My Baseball Friday

The teams gather on the field at Oxford

"I love it when a plan comes together." -- John "Hannibal" Smith, The A-Team

There was no way I could still call the final game of the 13U state Babe Ruth tournament in Trumbull. I had resigned myself to that fate.

I'd agreed to serve as MC for the Cal Ripken 11U tournament opening ceremony at Oxford. I figured there was no way to get to both places.

Oh, you know me. I'm a completist.

But even I couldn't morph between the two. So, no way.

Well, I've likely given away the end of the story. You know I got to both.

Dan Orlovsky -- Shelton's own, now working at ESPN -- 
addressed the crowd

Oxford set their ceremony and subsequent skills competition at 2:45 p.m. Game two -- the championship game -- between Stamford and Easton was set for 7 p.m. in Trumbull.

The two are no more than a half-hour apart.

The Oxford ceremony was well organized. I had a script and I followed that. The parade of teams, speeches, and opening ceremony were brief. The skills competition took a little longer.

All the while, I broadcast it on Robcasting. I figured it would make a good test broadcast to see if everything worked. It did. Everyone appeared happy.

It was also cool to do play-by-play on a home run derby. While I'm no Chris Berman, it was still fun to try that.

Home run derby competitors chat

The weather will be dicey tomorrow for the first game at 9 a.m. but I'll be ready as best as I can be. Of concern to me is the outside platform that I'm supposed to call the games from. I'm not sure either of my pods will fit up there but we'll find out. I think they might be too big. 

While I certainly would prefer to stay dry and not get overheated, the equipment is my first concern. So finding cover will be important. 

At worst, I might have to pick up a small tent but we'll cross that bridge.

Though I was invited to join everyone at a gathering for dinner in Oxford after the skills competition, I jumped in the car and hit the road for Trumbull.

Oh, I also fielded a call about the basement at the apartment but we'll hope that topic has been settled. There was frankly enough drama lingering around that made the day exhausting. I didn't need that.

Trumbull. The final frontier

I made it to Trumbull in plenty of time for the championship between Easton and Stamford. Easton/Redding as they're formally known struck for five runs in the first inning and I thought we might have a stinker on our hands.

But baseball gives you seven tries at this level and Stamford nibbled away. Easton tacked on another run in the second to get to 6-1.

Stamford continued to hang in there and finally connected for four in the bottom of the sixth. Three outs later, they were the Connecticut state champions, winning 8-6.

Once again, Trumbull served as a wonderful home for my baseball sojourn, part one. But the transition to part two has already begun and we move on to Oxford tomorrow morning.

If the weather is agreeable, first pitch will be at 9 a.m. Every pitch of the tournament will air on Robcasting at robcasting.mixlr.com. Please listen along and keep me company. As I've mentioned, it's a grind but it's generally one that I love.

Congratulations to Stamford for winning the 13U and best of luck at the regionals in Massachusetts. If anyone wants to hire me for that, they know where to find me.

And now, it's time to find out who wins 11U in Cal Ripken to go to the World Series in Florence, AL.

That journey begins early tomorrow.