Amazing, fantastic, wonderful

WALNUT CREEK -- You knew it could be done. You knew the Muckrakers had it in them. You just didn't know when it would happen.

Well, it happened.

Yes, that's right -- the Muckrakers played a softball game and didn't lose.

OK, so they didn't win, either. But if rallying for eight runs -- EIGHT FREEKIN' RUNS -- in the bottom of the seventh inning to vaporize certain defeat doesn't qualify as at least a moral victory, then your Aunt Minnie's on crack.

Let's add one more meaty morsel to this steaming stew. The Muckrakers came within one old guy of actually pulling out this shootin' match -- the most aged player on the team was tossed out at home plate on a bang-bang play for the final out of the game.

And that, kiddies, is pretty much the story of the Muckrakers' one-for-the-ages 12-12 deadlock against The Franchise in the opener of the '05 fall league season at Heather Farm Park.

If The Franchise was a bit bemused that a team had just tied it seemed a smidge delirious, then it was only because it had no clue what its foes had been through. Namely, an 0-12 summer-league campaign that was every bit as ugly as the record would imply.

And the fall-league lid-lifter had all the earmarks of being just another Muckraker whack job. You know the sad litany -- opponents score fast and furious, dubious defense, Muckraker bats silent, rallies nonexistent.

The Muckies scored one lonely run in the fourth inning to at least snap the shutout, and they powered across three more in the sixth -- Chris Wagnon and Luke Abbott both had RBI doubles -- to make the score semi-respectable.

Then came the bottom of the seventh, and, oh, what a bottom of the seventh.

Dave Taxier, your humble scribe, and the above-mentioned old feller, started it off innocently enough with a bloop single. Darby -- and by the way, very nice recruiting, Matt -- followed with a hit. Then things continued to get interesting as Bob Leal, playing hurt, walked, then Mike Gale singled for an RBI, Wagnon walked and Abbott plated a run with a sacrifice fly. Matt Petersen roped an RBI single, Chase Bryson walked, and Ricardo's sac fly furnished another tally. Dave Belli added to the fun with his hit inside the first base line.

The Tax Man, batting again in the frame, drove in two with his second single of the uprising. Then The Franchise got tricky. It intentionally walked Darby to load the bases to get to Leal. Leal, taking umbrage, appeared to foil the strategy when he solidly lined a base hit. Tax chugged around third and headed plateward as best his aged legs would carry him, but perfect Franchise execution did the trick in nailing the GM at the plate.

There's your ballgame. Tie attained; win denied.

Try relaying all of this to your grandkids someday. It won't be your fault when the ungrateful little urchins don't believe you.