The participating teams for the 2007 tournament were:

 

Columbus Ohio Pirates Indianapolis Expos Crawfordsville Orioles

Indianapolis Pirates Louisville Sluggers Ft. Wayne Rangers

Chicago Giants Terre Haute Cubs Indianapolis Sox

Chicago Oaks Ft. Wayne Cardinals

 

For 2007 we had a field of eleven teams. Newcomers to the tournament were the Fort Wayne Cardinals, the Indianapolis Pirates and the Indianapolis Sox.

 

Teams were seeded after the first two games, with all teams making the tournament. The top three teams all received a first round bye. Using a tie breaker of runs allowed made for hassle free and accurate seeding as evidenced by the fact that the semi finals featured the 1, 2, 3 and 4 seeds, with the 1 and 2 seeds meeting in the final game for the first time in tournament history.

 

For the tournament, the only thing better than the weather was the competition. We had extra innings, iron man pitching, pitchers duels, a triple play and a walk off home run by a guy named Walker.

Standings

 

1. Chicago Oaks 2-0

2. Indianapolis Expos 2-0

3. Ft. Wayne Rangers 2-0

4. Terre Haute Cubs 2-0

5. Ft. Wayne Cardinals 1-1

6. Indianapolis Pirates 1-1

7. Columbus Pirates 1-1

8. Indianapolis Sox 0-2

9. Crawfordsville Orioles 0-2

10. Chicago Giants 0-2

11. Louisville Sluggers 0-2

 

The Indianapolis Pirates pulled off the triple play in their 5 to 1 loss to the Chicago Oaks in round robin play. With runners at first and second and no outs the Oaks decided to put the runners in motion when the count reached 3-2 on the batter. Pirates shortstop Jamie Nunnally flagged down a soft line drive behind second for the first out. He then flipped the ball to second baseman Mike Lexa who doubled up the runner who left second and then tagged the runner coming in from first to complete the triple killing.

 

 

First Round Results

 

Ohio Pirates 9 Chicago Giants 8 10 innings

Sluggers 8 Indy Pirates 7 10 innings

Orioles 10 Indy Sox 8

The Ohio Pirates went back and forth with the Chicago Giants before finally putting it away in the bottom of the 10^th on a walk off Home Run by Jeff Walker. In the second round they fell victim to last inning heroics by the Expos Ryan Noward who came up with the game winning hit against a drawn in outfield in the bottom of the 11^th.

 

While the Pirates and Expos were battling in extra innings, the Louisville Sluggers and Fort Wayne Rangers hooked up for a slugfest with the Rangers prevailing 17 to 14 in a 4 hour affair.

 

In other second round action the Terre Haute Cubs handled the Fort Wayne Cardinals 8-1, and the Chicago Oaks had a complete game effort from Bobby Hutchins(more about him later) in their 12-4 victory over the Crawfordsville Orioles.

 

This set up the semi final matchups for Monday with the #1 Oaks matched up with the #4 Cubs and #2 Expos facing the #3 Rangers.

 

The Oaks scored early and responded whenever the Cubs started to catch up, winning it 6-3 with a complete game by Bobby Hutchins…that guy again!

 

The offensive machine of the Fort Wayne Rangers, which had scored 52 runs in 3 games, was slowed to almost a standstill by the strong left arm of the Expos Jeff Montfort. Montfort struck out 12 and allowed only 3 runs before giving way to John Hensley who picked up the save by leaving the tying run on third base in the 9^th. The Rangers Sean Giese had a strong game allowing only 1 earned run but was done in by defensive miscues.

The Expos Kyle Corbin did most of the offensive damage with 3 RBI.

 

The Expos took an early lead in the championship game scoring in the 1^st with 2 out. The Oaks responded in the bottom of the inning with a 2 out run or their own. It would be like that for the whole game with two ties and 5 lead changes before it was over.

 

Matt Tibbs took the mound for the Expos and held off the Oaks allowing 4 runs, none of them earned, before giving way to John Hensley with one out and one on in the 8^th. The usually reliable Hensley, one win and one save in relief for the tournament, couldn’t throw a strike to the three batters he faced. He hit left fielder James Bell, walked catcher Greg Rieves, and went 0-2 on first baseman Danyale Simmons then gave the ball to Chad Ricketts who got out of the inning with a sac fly to Simmons and then a walk to Cedric Collins which resulted in Collins being caught stealing. But the damage had been done, the Oaks had scored 2 to take the lead going to the 9^th.

 

When Brady Beyers opened the 9^th for the Expos with an infield hit and promptly stole 2^nd you could sense that the Expos were going to make the comeback a reality. Two hits and two errors later the Expos had a 4 run lead to protect in the bottom of the 9^th. Ricketts faced four batters to pick up the win in relief. Chad also contributed going 3 for 4 with 2 runs.

Kyle Corbin’s 3 for 4 effort with 2 RBI lead the way for the Expos and earned Tournament MVP honors (Pictured with tournament director and IABL VP, John DeCosta).

 

The Iron Man Award would certainly go to the Oaks Bobby Hutchins

for his amazing performance in pitching three complete games in two days, winning two and taking a lead into the 9^th inning only to be undone by the defense.

 

 

Final	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9	R	H	E
Indianapolis Expos	1	0	1	0	0	1	2	0	4	9	14	2
Chicago Oaks	1	1	0	0	0	1	1	2	0	6	6	4
W: C. Ricketts 1-0 L: B. Hutchins 2-1