Safety Harbor Survives Scare, Beats West Pasco 10-8 to play for District Title!

Safety Harbor All-Stars went into the sixth inning with a 10-3 lead. Our starting pitcher, John Paul, ran out of gas after an impressive game and was replaced by Gabe. Unfortunately for us, West Pasco's bats came alive, hitting Gabe's accurate pitches through the infield and dropping some in front of the outfielders, scoring a few runs.

Gabe pitching.

Coach Bob Bates brought in Tommy Daily to try and close out the game. Tommy struck out one and Gabe, now playing right field, caught a high fly ball to get the team to two outs. With bases loaded and Tommy reaching his limit of 20 pitches (any more and he couldn't pitch tomorrow and he's our starter), Coach Bates turned to Steve Javaruski to close out the game. With bases loaded, two outs and Safety Harbor leading 10-8, Javaruski threw a strike which was lined high and deep into right center field, where it was caught by Andrew Llewellyn to bring the exciting game to a dramatic climax.

Gabe hitting leftie.

All of the parents and coaches were spent. This is the farthest any Safety Harbor team has gone in tournament play for almost 10 years and they have never won a District Title.

Tomorrow we get our chance at making history. We face our arch rivals, the Countryside All Stars, at 3:00 p.m.

Gabe had a good game, going 2 for 2 and walking twice. At second base he made two ground outs, a tag out and a pop fly out. And, as stated before, he made that important catch in right field.

The game was a real nail biter and major cudos go to West Pasco for making such an impressive comeback.

So, tomorrow we will do our best to continue this wonderful streak. As Steven J likes to say, "we have two options... winning or winning big." That's become our motto. Let's see if we can make our dreams a reality.

Stay tuned...

Click on pic below to see one of Gabe's hits, this time from the right side.

Click for video.

Safety Harbor All Stars Win Again 9-2

Last night the Safety Harbor All Stars beat Largo All Stars 9-2. Gabe went 2-3, both were hustle singles where he beat out the throws. He also came in at the end of the game with the bases loaded.

The first batter got a hit up the middle but a great throw from center fielder John Paul to catcher Tommy Daily to get a runner at home put the end of the game just one out away. Gabe then struck out the last batter looking to end the game. Other great plays came from pitchers Robert, Andrew and Trevor, as well as the hot bats of Steven and Logan.

Gabe playing 2nd Base, JP playing Center

So, they finish the pool play the only team 3-0 and face either Countryside or West Pasco Saturday (today) at 1:00 p.m. in the semi-finals. There are no weak teams moving forward, so we have to play our best every pitch, every hit, every out.

DC and I cheer Gabe on from the
only shaded location available.

We were honored to have Robbie, Kristi, Tyler and Lauren at the game from Georgia. And Charles, Betty, Andrew, Elizabeth, Lisette, Theres, John Paul, Stephen and Chaz, still recovering from his appendectomy all came out as well! Thanks Bauers.

You just gotta love family!
Lauren hangs out with some of the Bauer kids.

Chaz even made this great sign (see below). How awesome!

A recovering Chaz takes the time
to show Gabe his support!
What a trooper!

The support from the family was great

We are very grateful for the effort and success of this young team. Now on to the next round! Go Safety Harbor!

All Stars Continue Tonight

The All Star games continue tonight. We are honored to have Kristi and Robbie from GA along with Tyler and Lauren on hand to watch tonight's game.

I'll have an update later tonight.

Ratatouille (2007)

Pixar has set the bar so incredibly high that average films seem like a huge disappointment. Ratatouille is one such disappointment. The technically marvelous, yet overly dull story revolves around a rat who can cook joining forces with a chef who can't in order to save a family restaurant.

It all sounds good on paper, but the first half of this film moved very slowly to the point that I wanted to go get some nachos just so I could have something to do. Sure, I could have been effected by recently going cold turkey on caffeine, but all of the kids around me were even more restless than I was.

Granted, there were funny moments and the last half of the film is very good, but I left the film putting it as the least effective Pixar film yet, just below A Bug's Life.

In the end, the film is about rats... animated or not, they're still rats. When you see them swarm, you instinctively squirm.

A good rental, but that's about it.

Safety Harbor All Stars Win Again, 11-0

The Safety Harbor 10-11 All Stars won again, beating Palm Harbor 11-0 in four innings. Tommy Daily pitched three innings and Gabe closed out the fourth for a combined no-hitter. There were some great hits by the team and wonderful defense plays by Logan Bates, Robert Robicheau and Andrew Llewellyn.

You can see one of Gabe's hits (DC wasn't there and Dea and I were involved in the game) and Gabe closing out the game pitching by clicking picture below. The file is a little bigger, so may take a little longer to load into your computer.

We play again next Friday. If we make the playoffs, we'll play Saturday and if we win that game we'd play for the District 12 title on Sunday.

But, lets just focus on one game at a time.

By the way, Gabe's 2 for 2 game yesterday got him mentioned in the paper this morning (see below) even though they didn't get that he hit two doubles, instead of one.


Its nice to see the team's efforts finally paying off on the field.