PCF/HH Pulls Off Huge Win Over Gensler

Members of the PCF/HH softball team have the taste of victory on their tongues,

as they celebrate their victory over Gensler last night. (Photo: George Varthalamis)

Celebrations continued into the wee hours of the morning at bars across the Upper West Side, today, in honor of what many thought couldn't, or wouldn't, be done – an 11-5 victory by Pei Cobb Freed/Hart Howerton over 2007 S.L.A.M. champions Gensler Associates. The victory improved PCF/HH's record to 5-4 on the season and improved the team's morale as they face two tough opponents to close their season before, what everyone hopes will be, a long postseason.

It all started off with a strong top half of the first. Though the Black and Red only scored once in the inning, they worked long counts against Gensler's All Star pitcher Jose S. and loaded the bases with smart at-bats.

Things only improved through the first half of the game, as PCF/HH ran up a 9-0 score through two and a half, including a monster home run by Carlos Sagastume (2-for-3, 1 walk). Sagastume, who's in third on the team with plate appearances, is boasting an incredible 1.100 slugging percentage on the year.

Starting pitcher Juan Monahan (2-for-3 with 1 run and 1 RBI) was virtually lights-out through the first three innings, surrendering just 3 hits, no walks, and 1 run while striking out 1. But in the top of the fourth, while singling to the opposite field, the right-hander pulled a hamstring and had to be removed from the game.

The loss of Monahan gave Gensler some temporary life, as they answered PCF/HH's 2 runs in the top of the fourth with 3 runs of their own, closing the score to 11-4. But after a second pitching change, bringing first baseman J. Strong (2-for-4 with a double and 1 RBI) in as a closer, the Black and Red held the league champions to 1 more run over the final two innings.

Improving on their already stellar offensive numbers were several other players. Leadoff hitter Steven Peterson (1-for-2 with 2 walks, 1 RBI and 3 runs scored) has shown patience at the plate all year and currently leads the team in base-on-balls with 5. Batting behind Peterson was Carl Pearson (2-for-3 with a double, 1 run, and 3 RBI), who leads the team with an astounding .750 batting average and on-base percentage. Batting third was Mike Copeland (3-for-4 with 1 run scored and 2 RBI) who leads the team in base hits with 14 and is now tied with Strong for 11 batted-in.

PCF/HH also put together their best game of the season in the field. Leading the way was third baseman Ron Rainone (1-for-2 with a sac fly and 2 RBI) who, among other things, recorded the team's first two outs as the impetus of a 5-5-3 double play in the first and a unique 1-4-5 double play when Rainone tagged the runner at home plate for the final out of the game.

Although the archives are stored largely in the mind of former players, it is believed with near certainty that yesterday's win was the first time a PCF team has beaten Gensler in more than nine years. The Black and Red, as the teams from PCF and HH became known once they merged at the start of the 2007 season, fell to Gensler 12-1 last year, a season in which the Rockefeller Center-based firm lost only once – in the second game of the finals – en route to their second championship since 1980.

It's going to take hot bats and stone-cold defense for PCF/HH to continue their winning ways. The team faces an undefeated Holzman Moss/Robert A. M. Stern Architects team that the Black and Red beat in a one-game quarterfinal playoff in 2007. Game time is 7 p.m. this Wednesday at Central Park's North Meadow Field 11.

PCF/HH closes out the season with a rainout make-up game against Polshek Partnership Architects on August 11.

Carl Pearson takes a familiar position – on base – in a game against RR/DBB earlier this

season. Pearson leads the team with a .750 batting average and on-base percentage.
(Photo: Stuart Philips)

Those Who Live In Glass Houses ...

Perkins Eastman may have to consider hiring Nixon's White House "plumbers" to fix the leaks in their office. Trickled down to my inbox from a number of anonymous, but reliable, sources came PEA's in-house softball update.

According to PEA, they "humbled" PCF/HH on June 19. Furthermore, they must have consulted Wikipedia as one of their primary sources of facts for the game, as they clearly misstate that the game was a "... mercy-rule-shortened, 5-inning contest ...".

In fact, the game was shortened because the permit after ours prohibited the game from lasting longer than five innings. Granted, some of the blame for this has to do with the fact that PEA was able to stay at the plate for long periods of time. But it had nothing to do with getting mercied. Hey, they're S.L.A.M.'s rules, not ours: "If the visiting team is ahead by 11-runs at anytime after the fourth inning, the home team will have until the bottom of the inning to bring within 10-runs. If the home team is ahead by 11-runs anytime after the fourth inning, then the game is over." The score was 13-2 entering the top of the fifth. Neither team scored in the fifth inning before the game was called on time.

We, the management of the PCF/HH softball team, aren't going to make excuses. We're not going to talk about how our starting pitcher was out of town, or how other starters were likewise on summer vacation. We're not going to talk about the fact that the momentum changed the moment we swapped pitchers. You guys remember; Cate Foster, the one that led a teammate of yours to say, "What, did you put in Joba Chamberlain in?"

No, we won't make excuses because we didn't play well. But everyone already knows that because we publish our team reports publicly on this blog. Anything we have to say, we say it in the open. Like the fact that we're 4-4 and currently sit in fifth place while PEA rests in eighth place at 3-5-1.

Being called out in public ... now that's humbling!

This was posted in good S.L.A.M. fun, not out of anger towards PEA.

Win Some, Lose Some: PCF/HH Remain at .500 Through Roller Coaster Season

Above: Veteran PCF outfielder Carlos Sagastume does his best A-Rod

pose during one of his four successful at-bats last week.

Sagastume went 4-for-4 in PCF/HH's victory over RR/DBB.

Below: Pitcher Juan Monahan collides with RR/DBB's first baseman.

(Photos: Stuart Philips)

Momentum continues to swing like a pendulum in the 2008 S.L.A.M. season, as the combined team of Pei Cobb Freed/Hart Howerton fought for a compelling 12-4 victory over Ronnette Riley/Davis Brody Bond last week. The victory was just two weeks separated from a 12-2 thumping the Red and Black took from SOM/Swanke/Cooper.

PCF/HH and RR/DBB met on the fields of North Meadow for their match-up on July 15. Leading off as the visiting team, the Red and Black catapulted themselves into an early 5-1 lead, scoring their first five batters in the first inning. Though RR/DBB closed it to 5-2 in the third, PCF/HH piled on 4 more runs in the fourth, 1 in the fifth, and 2 in the seventh for the complete-game, 12-4 victory.

Pei Cobb Freed veteran Carlos Sagastume and Hart Howerton outfielder Mike Copeland led the offense for PCF/HH. Sagastume went 4-for-4 with 2 doubles, 1 RBI, and 3 runs scored. Mike Copeland batted an equally impressive 1.000 on the day, going 3-for-3 with a triple, 1 walk, 5 RBI, and 2 runs scored. J. Strong remained a rock of consistency for his team, batting 2-for-4 with 1 RBI and 1 run. Both PCF's Dwidson Metayer and HH's Steven Peterson equaled Strong's 2-for-4, with Peterson contributing 2 runs scored and Metayer driving in 1. Hart Howerton's Carl Pearson was 1-for-2 on the day, scoring once and driving in 1.

Pearson, Copeland, and Strong have proven to be the new leaders of the team, each registering a mind-blowing batting average greater than .600 (minimum 10 at-bats). Pearson leads the team with a .692 batting average (9-for-13 on the year). Copeland leads the team with 11 base hits and a third-best .632 average while Strong has driven in a team-high 10 runs while batting .684 from the heart of the lineup all season. Sagastume isn't far behind, batting .588 and leading the team in extra-base hits with 6 in his seven appearances this season.

Defensively, PCF/HH held tight though the game by making a number of outs with RR/DBB runners on the base path. Strong turned an unassisted double play at first base in the second, while the catcher Metayer tagged a runner out at the plate off relay throws from left fielder Sagastume and second basewoman Cate Foster (0-for-3). Black and Red fielders made outs at each of the bases at least once in the game. Pitcher Juan Monahan threw the complete game, surrendering 12 hits and 4 runs while walking 1 and striking out 1.

It was a marked improvement over the team's ghastly 12-2 drubbing at the hands of SSC two weeks earlier. Their July 30 meeting was a game they'll soon try to forget, as it proved to be impossible to develop any kind of consistency on either end of the field. Left fielder Doug Chu (1-for-2, playing in only his second game with the team) and extra hitter Yusuke Okabayashi (2-for-3) scored the only runs of the game. RBI were provided by Strong (2-for-3) and Kenneth Wiland (0-for-2 with a fielder's choice RBI in the second). SSC scored a trio of runs in four different innings to put the game at Central Park's Great Lawn out of reach.

PCF/HH (4-4 on the season) will continue this season's Vegas crap shoot Thursday, when they try their collective luck against a very difficult Gensler team (7-2). Game time is 5:30 p.m. on Hecksher Field 1.