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by Bob Fromer
The Chromies turned on the power at the end of their Premier Nationals final against the Pioneers at Farnham Park on Sunday 31 August and quickly turned a small deficit into a large lead to win a third straight Co-ed Slowpitch A-grade National Championship. But being the Chromies, they had to do it the hard way.
Four home runs over the left field fence in the final – two by Eric Kelly and two by Ales Mravlje – accounted for 12 of the Chromies 15 runs, as a close game that looked like it might be going towards the Pioneers turned into a 15-8 Chromies victory.
The win ensured that the Chromies will be one of Britain's representatives at the next European Slowpitch Super Cup in 2016, and it marked the first time that any team had captured three straight A-grade National Championships since Baker Tomkins took four in a row from 1998 through 2001.
But the past decade has been one of dominance by the Chromies, who have won seven of the last 11 titles and eight altogether, and no other team in the history of British softball has more than half that total.
The Premier Nationals was contested by the top eight teams from this season's 12-team National Softball League on a cool but dry weekend that ended with Pitch 1 at Farnham Park bathed in late summer sunshine. The final between Chromies and Pioneers was filmed by JP Productions for BSUK, and the full is now available to watch via a new BSUKTV section on baseballsoftballuk.com. It's a game worth watching.
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Making it tough
The four teams favoured to make it to the Page Playoff from the round-robin stage at the Premier Nationals were Chromies, Pioneers, Blue Steel and H2O, and that's what happened in the end – though H2O's place was in doubt until the last game of round-robin play, with Legends, Maniacs and Slammers all in with a slim chance of displacing them. But H2O, who struggled to score runs and lost three of seven games during the round-robin, found some form at the end, and a 12-1 thrashing of Maniacs put them into the top four.
On Saturday, both the Chromies and Pioneers went undefeated and the ever-improving Blue Steel lost only once (6-5 to Pioneers), and these three clearly established themselves as the best sides in the tournament. For Pioneers, there was some redemption involved after they had come into the Premier Nationals as one of the favourites in 2013 and then collapsed and finished last. This year, the Pioneers came out playing determined and aggressive softball from the very first game and they finished on top of the round-robin standings, losing only a final meaningless game to Slammers on Sunday when already assured of being the #1 seed in the Page Playoffs.
But for Chromies, the path is never that straightforward. Having gone undefeated on Saturday, they promptly lost their first two games on Sunday morning, 9-8 to Pioneers and then 12-11 to Blue Steel, who staged a winning rally in the bottom of the final inning. Suddenly, the Chromies were looking a little old and slow, the offense wasn't clicking, and they even struggled in their final round-robin game against new NSL team Thunder, clinging on for a 10-8 win.
The result was that Chromies finished third in the round-robin standings, behind Pioneers and Blue Steel, and now faced having to win two games to even get to the final and three straight games to win it.
However, Chromies' Hall of Fame Manager Doug Clouston – at least in hindsight – never had any real doubts. “That's the Chromies,” Doug said as his team celebrated at the end of the final, “we can never do things the easy way. But this is always the tournament we most want to win, and it was a great comeback in the final after Pioneers went ahead. I'm really pleased for the whole team.”
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Round-robin standings
We'll get to that final in a minute, but first let's see how the teams got there.
The final round-robin standings were:
Pioneers (6-1)
Blue Steel (6-1)
Chromies (5-2)
H2O (3-3-1)
Slammers (3-4)
Legends (2-5)
Thunder (1-5-1)
Maniacs (1-6)
A word should be said about Legends, who finished third last year and second in 2012, and Maniacs, both of whom played better than their final records suggest. Slammers were a much-improved team from the one that finished seventh in 2013. As for Thunder, who had close games with both the Pioneers and Chromies, they were happy enough with their performance at their first-ever Premier Nationals.
After the Chromies' mini-collapse on Sunday morning, the Page Playoff line-up looked like this:
1 v 2 game: Pioneers v Blue Steel
3 v 4 game: Chromies v H2O
The loser of the 3 v 4 game would be fourth; the winner of the 1 v 2 game would go straight to the final, and the winner of 3 v 4 would play the loser of 1 v 2 for the other final place.
Page Playoffs
After Blue Steel's one-run win over Chromies and one-run loss to Pioneers during the round-robin, prospects looked good for a competitive 1 v 2 game between Blue Steel and Pioneers. But having played with confidence throughout the round-robin, Blue Steel seemed to freeze when they got to this game, and came out looking flat and a bit intimidated.
As a result, the game was over quickly, as the Pioneers scored five runs in the bottom of the first inning and six more in the bottom of the second, and then coasted to a final margin of 12-3. Three Blue Steel errors meant that not all of those runs were earned, but the Pioneers ripped off seven straight singles in the second inning against the pitching of Mark Bowman (by Robbie Robison, Amy Rice, Steve Hazard, Laura Brockman-Hill, Dan Spinks, Liz Keaveney and Sean Spinks) to make the score 11-1 at the time, and that was pretty much that.
Meanwhile, in the 3 v 4 game, Chromies decided that the time had come to put on their game face, and they destroyed H2O in four innings by a score of 22-2. “It wasn't really errors,” said one H2O player afterwards, “they just kept hitting and hitting. There was nothing we could do.”
Pre-final
So that brought Chromies and Blue Steel face to face to decide who would join Pioneers in the final and who would finish third.
And what a contrast this was to the first two Page Playoff games.
The key was that Blue Steel had recovered their nerve, and after their offensive outburst against H2O, the Chromies' bats went silent once again. The result was one of the lowest-scoring games of the entire tournament, with pitching and defense in control.
Blue Steel took a 1-0 lead in the bottom of the first inning when Chromies' pitcher David Lee walked lead-off hitter Adam Mullins, who moved to third on one ground ball out and scored on another.
Chromies tied the game with a run in the top of the third inning – Paul Gough's single drove in Danny Gunn – and then Chromies took a 4-1 lead in the top of the fourth on a three-run home run to left field by Eric Kelly – a portent for what was going to happen in the final.
But Blue Steel had the perfect response, and a two-run drive over the fence in left by Phil Kielthy in the bottom of the fourth inning brought the score back to 4-3.
Paul Gough's double and Moe Flett's single made it 5-3 to Chromies in the top of the fifth inning, but Claude Snape's groundout scored Adam Mullins in the bottom of the sixth to close the score to 5-4. When Chromies went down in order in the top of the seventh inning, they were faced with the unnerving task of defending a one-run lead in the bottom of the seventh against a team that had specialised in late-inning rallies over the weekend.
The first two Blue Steel hitters went down quickly, but then Jackie Strey singled to right field and Mark Bowman steered a single up the middle. The next batter was Blue Steel outfielder Beth Bear. One more hit could tie the game; an extra-base hit could win it.
In left centre field, the Chromies' Moe Flett moved in shallow, anticipating a ball hit just over the infield. But there was nothing but green behind her. Anything hit over Moe's head was going to give Blue Steel the ball game.
Left centre field was exactly where Beth hit the ball, and suddenly Moe was back-pedalling. But she stuck up her glove at the last second and Chromies were in the final.
When asked afterwards if it might have been dangerous to play that shallow with the game on the line, Moe simply shrugged. She is a player who plays on instinct, and her instinct is almost always right.
The Final
People talk about momentum being important in games, and in the final, the momentum started with the Chromies, shifted to Pioneers and then made a decisive shift back to the team in black.
Chromies wasted no time putting a run on the board. The first batter of the game, second baseman Danny Gunn, hit a long drive into the right field corner that Kim Akehurst couldn't quite catch up with. Danny tore around the bases and was crossing home plate before the ball was even back in the infield. But the next three Chromies went down in order.
Pioneers hit back immediately with an unearned run in the bottom of the first inning as an error by third base player Chiya Louie allowed Steve Hazard to get to second base and Laura Brockman-Hill drove him in with the first of her three singles. But Chiya was to make amends later with some good defensive plays as well as contributing two hits and two runs scored to the Chromies' offense.
Neither team scored in the second inning, but in the top of the third Vicky McKendrick reached on a fielder's choice, Danny Gunn and Chiya Louie singled, and then Slovenian national team star Ales Mravlje boomed a long home run into the bushes beyond the left field fence and Chromies had a 5-1 lead. The Pioneers held a long team meeting on the sidelines before coming to bat in the bottom of the third inning, but it did no good as they went down in order.
Each team scored a single run in the fourth inning to move the score along to 6-2 in the Chromies' favour. But in the bottom of the fifth, the momentum shifted to the Pioneers, who scored five runs to take their first and only lead at 7-6.
It started, as rallies often do, with an error that allowed Fleeta Chew-Siegel to reach base. One out later, Robbie Robison singled Chew to third and he scored on a sacrifice fly to right centre by Amy Rice. That brought up Steve Hazard, who doubled in Robbie Robison, and Steve scored on yet another single by Laura Brockman-Hill, a sharp line drive to right field. Chromies pitcher David Lee, pitching carefully to his opposite number Dan Spinks, walked him on a 3-1 count and Liz Keaveney took the automatic walk behind Dan to load the bases. That brought up Sean Spinks, who slapped a single to left field to drive in two more runs and put the Pioneers a run up at 7-6.
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But after that, the Chromies began to mash the ball, and Pioneers didn't have an answer.
In the top of the sixth inning, Ales Maravlje and David Lee singled, a sacrifice fly scored Ales, and then Eric Kelly hit a high drive that came down over the left field fence, and the Chromies were back in front, 9-7. The Pioneers went down quickly in the bottom of the inning, and the coup de grace came in the top of the seventh.
With one out, Danny Gunn and Chiya Louie singled, and Ales Maravlje sent yet another drive soaring over the fence in left centre as the lead went to 12-7. Moe Flett grounded to second base for the second out, but David Lee hustled out a double to left, Misha Sulcova singled him to third and Eric Kelly sent another drive over the fence in left and the game was effectively over.
In the bottom of the seventh inning, Steve Hazard took his turn to put the ball out – another blast to left field – but it was just a single run and a bit of consolation. The final out was a high fly ball off the bat of Dan Spinks that Moe Flett waited for in left centre field, and then the Chromies could start on what was a pretty restrained celebration. But then, they've been there before.
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MVP awards for the final went to Laura Brockman-Hill and inevitably, given his seven RBIs and some good work at shortstop, to Ales Mravlje.
The five home runs hit by the Chromies, including Danny Gunn's inside-the-parker that led off the game, were undoubtedly the key to the Chromies' victory. But the conventional wisdom that co-ed softball games are decided by women still played a part. Laura Brockman-Hill deservedly won the female MVP award for her three straight singles and two RBIs for the Pioneers – but she had the only hits by a Pioneers' female player. All their other women went a collective 0-for-10, while the Chromies' women were 6-for-20 and scored four runs.
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Premier Nationals Notes
The Premier Nationals – which may be combined with all the other Co-ed Nationals on the same weekend next year if BSF intentions finally come to fruition – enjoyed excellent weather and were well-run by BSF Tournaments Officer Fiona Thorley.
In order to give as many umpires as possible practice in working the three-umpire system used in ESF competitions, BASU provided a large crew under Umpire-in-Chief Jes Sandhu, and every game had the benefit of three umpires throughout the weekend.
While the Premier Nationals were played out on the two softball diamonds at Farnham Park, the British Baseball Federation National Championships for National Baseball League and AAA Division teams were taking place on the baseball diamond, the first time the softball and baseball Nationals have been played together since 2006. But interaction and the exchange of spectators was less than might have been hoped.
There was a lot of positive reaction to the fact that the final between Chromies and Pioneers was filmed and will be available on 3 September through the BSUK website after editing and the addition of graphics. This was a trial for what BSUK hopes will be live webstreaming of more baseball and softball events in 2015. The second part of the trial will come on Sunday 7 September when the final of the AA Baseball National Championship will be filmed and also posted on the BSUK website a few days later. Commentators for the Premier Nationals final were Erik Janssen, former producer of Major League Baseball broadcasts on Channel 5 and GB Under-19 Women's Team Head Coach Rachael Watkeys.
Premier Nationals final placings
1 – Chromies
2 – Pioneers
3 – Blue Steel
4 – H2O
5 – Slammers
6 – Legends
7 – Thunder
8 – Maniacs
Past winners
The full list of National Championship winners shows how dominant Chromies have been over the past decade:
2014 – Chromies
2013 – Chromies
2012 – Chromies
2011 – Pioneers
2010 – Pioneers
2009 – Chromies
2008 – Dragons
2007 – Chromies
2006 – Chromies
2005 – Slammers
2004 – Chromies
2003 – Stingrays
2002 – Pioneers
2001 – Baker Tomkins
2000 – Baker Tomkins
1999 – Baker Tomkins
1998 – Baker Tomkins
1997 – Chromies (then known as Superchrome)
1996 – Windsor Dodgers
1995 – Genies
1994 – Slammers
1993 – Isherwood
1992 – Slammers
1991 – Meteors
1990 – Sliders
1989 – Pirates
1988 – London New Zealand
1987 – Pirates
Photos by Phil Kielthy