Dawgs Softball in Israel | ñåôèáåì éùøàì - äãåâæ

Some Dawgs are taking part in the ISA umpiring clinic. When a team has umpires in its roster, it helps to improve the quality of play of the team, and helps to reduce unnecessary arguing with the umpire on the field during the game. A team's umpire never umps his own team , of course. In the ISA, umpiring is a paid position (if you call what they get real money, that is . . . ) In the photo, we have, from left, Dan Aronovic (Penticon), Jeremy Shai (Dawgs), Yaniv Gohary (Dawgs) , Olga Rushotov (standing), Bob Kessler (Instructor), Danny Epstein (Dawgs), Shyella Mayk (Tel Aviv), Wendy Halley, Donna Trimble, and Eitan Milgram (Shomrat)

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äàéîåï äøáéòé, á- 02.03.03 äúçìðå òí îâøù øé÷ òåã ôòí, åæä ðùàø ëëä. îæâ àååéø äéä ðôìà. òùéðå äôòí àéîåï äâðä òí àéîåï çáèåú. øàéðå äâùä ùì ùîåàì, éçæ÷àì äçãù, åâ'øîé. àôùø ìøàåú àú äñèøèâú ääâðä á - äðãàåèñ. ðåëçéí: åúé÷éí: ìåàì áì÷îï (ñåó ñåó) ,ùîåàì âåìãùèééï,éäåðúï ãéí,ãðé àôùèééï,â'øîé ùé,éðéá â'åäøé åçãùéí: àìé ôâï,çéìé÷ áñø,ñèéá ÷øåððâåìã, éåñé âìé÷îï, àåøï òðáø, ðúï îðãì, éçæ÷àì âðõ, â'éé÷ îéìø, àéîåï çîéùé áëôø äáôèéñèéí. 05.03.03, éåí øáéòé ëìåá çáèåú áùòä 7:45 òã 8:45, àéîåï ÷áåöä î ùòä 8:00 òã ùòä 10:00

________________________________ Our fourth Dawg training on March 2 started with an empty field, but this time we don't know why. The weather was wonderful, and we had a great turnout: 14 players. We started out with calisthenics, then Jon Dym's famous relay race, in which groups of three or four players relay the ball to each other for several rounds. The group that comes in last must run around the distant lamp post, at top speed. That is, heart-attack speed, guys. This reporter swears that he came in last only once, but the other guys claimed his group came in last twice. Hmmmmm . . . there must be a conspiracy. We had a few new guys here, many of them found out about the team from this wonderful website. Yecheskel, a new immigrant from Argentina, showed his prowess both behind the plate and at the mound, and Natan Mandel showed us how a real 2nd baseman is supposed to play. We did defensive drills once again, but this time the pitching was a bit more aggressive. Shmuel is pleased at his accurate chang-ups, and later Jeremy gave us all some real heat. For defensive positioning and plays (see "Defensive Positioning" in "Handouts"). Attendance report:

Veterans: Shmuel Goldstein, Jon Dym, Jeremy Shai, Danny Epstein, Yaniv Gohary, Lowell Blackman (finally!) Newcomers: Eli Fagan, Steve Kronengold, Yossi Glickman, Hilik Besser, Oren Inbar, Yechezkel Gantz, Natan Mandel, Jake Miller

Next practice (#5): Wednesday, March 5, at Baptist Village in Petach Tikva. Batting cage open from 7:45 to 8:45, team practice from 8 PM to 10 PM. Last practice before our first game. -----------------------------------------------------

For a guy who wasn't even there, we'd like to say "Great Reporting, Lowell" ____________________________________________________________________________ Rishon LeZion, Israel February 19, 2003 In a fit of modified madness, tempered by a passion for the game, Shmuel Goldstein, a resident of the Jewish settlement of Revava, a Torah scholar, an expert in technical writing and documentation, and a star pitcher for his softball team, the DGTech Dawgs, held a late night practice at the Rishon LeZion sports field, which, by all accounts, had essentially become Lake Rishon LeZion. "Well, it was a little hard sloshing around in the water. Catching the ball was somewhat challenging, too. My pitching was a bit off, and I couldn't throw so many pitches. Not having a catcher to catch my throws, I had to retrieve all the balls myself. That sort of slowed down my rhythm and interrupted my concentration. But I needed the other eleven Ducks, I mean Dawgs, to work on other drills and skills." Goldstein, a burly ballplayer with a physique not unlike other hard throwing hurlers in history - Fernando Valenzuela, Goose Gossage, Babe Ruth, Israel's own Tito from Argentina, and Ami Baran - originally hails from Los Angeles. "While working at ECI, a colleague, playing in the league at the time, got me interested in softball. Pretty soon, I got my own team together. Five years and four kids later, here I am, on the mound where I belong. "Pitching came quite naturally to me. And I work at it, throwing balls over and over at a net propped up against the wall of my house. Once, some guys from the Mitchell Commission came by, asking about it. They then told me it violated the Oslo agreements because it constituted setting up an illegal structure in the occupied territories. Those guys don't know softball and they certainly don't know me," Goldstein said, stern-faced and determined.

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äàéîåï äùìéùé, á- 19.02.03 äúçéì òí äøáä øåç, àáì ìà îàéúðå, îäîæâ àååéø. àçøé ëîä ã÷åú ùì àåìé ëï àåìé ìà, äâùí äôñé÷, åäãåâæ òìä ìîâøù. èåá - äúçìðå òí îâøù øé÷ òåã ôòí, åæä ðùàø ëëä. ø÷ àðçðå. â'åï òùä ìðå àéîåï ÷áåöúé ëùäúàîðå òì îé÷åí ùì ëì àçã áî÷øéí îñéåîéí. àôùø ìøàåú àú äñèøèâéä á - äðãàåèñ. ðåëçéí: åúé÷éí: àìáøè ñø÷åáéõ , øåáøè àáï ,ùîåàì âåìãùèééï,éäåðúï ãéí,ãðé àôùèééï,â'øîé ùé,éðéá â'åäøé åçãùéí: àìé ôâï,çéìé÷ áñø,éäåãä ÷øåððâåìã,øåòé ëäï, éåñé âìé÷îï àéîåï øáéòé áøùì"ö. äñôåøè-ëéó ìéã äçé -ëó ùì øàùåï. 2003 ðãçä ìéåí øàùåï, 8 áòøá, 02 áîøõ

----------------------------------------------------- Our third Dawg training on Feb 19 started with an empty field, and small wonder. The forecast called for stormy, rainy, and cold conditions. But the Dawgs don't know enough to come in out of the rain, and besides, it didn't rain that much. And also besides, how cold can it get in Rishon? After a scare of about 10 minutes of rain, our prayers were answered, and the rain stopped. But the wind continued, and this reporter at least remembers several of Jeremy's fly balls that started to go to right field, and ended up in the next field over. Under the capable tutelage of Jon Dym, the Dawgs started working on team defensive positioning and plays (see "Defensive Positioning" in "Handouts"). In fact, this was just about the whole evening, after a brief throw-relay race in which this reporter never lost. Attendance report:

Veterans: Shmuel Goldstein, Jon Dym, Jeremy Shai, Danny Epstein, Yaniv Gohary, Albert Sarkovitz, Robert Even Newcomers: Eli Fagan, Yehudah Kronengold, Roi Cohen, Yossi Glickman, Hilik Besser

Next practice (#4): Sunday, March 2, At the Sport-Kef in Rishon LeTzion, 8 PM (the practice on the 26th was postponed because of the weather). Note that practice #5 will be at Baptist Village. -----------------------------------------------------

2003 started out with good practices, but without a sponsor. In the photo above, ltr: Steve Kronengold, Eli Fagan, Danny Epstein, Natan Mandel, Oren Inbar, Jake Miller, Yaniv Gohary w/bat, Yossi Glickman, Jon Dym, Jeremy Shai (squatting), Yechezkel Gantz, Hilik Besser, Lowell Blackman. With Jon Dym on board as an energetic coach and with managerial experience and "ichpatiut"(*), we were able to schedule several practices before the start of the season. In addition, like a matriarch Elephant (what's with the animal comparisons here?), Jon brought the knowledge of exactly where to practice: Sport-Kef in Rishon Le-Tzion. You see, this field is conveniently located next to Highway 4, is lighted, and costs NOTHING. So, there we went. Actually, we started the weekly practices in the summer of 2002, and these sessions were helpful. As for the Spring of 2003, the start was very cold, as the winter of 2002-2003 in Israel was a cold, wet one. In addition, several players found out about the team from the website, which is a first for us. The downside of 2003, at least as of this writing, is that we did not have a sponsor. However, because of the fortunate lobbying on the part of Otzma (see Otzma in Links), we were able to squeek by the year without schnorring more money from the guys. If you, Gentle Reader, wish to sponsor this team, imagine your name up in lights: "Gentle Reader DAWGS" Sound good? Well, email either Shmuel (shmuel_goldstein@hotmail.com) or Jon (jdym@012.net.il) The spring season ended up with fewer wins than we expected. We won all of 2 games, and one of them was by forfeit. Hmmmmmm. But, the games we *did* play featured tighter defense, if you can believe that. Well, believe it. The difference here was that the bats went silent for some reason, and also, simply, the whole league has gotten better. Yechezkel Gantz was certainly the rookie of the year, contributing behind the plate, on the mound, then later at SS, and his bat turned out to be the best on the team, which admittedly, isn't saying much. Shmuel's pitching goals were to keep his ERA in single digits, walk less than one batter per inning, more strikes than balls, and more SO's than BB's. He acheived all these goals except the last. ERA was just under 9, Free Ride per inning (BB+HP) was 0.93 (note that the avg batter/inning he saw was 6.5), 1.37 S/B ratio, but Free Ride % (BB+HP) was 14.20 whereas SO% was 2.60. The fall season saw the addition of Eli Krantman at short, who didn't disappoint us there, no sir. His bat is another story. We're gonna have to work on that one. We also saw Michael Moronov, who played a couple of games with us, and is another Rechovot Youth Softball player. He looks good, but he's young. Albert also, just keeps getting stronger and stronger. He can throw out someone stealing second without a second thought. Imagine a Polar Bear with a Russian accent. Da, nazdarovya, growlsky. We lost Jeremy to the IDF - keep us safe, Jeremy, and keep yourself safe, too. Yaniv will be going in during the winter of 2004, so we're going to lose him then, too. Russell did not show up in the fall, and neither did Yehudah Kronengold, but that doesn't necessarily mean they have left the team. And oh, we saw that former Dawg Eitan Pomeranz joined Tri-United, and we are glad to report that we struck him out in his first at-bat against us. As for our play, we nominally improved from the spring, and could have, and should have, had a win/loss percentage of 0.400 for the fall (instead it was 0.200). We had a game against Shomrat, in which, going in to the 6th inning, we were leading 14 to 11. But our intrepid starting pitcher got a major case of butterflies and lost his control. We put in Yechezkel, who had even worse control. The game unravelled, and Shomrat scored 8 runs in the top of the 7th. We only managed to score 4 more in return, losing the game, 18 to 19. This means that we've got to work on Yechezkel's pitching, and Shmuel still has some mental work to do, as well. Yossi Glickman is a promising guy, and very fast on his feet, although he's kinda weird. Well, you're weird, too, aren't you? So what are you complaining about? (*) Hebrew slang for "a guy who actually gives a damn" List of players (Spring): Blackman, Lowell Dym, Jon Epstein, Danny Even, Robert Gantz, Yechezkel Glickman, Yossi Gohary, Yaniv Goldstein, Shmuel Kronengold, Yehudah Mandel, Natan Rothstein, Russel Sarkovitz, Albert Shai, Jeremy Sommer, David List of players (Fall): Blackman, Lowell Dym, Jon Epstein, Danny Even, Robert Gantz, Yechezkel Glickman, Yossi Gohary, Yaniv Goldstein, Shmuel Krantman, Eli Mandel, Natan Moronov, Michael Sarkovitz, Albert Sommer, David In photo below: Top, ltr: Lowell Blackman, David Sommer, Yechezkel Gantz, Danny Epstein, Jon Dym, Yossi Glickman Bottom, ltr: Shmuel Goldstein, Robert Even, Albert Sarkovitz, Eli Krantman, with Yaniv Gohary in front