The Tribune

By BRENT STUBBS

Senior Sports Reporter

bstubbs@tribunemedia.net

NORMALLY when a couple of former champions clash on the field, you would expect some fireworks between them. But Saturday night, the much anticipated rematch with the Arnette’s Sporting Lounge Hitmen and the BTC Warriors ended with a different twist.

Leading 3-0 going into the top of the fifth inning of the New Providence Softball Association men’s feature contest, Hitmen manager Darren Stevens got into a heated argument with plate umpire Austin Butler over his calling of balls and strikes.

After ejecting Stevens for his “derogatory remarks” to him, Butler felt he took too long to leave the playing field and he called the game, awarding the victory to the Warriors.

A shaving match ensued as players from Arnette’s Sporting Lounge rushed to the defence of Stevens. Butler had to be restrained from defending himself against the team and ushered off the field.

It was the second incident that occurred on the night that was dubbed a “Father’s Day Special” as league president Godfrey ‘Gully’ Burnside got into a verbal confrontation with Proper Care Pool Young Stars’ manager Stephen ‘Bishop’ Beneby over the use of a player in their opening ladies’ game against the Electro Telecom Lady Hitters.

The Lady Hitters, however, had a double dose of celebrations as they helped manager Carl ‘Bang Bang’ Johnson enjoy his 46th birthday with their first victory of the season with a 9-2 stoppage of the Young Stars.

The night did some added flair as the league honoured three of their former managers in Jack Knowles and Robert Gilbert, giving them their “flowers while they are still alive.”

Hitmen 3, Warriors 0

The three runs produced in the top of the second inning, sparked by Keiron Munroe’s run-producing single, went down the drain as Stevens didn’t leave in sufficient time after he got ejected.

Arnette’s Sporting Lounge didn’t take the decision too well as BTC avenged their 7-5 defeat in their first match-up earlier in the season as they tried to take their frustration out on Butler. The win improved the Warriors second place record to 4-1 and the Hitmen fell to third at 3-3 with the Sting Truckers out front at 6-0 after they stopped the Mighty Mitts 12-4 on Friday night.

At that point, Alcott Forbes was working on a two-hit, eight strike out performance on the mound for the Hitmen, while Cardinal Gilbert was not too bad himself, giving up three hits with five strike outs.

But it was Gilbert’s third consecutive hit by a pitch on Arnette’s Sporting Lounge designated player Adrian Pinder that sparked the controversy between Stevens and Butler. After striking out Devaughn Wong for the second out in the fifth, Gilbert beamed Pinder to place him on first base again.

Stevens asked Butler to warn Gilbert about his pitches and the two got into an argument after Martin Burrows got a ball on his count at the plate. The argument continued and after Butler ejected Stevens, he called the game because the “manager” took too long to leave the field.

“From the season started, the officiating has been in question for me,” Stevens said. “Personally, I think these young officials need more training and they need to allow the senior officials to call the big games. That’s the problem. Are they afraid? My player got hit three times and I only asked if he could warn the pitcher, but he don’t want anybody to talk to him. Then he ejects me. I had two minutes to leave the field. thirty seconds he called the game. That’s incompetence on the officials.”

In all fairness to Butler, who was unavailable for comments, he did instruct Stevens to leave the field. But he didn’t make any attempt as he continued to argue his point.

Lady Hitters 9,

Young Stars 2

After watching Proper Care Pool pick up their first win of the season on Friday night, the Electro Telecom got jealous and decided they were not going to be the only winless team left in the ladies’ division.

They picked Johnson’s birthday on the eve of Father’s Day to celebrate as winning pitcher Thela Johnson had a 2-for-2 night with a run-scoring double in a two-run bottom of the first and a two-run in-the-park home run in the fourth to clinch their first victory in five games.

“It’s a good way to start the winning streak. Now I can really enjoy my birthday,” said manager Johnson. “We’re going to win all of our games from here. We added a few new players and so they were not all in sync yet, but I think this is definitely what we needed, something to celebrate as we start to gel now.”

While Thela Johnson also had a pair of walks to help her cause, Shequell Bain got on base on four unearned passes and came home three times. Giavanna Petterson also had a pair of walks and scored twice.

Thela Johnson finished with a one-hit, six strike out performance for the win. Erin Johnson started and was tagged with the loss before Rochea Morley relieved her in the second inning for Proper Care Pool, who have a completely new look on the field with just about all of their veterans gone.

After the loss, manager Beneby was adamant that his Young Stars will have to go through their growing pains, but they don’t need any help from anybody else to get over the hump.

“Right now the league seems as though they don’t want us to play in the league,” Beneby said.

“I think first and foremost, what needs to be corrected is the president is the president and the commissioner. That’s a problem.

“If that’s going to be the situation, then we need to form a Coaches Association and deal with that situation. This isn’t the first time that I had an incident with the president. The young lady in question, already played in three games. Now all of a sudden, you tell me she is not on the roster. I have a problem with that. We had the same problem last night when she played.”

Beneby was referring to their celebrated 15-7 win over the College of the Bahamas Lady Caribs on Friday night as they picked up their first victory as the league finally got in its first set of games for the week, due to the rain. The player, Brittany Ferguson, was in the starting line-up.

To ensure that the issue doesn’t continue to prevail, Beneby said he’s going to write to the league for a copy of the his roster that they have on file for him because he really don’t want to discourage the young players.

“I have more young players on this team than in the league,” he said.

“In order for the league to survive, you need young players. You can’t discourage them. If allowed to play, we can go a long way. Every time we go to play, there is always something to do with the league administrators, not the officials.

“The president came to my dug out and told me that I need to stop being an idiot. He need to be more mature because I’m a grown man. That’s why I told him he’s an idiot back. The president can’t be president and commissioner. That is too much authority.”

Young Stars 15,

Lady Caribs 7

Proper Care Pool produced a seven-run outburst in the third, sparked by Deandra Hart’s two-run single and Chandra Mackey’s two-run triple to break the game open on Friday night.

Hart ended up going 1-for-5 with two RBI and two runs, Mackey was a perfect 2-for-2 with two RBI and two runs; Alex Gilbert was 2-for-3 with two runs and Kadilia Turner was 1-for-3 with two runs.

For COB, Richara Bain was 2-for-3 with two RBI and Helena Curry was 1-for-2 with a RBI and a run scored.

Truckers 12,

Mighty Mitts 4

Sponsored this time by Sting, nothing has changed on the field for the Truckers as they continue to stream roll past their opponents in their return to the league after a brief hiatus.

Manager Perry Seymour has his Truckers clicking on all cylinders as the Mighty Mitts were their latest victims, thanks to Jamaal ‘Sarge’ Johnson’s three-rum homer and Orlando White’s solo shot both in a four-run first inning. They added six more in the third and two in the fourth.

Anthon ‘Bookie’ Gibson got the win on a four-hit, seven strike out feat. Victor Grant was suffered the loss on seven hits with two strike outs. Michael Ingraham had a two-out solo homer in the fifth.