Today’s entry comes to you from Kenosha, WI.
You have all heard me say too many times (most recently last week) that after a tough loss it only takes the short walk over to the postgame to bounce back after a loss.
Not so yesterday.
Last night my walk took me many miles north to walk off the loss. Thankfully, Matt Foley was my walking mate. He has talked me out of the river and I am headed back to the flatlands.
We will carry that loss for a long long time. I have experienced some tough sporting losses in my recreational career but this one may top the list.
I am not sure what is lower this year - our run output or my ComEd bill.
The great news is that we had our biggest crowd of the year last night. The kids were so excited for the game. Check out the wonderful homemade sign by Annika.
With seven runs in that first inning, it was like we were printing money in the field giving us a glimmer of hope. Then, as the game progressed, our green shoots turned into brown manure.
The Cougars, after our first inning stimulus package, needed some quantitative easing because our bats, like current real interest rates, were close to zero.
We went to extra innings but came out on the losing end of the trade, 10-9.
In the end, it was an excellent matchup against a worthy opponent. We need to dust ourselves off and find the silver linings. More often than not, we can learn more from losing than winning, which is why we are the smartest team in the league.
Let’s hope the Cougar Wives Fan Club has a better showing for their Thursday night outing. Fittingly, they will take their own afterparty to Bluestone, which according to this first reviewer, is a bona fide Cougar den.
Truly, the best part of last night’s game is the fact that it was a brilliant summer night and we had a kid-friendly start time. Here are the real highlights from the game:
This one below is my favorite.
Our fans finished first last night. As you can see, everyone had a great time.
Noticably missing are pictures of the team. Maybe next week with smiles on our faces.
Our currency suffered some devaluation last night but we need to shed our legacy assets (um, liabilities) and have an upsurge of optimism for a full recovery next week.
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As a postscript and for the record, here is evidence that my spikes were not up during my slide. The Cougars like to get dirty but we play clean.
Ouch! Although it may be hard to take any positives out of this one, let’s try to learn something anyway. This is a game of MO-mentum, and you lost that after your big first inning, possibly because you felt this would be an easy game. It is hard to play angry with a big lead, so you could easily fall into a comfort zone and lose focus. Meanwhile the other team is chipping away, and by the end of the game they had the MO, and you did not. (>) MO tends to go with the team that is playing with enthusiasm, and goes away from the team that is playing with fear that they might lose their lead. Whenever another team has a rally going and is chirping too much, here is how to get MO back on your side, have a huddle in the infield and have your pitcher slow the game down so the other team runs out of things to chirp about. This turns their enthusiasm into disgust with your slowdown tactic, and now you can focus on the concept that you can only play the game one pitch at a time, and it is a round object being hit with another rounded object so anything can happen. Get your focus back by reminding each other that every out is a big out. Celebrate every defensive out with enthusiasm and MO might just decide to leave the other team and return to you. Next time you have a big lead, avoid the comfort zone, develop a killer instinct and stomp on their throat, give them no opportunity to start any enthusiasm. Revisit the (>) statement above and have fun. If they still beat you, at least you can feel you gave it your best shot rather than feeling like you let it slip away.
ReplyDeleteJoe D.