HISTORY 2020
2020 was all about transformation and bad news for the WHAT? Softball Club.
On January 24th, the WHAT? Sftbll open up the winter season in the annual Chula Vista Dome Tournament with a game one victory against Midwest Swing club, to a score of 21 - 4. Both Matt Boley and Bradley Daniel made their return to the batting order. In game two, catcher Alex Rodgers blasted a 2nd inning 3 run HR, against the Mustache Mayhem club.
Yes, the transformation had begun with those October and December days. Yes, the transformation had begun when Robbie Babington signed a similar contract to Justin Corona three months earlier. Yes, the entire rebuilding process was itself an elongated version of the same transformation, kick started with the additions of Brent Fitzgerald and David Rzewnicki during the summer of 2019.
Bad News Rd, 1: An announcement was made, upended by the COVID-19 pandemic; the softball season will be delayed by nearly 3 months.
The regular season, which was originally scheduled to begin April 21, was delayed.
Throughout the spring, the question of whether to start in July and proceed as normal has been somewhat contentious. Softball coaches around the County cited the financial sting of playing without revenue from sponsors.
After an abbreviated 2020 summer that is now a blur, Lake County softball is set to return in July with all Lake County teams back in action. Every clubhouse begun there checklist of goals, player personnel, equipment and availability before the season begins. It’s that magic number of wins. It’s raising a championship trophy in September. It’s getting your name called out by your teammates.
But when the thirty-year head coach first met with his team early in summer, his message to his guys was clear: it’s time to take the next step. It’s time to set the bar higher. It’s time to punch a ticket to a championship. “I think it’s that bad taste in our mouth after losing in late rounds that we learned something,” Coach said. “We genuinely felt like we belonged playing in any playoffs. Going deep two times out of three is good, but what’s next? Let’s get ourselves into that championship series and see who steps up. That’s going to be fun competition.”
The 2019 season was a rebound year for the WHAT? Squad. The team finished with 34 combined wins and a Mundelein Park District Fall League Championship, marking one of the best turnarounds by a ball club in the County. Now in 2020, Coach and his staff welcomed back 10 winners from a year ago to go along with 3 newcomers.
With Opening Day approaching, there are still question marks to be answered, but Coach has an enthusiastic outlook for the journey ahead.
“My mindset is first of excitement. I’m excited about the talent level. I’m excited where we are from an offensive and defensive standpoint. I’m excited that we have the nucleus of the defense back. Offensively, we have guys like Drake Larriuz, Aaron Archibald and Brad Callahan returning to the lineup. We also have several veteran ball players who have scratched and clawed for multiple years in our program. It’s now time to see what their leadership can bring for us.”
Bad News Rd, 2: During a press conference, an announced was made that 3 ball players, Matt Cross, David Rzewnicki and Vic Tuccy, had all decided to quit the Squad without any indication why. The Organization had also acknowledged that it had been Cross, Rzewnicki and Vic Tuccy that had broken off all lines of communications.
Regardless of the reasoning, it is always a shock to see ball players suddenly quit, not just by mentally or physically easing up in their efforts, but by completely removing themselves from contention.
“When a ball player quits for no apparent reason they hurt the ball club. Guys, who don’t enough guts to finish out the year, generally act like if it's not their fault. There all cowards, they ruined a squad, because they didn’t have enough (guts) to stay there and finish the job. And that’s the truth. It’s cowardly.”
Ask around, athletes will tell you there is no worse sin to commit in the world than walking away from a challenge when there is still life left. Even when a team is eventually defeated.
Bad News number 3: The Coach met with the media again on Saturday afternoon to discuss the availability to infielders Connor Fitzgerald, Cal Haley and outfielder Tommy Dubicki, amongst other topics. The brutal news came out when Coach confirmed that Fitzgerald, Haley and Dubicki will not be available to participate in the upcoming season due to personal off the field conflicts. Connor Fitzgerald will miss around five to six months, which would put him back in action in late August or September based on his personal schedule.
There is belief within the organization that the clubhouse, filled with vibrant, youthful stars and savvy veterans, can overcome this adversity and keep their focus on the ultimate goal. While the Fitzgerald, Haley and Dubicki news is tough, the group understands that they need to move on and win softball games.
Despite today’s bad news, Coach expressed excitement with hid guys and the team overall. He explained that players like Nick Krocker have had a great spring and deserve credit for their hard work and improvement. The basis of his words was that the lack of availability is a big blow, but the team needs to move on and put forth the best group of 12 guys on opening day.
About this time every non-pandemic summer, softball begins to settle into a brief equilibrium. The teams that outplayed their talent early often succumb to softball gravity. The teams that underperformed into a late-September panic often look up and find themselves just about where they thought they would be. On July 22nd 2020, WHAT? Sftbll open their season on a Thursday night in Mundelein, with a pair of lost from Swaggin’ softball club.
A battle for first place so early in the season seemed improbable for the WHAT? Sftbll after their 0-6 start, but their opponents are primed to be the team threatening to keep the WHAT? Sftbll from back-to-back successful season. “Ideally, doing it as long as I have, you want two or three guys to be hot all the time, instead of having seven or eight or nine on because then when they do go cold it’s usually not real good,” Coach said afterward.
Not much has gone right for the WHAT? Sftbll Club’ during this inopportune start to the season. They have managed to lose games in all sorts of ways. The struggles began right after the organization announced bad news number 4 - that second basemen Brent Fitzgerald had ask for an unconditional release from the roster.
The WHAT? Sftbll Club knew that their starting batting order wouldn’t be a strength coming into the season. They were even candidates to acquire a veteran infielder, but that ship may have sailed. With them suddenly falling behind in the league, the front office lost all opportunity to address any issues. Seeing as they’ll have much bigger decisions to make, like potentially shipping away one of their stars by the end of the month. The coaching staff will just have to work with what he’s got when it comes to their lackluster batting order.
“Those teams on Thursday nights can hit. They can straight up bang at the plate,” Pitcher Aaron Archibald said. “The way I look at it, if we don’t hit, it’s going to get a little embarrassing out here.”
If there is one way to describe the 020' lineup, it’s that they’re consistently inconsistent. They’ve been this way for years now. WHAT? Sftbll is one of the streakiest teams in softball, and it just so happens that they’re in another slump. For many teams, individual players go into slumps, but it seems that the WHAT? Club’ entire roster has that tendency.
On August 6th 2020, pitcher Ralph Lozano made his tremendous Fall League return to the batting order.
Surprisingly the Squad was playing well, the ball was getting hit out of the park and runs were being scored. But the WHAT? Club was very reliant on the home run ball, so it’s no surprise that those slumps keep occurring. While there has been hope that they can fix these trends, they were entering the end the season, and still having the same problems at the plate.
These past several weeks has really put a damper on their season. It looked like they were prepared to ride out the year with the current roster, and make minor moves to generate more success. Now, they are back to square one, which leaves the front office in a unique situation. They may feel inclined to make any major moves this far in season. This WHAT? Club struggles could force their hand, especially if it goes on any further.
October 29th 2020, WHAT? Men’s Softball squad enters into the Mundelein Thursday Night Fall league Playoff’s, only to lose to Teddy O’Brians club to a final of score of 15 - 5 to end the season.
"Teams are going to go through this," Coach said. "We've just got to continue to play. It's well known that everybody is going to be coming out and gunning for us, and that's what we want. But it's just another stepping stone. We're going to have ups and downs during the year, and these things are going to happen. It's just a matter of how fast we can turn it around.”
- Tomorrow's another day. We've just got to turn the page. . .