Imperial Baseball rank 8th in the Country
On the last Saturday of the term, the Imperial Falcons descended to Farnham Park for the National University Baseball Championships. The inconvenient date of the event meant many club members could not attend the tournament. Thankfully, we were able to field a full team due to Abrar Masud joining last minute, even though he was ill and had literally chundered in the morning.
The first game was played against Durham’s first team. Being the only university to field two teams, Durham looked to be the favourites. Nevertheless, the game was fought closely in the first few innings thanks to a huge line drive home run by Mark Skopec, Edo Lisi’s knuckleball pitching and an acrobatic double play by Daniel Kok. Unfortunately, when it looked like Imperial were gaining momentum, Jake Lee decided to hustle his way home on a wild pitch. Jake, a second year physicist, ran into a pitcher who was much larger than him. It doesn’t take Jake’s knowledge of momentum and collisions to tell you that it would end badly for him. Jake ended up with a concussion and was in hospital for the rest of the tournament. Fortunately, he has recovered. Unfortunately, he is still studying Physics.
Playing more than eight hours of baseball is tiring, and even more so when the team is a man down. Imperial struggled for the rest of the tournament. Highlights of the day include Joseph Koulson striking out most of UEA, Markkkk’s curveball being filthier than Edo, Jonathan Cheung finally scoring a run, Andrew Counsell getting hit by a pitch almost every game, and Bryan Chong’s attempted bunt.
Durham 2s were kind enough to lend us Brad, a spare player, for our game against them. Brad volunteered himself to pitch an inning for us. Brad talked the talk and then walked every batter he faced. He threw zero strikes and even hit a batter. The team hasn’t decided if Brad was bad, or Durham had just played 4D chess with us.
By the end of the day, everyone was exhausted. Jonathan, the back-up catcher, had never squatted for so long in his life. Asked to describe the team’s performance in one word, Abrar commented “participation”. Regardless, Imperial had just placed 8th in a national tournament*.
Shoutout and farewell to the following graduating members:
Edo Lisi, who has been a member of the club for four years. He brought great fun and chat to all the training sessions.
Justin Chu, another veteran of the club, who would always appear out of nowhere to nail a diving catch.
Daniel Zarasua, who has flown back to the States. His equipment donations were much appreciated and his passion for the game will be missed.
Joe Ronan, who has snaked us for LSE next year, will be remembered best for playing two games of baseball with a collapsed lung.
Daniel Kok, who brought versatility to the team with his switch hitting (batting average 0.000 hitting left), and brought even more laughs with his attempt to “switch field”. His attempts to relief pitch will not be missed.
Mark Skopec, who shared his national team experience with the club and made huge offensive contributions to every game he played. His largest contribution to Imperial Baseball is still the game Pepper.
We are looking for the next generation of Imperial baseball AND softball players. Please contact jc6317@ic.ac.uk if you are interested in joining Imperial’s greatest society! All levels of experience are welcome!
*only 8 teams entered the tournament
