Opening Day - Gladiator Field - April 8, 2010

Wingate opened the new stadium today against the Washington Nationals after having two games on the road. Wingate came into the game with a 1-1 record. The weather was beautiful and we had a near sellout crowd of 44,752. 248 seats went unclaimed but the deafening roar of the fans made it seem like there were 90,000 people in the stands.

Said Jeff Palin, "this is exactly why we brought this team to Wingate. Look at this crowd! There are orange shirts everywhere! I sure hope we can live up to the fans' expectations."

Well, for one day at least, these Gladiators made their fans proud. Wingate won the game 5-4. Their free agent signee, Himmi Nsoah, pitched 7 1/3 strong innings. "It was very exciting and I was a bit nervous out there. I just tried to hit my spots and it worked out pretty well. I made one horrible pitch on the day. Luckily the guys picked me up and we were able to come back and win." said Himmi.

After getting down 1-0 to the visiting Nationals, Dave Bruce and Tim Christensen hit back to back doubles in the bottom of the 1st inning to tie the game at 1. Washington retook the lead on a 2-run blast by Jorge Roman in the top of the 4th inning. Wingate tied the game in the 5th on a run-scoring single by Christensen and a double by Carlos Trujillo. In the bottom of the 6th Wingate took the lead for good by scoring on an error by the SS and on a run-scoring single by Christensen. Min-Jae Yi closed the game out in the 9th and the Gladiators head into tomorrow's game with a 2-1 record.

Christensen is our player of the day: he went 3 for 3 with 3 RBI's along with 2 walks. Tim said after the game, "The fan support provided a lot of adrenaline for us today and I'm happy I was able to come through a couple of times and help the team win. We have a good team this year and if we can avoid injuries, we may be able to give the Gulls and Coyotes a run for their money when it is all said and done."

Gladiator Field Firsts:

First Hit: Al Gardner (Washington), Double
First Wingate Hit: Dave Bruce, Double
First Home Run: Jorge Roman (Washington)
First Strikeout: Jonathan Hooper, Washington (by Himmi Nsoah)

Tomorrow's game pits William Hennessey (0-0) vs. Ernesto Morales (0-0). Game time 7:05pm. There are still about 10,000 tickets available so come on out and find out what all the commotion is about!

Notes: Joseph Lewis (2B) is one schedule to return to the team next week. Luis Rodriguez had a hot spring and has started the season off hot at 2B so it should be interesting to see where Lewis fits into the scheme.

That was really fun to read. Great stuff. I have not looked over your team that closely at this point so I have no guess as to how it will end up for the season. At this point, Jorge Roman is basically the Nationals only offensive player. I don't see anything to put in front of him and also don't see any protection to place behind him. I don't know how to do intentional walks here but if I was playing the Nationals he would be given a pass to first base every time. Maybe as the season progresses the Nationals will pick up offensively. At this point though I really don't see it happening anytime soon. Once again, that was a wonderful read. Good luck with your games tomorrow and have a great evening.

another good article Jeff

Thank you. Believe me, if I could have pitched around him for 4 days I would have. I don't think you can set anything that allows you to pitch around a certain player.

Good luck to you as well.

Jeff

you can probaly change the settings to increase pitching around players but not to not pitch to individual players as far as I know.