As has become my practice at the end of every high school sports season, I'm re-visiting my preseason baseball and softball predictions to see how I did.
BASEBALL
My picks
Playoff teams: High Desert: 1. Reno. 2. McQueen. 3. Reed. 4. Wooster. Sierra: 1. Douglas. 2. Manogue. 3. Galena. 4. Damonte Ranch.
Regional champion: Douglas
Surprise team: South Tahoe
Thoughts (at the time): As much as I hate picking the home team to win it all, because I really don't want to put any undue pressure on anyone, Douglas does appear to have the top 1-2 starters on the mound in the region, if not the state. An experienced lineup certainly helps things out. The key here will be getting through an exceptionally tough Sierra League slate and staying healthy. There won't be any let up at any point during the year. Reno could very well go unbeaten in the High Desert, while a very good team in the Sierra League will be left out of the playoffs entirely.
Reality
Playoff teams: High Desert: 1. Reno. 2. McQueen. 3. Wooster. 4. Spanish Springs. Sierra: 1. Douglas. 2. Carson. 3. Damonte Ranch. 4. Manogue.
Regional champion: Douglas
Surprise team: Carson/Wooster
Thoughts: Well, the home team did win it all, so no regrets there. Reno went unbeaten in league play and a very good team (Galena) was left out of the playoffs. That all being said, I was amazed at the late-season development of a talented Wooster squad and even more amazed at Carson's run through the Sierra League. Carson, I believe, is well on its way back to greatness under the direction of coach Cody Farnworth. I have them and Galena pencilled in as the league favorites next year.
SOFTBALL
My picks
Playoff teams: High Desert: 1. Spanish Springs. 2. Reed. 3. Reno. 4. McQueen. Sierra: 1. Carson; 2. Douglas; 3. Galena; 4. Wooster.
Regional champion: Reed.
Surprise team: Galena.
Thoughts (at the time): Spanish Springs lost a lot of its elite level talent from last year, but I still see the Cougars as the best overall team. The Reed-Spanish Springs series should be a classic. Carson has looked pretty good early on, and Cassie Vondrak seems to have taken her game to a new level. Douglas is the best overall team in the Sierra, but a lot hinges on senior pitcher Stephanie Harper's arm. If she stays healthy, Douglas wins the league and maybe even takes a run at the regional title.
Reality
Playoff teams: High Desert: 1. Reed. 2. Spanish Springs. 3. Reno. 4. McQueen. Sierra: 1. Douglas; 2. Galena; 3. Manogue; 4. Damonte Ranch.
Regional champion: Reed.
Surprise team: Galena.
Thoughts: Seems I overestimated Carson and underestimated Reed and Douglas. Harper battled through some nagging injuries to turn in a stellar season and lead Douglas to its first league title since 2004. For a while there, Douglas went toe-to-toe with the eventual regional champs Reed and regional runner-ups Spanish Springs. Reed came up with some big wins during the season and the tournament, though, to take the whole thing.
Among the many, many issues the NIAA is planning on tackling at its board of control meeting on June 16 and 17 will be the possible re-formatting of the regional baseball tournaments.
A proposal is on the table to switch to a straight eight-team double-elimination bracket to determine the regional champion. It's the same basic format that softball currently uses, although I can't imagine they'll try to cram it all into three days. Maybe they will, who knows?
If adpoted, the format would go into effect for next season.
The current format follows closely the former College World Series formula, where the winners of the two four-team double-elimination brackets meet in a one-shot deal for the regional title. The CWS actually switched formats in 2003 so that the winners of the two brackets face each other in a three-game championship series.
I have no clue what the general feeling among coaches and administrators feel about the proposal, but I can see clear positives and negatives for both formats.
Under the current format, you can battle your way through the tournament with a perfect record and have it taken away in one game in the championship. On the other hand, if you're an underdog, it greatly vamps up the possibility of an upset in the championship game (particularly if the favorite has already given its pitching staff considerable wear during the week). Still, you can argue that the current format gives an advantage to the best team on the best day. If you throw your ace in the opening round of the playoffs, you theoretically get a new set of innings for the title game assuming you don't use him at any other time during the week. That sets up a great pitching battle, and arguably a better baseball game, like we saw between Reno and Douglas this year.
Under the proposed format, though, some of that premium on pitching goes away. Your hitters can theoretically have a bad game on the final day of the bracket and still come back to win the title in the "if" game. Regardless, everyone exits the tournament with two losses, except for the champion. In a lot of ways, that's really how it should be in baseball (and how it was, by the way, before the NIAA switched to mirror college baseball).
Personally, I love the current college format, where you get the twin brackets (which have their own quirks and strategic anomalies) and the three-game series for the final. I don't see that being quite as cost effective for the NIAA or as feasible scheduling-wise, but it is great baseball in its purest form. The teams that emerge from the brackets get a new start with their staffs at full strength for three games.
Given the two available options, though, I think awarding the deepest team with an extra game at the end is a better option.
Palo Verde captured the NIAA Award of Excellence for 2009. Athletic programs across the state are given points based on athletic acheivement, scholastic acheivement and sportsmanship throughout the year.
Douglas High finished sixth among 4A schools behind Palo Verde, Reno, Centennial, Bishop Manogue and Cimarron-Memorial. That's a pretty successful year overall for the Tigers.
- This will be my last extended notebook of the school year. I'll keep posting updates as I have things to write about during the summer, but most of the regular features will go on break with the rest of the Carson Valley student population. Expect more national stuff (i.e. stuff you don't care about, or at least stuff you don't care hearing my opinion about) and less local for a couple more weeks.
- I hate in-game interviews. Talk about the worst possible waste of air-time. Without fail, every single one of them goes something like this:
Commentator: As we do every week on Saturday Afternoon Baseball, we're going to check up with (insert manager's name here) to see how he thinks the game is going in this week's Gatorade In-Game Soundoff. Coach? How do you think it's going today?
Manager (wearing over-sized headphones with a Gatorade logo on them): We're winning.
Commentator: Yes, but why is that?
Manager: We have more runs than they do.
Commentator: What about your pitcher? What do you think about him?
Manager: He's right-handed.
Commentator: Yes ... he is. He sure did a number on that Gatorade machine in the dugout after that argument with the umpire last week.
Manager: I hate the Gatorade machine. It leaks. Yesterday I sat down in a big puddle of Frosty Blue and was stuck to the bench when the game ended. It was awful. I smelled like blueberries the rest of the night.
Commentator: Nothing a shower couldn't have fixed I'm sure ... We've got 10 seconds left so as quick as you can, tell me what you think about the history of baseball (Manager curses in the background). Everything OK down there?
Manager: Someone just spit on my shoe.
Commentator: Okay, and that's all the time for this week's Gatorade In-Game Soundoff, the one spot on TV that brings you closer to the game than anything else in the world. Getting back to the play-by-play, it looks like we're coming in on the tail-end of a grand slam home run.
- I am convinced the Ocean's 11 gang had an easier time of breaking into the Bellagio vault than I have trying to change the batteries in my daughter's "Dance-N-Shout Elmo" toy.
Celebrating the only player ever ejected from a Major League Baseball game for sleeping in the outfield.
- Olympic superstar Michael Phelps recently published a children's book called "How to train with a T. Rex and win eight gold medals". In it, he puts his pre-Olympic training schedule into context for kids. For example, his 60,000 meters a week in the pool equate to 183,040 trips around the bases on a baseball diamond. His legs are strong enough to press nine tons in one workout, which is equivalent to a Tyrannosaurus Rex and 10 velociraptors.
The book does not, however, contain any equations for the contextual value of "statute of limitations."
