All, The World Tournament (WT) schedule has been published. Everyone should look on the NHPA site and check when you and your family or friends are pitching. I’ll be fortunate enough to pitch the same time all the top Pitchers will be qualifying for the Championship Classes. This was the luck of the draw when my Class was going to pitch. Last year it was on the week before and I would have missed all the Top guns. I am looking forward to seeing history in the making. Every California Pitcher should set their goals to attend a WT when they are this close to home. Next year, the 2014 WT will be in Buffalo NY. The 2015 will be voted for this year during this year WT. Texas, West Virginia, and Kansas is the locations up for grabs. I’ve only pitched in Texas, and can tell you from experience …. it’s would be “a whole lot of fun” based on the way they put on their weekly events. California doesn’t have a pre-registration like Texas does. They have several sessions per day with hundreds of Pitchers rotating through from sun up till sun down. On Friday night, they have a Hospitality Doubles Tournament with all the early arrivals, and it’s a party. They have to travel really far to some of their tournaments, so they come prepared to make it a weekend of pitching and fun. I never pitched sanctioned Horseshoe anywhere else, but I have a feeling, it will be the same good experience no matter what State you pitch in. What’s cool about it is they all have their own thing on how tournaments are run, and you’re always guaranteed to have a great time. I look forward to driving across the country on a “Horseshoe pitching Tour” someday. Let’s review last week’s tournaments. There were only (2) locations this week compared to last and next weeks (5). In Burbank, it was the Joe Sledge Open with (18) Pitchers split up into (3) Class groups of (6 on 2). Jim Atwell was the Tournament Director and used his new computer that was donated to the Club by Mike Andres from the Buena Park Club. The Championship Class was pretty close when Bob Mullins was clean with two games left. Two other Pitchers had only one loss so all eyes were on Bob’s game against Hank Kane that was tied on the last two shoes. Bob just missed the peg, left & right, Hank’s first shoe hit Bob left shoe and on the last shoe of the game…. Hank nailed the ringer for the win. So now we have a 3-way tie with one game left. The Top Seed Lloyd Van Duyn vs. Dale Hughes and Bob Mullins vs. Dennis Harville and Hank was the score keeper. Lloyd had just returned from a month long vacation and was not at his normal high level of play. Dale finished regulation with his one loss in time to watch the game next to him. Bob and Dennis had a history of games played and Bob mentioned he hasn’t beat Dennis in several of the last times they pitched. I have the game score sheet right here in front of me now. Bob started the game hitting (11) ringers in the first (14) shoes and Dennis was able to cancel (6) of them. Then Dennis hit (10) of the next (12) shoes. Bob hit a six pack to bring the game to one point after 24 shoes. Then another series of innings and Dennis hit a six pack to bring the score to a one point game after 34 shoes and Dennis was ahead by one. Bob hit an open six pack to go up by (5) and in the last inning…. Dennis hit an open six pack to win (47-46) and was the named “The Spoiler” of today’s tournament. This put Dale Hughes vs. “Mr. Play-Off “Hank Kane in the final match. Dale finished with the highest average of the tournament, but Hank earned his name and made his last game count, to take home his 4th win of the season. The B Class was the Leonard Lopez (5-0) show when he went clean. His high game of 55% and averaged over 44% for the day was enough to take home his 6th victory. Leonard won the Men Championship Class in Santa Barbara the week before, and will be a sad loss to the SCHPA when we lose Leonard to Colorado in a couple of months when he plans to retire closer to his family. The rest of the B Class was very tight and they had 3 Pitchers at (3-2). Al Wilson, Dean Gorder, and David Earl finished 2-3-4. Al Wilson pitched a 65% game and was the Tournament’s Top Gun. The C Class was also very close after the dust settled. Ernie Miller (4-1) was the only Pitcher to finish over his entry average and took home his first in nearly a year. Ernie might be remembered by some after he was taken from the 2012 State Championship by ambulance and had a quadruple heart by-pass. Well he’s back pitching again. There was another 3-way tie in this Class with a (3-2) record. Eddie Montoya, Tony Lombardi, and Les Smullen finished 2-3-4. New Pitcher Grant Powell was here today in his first tournament and made (5) new friends. Grant is a very nice man and pitches with us in Sanction League on Thursday night’s here in Burbank. You can expect to see him moving up the ladder as he gets more tournaments in. Together, the tournament pitched 33.66% with more then 1,200 ringers and 4.6 tons of steel. The next tournament here will be the Frank Fernandez Open on July 6th. Our buddy Kingston Lindsey, who is the only Hawaiian in the WT, will be in town to pitch. Over at the Cardiff Riviera Club, they were scheduled to have the Arturo Torres Open but I have not heard or seen anything. If anyone knows what happened here, I would appreciate hearing about it. I have some old Horseshoe pitching stats dating back as far as 1926. In these boxes of goodies, I found the two 1963 & 70 South Gate World Tournament programs. I’ll have them at the South Gate Tournament this weekend if anyone wants to look at them. I offered some of the information to the NHPA Museum in Missouri and they are interested. My goal is to distribute the History back to a place where it would be best served. A lot of the stats were from 1930’s through 1970’s. There are newspapers of Horseshoe events and a lot of WRW Jr as he started to pitch and wow the crowds. Ted Allen, Fernando Isais, Don Titcomb, Elmer Holh, Curt Day and Jesse Gonzales Sr. are only a few of the names that were headliners back in the day. I have lots of NCHPA stats and schedule summaries along with WT results. Jim Weeks was the NATSTATS before the computers were around. Log books of stats for Southern Cal Pitchers were hand written. Very cool stuff and it’s been sitting too long. We have a lot of tournaments this week, so I hope every one gets a chance to enjoy their weekend out at the beach, or park and of course, the Horseshoe pits. It going to be another hot one here in So. Cal. be sure to take a hat, sun screen, chair, towel, water, and an umbrella if you got one. All the Fun Facts have been update with the exception of Cardiff so I’m ready to go, and I’ll …. See you at the Pits, Dale Balboa Park – San Diego – Charlie Castelo Open - $ - Money Tournament at a great place to pitch Boron – Marshall’s Open – P – They don’t have many tournaments, but you can expect a lot of competition Lake Gregory – Lake Gregory Open - $25 pre-registration deadline was June 1st - Nice outdoor spot to pitch Lake Isabella – Pitchers Memorial Open – P – Should draw in some good Pitchers…. Like you!!! South Gate – Lopez Grand kids Open – P – Great place to pitch and the Lopez Family will be here in full force.
Posted on: Thu, 06 Jun 2013 15:38:27 +0000
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