Dan Durbak came up to me after the game at Watervliet High on Monday night and said, "You know, I joined this team in 2016, and this is the first time since then that
we won a playoff game."

That's stick-to-it-ive-ness. Impressive.

Impressive, too, was Dan's performance on the hill, pitching nearly six shutout innings, and, as a batter, clocking two long balls over the centerfielder's head, as the Peppers
won their first playoff game since, I'm guessing, 2012 (which, if you're keeping tabs is a decade and if you're viewing it poetically is a long dry spell), downing the Americans,
11-3. ( I'll be a little thin on the details because the book is now about 30 miles from where I'm sitting.)

The Peppers, who entered the game with a fifth-place, 4-10-1 record, took to hitting the fourth-place, 7-7-1 Americans from the first or second pitch, as catcher Charlie Freer
socked a double to left. Memory says that Charlie also racked up a triple and a single, all of his hits and hustling done on a sore-boned knee but propelled too by the
gas of considerable good humor.

After that, most of the next six batters, slapped singles or better. That parade consisted of (it's a historical day, so time to get the names in), Tony Mogavero, Chuck Rebuhn,
Dan Durbak, Frank Kerbein, manager Dave Plew, your scribe, and Mike Barton. Later, outfielders Ted Witting, Frank Montagano, and Ben Krahforst would
put some lumber on the ball, but I regret that their precise contacts are, as I've noted, in a book 30 miles from me. (Wait! I remember one. Can't forget. Late
in the game, Ted Witting launched a loud, high and far shot over the centerfielder's head for a double, which lumbering into second drew sustained applause from the Peppers' bench.)

The Americans played hard, never quit and never, too, lost their ability to arrive at first base, where I played, with some dry wit. A good group. We were lucky
to have played them. Luckier yet to know them.

-Your scribe, Mike, wishing you all, now and then, an historical moment, pleasant variety.



-- Edited by mikehart on Tuesday 23rd of August 2022 01:49:48 PM