Senior Buccos stay hot as temperatures rise in Valley

     As temperatures rise in the San Fernando Valley in mid-July, the race is heating up in LA County Senior Softball League. The Buccos, after beating the Hollywood Stars 11-6 with a “phenomenal defense” in mid-July, were bunched in a virtual three-way tie for fourth place in the 14-team league.

     Team captain Mark Lambert lashed a home run and made a fine running catch in short left center in the final inning of the game against the Stars, one of many highlight reel plays in the game. Third baseman Greg Waskul, switching out of spikes to tennis shoes for his sore ankle, found his footing and contributed a half-dozen outs with flawless play at the hot corner. Our frequent sub, Yankee manager Joey Carbone, was a dirt devil at second -including his own specialty of throwing while sprawled on the field in a cloud of dust after smothering a grounder.

"You guys played phenomenal defense," the Stars top-rated player Jason Banner told me after the game. "Nobody on my team was hitting. Except for me."

Let the record show that Banner hit three mild-shot singles to medium right that Gene Sherman deftly handled.

The contest turned on a mid-game strategy shift. The Stars had been finding grass with short fly balls just out of shortstop Joe Blachman's reach. The shift had Lambert coming in and rover Mike Novak deployed to short left. If nothing else, it probably got into the heads of the Stars' batters.

It was heartening to see Allan Judkowitz, whose long battle with pancreatic cancer has inspired many of us in the league, rise from his sickbed and donning his gold Bucco jersey to watch the end of our game.

                    -----                    -----                       -----                  -----

    It was a much-needed win after the Buccos lost the previous week 14-8 to the league’s top team, the undefeated Archies. I was missing from the game, having flown to Florida to visit my mother, soon to turn 96.

     Mark Lambert (show in pic above), took over as manager for the game and was so frustrated by the experience – including a heated argument with the umpire  that he begged me to find someone else to manage when I’m away.        

     Mark, a former manager himself in this league, has complained for as long as I’ve known him, about how much he hates managing a team. Mark, the father of three daughters, is a sweetheart, but like many players in the this league becomes highly competitive and a bit disputatious on the field.

     The now-retired deputy Los Angeles City Attorney for Consumer Affairs is most known for leading a sweeping crackdown in 2017 against pay-to-play acting auditions in Tinseltown. The mix of acting workshop owners and casting professionals accepted plea deals for violating California’s Krekorian Talent Scam Prevention Act, which had previously been rarely enforced. The once pervasive practice, in which casting directors and their low-paid assistants frequently staged paid auditions with aspiring actors, many of them children, has now been drastically curtailed.

     I’ll need to find another deputy as I’m going back east at the end of July for more family visits.