Unicorns' Inaugural Year Ends with Low Runs but High Spirits

            “We didn’t expect this season to be easy, but we sure didn’t expect this record,” Skipper Greg Weaver commented after the Unicorns fell in their last two games to end the season 0-14.  “Then again, it’s not a surprising outcome, us being VBC and all.  That’s just how we roll.”

            It was baffling to the Unicorns that the game went as poorly as it did, though.  Essentially, the Carroll Truckers were just hitting it exactly where the Unicorns weren’t—there weren’t an usual number of errors made.  Yet, somehow, the Unicorns lost the first game 28-2, and lost the second game (y=|X|+28)-1, where Y is a number greater than the Truckers’ run total in the first game and X is an unknown variable approaching infinite. 

The dreaded base-on-balls wasn’t even a harsh factor in the games.  B-Weave posted only five walks in the first game.  That number was his second best all season.  But, he gave up 28 hits.  While that total is cringe-inducing, the second game was even worse—so much so, in fact, that the run total gave the skipper temporary memory loss while he was in the field, resulting in a lack of any records of MagiCarp’s pitching. 

To put the strangeness in perspective, the Truckers, the team that placed third, outhit the second-place team at a ratio of 2.5 to 1.  The numbers were closer to the first-place team: 19 for the first game and 27 for the second versus 28 and z=|X|, where z has an error margin of approximately 5.  The first-place team in the division was the one that was made up of Krakens.  In short, the games were simply unbelievable.  Interviewing the Unicorns led to the following possible explanations:

“The Yetis that VBC used as their first mascots made the evening cold, thus explaining how all of the balls hit into the outfield fell short of the positioned players.” – The Skipper

“Venus was in retrograde.  [Also,] Unicorns are incapable of being ‘walked.’  They are seduced by neon orbs.” – Leslie Paxton

“… and Larry [Strait]’s birthday magic died the week before and took all of the Unicorn magic with it.” – Also the Skipper

“From my perspective, having not been at a single game this season, I give this moderately testable hypothesis. I now turn to the infamous Chewbacca defense. Chewbacca is from Kyshyyyk, but he lives on Endor. That does not make sense. Now, why would an 8 foot tall wookie want to live on a planet with 2 foot tall Ewoks. That does not make sense. Now, you may be asking yourself, what does this have to do with these stats. nothing, it has nothing to do with these stats, but it does offer an example of something else that does not make sense. Now, on to the hypothesis. These "truckers" may have had some help in the field; not by performance enhancing drugs, but by Angels, yes Angels, strategically placed in the outfield. I interviewed Danny Glover who stated that he has seen these angels hanging out on baseball and softball fields and they strangely look like Christopher Lloyd. According to Mr. Glover, the angels cannot help in the final game, so while they had helped this team gain an extraordinary batting average. They were unable to capitalize in the final game. Now, look at the pretty monkey.” – Former Unicorn Matt Portner (he probably didn’t understand what had happened and/or was drugged when he responded to interviewers)

Everyone might be delusional about how much skill factored into their problems, but that’s how the cookie crumbles.

            Aside from being batted around in their final games, the Unicorns also suffered an injury.  No one could report the instance of the injury better than the injured.  Catcher D-Dom recalled the situation at a press conference:

           

“[Trying] to follow the ball getting tossed around the field, [I] noticed a very eager player from the opposing team racing from 3rd base to home plate. The pitcher, honing in on [that player’s] trickeries, quickly throws the ball in my direction.  Astonished by the fact that I actually managed to catch the ball, I quickly snapped out of my utopia and moved swiftly to tag out Mr. Evil.

It all happened in a matter of seconds.  There was a brief moment in which I've convinced myself I blacked out, but could still feel the crack that severed my bone in two.  I remember looking at him and thinking, ‘Sweet Jesus, he's coming at me at a pace quicker than expected...’ [right before] his larger-than-normal shoulder came rushing into my glove and sent me into physical suffering.”

D-Dom, in making her first play at the plate, effectively broke her finger.  After two rounds of x-ray tests, the need for surgery was ruled out so as long as she kept up with her new cast and regularly-scheduled x-ray appointments.  “My x-ray parties have been going great,” she recently confirmed.  “The doctor is very pleased about the progress of my traumatic experience.”  It will be six weeks until she is able to meet fully the “challenges” of “[opening] cans, brushing [her] teeth, [and] climbing mountains… But the most loathsome of all are the limitations this has put on my texting abilities."

           While D-Dom was put on the 60-day DL, Mary Hasan, catcher for the Unicorns in the spring, filled in her spot from the DH position that evening.  Thankfully, she could still walk the next day after having not done that for months.

  

The Unicorns’ fall season was much like D-Dom’s injury: there were some plays made at some difficult teams, but as they were turning around to beat them, they just wound up broken.  But, all is not lost. 

A number of Unicorns have expressed interest in fall and winter training to get ready for the spring.  Even in her battered state, D-Dom remains optimistic: “All the same, I look forward to another great Apocalypse with the Unicorns and can’t wait for next season.”

            Stayed tuned for the seasonal wrap-up next post.