The 4th annual Burby World Cup took over Oakridge. TBLers from many nations and representing their family bloodlines in some cases took the field on a chilly Saturday morning. The 3 time defending champion UK squad would see challengers from Canada, Mediterranean, Far East and the Eastern Block all coming for the crown and you could certainly argue this tourney may have been the most talent rich to date.
In the days first matchup we saw a battle for the automatic bid to the finals between EB and Canada. Eastern Block rode the arm of Joel Heard to victory as they narrowly edged a gritty Canada squad 1-0. The next matchup on the bracket was a fascinating battle between the Sufi heavy Far East squad take on the All-Italian’s of the Mediterranean. Behind solid pitching from Naazim Sufi and some timely hitting, the Far East movement was dancing into a semi-final matchup with the UK.
With the Eastern Blockers on standby, FE and UK engaged in an epic pitching duel between Naz Sufi and Joe “The Historian” Callaghan in a game that felt like it wrapped up in 15 minutes. The UK certainly had chances to push runs across but struggled for the key hit. Robert Irvine was the offensive bright spot as he drove in the lone run of the game to back Callaghans 5 shutout innings and the defending champs were headed back to the final.
Eastern Block manager Adrian Golombek was sitting pretty as his team stunned the UK with the first run as Joe needed to get a beer in his system to loosen his arm up. In the bottom half, Heard took the mound and between the 5 innings from game 1 and the break between his arm simply couldn’t answer the bell on this chilly March day.
Rob Skasko took over and his sidearming style kept the UK off the board early. The EB would add another run as a lineout turned into a triple on a misplay by Irvine and the 4peat was starting to unravel.
The UK began mounting a comeback and taking it to Skasko. Callaghan hit a bomb to tie the game, Scotland tripled one in and the score went from 2-0 EB to 5-2 UK pretty quickly. Joe settled in and worked 4 innings of 2 run ball. Nick Wadden would snap his slump on the day with a no doubter to CF to extend the lead. Kevin Leach put the finishing touches on it with a moonshot across the street and Scotland cleaned up the 5th inning. Despite a tough game from both opponents, the United Kingdom reigns supreme and completes the 4peat. Will somebody be able to form the right team to dethrone the UK? See you in 2019......
Rob Scotland
