Tag: nsl

NSL Expansion in 2022

In 2022, the National Softball League will add a third division – an eight-team NSL3 league — and will be played as a stand-alone event at Farnham Park, rather than being part of the Diamond Series. NSL league games will be held mainly on three weekends: 21-22 May, 4-5 June and 9-10 July.

However, on the weekend of 9-10 July, only NSL2 and NSL3 teams will compete, with the third weekend of play for NSL1 moved to 23-24 July. This is to avoid a clash with the European Co-ed Slowpitch Championships, in which a number of NSL1 players will be involved.

There will be a National Championship weekend for NSL1 and NSL2 on 3-4 September, involving the top eight teams from the 12-team standings in each division. The NSL3 Nationals, however, will be played on 9-10 July, with all eight teams involved.

All NSL league play in 2022 will be run by BaseballSoftballUK on behalf of the BSF and any profits made will be invested in upkeep and improvements at Farnham Park.

The 2022 Diamond Series will be played on three other weekends at Farnham Park, with those dates to be published soon.

The BSF is also hoping to start an eight-team NSL4 division, but a limit on the number of grass pitches available at Farnham Park this season due to refurbishment work on the part of the Local Authority means that NSL4 will have to wait until 2023.

There will be two-up and two-down between all three NSL levels after the 2022 league schedule has been played, with the bottom two teams in NSL3 dropping down to NSL4 if that division is constituted for 2023. Otherwise, those two teams will need to wait a year before they can re-apply for NSL3.

2019 NSL3 Nationals

NSL3 Nationals promote Camels & Ducks to NSL2

At the same time as the NSL1 and NSL2 Nationals were being played at Farnham Park, eight teams were contesting the NSL3 Nationals Tournament at Parrs Wood School in Didsbury, Manchester, with two places in NSL2 for the 2020 season at stake.

The promoted teams, based on round-robin standings, were the Spittin’ Camels from Manchester (shown above) and the Fuzzy Ducks from London (shown below), and the Camels also won the tournament and the title of 2019 NSL3 Champion.

The BSF’s NSL3 Nationals, played at Parrs Wood School in Manchester on 31 August-1 September, was a triumph for the Spittin’ Camels from Manchester, who won the tournament and also gained promotion to NSL2 for 2020, along with London’s Fuzzy Ducks.

Eight teams travelled to Manchester to compete in the second NSL3 competition, some from further afield than others. The Manchester Softball League was represented by the Spittin’ Camels, Mavericks II and Meerkats and they were joined by the Sefton Loan Sharks from Liverpool, the Bracknell Scorchers and, from London, the Raiders, Fuzzy Ducks and Blitz Havoc.

Havoc had just been relegated from NSL2, so were looking to bounce straight back up. The Scorchers had won the C-grade title at the Diamond Series, but this tournament was expected to be a step up for them, especially as it featured the three Manchester teams that had won the B-grade Cup at Diamonds, and the Fuzzy Ducks, who had won the BSF League Nationals.
Format

The format was a simple eight-team round-robin, after which the top two teams in the standings would be promoted to NSL2 for the 2020 season.

But the tournament was also played to a conclusion to determine a 2019 NSL3 champion, with semi-final places for the top four teams and then a final.

Saturday

The Scorchers showed no signs of nerves in their first match, with a 13-4 victory over the Meerkats that proved they hadn’t come all the way to Manchester just for the experience.

The Meerkats were the only team without a win after the first two rounds of games, as all the defeated teams promptly beat their next opponents to leave things very close indeed.

However, the Camels took two victories forward, and ended Saturday on top of the table at 3-0-1 after a thrilling game with the Fuzzy Ducks in which the Ducks tied the score in the final inning.

Apart from the Scorchers and Havoc on 1-3 and the Ducks on 2-1-1, all of the other teams finished 2-2 at the end of Saturday, showing how close the competition was and the fantastic standard of softball being played by everyone.

Sunday

On Sunday morning Blitz Havoc brought the spirit of Barnes Wallis to the proceedings, bouncing back from what may have been a disappointing Saturday to win consecutive games against the Mavericks II and Meerkats before losing 13-12 to the Scorchers in their last game.

The victory over the Mavs II put Blitz Havoc in fourth place on head-to-head and gained them a semi-final berth against the as yet unbeaten Camels, who topped the table and qualified for NSL2 with a game to spare.

Second place in the table went to the Fuzzy Ducks, whose only defeat was against Blitz Havoc in their first game, and they started celebrating their promotion immediately, which definitely affected them in their semi-final defeat by the Loan Sharks, while the Camels were too much for Blitz Havoc in the other semi-final.

So the tournament final was between the Spittin’ Camels and the Loan Sharks, and the Camels continued their unbeaten record by winning 10-6.

Congratulations to the Camels and the Ducks on their promotion to NSL2, and many thanks to all the teams, umpires and spectators who braved the strange mix of pouring rain and burning sunshine (it’s not really strange for Manchester) to make this NSL3 tournament a success.

Results

Promotion to NSL2:
Spittin’ Camels and Fuzzy Ducks

NSL3 Winner:
Spittin’ Camels

MVPs:
Vicky Green and Max Fagan (Spittin’ Camels)

Final standings were:

1 – Spittin’ Camels (Manchester)
2 – Fuzzy Ducks (London)
3 – Sharks (Liverpool)
4 – Blitz Havoc (London)
5 – Mavericks II (Manchester)
6 – Meerkats (Manchester)
7 – Raiders (London)
8 – Scorchers (Windsor & Maidenhead)

NSL 3 NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP WINNERS
2019 – Spittin’ Camels
2018 – The Mob

2019 NSL2 Nationals

NSL2 Nationals

The NSL2 Nationals were played alongside the NSL1 competition at Farnham Park, and also provided a feast of good softball in pleasant early autumn conditions, marred only by an hours’ worth of cloud and drizzle in the middle of Saturday afternoon and some cold gusts of wind on Sunday that at times had pitchers struggling to cope.

The top four teams to emerge from the NSL2 round-robin to contest the playoffs were, in order of finish, the NSL2 league winners Blitz Bombers from London, Tempest from Manchester, the Honey Badgers from Glasgow and the Naturals from London.

While NSL1 teams had opted for a Page Playoff format to settle their tournament, with no placing games, NSL2 teams had opted for semi-finals and a final to settle things at the top and placing games to settle places 5-8.

In the placing games, SPAM, who just missed out on a playoff place, defeated Bristol Bees 14-4 to claim fifth place and the Terriers beat Ninos Privados 13-4 to claim seventh. Full standings are below.

Meanwhile, in one semi-final, the Honey Badgers edged out the Naturals 7-5 and in the other, Tempest defeated the Blitz Bombers 7-3.

NSL2 final

The NSL2 final was something of an anti-climax, but only because Tempest, who had just managed to edge past the Honey Badgers by 9-8 in the round-robin on Saturday, put on an awesome display of consistent power hitting that produced a 22-2 four-inning mercy rule win on Sunday.

Tempest scored seven runs in the top of the first inning, four in the second, three in the third and then eight more in the top of the fourth, racking up 21 hits including two home runs, five triples and four doubles. The Honey Badgers committed only three errors but were overwhelmed by line drive after line drive to all parts of the field.

David Howes, Luis Arrevillagas, Linni Mitchell and Amilcar Gomez had three hits each for Tempest, and Jordan Colton, Becci Wadeson and Emma Agostini each chipped in with two.

In response, the shell-shocked Honey Badgers could muster only two runs in the bottom of the third inning on four straights singles – their only hits of the game – plus a sacrifice fly, with the RBIs going to Paul Sweeney and Kyle Wilson.

MVPs for the final, both understandably from Tempest, were Luis Arrevillagas, who had a home run, a triple and a double, and Linni Mitchell, who added two singles and a triple to the attack and drove in four runs.

NSL2 standings

Final standings in the 2019 NSL2 Nationals were:

1 – Tempest
2 – Honey Badgers
3 – Blitz Bombers
4 – Naturals
5 – SPAM
6 – Bristol Bees
7 – Terriers
8 – Ninos Privados

The 2019 NSL2 league winner was the Blitz Bombers, who will be promoted to NSL1 for the 2020 season.

NSL 2 NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP WINNERS
2019 – Tempest
2018 – Manchester Mavericks
2017 – SPAM

2019 NSL1 Nationals

Knights dethrone Pioneers in great NSL1 final

Sun 1 Sep 2019

By Bob Fromer

It had been 10 years since anyone other than Pioneers or Chromies had won the BSF’s A-grade NSL National Championship, but over the weekend of 31 August-1 September at Farnham Park, the Windsor Knights broke the duopoly in thrilling fashion.

In a brilliant NSL1 final on Sunday evening that was close all the way through and played before a large and fully engaged crowd, the Knights staged a three-run rally in the bottom of the seventh inning against Dan Spinks and the Pioneers to capture the 2019 National Championship by a score of 13-12.

When Aaron Thomas smashed a double to the fence in left centre field and Kim Miller, running for Lucy Binding, who had hit a similar double minutes earlier, crossed the plate with the winning run, the Knights’ celebration was ecstatic – and well-earned, because though the margins are narrow, they had been the best team all weekend.

In the round-robin phase of the tournament, the Knights had finished top with just one loss and one draw, and registered notable wins over the NSL1 league-winning Travelling Dodgers, Chromies and H2O while drawing with Pioneers.

In the 1 v 2 Page Playoff game, the Knights utterly routed Chromies by a score of 20-5 with a great display of power and defense.

And in the final against the defending champion Pioneers, the Knights out-homered the Pioneers, matched them in the circle and on defense, and executed the game-winning rally with a nerveless display of line drive hitting.

After the game, the greatest emotion came from those who had been part of the Windsor Knights the longest.

“After years of working and building for this,” Lucy Binding said, “this weekend we proved absolutely that we’re a good team and that we deserve to be here — and to represent GB Softball in Europe.”

Colin Stone said, “It’s a proper team! Everybody plays for everybody else, everyone supports everyone else. It’s fantastic!”

The results this weekend also determined the teams that will represent Great Britain at next summer’s European Co-ed Slowpitch Super Cup. Pioneers had already qualified as 2018 Super Cup winners, leaving two more places available, and these will now be filled by the 2019 National Champion Windsor Knights and by the 2018 National Championship runner-up Chromies.

Four games were live-streamed from Farnham Park on Sunday afternoon and came be seen on BSUK’s YouTube channel on https://www.youtube.com/user/baseballsoftballuk:

The NSL1 1 v 2 Page Playoff game between the Windsor Knights and Chromies.
The NSL1 Page Playoff pre-final between the Pioneers and Chromies.
The NSL2 final between the Honey Badgers from Glasgow and Tempest from Manchester.
The wonderful NSL1 final between the Windsor Knights and the Pioneers.

More details on the classic NSL1 final are are below, but first, a summary of other results from the weekend.

NSL1 final: the details

The NSL1 final was a game rich in incident, full of key hits and good defensive plays, contested by two talented and confident teams that refused to give an inch.

Pioneers scored in five of the seven innings and the Knights scored in six, but crucially, the runs were scored in ones, two, threes and a couple of fours. The pitching and defense was too good on both sides to allow the big inning that might have turned the game.

Pioneers’ second baseman Dan Bello, who the Knights could not get out – he had three triples and a double in four at-bats — led off in the top of the first inning with a triple and soon rode home on the first of two home runs by Steve Hazard, who had hit three in the previous game, a 13-7 win over Chromies that put the Pioneers into the final.

But those two runs were all that Pioneers scored in the top of the first inning, thanks in part to a great force play started by Knights’ shortstop Max Zerhusen.

In the bottom of the first inning, the Knights countered with four runs. Max Verhusen went Dan Bello one better by leading off with a solo home run, and then a double by Kelvin Harrison and a single by Natalie Woolley set up Knights’ pitcher Wolfgang Walther, who drove a three-run home run over the fence in left field.

Earlier in the afternoon, Wolfgang had hit three home runs, good for nine RBIs, when the Knights crushed the Chromies in the 1 v 2 Page Playoff game.

So the Knights ended the first inning of the final with a 4-2 lead.

When Pioneers failed to score in the top of the second inning and the Knights tacked on two in the bottom half on solo home runs by Neil Selvester and Max Zerhusen, the lead became 6-2, the largest margin that the Knights were to enjoy.

Over the next four innings, however, the Pioneers gradually chased the Knights down, “winning” the third inning by 2-1, the fourth inning by 3-2 (despite a long home run by the Knights’ Barbara Herzgen over the fence in left centre field) and drawing the fifth inning 1-1. A number of fine plays by shortstop Steve Hazard and third base player Kasey Pettit-Castor were features of these middle innings for the Pioneers, while the Knights had excellent and important catches in the outfield by Kelvin Harrison, Anna Wareham and Neil Selvester,

All of that left the Knights still 10-8 ahead, but in the top of the sixth inning the Pioneers pounced and took the lead for the first time since the middle of the first inning.

Dan Bello (who else?) led off the top of the sixth for the Pioneers with a triple, though this one was a little fly ball down the right field line that bounced away from the defenders. The next batter, Kasey Pettit-Castor, drew a walk on a 3-2 pitch. It was only the second walk that Wolfgang Walther had allowed in the game, but it felt like it might be important – and that was confirmed when Steve Hazard followed with a three-run smash over the left field fence.

One out later, Dan Spinks parked a solo home over the fence in left centre, and the Knights only averted further scoring by executing a beautiful 4-6-3 double play.

But now Pioneers had a 12-10 lead, and when the Knights tried to respond in the bottom of the sixth inning, there was nothing there: they went down without scoring for the only time in the game, thanks in part to a brilliant force play created by Kasey Pettit-Castor from a bouncing ball that pulled her far behind third base.

This was the only time on the weekend that the Knights looked rattled. But having failed to score in the bottom of the sixth inning, they then performed the crucial feat of setting the Pioneers down in order in the top of the seventh inning so that the deficit remained at two. A great catch at the fence in left centre field by Kim Hendry on a drive by Amy Rice was the key play of the inning.

So the Knights came up in the bottom of the seventh inning with just a two-run gap to overcome, and it was an uncharacteristic error by Dan Spinks, the best-fielding pitcher in the game, that opened the door.

Natalie Woolley led off and smashed a ball up the middle that caromed off Dan Spinks’s leg towards third base. Dan sprinted after it and fired off-balance to first, but the throw pulled first base player Jane Pettit-Castor into the baseline, and Natalie, Jane and the ball all arrived at the same place at the same time.

There was a terrible full-on collision, and while Natalie Woolley got up relatively quickly, Jane Pettit-Castor stayed down for a long time as the first-aiders attended to her. Eventually, Jane was able to get up and leave the field, and the Pioneers shuffled their defense, with Amy Rice moving to first base.

It was close to 15 minutes before play resumed, with Natalie Woolley on first and no one out. But the end came quickly.

Wolfgang Walther drove a sharp single to left field, and when the ball skipped past the fielders to the fence, Natalie scored and Wolfgang wound up on third.

Next up was Lucy Binding, who had entered the game in the fifth inning, and who later admitted her heart was pounding. But it didn’t stop her smashing a line drive double to left centre field that scored Wolfgang and tied the score at 12-12.

Kim Miller re-entered the game to pinch-run for Lucy with Aaron Thomas at the plate, and with no one out, the Pioneers were going to need a miracle to stop the Knights from completing the comeback. They didn’t get it.

The count went to 3-1 on Aaron as Dan Spinks tried to keep the ball away from him, but on the next pitch Aaron drove a long fly ball to left centre field that landed at the base of the fence. Kim Miller, who had waited to see if the ball might be caught, now only had to round third and into the joyful embrace of her teammates as soon as she crossed home plate.

The age of the Pioneers and Chromies had ended, at least temporarily, at the hands of a team that had worked very hard to achieve exactly this result, and who did it with style.

But make no mistake: the Pioneers and Chromies will be back next year.

NSL1 Page Playoff scores

1 v 2 game: Windsor Knights 20, Chromies 5
3 v 4 game: Pioneers 13, Legends 9
Pre-final: Pioneers 13, Chromies 7
Final: Windsor Knights 13, Pioneers 12

Final NSL1 standings

1 – Windsor Knights
2 – Pioneers
3 – Chromies
4 – Legends
5 – H2O
6 – Travelling Dodgers
7 – Blue Steel
8 – Greensox

The 2019 NSL1 league winner was the Travelling Dodgers.

History

Below are the National Championship and NSL winners over time, and the list shows what a rare feat the Windsor Knights pulled off this year. No one but Pioneers and Chromies had won the A-grade National Championship since 2008, and since 2002, when Pioneers won their first title, the two teams had won 14 out of 18 championships.

2019 – Windsor Knights
2018 – Pioneers
2017 — Chromies
2016 — Pioneers
2015 — Chromies
2014 – Chromies
2013 – Chromies
2012 – Chromies
2011 – Pioneers
2010 – Pioneers
2009 – Chromies
2008 – Dragons
2007 – Chromies
2006 – Chromies
2005 – Slammers
2004 – Chromies
2003 – Stingrays
2002 – Pioneers
2001 – Baker Tomkins
2000 – Baker Tomkins
1999 – Baker Tomkins
1998 – Baker Tomkins
1997 – Chromies (then known as Superchrome)
1996 – Windsor Dodgers
1995 – Genies
1994 – Slammers
1993 – Isherwood
1992 – Slammers
1991 – Meteors
1990 – Sliders
1989 – Pirates
1988 – London New Zealand
1987 – Pirates

2019 NSL 1 Champions

Travelling Dodgers break through to snatch NSL1 title

 

The domination of the National Softball League’s top division by the Pioneers and Chromies has finally been broken!

The Travelling Dodgers put together an unbeaten 8-0 run on the final weekend of play in NSL1 this season, a standalone tournament on 27-28 July at Farnham Park, to win the 2019 NSL title by one game over Chromies and 2.5 games over the defending champion Pioneers.

The tournament also decided the eight NSL1 teams that have qualified for the Premier Nationals, scheduled for 31 August-1 September at Farnham Park, and the team that will be relegated to NSL2 for the 2020 season.

The reason these games were played as a standalone tournament rather than at Diamond Series 3 the previous weekend was that Diamond 3 clashed with the European Slowpitch Championship.

Outcomes

The team that finished last in the table and will be demoted to NSL2 for next season is London New Zealand (LNZ), who have been flirting with relegation for a couple of years and finally achieved, winning only two games all season while losing 20.

LNZ’s fate was clear by Sunday morning, but it took until the final round of games on Sunday afternoon, in which the Travelling Dodgers beat Legends and the Pioneers lost to H2O, before it was entirely clear who the league winner would be.

Chromies almost matched the Travelling Dodgers over the weekend with a record of 7-1, but that one loss, in a tight 6-4 game with Pioneers on Saturday, condemned Chromies to second place.

Most of the Travelling Dodgers’ wins over the weekend were relatively comfortable, including a 12-5 defeat of Pioneers and a 15-8 victory over H2O.  The one threat to their unbeaten record on the weekend came from the KKs, a team much further down the table, but the Dodgers squeaked through that game by a score of 9-8.

Premier Nationals Qualifiers

The eight teams that will compete at the 2019 Premier Nationals, with a National Championship and a place in next year’s European Super Cup at stake, are shown below in the order in which they finished in the league table:

Travelling Dodgers
Chromies
Pioneers
Knights
H2O
Greensox
Blue Steel
Legends

There wasn’t much suspense this year around the bottom of this group, since Nationals places were sorted with three rounds of games left on Sunday and in the end, there was a three-game gap between eighth and ninth place.

The three teams, along with LNZ, that failed to qualify for the Premier Nationals were:

KKs
Tigers
Mavericks

For the KKs, in just their second season in NSL1, a ninth-place finish represented a move upward after they just avoided relegation last year by finishing in 11th place.

The Mavericks, in their first season in NSL1 for some time, will have been happy to retain a place for next season.

2019 NSL 2 Champions

season ends with Blitz Bombers gaining promotion to NSL 1

The final games of the season in National Softball League 2 were played on weekend of 20-21 July at the Diamond Series 3 tournament at Farnham Park, and the biggest winner was the Blitz Bombers, who topped the standings and will be promoted to NSL1 for next season.

The Bombers head the list of the eight NSL2 teams that qualified for the NSL2 Nationals, to be played on the weekend of 31 August-1 September.  These teams, in the order they finished in league standings, are:

1 — Blitz Bombers
2 — Naturals
3 — Tempest (in their first season in NSL2)
4 — Honey Badgers
5 — SPAM
6 — Terriers
7 — Bees
8 — Ninos Privados

Ninos Privados and Warriors finished in a tie for the eighth and final playoff place with identical 7-14-1 records, but a 15-11 victory by the Ninos over the Warriors on Saturday at Diamond 3 was the difference.

Final games in NSL1 were not able to be played at Diamond Series 3 because of the European Slowpitch Championship that finished on the same weekend; these games will be played as a standalone tournament at Farnham Park on the weekend of 27-28 July.

Relegation

The two teams demoted from NSL2 are Misfits and Blitz Havoc, who will be offered places in the NSL3 National Championship tournament in Manchester on 31 August-1 September, which offers them a chance to regain their NSL2 status.

The Mob (last season’s NSL3 winners), just managed to avoid relegation, claiming 10th place over Blitz Havoc by winning both their games against them, even though the two teams had the same win/loss ratio.

Dana Granville, The Mob’s captain, said, “What a ride — I felt sick with tension.  We were making desperate calculations every round — were we safe or were we out?  The Mob bobbed up and down all weekend between ninth and 11th before finally settling in 10th to remain in NSL2, which was our aim this season.”

2019 NSL D2 Update

Pioneers and Blitz Bombers continue to lead NSL standings

Monday 1 June — The second round of games this season in the National Softball League, played at the second Diamond Series tournament on 15-16 June at Farnham Park, has seen the leaders maintain their momentum in title races that look like going to the wire.

Pioneers still lead NSL1 after the second round of play, but four other teams are with a game-and-a-half of the them, while NSL 2 is even tighter.  The Blitz Bombers retain the lead, but the top three teams are all on three losses and are separated only by the number of draws each of them has played.

Meanwhile, the more important races in the National Softball League at this stage are arguably the struggle to make the top eight and secure a place in the NSL Nationals at the end of the season.

Here, too, the races are tight.  In NSL1, just three games separate the sixth and tenth place teams, while the margin between sixth and tenth in NSL2 is just two-and-a-half games.

So there will be a lot still to play for when the third and final round of NSL regular-season games takes place in July.

This season, unusually, those final rounds will be split.  The 12 NSL2 teams will play a final weekend of NSL games at Diamond Series 3, on 20-21 July.

But because of the European Slowpitch Championship taking place in Hungary from 15-20 July and pulling key players away from many NSL1 teams, the final round of NSL1 play will be a standalone event at Farnham Park on the weekend of 27-28 July.

NSL1

In NSL1, the Pioneers cruised through most of their games, including an astonishing 31-2 win over the KKs, who are holding down ninth place in the division.  But they ran into trouble against H2O, drawing 8-8, and suffered their only loss of the weekend to the old enemy, the Chromies, by 13-11.

The Chromies, who have been jousting with the Pioneers at the top of A-grade softball for the past few years, only managed a 4-3 record in the first round of NSL games in May and that left them in fifth place, with some people writing them off.  But the Chromies have bounced back, going 6-1 at Diamond 2, and now sit in third place, just a game-and-a-half out of the top spot.

The Chromies beat up on some of the lower-placed teams in the division at Diamond 2, with wins over LNZ by 22-2 and the Mavericks by 21-0 and they also trounced the fifth-place Travelling Dodgers 26-5 and the second-place Knights 15-6.  But Chromies are always prone to the odd banana-skin result, and this past weekend it came in the form of a 15-12 loss to the eighth-place Greensox.

Meanwhile, one of the more consistent teams over the first two weekends of NSL play has been the Knights, who went 5-2 on the opening weekend and 5-1-1 this past weekend and thus remain in second place, just one game behind the Pioneers and hoping to strike for their first-ever NSL title.

In the race for NSL Nationals places, the top five teams – Pioneers, Knights, Chromies, H2O and the Travelling Dodgers, are looking safe.

But that leaves three places to be contested by Blue Steel and Legends on seven losses, the Greensox on eight losses, the KKs on nine, and even the Mavericks on 10 losses have at least a chance.

2019 NSL D1 Update

Pioneers start where they left off as the 2019 NSL season begins

The first weekend of National Softball League play in 2019 took place at the Diamond Series 1 Tournament at Farnham Park on 18-19 May, and there was a familiar team sitting at the top of the NSL 1 standings when play finished on Sunday evening.

Pioneers, the reigning National Champions, NSL winners and European Slowpitch Cup gold medallists, finished the weekend with a 6-1 record, with their only loss coming at the hands of Legends by a score of 7-6 in the last game of the day on Saturday.

There were some less familiar names at the top of the NSL 2 standings after the weekend, however, with Blitz Bombers and Tempest (formerly Drizzle) both on 5-2 records and separated only by a wafer-thin head-to-head result in which the Bombers beat Tempest by a score of 11-10.

As usual, there are 12 teams competing in both NSL 1 and NSL 2, and eight of them will qualify for National Championships at the end of the season after two more weekends of play.

Results on the first weekend suggest there could be a lot of volatility in the standings over the summer, with parity the order of the day and a lot of teams bunched tightly behind the leaders in both competitions.

In addition, teams have yet to play all of their opposition, and match-ups yet to come could also trigger movement in the league tables.

NSL 1

For Pioneers, it was partly business at usual at Diamond 1, as they were comfortable winners over LNZ, Blue Steel, Mavericks and the Travelling Dodgers, one of the teams expected to challenge for the NSL 1 title this season.

But Pioneers had to struggle to beat the Knights by 10-9 and the Greensox 9-7, and were upended 7-6 by Legends — and Pioneers have yet to play long-standing rivals Chromies and H2O, so more challenges lie ahead.

Nor have Pioneers managed to open anything like a gap on the chasing pack.  The Knights, Travelling Dodgers and H2O all sit just a game behind the current champions with a 5-2 record, and just behind that group are Chromies and Legends on 4-3.

Meanwhile, those teams will be looking over their shoulder at four more teams on 3-4: the Greensox and the newly-promoted Mavericks from Manchester plus Blue Steel and the KKs.  Altogether, nine teams chasing the Pioneers are separated by just two games in the standings.

Only the Bristol Tigers, at 1-6, and traditional relegation battlers LNZ, on 0-7, look genuinely out of the title race after the first weekend of play.

2018 NSL Nationals

Won by Pioneers, Mavs and Misfits

By Bob Fromer

Great softball, close games, perfect weather, exhilarating finals and a record number of “ladybombs” (over-the-fence home runs by women) were the hallmarks of the 2018 British Softball Federation NSL National Championships on the weekend of 1-2 September at Farnham Park.

Three separate competitions took place over the weekend:

  • The Premier Nationals for the top eight NSL 1 or A-grade teams from this year’s NSL 1 league competition.  The winner would be National Champion for 2018 and gain a place in the 2020 European Slowpitch Super Cup.
  • The NSL 2 Nationals for the top eight NSL 2 or B-grade teams from this year’s NSL 2 league competition.  The winner would be NSL 2 National Champion, while the winner from NSL 2 league play would gain promotion to NSL 1 for 2019.  As it turned out, the same team won both the Nationals and the league.
  • The first-ever NSL 3 Nationals, for eight teams with aspirations to join the NSL structure.  The two teams that finished at the top of the round-robin standings would both be given a place in NSL 2 league play in 2019.

Three games were webstreamed from Sunday’s playoffs: a brilliant NSL 1 Page Playoff pre-final with a twist in the tail, and then the NSL 2 and NSL 1 finals, both high-scoring back-and-forth affairs where the winner was in doubt until the end.  All three games can be viewed on BSUK’s YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/user/baseballsoftballuk.

Fields were repaired and re-lined throughout the weekend by BaseballSoftballUK’s field crew, and for the NSL 2 and NSL 1 finals, a PA announcer introduced the teams individually at the start of each game.  All this was part of the BSF’s commitment to raise the presentation of its National Championships and make them the pinnacle tournaments of the season.

Results

Let’s cut to the chase for busy readers and lay out the results.

NSL 1

In NSL 1, as expected, Pioneers and Chromies, who have dominated the Premier Nationals in recent years, finished first and second in the round-robin phase of the tournament and eventually faced off in the final, with Pioneers winning the title in a 24-20 slugfest in which the Chromies were always on their heels but fell just short in the end.  There will be more detail on this game below.

However, the expected final match-up almost didn’t occur.  The Windsor Knights, playing their best softball ever at the Premier Nationals, made it to the Page Playoff pre-final game against the Pioneers, with the winner to play Chromies in the final.  Against expectations, the Knights shut down the potent Pioneers offense, and late in the game were one out away from taking a 7-4 lead into the seventh inning.

That’s when Vicky Chapman came to bat with two out and two on in the bottom of the sixth inning, took three straight balls from Knights pitcher Wolfgang Walther, and then sent the next pitch soaring over the fence in left-centre field to tie the game.  The Pioneers then held the Knights scoreless in the top of the seventh and squeezed out a run in the bottom of the inning to win 8-7 and crush the Knights’ hopes.

“Yes, I knew the count was 3-0,” Vicky Chapman said afterwards, “but the pitch was right in my zone!”

Lucy Binding from the Knights said, “I’m so proud of what we achieved this weekend.  We’ve never done this well or made it this far before.  I’m disappointed – but we can take what we accomplished forward to next year and the future.”

Legends, who reached the final last year before going down to the Chromies, finished fourth, but lost by only a single run to Knights in the 3 v 4 Page Playoff game, so are maintaining their challenge in the top echelons of NSL 1.  The notable absentee from the top four was H2O, who could only manage two wins in the round-robin phase.

NSL 2

Last year’s NSL 2 Nationals winners SPAM topped the group after round-robin play, but then two heart-breaking losses kept SPAM from reaching the final.

In the Page Playoff 1 v 2 game against the Bristol Bees, SPAM lost 7-6 and then met the NSL 2 league winners Manchester Mavericks in the pre-final.  Going into their last at-bat as the home team, SPAM trailed 15-8, but staged a furious rally that brought the score to 15-14 with the tying run on third base and two out.  But that’s where the rally ended.

So the Mavericks, playing their fourth straight game, met the Bees in the NSL 2 final, and the Bees came out with all guns blazing, running up a 12-5 lead after two innings.  But the Mavericks then changed pitchers, shut down the Bees and chipped away, scoring in every inning, until they finally tied the game 13-13 at the end of the sixth.

In the final inning, the Mavericks scored four and the Bees scored two and had the tying runs on base with just one out.  But that’s where the rally ended and the Mavericks, who were top of the table in NSL 2 league play, will move up to NSL 1 next season.  There will be more detail on this game below.

NSL 3

The outstanding team during the NSL 3 round-robin was undoubtedly The Mob, who went undefeated with a 7-0 record, though several of those wins came in close games.  The team that finished behind them with a 4-2-1 record was Drizzle, and both teams will be given places in NSL 2 for next season.

But playoffs can be cruel to round-robin winners, and the NSL 3 playoffs consisted of semi-finals and a final rather than a Page Playoff, which would have given The Mob a second chance.  In the event, The Mob went down 8-4 to Misfits in the 1 v 4 semi-final, while Raiders Gold prevailed over Drizzle in the 2 v 3 semi-final, and it was Misfits and Raiders who met in the NSL 3 Cup Final, with the Misfits winning 11-7.

Impressions

The outstanding impression from the weekend was how closely matched almost all the teams were at all three NSL levels, with just one or two exceptions.

There were 32 games over the weekend decided by three runs or fewer, and the league tables kept fluctuating throughout the round-robin phase of the tournament, which took up all of Saturday and the first half of Sunday.

The conclusion has to be that the NSL structure is working, providing good competition with incentives and opportunities for teams to improve and advance, and that’s why so many teams are now looking for the chance to join in.  The BSF hopes to have an NSL 3 league structure in place by 2020, playing in tandem with NSL 1 and NSL 2, and will look at additional possibilities for mobility within the system.

Below are reports on the NSL 1 and NSL 2 finals.

NSL 1 Final:
Pioneers 24, Chromies 20

This game was a breathtaking display of high-level co-ed slowpitch softball, with 44 runs scored on 52 hits, but only three errors in the whole of the contest.

Each team had four home runs, with Mike MacDowell hitting two for Chromies and Steve Hazard two for Pioneers – but Chiya Louie for Chromies and Vicky Chapman for Pioneers also hit the ball out of the park, and both women had multiple over-the-fence home runs over the weekend.  Chiya went 5-for-5 in the final with five RBIs; Vicky was 4-for-5 with four RBIs, and every one of their hits were smashed.  It was an awesome display.

The game began with little sign of the offensive hurricane to come.  In the top of the first inning, Pioneers failed to score for the only time in the game and Chromies took a 3-0 lead in the bottom half when Matt Tomlin doubled, Chiya Louie singled to drive in Matt and Mike MacDowell belted the first of his two home runs over the left field fence.  So far, so normal.

In the top of the second inning, however, the Pioneers mounted a relentless onslaught against the Chromies and pitcher David Lee.  The inning began inauspiciously for Pioneers when Dan Spinks was out on a third strike foul, but then 10 of the next 11 batters had hits, including Steve Hazard’s first home run of the game and capped by the home run from Vicky Chapman.  Virtually every ball was hard-hit, and there was nothing the Chromies could do.  By the time the inning finally came to an end, Pioneers had sent 16 batters to the plate, scored 11 runs and taken an 11-3 lead.

This was the point when the game could have got away from Chromies if they hadn’t been able to respond.  But typically, they responded in style, with seven runs on seven hits in the bottom of the second inning, including a three-run home run from Mike MacDowell and a solo shot from David Lee.  The game was back on, with the Pioneers’ lead cut to 11-10.

In the third inning, the Pioneers scored twice, but the Chromies came back with three runs on hits by Moe Flett, Misha Sulcova, Danny Gunn and Paul Gough and a sacrifice fly from David Lee, and that tied the score at 13-13.  It was to be the last time the Chromies had a share of the lead, but the Pioneers were never able to pull away until late in the contest.

Pioneers re-took the lead with three runs in the top of the fourth inning when Dan Bello belted a three-run line drive home run with Ruth Macintosh and Steve Rice on base, and in the bottom of the fourth inning, the Pioneers replaced Dan Spinks in the circle with Kasey Pettit-Castor, who had previously been playing third.

It was a bold move, and it worked, with the Chromies only managing three runs in the fourth and fifth innings.  But Pioneers were also having a fallow patch, and at the end of the fifth inning, the Pioneers held a slim 17-16 lead and the large crowd watching the final was waiting to see what would happen next.

What happened next was a decisive five-run rally by the Pioneers in the top of the sixth inning to finally create some separation between the teams.

The rally began, untypically, with Ruth Macintosh reaching on an error, and three straight singles followed, by Steve Rice, Liz Keaveney and Dan Bello.  That brought two runs home, and Steve Hazard’s second home run of the game, a three-run blast to left centre field, took the score to 22-16.

With Dan Spinks back in the pitcher’s circle, the Chromies could only score one in reply in the bottom of the sixth inning and Pioneers tacked on another two runs in the top of the seventh.  Vicky Chapman led off with a single, Ruth Macintosh drove a long triple to right centre field and a single by Steve Rice brought Ruth home.

So the Chromies came up in the bottom of the seventh inning trailing by seven runs.  But this is a team that never gives up, and a one-out triple to right field by Kat Golik got things started.  Kat scored on Matt Tomlin’s single, and Matt was able to trot around the bases when Chiya Louie did what she loves to do best and put yet another ball out of the park.

But that was as far as Chromies could go.  Mike MacDowell bounced out to second base and Moe Flett hit a ground ball to Steve Hazard at shortstop, and the Pioneers’ celebrations began.

MVPs for the final were Steve Hazard and, inevitably and hugely deserved, Vicky Chapman from the Pioneers.

Pioneers have now won the National Championship twice in the past three years, and you have to go back to 2008 to find the last time someone other than Pioneers and Chromies won the title (it was the Dragons, who no longer exist).  Since that time, Chromies have five national titles and Pioneers four, and right now it’s hard to say who might break up that duopoly.

Chromies remain by far the most successful team in British softball history, however, with 10 Co-ed Slowpitch National Championship wins since the first one was held in 1987.  Their closest challengers are Pioneers, with five titles, and the now-defunct Baker Tomkins with four.

NSL 2 Final:
Manchester Mavericks 17, Bristol Bees 15

This was another great game of softball, and it ended up even more closely contested at the end than the NSL 1 final.  But it took a different route to get there.

The Bristol Bees had ensured their place in the final early in the afternoon when they defeated SPAM in the 1 v 2 Page Playoff game.  So they had a chance to rest while the Manchester Mavericks came through their epic pre-final with SPAM, then came straight to the final to play their fourth game without a break.

That may have had something to do with the fact that the Bees put up 12 runs in the first two innings on the back of 11 hits but also five Mavericks’ errors, while the Manchester team could muster only five runs in reply.  Charlotte Sykes had a single and a triple for the Bees in those first two innings, George Stamets had a double and a single and Trevor Sykes had a pair of singles.

In the third inning, however, the Mavericks made the move that changed the course of the game, replacing starting pitcher Adam Cole with the veteran Pete Nightingale.  Abruptly, the Bees stopped buzzing, and they had no runs, one hit and just two baserunners over the next three innings.

Meanwhile, the Mavericks, who scored in all seven innings, just kept tacking on – nothing dramatic, but the scoreboard kept ticking over.

The Mavs picked up three runs in the third inning, with doubles by Laurence Pearmain and Ian Yates the key hits.

They scored one more in the fourth, on a line drive home run by shortstop Anthony Garcia Reyes drilled over the fence in centre field.

Two more runs followed in the fifth inning on three singles and an error.

At the end of the fifth inning, the Bees were still ahead, 12-11, but they could feel heavy footsteps coming up behind them, and the Mavericks finally took the lead, 13-12, with two more runs in the top of the sixth.  Pete Nightingale’s double got things started and some singles and errors followed.

In the bottom of the sixth inning, the Bees finally emerged from their torpor and tied the game on a triple by George Stamets and a single by Trevor Sykes.  So the score was now 13-13 as the game approached the final frame.

And that’s when the Mavericks chose to have their highest-scoring inning of the game, posting four very big runs.

Laurence Pearmain led off with a double and scored on a single by Anthony Garcia Reyes.  Tanya Basu then singled to centre field, and Pete Nightingale took his moment in the spotlight, as he has so often before, blasting a three-run home run that put his team into a 17-13 lead.

In slowpitch softball, though, no lead is safe, and the Bees went on the attack with one out in the bottom of the seventh inning.  Chris Ingle and Ceri McGuiness lined singles to left field, Callum Joynes drove in one run with a single, and a line drive single to right centre field by Charlotte Sykes, her fourth hit of the game, made the score 17-15.

George Stamets took two strikes, then made his bid for glory, with a deep drive to centre field that was caught not far from the fence.  But both runners moved up after the catch, so the tying runs were in scoring position with two out and Jill Brown at the plate.

Jill hit a fly ball towards short left field, but Anthony Garcia Reyes glided back to take the catch, and the Mavericks had their NSL National Championship trophy to go with their NSL 2 league title.

And they will try their luck in NSL 1 next season.

MVPs for the final were Pete Nightingale and Emma Carruthers from the Mavericks.

Final standings

Here are the final standings from all three NSL National Championships.  For NSL 1 and NSL 2, this includes playoff games, but the NSL 3 standings are based on round-robin results only.
NSL 1
1 — Pioneers
2 — Chromies
3 — Knights
4 — Legends
5 — H2O
6 — Bristol
7 — Dodgers
8 — LNZ
NSL 2
1 — Mavericks
2 — Bees
3 — SPAM
4 — Bombers
5 — Honey Badgers
6 — Havoc
7 — Ninos Privados
8 — Warriors
NSL 3
1 — The Mob
2 — Drizzle
3 — Raiders Gold
4 — Misfits
5 — Spittin’ Camels
6 — Fuzzy Ducks
7 — Tomahawks
8 — RG Blue Sox

History

2018 Nationals Preview

Qualified teams confirmed for NSL Nationals

Following the completion of National Softball League fixtures at Diamond Series 3 on 28-29 July, we now know the teams that have qualified to play in the Premier and NSL 2 National Championships at Farnham Park on 1-2 September.

We also know the teams that will contest a parallel “NSL 3” tournament on the same weekend, with the teams finishing first and second gaining promotion to NSL 2 for the 2019 season.

And congratulations are in order for the Mavericks, who finished first in the NSL 2 standings and will be promoted to NSL 1 for 2019, while Thunder is the team that came last in NSL 1 and will be relegated to NSL 2.

NSL 1

The final standings in NSL 1 were affected by the fact that Chromies and Pioneers did not take part in Diamond Series 3 because the European Slowpitch Super Cup started the following day, and their unplayed fixtures were counted as draws.

Nevertheless, Pioneers still managed to top the table, and a tie between Chromies and H2O for second place was resolved in Chromies’ favour on runs conceded.

The eight teams that will contest the Premier Nationals, based on their places in the table, are:

1 – Pioneers
2 – Chromies
3 – H2O
4 – Travelling Dodgers
5 – Legends
6 – Knights
7 – Bristol
8 – LNZ

In the final NSL 1 game, Greensox drew with Legends, resulting in three-way tie
between LNZ, Greensox and Blue Steel for the eighth and final Premier Nationals place, which again had to be resolved by maths and regulations.

The four teams missing out on the Premier Nationals finished in this order:

9 – Blue Steel
10 – Greensox
11 – KKs
12 – Thunder

The final table will be a particular shock for Blue Steel, who have finished in the upper reaches of NSL 1 for the past several seasons.

The KKs and Thunder fought all the way to avoid relegation, but the KKs sealed their place in NSL 1 with a win over the Dodgers, and it was Thunder who will play in NSL 2 in 2019.

NSL2

The two teams that were new to NSL 2 this year, Honey Badgers and Blitz Havoc, both did well over the season, and both achieved a place in the NSL 2 Nationals.

The division was won by Mavericks, who will play in NSL 1 next year.  The eight teams to qualify for the NSL 2 Nationals did so in the following order:

1 – Mavericks
2 – Warriors
3 – Bristol Bees
4 – Ninos Privados
5 – Blitz Bombers
6 – SPAM
7 – Honey Badgers
8 – Blitz Havoc

The four teams missing out on the NSL 2 National finished in this order:

9 – Terriers
10 – Naturals
11 – Pyromaniacs
12 – Outlaws

Pyromaniacs and Outlaws are relegated, and their places will be taken next year by the two teams that finish at the top of the “NSL 3 Nationals”, to be played alongside the Premier and NSL 2 Nationals at Farmham Park on 1-2 September.

Trophies and medals for first, second and third place teams in NSL 1 and 2 will to be presented during the NSL Nationals.