Apr 29, 1999
This is the last installment for the 1999 Preseason as the season starts in 3 days!!!
We had a very busy preseason with 2 scrimmages, 2 outdoor practices, and several stints
in the batting cages. The Cubs should be ready for their run at defending the Middlesex
MSBL crown! There are 8 new players this year and the recruiting class looks very solid!
We are missing several key players for the first game on Sunday, but hopefully the team
can overcome this obstacle to win its' first game in 1999!!!
Apr 11, 1999
The first annual NH Cubs versus MA Cubs preseason scrimmage took place yesterday at Bishop Guertin High School in Nashua. It was great
to see ex-Cubbie Glen Waugaman again! He made a sensational catch in left field robbing John Sudkin of extra bases.
We played 5.5 innings for a 3-3 tie. It was a great time. Tom Barnes pitched a great three innings and managed the only hit off
Will Lessard. Dan Gould and Bryon Withers both pitched an inning. Bryon hit one of his bombs to straight away center field
for a homer. Package had a good first day hitting one solid line drive and making contact each at bat. He also caught the inning Bryon
pitched. No tremendous defensive plays were made, but we played solid baseball with only a couple errors. It was a very
promising first outing of the season. This was a great warmup for next weekend's scrimmage against the Orioles.
Mar 27, 1999
The Cubs had their first outdoor practice at Mary Dennison field in Framingham. Ten players
were able to attend. Only two bats were broken and several pitchers were able to get some tosses
in. Andy Schultz gallantly stood in as a catcher! It was a beautiful day and a great time was had by all.
We have ordered uniforms and placed an initial bat order. We still need to order about thirty bats
and that order should happen around April 9th. We will be sending our roster to the league office this week. It
looks like we will carry 18 players on the active roster. The team is looking solid, it should be a very exciting season!
Feb 24, 1999
Team meeting update (Feb 21)
Thanks to Tom Barnes for taking the lead on getting the
hitting organized. This will help us start the year strong!!! This will
probably be the third year in a row that our first game will be against our
arch rival Orioles. This must be the best rivalry in the league since we've
met in the finals for the last two seasons and one of our better players
has left our team to play for them.
The 1999 season will start on May 2. The final schedule will be made in
April, but there's a good chance the schedule will be the same as last year.
See the schedule link for a best guess at what our 1999 schedule will be.
We need to have our field reserved by April so the schedule maker can
include that information. Tom Barnes and Frank Fazio will procure the
field. I know Tom has been talking about trying to get some Sunday night
games at Bowditch field in Framingham. We could play our first night game
ever this year!!!!
The same 8 teams will form the league this year. The league has switched to be
a wooden bat league. Every team must have at least a 16 player roster. You
must play in at least 9 games to be eligible to play in the playoffs. At
the end of every game both managers must sign a roster card that must be
mailed to the league office by the following Saturday. The league office
will use these sheets to determine playoff eligibility. If you are tossed
from a game, then that game can't be counted towards your playoff eligibility. Umps
have been instructed to take a zero tolerance policy and toss players who talk back.
Our equipment is showing signs of age. We need 6 new batting helmets, a new
catching skull saver and a new catching chest protector. These costs will
have to be absorbed by the team which should run around $400.
We will continue to take batting practice on Sunday afternoons at Ashland
until the weather is good enough to practice outside. Next Sunday we will
hit from 4-5 (2/28/99).
We must all purchase wooden bats this year. We decided to place a bulk order for the team which will include
2 bats per player plus 6 bats for the team.
We need to get a volunteer to be the game field manager. Rich Schwarz will
perform the admin work from week to week. If there are no volunteers than Rich will
serve as the on-field manager too. We had a suggestion to see if John Sudkin's
dad would like to be the manager.
Over our three years of existence, different jersey types have been bought.
It has been decided that we will all wear the same style jerseys this year
with numbers. What this means is the original Cubs (Andy, Frank, Matt and
Rich) will have to buy new jerseys. Players who joined in years two and three
will have to get numbers placed on their jerseys. Bryon Withers will
be placing the order for the uniforms, but requests will be funneled through
Rich Schwarz.
We will keep stats for this season. We have not done a very good job of
this in the past (it is tough when 8 or 9 guys show up...) but this season
we will make sure stats are kept.
A kangaroo court was also discussed. Bryon Withers has enthusiastically
taken charge of organizing this and maintaining the beer count. The items
to be fined and rewarded are under review at this very moment. I'm sure
Bryon will have more information on this exciting development at next week's
batting practice. I hope the court doesn't start until May....
At this point it's looking like we will be carrying 17 players and 5 reserves on our roster.
Also, the Orioles are supposed to be sending us one more player, a
pitcher/ catcher as compensation for Will and John Sudkin has a player in mind both of which will change these counts.
The 17 roster players will have to pay before they can play a game where the
reserves will not pay and will only play if we are going to be short players
for a particular game. See the roster link.
Here is the 1999 budget. The team will need to spend around $3650. This covers
league expenses, umpires, game balls, fields, wooden bats and updating our equipment.
Each player will probably have to spend $200 plus uniform costs. Uniforms will cost
$100 for new players and returning players have shirts or numbers to buy.
We decided to use the 240 dollars we won from last year to help update our
equipment.
Bryon also talked about getting his company to sponsor a portion of our
costs this year. We'll have to see what happen with that.
Feb 20, 1999
Our first team meeting for 1999 will be on Feb 21, 1999! We will hold the meeting after batting practice
at Ballplayers in Ashland. The batting practice starts at 4PM.
The MSBL league meeting is at noon at Chi Chi's in Framingham that same day. During the team meeting we
will discuss what happened at the league meeting.
The 1999 preseason has been very active. The league has decided to switch from aluminum to wood bats
for the 1999 season. We have also lost Will Lessard to the free agency market. Will has decided to play
with the Orioles this season.
There are several other league initiatives being discussed. There may be a new team called the Dodgers.
The league will be monitoring games played much more closely. Both managers will have to sign the game sheet
at the end of the game and mail the sheet to the league. The league hopes to alleviate issues around playoff
eligibility. The silly automatic out if you leave early rule has been kept but modified to make sense. If a
player knows before the game that he will have to leave early and both managers know about this before the game
starts, then it is OK for the player to leave. Also, a player can leave if an injury has occurred.
On the fun side of things, the team will have a few get togethers before the season starts. We still need
to decide what to do with the 250 bucks we won for winning the championship! There have been some discussions
about some preseason workouts starting in February to get ready for wood bats. As info becomes available it will
be posted on this website.
Please keep in mind that we will need recruits for the 1999 season. Tom and Suds have both talked to several
potential players. The newspaper article brought us three recruits. Please continue to get the word out. The MSBL
can always use players. Also keep in mind the fact that the league has discussed making this the final season to
recruit players for your own team. In future seasons all new players will be drafted into the league.