Our friend Bernie Lopez (a member of my 50+ team, Long Beach Deadwood) spent the last couple weeks in Saskatoon taking in the XII World Championships. Have world caliber tournaments, (he) will travel. You may recall his report to us from the Czech Republic the summer before last, and the one in Holland last year. “Have world caliber tournament (he) will travel. I enjoyed the note and photos, as it gave me a feel of the tournament, from a fans perspective, and got Bernie’s Ok to share it with you:
Bernie Lopez (top center with the sunglasses) and his buddies at the XII World Championships in Saskatoon last week.
After a long, two-day grueling drive I’m back In Vegas where I was greeted by 116 degree heat. Guess I’ll never complain about the Saskatoon heat again.
After a brief rain delay, the day began with the Canadian boys playing New Zealand for the right to play Australia in the championship. The Kiwis did their pregame Haka to the delight of the hundreds of New Zealanders, who had flown to Canada for the tournament. They cheered and stomped the stands as the Kiwi boys did their thing.
The Canadian players pretty much stayed in their huddle ignoring the Haka, to which Kiwi 3rd baseman Brad Rona took offense to, scowled and kicked an arm gesture to the Canadians, to which the home crowd responded with a rousing and lusty boo. The Canadians answered the Haka by standing arm-in-arm singing their National Anthem to which the crowd of Canadian Thousands joined in. It was quite a sight to see and hear that many people sing at the top of their lungs – just before a fastpitch game. Needless to say, this was going to be a good game!
Team Australia sharing a gold medal moment with the crowd in Saskatoon. (click to enlarge)
But the Kiwis flexed their muscles and even the top-notch Canadian pitching couldn’t stop their hot bats as they sent the Canadians to their Bronze medal podiums by a score of 8-5. Now they had to face the Aussie’s who had previously knocked them into the loser’s bracket by blanking them 7-0. The Aussie’s sent their ace Adam Folkard to the mound. This time he no-hit the Kiwi’s 5-0 – game over. Adam Folkard absolutely dominated the Kiwi bats and is regarded as the best pitcher in the world having been clocked at 138 kmph. That translates into 85 miles per hour – how sick is that? And you wanna hear the worst part for his competition? He’s only 22 years old. And his teammate, 6’9″ lefthander Adam Kirkpatrick is no slouch, as he earlier threw Australia’s first perfect game in their World championship history.
Australia celebrates winning the gold medal at the XII World Championship, July 26, 2009. (Click to enlarge to fully appreciate this photo)The New Zealanders had won the previous 3 World championships, but this time it was no contest as the Australians proved to be quicker, younger, and more aggressive. Oh yea, and there’s that pitching dominance too. Changing of the Guard indeed.
Our USA boys finished fourth as they lost to New Zealand the night before 7-4. The evening prior, Canada beat up our boys 6-4 in a game our boys shoulda and coulda won, but guess it wasn’t meant to be. Japan finished 5th, Venezuela took 6th, and GB (Great Britain) ended up in 7th place with Argentina rounding out the top 8 spots.
Finally, a few things I’ll always remember is watching Japan against the Phillipines and listening to all the Asian softball chatter. And Venezuela plaing Mexico with the Latin softball lingo being chirped across the diamond. Or watching the Danish squad or the Czech team play and hearing their European sounds of the game. Oh yea, then there’s those African fellows from Botswana and South Africa; simply amazing! This truly was a WORLD championship!! I’m not sure where the next mens fastpitch World championship will be held in 2013, but what ever corner of this planet the boys will be lacing up their spikes, I will defintely be there. And you should try to go as well, I promise you won’t be dissappointed!
Anybody wanna pitch in to see if we could get this tourney here in in Vegas? How cool would THAT be! : )
Here are a few pics from the last day, enjoy.
Bern
