Each week, we will catch up with Team Captain Matt "Howitzer" Lungariello (pictured above) on his thoughts regarding the game of the week.
Last weekend on May 4, the Orators ended up idle when a trip to face the Hartford Dark Blues was cancelled due to rain. With a tough end to April for the Park City Nine, the rain week was a chance to put the first weeks of the season into perspective.
We got the chance to chat with Howitzer today and make sure all is still well on the Bridgeport scene:
KEEP IT VINTAGE: So the first rain out of the season - Is it a good thing or a bad thing to have two weeks off after the sweep at Waterbury?
HOWITZER: I think we all wanted to get back out there and put the three game sweep behind us. We were a little sloppy during the 60's games and it would have been nice to get a little more practice with the underhand game.
KIV: How are the injuries coming along?
H: It looks like only Cap is out at the moment. Everyone else would be clear to play at this point. Paul's hammy is not 100 percent, but we don't have a game this weekend anyway. I am not concerned about it at all.
KIV: Up next is two games of 1880's rules vs, Meddowe. This after the team struggled with several 1860's rules games to open up the season. Do you think the change to overhand pitching is going to be a welcomed change or cause problems?
H: I think we will be OK playing the 80's games. But, that is definitely not going to help us with the 60's. If anything, we will be more sloppy the next time we play the 60's games.
KIV: The overhand game can be offensive friendly if you don't have the pitching to stop hitters. Do you think the Orators have enough pieces to realistically be a competitive 1880's game?
H: We definitely have the pitching to do it. I think there will be a little pressure on Kurt since Cap won't be available. We have Gozer to close out the games, but the middle innings are what worries me. Now that I think about it, I don't know who is going to pitch the second game. I should look into that.
KIV: It's a month since Opening Day soon enough. There's been some up's and downs and even injuries. You said before you expected the team to win some this year. Has your thought process changed? Are you worried about the rest of the season or making any changes based on injuries?
H: My thought process is still the same. Like I said, I wish we played last weekend so that everyone could put last week's performance behind them but we still have a lot of talent. Once the season starts, it's nice to play a bunch of weeks in a row to gain a comfort level. But we cant make excuses, we are professionals (or at least we pretend we are) and we need to rise above it.
A few other things. Did you notice that Mike the ump is still on the e-mail list? You think he put Vintage's email addy into his spam folder? City is on there too. That must be annoying. And you didn't hear it from me, but don't be surprised to see a "Joe Louis like return"* from Khalid at some point this year.
* - Taking big bucks to make a comeback even though he is obviously past his prime.
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