Bill Chapman, Jessie, Bill B. What do these three players have in common? They are three talented players that are all eligible to play with the Vets in the playoffs. Problem is, these along with several others have gone “AWOL (no punt intended) since the middle of the season. The result? A Vets roster that has become a revolving door in part.

Zach stands on second. (Wolan)

Today’s game would not ease any pressure on the roster: due to scheduling conflicts, playoff game 1 would not feature Kim, Nate or the Vets veteran pitcher Palma. Instead, the Vets were forced to make some calls to avoid the forfeit. Because of the “no ringer” rule being in effect due to it being the playoffs, only players that have played 3 or games with the team are eligible to play in the playoffs. Though the Vests have many such people in their roster, most have gone AWOL. As a result, the team was forced to “sneak-in” 4 players, namely Paul who has played two past games with the team, Jason K and Josh, who have played only one past game with the team, and Zach who would be making his debut with the team.

In all, the Vets would have 11 players, 9 of which would be eligible to play defensively on the field.

Playoff game 1 features the Pittsfield Vets up against the Beers. This game is a rematch of a game 10, which features an extremely close game between these two clubs.

With Rick Palma out on holiday, team skipper Joelle (JOE-L) called on A-WOL to start the game. A-WOL, who has not pitched since game 4, would be making his 3 appearances with the Vets.

The Vets defense was mixed at best. At times, the Vets were able to make quick work on the Beers. In fact, the Vets limited the Beers to 1 or fewer runs in 4 innings of play. However, at other times, the Vets exhibited sincere trouble in making routine outs. This observation was most evident in the fourth, and the Vets yielded 11 runs in that innings.

As for the pitching, A-WOL commented that he had good control of his pitches during the game. “I felt most of my pitches were hitting the mark for most of the game. Of course, a pitcher is only as good as his or her fielders. I did what I could to make batters hit in recordable outs. Unfortunately, we had trouble making them in the fourth.

“By the time the seventh inning rolled in, I was out of gas,” comment A-WOL. “I had sincere trouble in hitting the strike zone. Lucky for us, the Beers hit into some routine outs as we escaped that inning with no runs allows with runners on first and third.”

As for the Vets offense, it’s scoring capability was severely limited thanks to some strong plays by the Beers defense. This included two outfield assists to erase a runner at third. The only strong inning for the Vets offense was the fourth inning. Here, the team scored four runs, two of which were from walks drawn in the inning.

In all, the Vets just weren’t playing the A-game that they had in their 3 previous starts and thus fell to the Beers 18-6.

Andy Wolan is a reporter for MLSB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Softball or its clubs.