Stash steals win from Green Robin Builders

Da’ Birds clipped again

The Secret Stash scored three runs in the bottom of the seventh inning to pull off a 10-9 win over Green Robin Builders in comp league action at Gothic Field Monday night. The win put a halt to a Stash three-game losing streak that had them circling the drain of the comp league standings.
Meanwhile, Green Robin Builders, Da’ Birds, appear anchored in third place and is now 3.5 games out of first place.
Fortunately, none of this will really matter once the playoffs start the first week of August.
Green Robin continues to confuse me. They’ve got the women, they’ve got the men, they’ve got the experience, yet they’ve also got some sort of bizarre mojo working against them.
Granted, I only get to see them two or three times a season and, for one reason or another, they always lose when I’m there. But I can’t imagine it’s me. I’ve got no mojo, let alone bad mojo.
The Stash have it all too, except for the experience, which may account for their 3-8 record. Though they do have Tony Wildman and that guy is a wealth of local softball experience as well as Terrann Wight, who has a couple of championship rings from her days with the Talk of the Town.
Anyway, after the first four innings Da’ Birds looked destined for a win and the Stash another loss.
Pete Basile led off the game stretching a double into a triple. Three batters later Margie Wagner flared a base hit down the right field line scoring Basile, but when she stretched for two bags, Mike Pruett gunned her down from shallow right for the third out.
Joe Erickson opened the second inning for Green Robin with a solo home run to put Da’ Birds on top 2-0 before a double from Pruett and a RBI base hit by Rather Hosch tallied the Stash’s first run of the game.
That would be it for the Stash offense though, for the next two innings as Green Robin rattled off seven more runs to take a 9-1 lead.
Kristi Miller singled and scored on a single by Laveda Bramlitt and Wagner picked the right field line again for a two-RBI double to build a 5-1 Green Robin lead.
The Stash threatened in the bottom of the third as Kate Schmidt and Joe Summerville tapped base hits to put two runners on with no outs. But Basile flagged down a line drive on the pitcher’s mound and fired to first for a double play to quash the Stash rally before it could start.
The Green Robin bats stayed hot in the top of the fourth inning. Base hits from Paul O’Connor and Mike Lauerman put runners in the corners for Miller. Miller delivered with a RBI single and then Basile cleared the bags with a towering three-run shot over the left field netting and a 9-1 Green Robin lead.
Then came a subtle, yet intense, paradigm shift. Or, in laymen’s terms, Da’ Birds’ bats went ice cold as the Stash bats heated up to pick away at the eight-run lead over the next three innings.
Will Dujardin doubled and scored on a double by Wight. Base hits from Ed Dujardin and Brianna Wiles then loaded the bases for Pruett, who drove in two more with a base hit up the middle.
Green Robin managed just two base hits in the next two innings. Erickson doubled and Niki O’Connor showcased her NCAA track and field speed, hustling down the line for an infield single but Da’ Birds had a bad case of the fly outs, leaving runners stranded.
Meanwhile, the Stash continued to chip away at the lead with surgical precision.
Mike Neustedter drove one Stash run home in the bottom of the fifth and the Dujardins and Wiles combined for two more Stash runs to close the Green Robin lead down to two runs heading into the seventh inning.
Neustedter then spearheaded a defensive stand by the Stash in the top of the seventh inning to hold Green Robin scoreless for the third inning in a row and set the stage for a late game rally in the bottom of the seventh.
Summerville kicked it off with an infield single. Amy Stevens won the mental showdown at the plate to look off three pitches and walk to first and Neustedter connected for a RBI double up the middle to pull the Stash within one with two runners on.
Lauerman pulled down a blooper from Sarah Fruendt to stem the tide temporarily but Will stepped up with two outs, two runners on and down one to drive the game-winning hit and complete the 10-9 comeback win for the Stash.