Sunday, May 31st, game at 5:30 was supposed to be the game of the day for CDMSBL's Capital Division. Its second game of the season.

But ever since the first contest on May 17th, interest in the division has jumped.

So, while only one game was set up for the 31st, it turned out that enough people wanted to play, so that Jim Jasiewicz (jimjazz@hotmail.com)
who is the division's principal organizer, as well as the manager of the over-62 reds, said let's put on a double header.

Enlisting help from Amber Ring and Anthony Nelson the Capital Division expanded its schedule Sunday, to two games one at 3 p.m.
one at 5:30. The more the merrier.

If you're interested in being part of that , then there are some things you should know about CDMSBLs Capital Division.

1. There are no standings. Hence, no pressure. We play for the fun of it. There are no "have to win" games. No playoffs. But there is a title game, which is also the last game of the year. The title then is that your team won (or lost) the last game of the year.

2. One of the curious and interesting parts is that everybody has to show at the game with two unis - a blue one, meaning jersey and socks, and a red one, also jersey and socks. Reason? Players find out at the field which team theyre playing for that day - the Albany Blues or the Capitol Reds. Which means from game to game you don't know who youre playing with, which starts a mystery before the first pitch; you think, is this crew good enough to win? Then, once the game gets rolling, you realize, hey these guys can play ball. We will have a good time for three hours.

Which means too that the idea of "teammate" gets expanded. The division now has 26 players, 13 to a team. But all 25 are each player's teammates.

3. So far, I've played on a Blues team (we won, 17-11) and a Reds team (we lost 18-12, or thereabouts). The numbers suggest that everybody can hit, field, pitch, make plays, and run the bases, and they also suggest that, sometimes, they can't. That's baseball.

The numbers say nothing about the good razzing that goes on. That's also baseball. And then the laughter that trails everybody as each
guy leaves the field for the parking lot. For a three-hour game, a $10 fee is well spent.

4. I never imagined I'd say that organization is cool. But I just said it. At our May 31 game, Jazz (Jim Jasiewicz), the Cap Division organizer
who also managed the Blues, and Amber Ring, who managed the Reds, posted each team's lineup in big black print on white paper, taping
it about six feet up on the new tall backstop. So, we knew when we were hitting and we knew, crucially, the names of guys we just met.

Why is that important? So we can cheer them by their names when they go to the plate and in that way, get to know everybody.

Then Amber - and Jim may have done this as well - opened a big three-ring binder with all the defensive positions filled in for the game.
Players could read when they were batting and where they were fielding. Everybody got about the same amount of playing and sitting time.
Nobody was a bench warmer for long.

And people got to play different positions, which, to my eye, is always a treat. (I played right, second and I pitched.) So, before the game's first toss
Everybody was relaxed. We all knew when and where we'd be playing. That relaxation didnt just happen: Jim and Amber's organization kept us all pretty cool.

One of my teammates on the Reds, Mike Laney described the Capital Division well: "It's casual and relaxed," he said. "Its a laid-back league.
It's challenging because it's baseball. But it's also a lot of fun."

I thought, yup, that's it. Mike's line that the game is challenging because it's baseball, was right on the mark. Theres no escaping it.
Baseball well played is always a challenge, always hard.

Which is part of the draw. In that respect, credit should be given here to the Blues starting pitcher, Nick Ristau.

Hitting's hard, and it's harder if batters meet a good pitcher, especially someone who can throw a good hummer, and it's harder yet if
batters see that pitch early in the season, when eyes and swing are not yet adjusted. I have no idea how many guys Nick whiffed over
three innings. There were a few, and I was one. But Nick did it fairly: with a good fastball that had to enter the zone around 70 mph.
Also known as ziiiiiiiip!

5. Finally, the take here on what happens in the games, can't be all mine. I talked to about half a dozen players at games end and asked
them what they got out of the game, if the preceding three hours were worth their time.

The best story of the day came from Josh Szpila. Josh is 34 and hadn't played baseball for a very long time, he told me. He'd kept in baseball
coaching little kids for years.

When he heard about Cap Division, he thought he'd give it try, to see if I can still play the game. Josh, who's tall and lean and looks strong, played short and pitched for the Reds and acquitted himself well. But it was at the plate in his second or third at bat that he showed he still had a lot of game left in him: the righty tagged one, a long high shot that cleared the centerfield fence, 350 feet out. I could see from his very slight smile as he came home from third that he figured that, yeah, maybe something's left.

People don't talk much about umpires but we had two that did a fine job. David Mosely and Lou Martinez are very good players in the Cap Division, but on Sunday they showed they were bone fide good umps too. There was no doubt when David made calls: his voice was loud and clear and for strikes, his right arm shot up high. In his strong voice and motion he was a part of each play. "I feel like I'm still in the game when I ump," David said. "I really try to put myself into it. Playing, umping, doesn't matter. Main thing be in the game."

And Lou did much the same umping the bases. I liked the fact that when I played second, Lou would turn to me from the infield grass and say, "This OK? I'm not blocking your view am I?" Perfect, I said. During out game, Lou would say the outs and the score so all the fielders would know. He said he especially liked umping the small kids games. "You can tell them things about playing, give them a little tip. You can see they like it."

I don't know how old Carlo Biloci is. I do know that he, like me, has a white beard, that he played for the victorious Blues, and he helped them win with a double to centerfield.

"This is a lot of fun," he said to me after the game. "I mean, I actually feel younger now, after the game, than I did coming here."

What was the source of his sudden youth, I asked.

"Lots of things. The game. The players. Hitting that double helped," he said. Carlo was right. He smacked a nice rising shot to center.

Who, I asked Carlo, threw you the pitch that you socked? He looked at me and at the same time that he threw his head back, laughed and said: "You!"

I laughed, too.

-Mike



-- Edited by mikehart on Friday 5th of June 2026 01:09:02 PM

-- Edited by mikehart on Friday 5th of June 2026 01:09:57 PM