULES. The playoff dates have been confirmed just as the schedule has always indicated, so mark this down on your calendar. . .

First Round Game - Wednesday August 21st - this determines whether we play in the championship or consolation round.

SemiFinal and Final Round - Sunday August 25th at McCleary. The first game will be approximately noon and the finals will be approximately 3pm. This will be followed by the star studded gala awards presentation at the Pilot, where I hear everything is FREE.

We are still holding on to second place in the standings, and this week we will again be at Wanless Park against the first place Thunderdawgs. Let's hope for a good turnout and start to tune up for the playoffs.

WE WAS ROBBED!!!

The good news is that we won 11-10 in six innings, the length of game that was agreed to at the end of the fifth inning. The bad news is that The Thunderdawgs insisted on continuing to play until they won. . . no matter how long that took! As it was history will record that they won 14-12 in 7 innings, but we know the truth and we will not forget . . .

We also welcomed some prospective new female members to The Originals this week. This should help greatly in the loss by default column.

Next week we are at McCleary vs. The Gorillas. At least they are an honest team.

The month of August is really looking like "the dog days of summer" for The Originals. Once again we were extremely short of players, bowing to The Gorillas 8-4 in a very low scoring game (by RCBA standards). At least we had a good turnout of women (they made up nearly half the team) who kept the game close.

It's time to get the full team together and get ready for the playoffs in 3 weeks.

We hope we'll see a stronger (or at least more male) lineup this Wednesday, August 7th at Riverdale East (Broadview) against The Beasties.

Q: "How do you lose when you outscore the other team 33-12?"
A: "You have a very low turnout."

Last night The Beasties beat us for the second time this season . . . second time by default that is . . . the first time they beat us by a score of 10-35!

At least those of us who showed up got a lot of batting practice as we were all at bat at least six times.

We are on an 8 game losing streak and have dropped from second place to near last in the standings. Next week is our final regular season game against the Toronto Athletic Club at Riverdale West.

Hope to see a good turnout this week as everyone should be back from holidays, and we really need to get some momentum going for the following playoff games.

In our final game on the schedule we managed to field a strong lineup that cruised past The Toronto Athletic Club 15-5 in a seven inning game that was called because of darkness.

The game was played with a strong breeze blowing in from the outfield that kept the score relatively low, but our infield especially played a strong defensive game to keep the other team from scoring any runs after the second inning.

This officially ends our seven game losing streak, and gives us some momentum for the playoffs.

We end the season in seventh place, which is deceiving because of our many defaults over the months of July and August. Nevertheless this sets us up nicely for the first round of the playoffs.

Next Wednesday we are playing RESports at McCleary South. This will determine wether we are in the Championship or Consolation round on the following Sunday.

Hope to see everyone there, it's no time for holidays now!

In the first round of the playoffs The Originals played a solid ballgame against R.E.Sports at McCleary.

We gave up 5 quick runs in the first inning, but came back quickly scoring nine. They clawed there way in to a tie over the next few innings, but again we went up slightly with a few in the fourth. It was a tight game until the eighth inning when we exploded for 7 additional runs to ice the game. We played an exceptional defensive game, with very few errors.

So now we are in the Championship round of the playoffs. On Sunday we play the winner of 1 vs 8 (The Thunderdawgs) at 1:30 on the east diamond at McCleary. If we win this game we will be in the Championship final at approximately 3:30 at McCleary.

After the final games there will be the awards party at the Pilot starting approximately 5:30pm. Each team will get 4 pitchers of beer and there will be about $1000 worth of buffet food. Food comes out at 6 and will be gone by 7. This will be followed by the awards presentations. Hopefully we will need to be there for that.

On the final Sunday The Originals faced last years champions The Thunderdawgs. It was an extremely tight game up until the eighth inning when The Thunderdawgs posted seven runs to take a lead that would hold up even through our ninth inning rally. The final score was 18-14.

The game was very well played and this years edition of The Originals had nothing to regret. We played well, we just didn't get the breaks when we needed them.

The final game between The Thunderdawgs and The Allsorts was also very tightly played. In the bottom of the ninth with The Thunderdawgs at the plate and down one run, the final out was recorded when the commissioner was thrown out at home plate. Yours truly had the privilege of making that call, but unfortunately it wasn't even close, he was out by ten feet.

All in all it was a great year, and we hope to see everyone out again next year.

See ya' next year, Jim