The Cubs played their 4th round robin game yesterday at Terry Park against last year's 3rd place finisher in the AAA division -- St. Louis Grays.
The game was shortened to just 6-1/2 innings due to the mercy rule, as the Cubs pounded out a 13-1 win over the Grays.
The Cubs slammed 17 hits in their 6 innings at bat, while limiting the Grays to just 4 hits in their 7 innings at bat.

The Cubs got off to another hot start in this game when Shawn Martin led off with a single and Jerry Rosen doubled him home, in the bottom of the first inning.
Mike Girard followed with a single moving him to third, and he scored on an error on a Gene Hallenbeck grounder to short.

The Grays cut the lead to 3-1 in the top of the 3rd inning on a lead off triple and a one out sacrifice fly.
Not wanting to allow the Grays to feel too good about their chances for very long, the Cubs jumped on the St. Louis starter for 5 runs in the bottom half of the inning.
With one out and Rosen on first via a HBP, Paul Cerone doubled him to third. Gene Hallenbeck and Dave Mitchell followed with RBI singles. One batter later,
TJ Scorsone singled home 2 runs and Ron Massaroni followed with a RBI single, and suddenly the one run lead was ballooned into a more comfortable 7-1 score.
Meanwhile Darrell Duncan was at his best on the mound for the Cubs using all 3 pitches to keep a very good hitting team from mounting any kind of comeback.
He pitched 5 full innings giving up just the one run, scattering 3 hits, 2 hit batters, and one walk, while striking out 3.

The attention of the offense was now on trying to get to a 10 run lead in 7 innings so that they could save some innings for
the pitching staff. The bottom of the 4th inning saw the Cubs building the lead to 10-1, scoring 3 runs with the help of a PJ Martone walk; a single by Kevin Carpenter;
a RBI single Martin; and a big 2-run double by Rosen. The 10 run lead goal would be met in the bottom of the 5th inning. A one out double by the red hot Darrell Duncan
and a drive to right by Massaroni, that glanced off the glove of the Grays' right fielder, accounted for that critical run. The Cubs did get some insurance in the bottom of the 6th.
With 2 outs and nobody on Randy Craft singled (his 2nd hit in just 3 at bats in the tournament). Singles by Martin and John Weber loaded the bases.
Mike Girard then singled, driving in 2 insurance runs for the mercy rule ending.

As it turned out, those two insurance runs were not needed, as TJ Scorsone came on to pitch the 6th and 7th for the Cubs. TJ got the 6 outs needed without giving up a hit.
The only base runner was on an error. That error in the 7th (with the game already salted away) was the only error on the day for the Cubs, and again there were spectacular
performances on defense. Ron Massaroni and Tim Brown again hit the highlight reel with spectacular defensive plays at short and second.

With this 3rd impressive win in 4 games (by a composite score of 44-5), the seeding committee had no choice but to put the Cubs in the AAAA (the highest division) for the playoffs.
This is the first time ever that an Albany team has been selected for the Quad A Playoffs. This playoff division is normally reserved for fully sponsored teams that bring 25-35 player rosters,
and teams that recruit players from all over the country. It is very rare for a team that has a roster that is 100% from one league, like us, to play well enough to be placed in the AAAA playoffs.
It is an honor in itself, even more so that they saw enough in us to seed us number 4 of the 8 teams in the Quad A playoffs, but we are now focused on taking these playoff games one game
at at time and doing everything in our power to win each game. If we win just one game it would be a great feat. If we were able to somehow win it all, it would be an upset comparable
to the 1980 USA Men's Olympic Hockey Team's triumph at the 1980 Winter Games in Lake Placid.

Today we get a days rest, then Thursday morning at 10:00 am, we face off with the Orlando Royals team that beat us 15-8 in our only loss this week. After that, it is a double elimination
tournament, just like any other, with us being a huge underdog to go all the way.
We will do everything in our power to make you all proud.




-- Edited by mgirard11 on Wednesday 13th of November 2024 10:46:05 AM