A TWO TEAM TUSSLE

Boasters League round 8~~

Although not mathematically impossible, it is somewhat unlikely that a team other than “Butter Nutz” or “Winky-Dinks” will be vying for top spot for the first half. With one round to play, everyone has 2 weeks to get any and all matches completed before the December 6 deadline, but with over 40 points separating the above mentioned teams from the remaining, making up that difference would be pretty challenging to say the least.

“Butter Nutz” also have the nervous ‘sit-on-the-sidelines’ for round 9. They lead “Winky-Dinks” by 13 points, but that could be made up easily enough with bonus points. “Butter Nutz” will need to make up plenty of matches over the next 14 days to give themselves a decent chance.

Making a late “charge” are “The Kampai Warriors”. They have been the cellar-dwellers since round 3, but have been steadily forcing their way up. Now in 8^th place, (and in turn giving “Vivio’s” the dubious honor of being the current holders of the wooden spoon), they are only 11 points off 5^th placed “Mongoose” – a goal easily attainable. In fact, “The Kampai Warriors” have to play against “Mongoose” in the final round – the perfect opportunity to gain ground.

Individual mentionables for round 8: Brien Baker (“Busting Rails”) handed Jeff Gembis (“Vivio’s”) his first loss of the season with a 2-1 win. Brien’s praying-mantis reach frustrated Jeff as he couldn’t figure a way to get the ball past him. As usual, Brien said it was all luck and the result could have easily been reversed. Dave Morrison (“The Kampai Warriors”) beat Tom Healy (“Winky-Dinks”) 2-1 in a close contest – as disappointed as Tom was, it was a better result against Dave as he lost 3-0 last time!

Tom MacEachern (“Paddy’s Dropshots”) improved his record to 5 and 1 with a 2-1 victory over Dave Devine (“Butter Nutz”); Jordan Ellis (“Winky-Dinks”) was helped with a strong start to the match as he held off Marc Lakin (“The Kampai Warriors”) for a 2-1 triumph; and Al Iafrate (“Busting Rails”) appeared to have too much juice for the tiring Rich Stimson (“Vivio’s”) as he took a 2-1 win.

Don’t forget that at the end of the first half of the season, I will be looking at everyone’s win / loss record. Based on those results, I will be shuffling the teams around in an attempt to make the second half even more competitive. Most of you will stay on your current team, some of you will have to be traded. It’s all in the name of fairness!