The Millennium Sunday Fall Softball League managed to stave off its 1st rain out of the season when the teams who were participating in the playoffs all pitched in, one way or another, to help get their fields ready to play on today.
In fact, for what is very close to being the first time ever (with one playoff series left next Sunday) in my 32 years as a commissioner of Sunday Softball League's there were no rain outs in both the Summer and Fall leagues.
The 2014 Millennium Sunday Softball League, which continues to be the largest Men's softball league in the state of Pennsylvania, played a complete 18 schedule followed by a four week playoff schedule with no rain outs, over 13 weeks.
And now, the 2014 Millennium Sunday Fall Softball League has played another complete schedule of 14 games with two weeks of playoffs without any rain outs, for a total of 9 weeks.
That's an amazing 22 weeks of softball in both leagues combined without a rain out, almost half of the calendar year.
Without a doubt a whole lot of luck was an important factor of this feat (hey, the league could get rained out on its next scheduled game) but none of it would be possible without the entire league knowing the drill, that has been practiced over and over again in the league's 17 year history.
There's no better time than now to thank all the teams in the league on the great job they did using the league's network of communication, for days like today to avoid a rain out.
Here are the chain of events that led to making sure the games had every opportunity of getting played today.
Step #1: Not long after the rain ended late yesterday afternoon, myself and my wife Barbara traveled to every field the league was using for today's playoff games to determine field conditions, that would be later conveyed to all the playoff coaches.
Step #2: After returning home and contacting all the home teams and afterwards all the away teams and umpire assigners, everyone was aware of what needed to be done to get their field prepared.
Step #3: Starting out around 8:30 a.m. I once again traveled to the fields to make sure everything was coming along with getting the fields ready.
The first stop was Interboro High School, where the home team Barnaby's of Ridley/Danese Softball had managed to get the field looking good and were even using leaf blowers to remove the leaves that had fallen on the infield. I asked the coach of Maggie May's/DVR what he thought of how the field was looking and he said, "It looks great, you know my team didn't want to sit home when we could be playing softball."
Next stop, Manor Field in Essington where the Millennium "B" Flight semifinal playoff series between Quan Ta Productions/Slurricanes and Barnaby's Bombers was about to start. Where to my surprise, in what I thought was an insurmountable task the day before, the Slurricanes true to their word had gotten their field ready for play. I will never doubt the Slurricanes again when they say, We WILL have our field ready for tommorow's playoffs.
So it's off to Camp Upland, but a funny thing happened on the way to the forum...err, fields.
The Upland area football teams (who were rained out on Saturday) had scheduled their make-up playoff games at Camp Upland without checking to see who had the field permit.
The teams using Camp Upland D Field were the Mudsharks and Ram's Head Tavern, because The Ball Park on Main Street looked far from having any chance to be made playable.
So while I was in transit, what do the Mudsharks do, well they made a great decision and decided to vacate Camp Upland D Field that the league held the permit for, allowing Upland youth football to use the field for their playoff games.
The Mudsharks somehow got the Ball Park on Main Street looking really good using all sorts of techniques used for field preparation.
Back to Camp Upland, where the Casey's of Ridley/Wawa and Dog House Saloon championship series was underway after the Camp Upland E Field had been well groomed.
And then over to Camp Upland A, where the Stanley Kup Inn and Lee Raech Jewelers were battling for the Millenniun Sunday Fall "E" Division championship, where all was well and the games were underway.
At that point, there was no way I had time to travel to Garret Mill Park in Willistown Township (Chester County) and if I did I might just be getting home now, because the marathon Millennium "A" Flight championship playoff series between AMI and Progress Marine/Square Bar lasted over 5 hours.
AMI repeated as champions, winning the series two games to one, but not before the following scores were posted on the scoreboard.
Game #1: Progress Marine 30, AMI 28
Game #2: AMI 32, Progress Marine 31 (9 Innings)
Game #3: AMI 25, Progress Marine 22
That's a total of 168 runs scored by these two softball titans who went toe-to-toe before a champion was finally decided.
So there you have it...that's what took place to make sure today's playoffs games all got played, as only the way the players and teams in the Millennium Sunday Fall Softball League could do it.
Congratulations to the teams who won championships today and to all the teams for the effort they put out to make sure today's games were played.
It's just another way that shows why teams who play Millennium Softball are some of the best anywhere.
Thanks.
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