No Happy Ending for Brockschmidt, Whiskey Caucus
By Patrick Curran
Posted at 11:57 p.m. on Aug. 14, 2012
(Patrick Curran/CQ Roll Call)
Sometimes, pure adrenaline can lift an average team over a far superior one — particularly at the end of the season. But most of the time, not even an emotional high can make up for pure talent on the diamond.
The latter was the case Wednesday night on the National Mall, as I Hit That Last Year (11-3) soundly defeated Whiskey Caucus (7-11), 26-16, in a late-season battle of mixed House Softball League teams.
I Hit That Last Year, coming in ranked No. 22 in the league and armed with two former college baseball players, didn’t waste any time showing off its guns. The favorites knocked home seven runs in the top of the first, and it looked like a blowout before Whiskey Caucus, a bipartisan team with a compelling history, even stepped to the plate.
“It seems like we either score a lot of runs in the first or go three-up, three-down,” shortstop Danny Finkelstein said. “But when we do score runs, we tend to score a lot of them.”
Whiskey Caucus was celebrating a bittersweet milestone in captain Ben Brockschmidt’s final game and managed to keep its composure after the first-inning onslaught — the second frame was a defensive clinic for both sides. Still, the underdogs didn’t manage to get on the board until the bottom of the third, when they had already dug an 11-run hole.
I Hit That Last Year got its hitting ways back in the later innings and coasted to a 10-run victory behind a strong effort from the game playlist, which everything from Lynyrd Skynyrd to Justin Bieber.
Brockschmidt, who is moving to Chicago, spoke fondly of his squad despite the loss.
“We’re here to have fun. We’re the definition of a rec league team,” he said. “We have people from the [Democratic] leadership, [Republican] leadership, minority, majority. … We’re just here to have a good time.”
