Who loves kickball?

This summer was one of the best of my life. I played lots of kickball, dodgeball, softball, and more. I've played kickball for two full years now, 6 seasons worth. Every season in the playoffs the team I play on loses to the team that eventually wins the championship. Yesterday that all changed. I woke up at about 6:30 in the morning excited for kickball (yes, yesterday, I chose kickball over the Ducks). I packed my truck with many changes of clothes and a cooler and left for the fields about 7:30 am. I got there before many of the players who had 8:00 games and helped set up a pair of tents for our team to use during the day. I reffed the first game of the day, featuring the Jellyball Pimps, a fun team. I actually got complimented on my reffing, which I take as a great compliment. Reffing is an underappreciated part of the game, and I truly appreciate all of the compliments I have ever gotten about my reffing. After the 8:00 am game Corey, our team captain, had our team partake in sliding drills. The ground was soggy with days of rain and it was fun, and eased a lot of players tensions regarding sliding, which turned out to be huge.
Our first game started at 9 and turned out to be much scarier than we predicted. Our captain, the aforementioned Corey, set up a "sit-out" schedule where some players would sit out games leading to the league championship. The first game he sat out, but thought about inserting himself when we got to the bottom of the lineup with two outs, basesloaded, in a close game. I am a bunter and can do so with the bases loaded. He decided to stick with the plan and let me kick. I tried to swing away and wasted my fouls. I ended up fouling out. Bah. The team we played, We got the Runs, scored more on us than the rest of the teams during the rest of the day combined. Anyway, we survived a scare as we put more runs on the board than they did. I guess I should mention that I played catcher during the tournament, which is not at all my normal position. I made a few throwing errors that gave the Runs a few extra bases and runs.
The next game was against the Jellyball Pimps. The Pimps are a fun team with a good catcher. During our pre-tourney team meeting (yes, we had a team meeting) we discussed our strategy against this team as bunting beyond the range of their catcher, as their catcher is their best player. We executed our plan and shut out the Pimps as our defense really started to play. The Pimps (complete with Pimp hats) did entertain us with their dance to "jump around" by House of Pain.
Our third game was against Errogenous. Errogenous is a rookie team that went 9-1 during the regular season, but were known for refusing the bunt. Earlier they had beat Jesus Kicks Balls, which was a team that nearly won the tournament during the Summer, by out-kicking them. We kicked a few pregame kicks and the wind-aided kicks really flew, which played into E's strategy. The thing about E was that they don't buy into bunting and don't really defend against the bunt. However, they did play an interesting style of defense that caused us to get tagged out rounding second multiple times. We didn't dominate as much as I the score suggests (we won 10-0 or so), but the ref of that game later told me that he thought we played like champions.
The next game was the game of the year and was one that we knew was coming. We played Crotch Chops earlier in the season, and it was close but they won. It was clear that we and Crotch Chops were the best two teams in our division on a day in day out basis, and this game lived up to the hype.

The Chops got two runs in the first and we weren't able to answer. As the game went on, it looked like the two runs was going to be it for the day. Several of us thought the game might end 2-0. The Chops got the bases loaded a few times, but were unable to get another run across. In about the fourth inning we got a runner on. The next kicker got on via bunt, then a deep fly ball was able to get the lead runner in on good aggressive baserunning and a good slide. The other runner got to third on the play to the plate leaving us with a man on third with one out. The next kicker hit a weak grounder to the pitcher. The pitcher tried to make a play directly on the kicker, but missed the tag as the runner hopped to the side. The pitcher had to hit the runner with a toss and that allowed our runner on third to score, as he wouldn't have been able to go without the throw. The score remained 2-2 going into the bottom of the last (7th). Our lead-off hitter got on. I was up next. I hadn't gotten on during the game. I bunted towards first and the pitcher got it and hit me in the back with a throw, making me out. I yelled out immediately for the runner to go three, and she ran. The throw came and she slid into the base safely. Had she not slid she likely would have been out. We had a runner on first with one outs and I was estactic to have not gotten a hit, but advanced our runner two spots. The next batter bunter and went to second and the defense focused on the winning run on third. The next batter bunted and they made no throw to let the bases get loaded for our big kicker coming up. The line drive went down the third base line and the celebration ensued. We were going to the championship game and we were thrilled and soaked.

The Championship Game: We faced WFT!?! in the championship game. They hadn't lost a game all season and had won this summer's championship. We won the rock-paper-scissors and elected to be the home team. The skies had darkened and opened up as the rain and wind really got going. Luckily the league had arranged for the lights to come on. Several teams stayed to watch and cheer and it was a good time for all. In the top of the first their leadoff hitter, who is fast, bunted and I nearly threw him out (actually, I would have thrown him out if not for the wet ball being hard to catch). I think that play threw off WTF a bit as they didn't bunt much after the first. Or it might have been the fact that we held them scoreless in the first and dropped a 6 spot on them in the bottom half. After that, they kicked away a lot. We built an 8-0 lead and we knew we were going to win. The rain made for a good game and lots of people slid into first and home, some of which I am sure was unnecessarily but lots of fun. With the lead, we were able to have during the final game. I even put a whole Burger King burger into my mouth and tried to eat it. It wasn't easy, but I did it.

When the final out finally came, we all dog-piled on each other and then slid into home for the fun of it. Hopefully some of the pictures came out good. Anyway, I finally was able to drink from the Championship Cup. I carried it around for hours last night.

In the end, yesterday was a great day. I love kickball.