AZ Clowns Top In-State Rivals, Advance to Final Four in Congressional League
September 21, 12:22 pm by kateackley
The No Talent AZ Clowns showed that their name is merely a bluff Saturday, crushing three opponents en route to a final four slot in the Congressional Softball League’s 31st annual tournament.
The most important game of the day pitted the Clowns, a team started several years ago by staffers for Arizona GOP Sen. John McCain, against an in-state rival, the top-seeded Raising Arizona squad that represents the State Society of Arizona. Riding high after two slaughter-rule-shortened wins earlier in the day, the Clowns claimed the tournament’s first final four spot with a 12-3 win in the day’s final game.
The two teams have more in common than their Arizona roots. The Clowns, who won the title in 2007 and 2008, also defeated Raising Arizona in last year’s championship game, and two Clowns players — right fielder Mark Delich and second baseman Katie Vlietstra — sit on the state society’s board.
But in contrast to the Clowns’ earlier wins — 18-0 over the Fearless LEADers followed by a 16-0 demolishing of the National Republican Senatorial Committee’s Pirate Crushers — Raising Arizona made a game of it, at least in the early innings.
The Clowns got off to a fast start. Shortstop Rob Bloom and Delich, a team founder and legislative assistant to McCain, both hit two-run, out-of-the-park home runs to take a four-run lead in the top of the first.
But in contrast to the Clowns’ earlier wins, in which lefty pitcher Stephen Burns shut down the opposition, Raising Arizona fought back, scoring three runs in the bottom of the second behind a two-run double by outfielder Tim Lundin. As the third and fourth innings passed without further scoring, it seemed for a moment like the game might turn into a nail-biter.
But instead, the Clowns exploded for five runs in the top of the fifth inning. Third baseman Dave Wonnenberg led things off with a double and was driven in by Vlietstra. Bloom and Delich followed with RBI doubles.
After three more runs in the sixth, a final four slot was a foregone conclusion for the Clowns. Raising Arizona moves to the losers’ bracket, where they will have another shot at the final four this weekend.
Still, the game was the Clowns’ most competitive of the day. Behind Burns’ strong arm and the powerful bat of Bloom, who had two home runs, the Clowns’ 18-0 win over the Fearless LEADers in the morning round was called after three and a half innings. The result was much the same in the Clowns’ midday game. Burns threw another shutout against the NRSC while Bloom, who had a three-run triple, and Blank, who had an RBI triple, helped the Clowns put 11 on the board in the third inning en route to a 16-0 win that also ended by slaughter rule after the NRSC Pirate Crushers were blanked in the top of the fourth.
“We play to have fun,” said Delich, who handles energy, environment and immigration work for McCain. “Winning is fun.”
Also advancing, and now just one win from the final four, were the Yellow Journalists, one of the league’s oldest teams that was founded by Capitol Hill press secretaries, and Rob’s Beltway Ballers, a team made up largely of Homeland Security Department employees. They will play this weekend for a final four slot.
The Yellow Journalists advanced after a forfeit win in the morning over a PhRMA Innovators team that fielded only one player. “I was actually kind of hurt,” said James Jones, the lone PhRMA player to show up for the game. “I thought we had a good chance.”
The Journalists then beat the Showboats in a midday game behind left-center fielder Matt Cassidy’s third-inning grand slam. The final score was 21-13. The Showboats, a team affiliated with U.S. Agency for International Development contractor Management Systems International, later defeated the Fallen Angels in a slaughter-shortened 12-2 contest to advance in the losers’ bracket. They will get another shot at the final four this weekend.
Rob’s Beltway Ballers advanced after a morning 13-7 win over the Fallen Angels. Shortstop Justin Darkoch’s two-run triple in the third, breaking a 7-7 tie, proved decisive.
The remaining losers’ bracket teams are the Pirate Crushers and Margin of Terror, made up of employees of Democratic polling firm Greenberg Quinlan Rosner. Margin of Terror lost 9-7 to Raising Arizona in a midday game after a late three-run rally sparked by Margin of Terror captain Adam Slater fell short. They will get another shot at Raising Arizona, and a final four slot, if they beat the Pirate Crushers this weekend when games resume at Beulah Park in Alexandria.
“We’re going to come back next week and try to win the championship,” Slater said.
Permalink
