*Editor’s note* The regular softball sportswriter was benched for using the Canadian spelling of “offense” last week. Here at the red white and blue IOF sports desk, we don’t allow that kind of thing.
Reefs Defeat Business 30-12
Softball. Image by Amanda Powers from Pixabay
The first two innings were almost as hard to watch as Monday’s MMRU sea otter necropsy. Dead Otter Expert, Dana “gutsy” Price confirmed, “you don’t usually get to see this kind of bloodshed twice in one week.”
Co-captain Haley “hardworking” Oleynik was yet again ready to leave early (which would have been reasonable since she arrived at AERL at 7am that morning, a good 3 hours before anyone else stepped foot on the third floor..). But luckily, MVP David Stretton (for the record, he’s actually Australian – another reason last week’s sports writer was benched) stepped up and hit two balls out of the park in a row, giving the Reefs their first two points against Psychology’s 8.
Things got dark when the Psychotics started asking questions, therapy style: “who’s that really good player in the outfield? We’ve never seen someone play like that in the grad student softball league. Did they hire him?” They were on to our secret weapon, Logan “clearly not a marine scientist, way too cool and athletic” Wedgewood. Luckily, he dropped a catch in the outfield and threw them off the scent (that dropped catch later lost us the game, by the way, thanks Logan).
Down by 6, although no one really knows how to keep score, it usually takes 4 PhD students to figure out, coach Kristen “soaring” Sora remarked, “I thought changing the jersey color from white to blue this year, after relentless complaining, would have improved our game, I guess grad student complaining can’t actually get anything done after all…” Luckily, the softball league wasn’t enforcing the number on the back of the jersey yet, although the Pelagic Ecosystems Lab is, as a way to keep track of all their members.
Then, by the grace of that sacrificed sea otter, Jake “thesaurus” Lerner showed up (late, of course) and gave a quick pep talk: “come on guys, you look about as sad as my lab mates when they report that yet another ESB freezer has broken down, let’s embrace the spirit I had at Disneyland a month ago and turn this game around!” He then proceeded to shut down three first base runs in a row, and the Reefs were back on the map. That momentum grew and they started to rack up points with runs by “speedy” Shiao and hits by Eliott “strong boy” Roocroft.
By the final inning, the Reefs were down by 3, batting first. Some players, like Anchovy McLaskey wished there was an easy way to finish the game, like IOF graduate students using AI to finish writing their thesis. But as scorekeeper Zeyu Zeng yelled out the runs, one turned to four and then somehow the Reefs were in the lead. One point ahead, and Jake struck out on second base. All they had to do now was hold the Psychotics off and they would defeat the best team in the league.
But like the broken promises of new tables, open houses, and grad student satisfaction surveys from various IOF committees (too many, really, for a department of its size), dreams were crushed. The Psychotics got the one point they needed and won the game.
Despite the loss, “who else but” Elsa reported, “I almost forgot how fun getting out on the field was, kind of like the department forgot that 11 of its students were graduating, thank goodness grocery stores always stock ‘congratulations’ cakes this time of year.”
We again polled the students who signed up but haven’t yet played a single game, and they responded, as if it were that review paper you’ve been promising you’ll write, “maybe later this summer.” And if anyone knows where in the world Max Miner is, please reply to this email.
The Keanu Reefs will be back next Thursday, to even their record, when they face off against a familiar frenemy, Microsoftballology, at 7pm at Thunderbird Stadium.