Thursday night brought an end to the regular season action in the 2019 Adult Summer Softball League at Posse Grounds Park. The seven teams in the league now look forward to the double-elimination postseason, which will begin on Thursday, Aug. 1 and conclude two weeks later on Aug. 15.
Rokzoo already had the No. 1 seed locked up entering the night, so was playing for nothing more than finishing off an undefeated season. They did just that, beating Slapnut Magoos 13-7 in the first game and wrapped up the perfect season with a 15-4 win over Red Rocks Rotary.
“This group of guys has all played together for a while,” Rokzoo’s Stephen Sarysz said. “We knew that we had a good roster coming into it. But the bottom line is we’re out here to have fun.”
Given the undefeated record and the fact that they have a first round bye, Rokzoo is the clear favorite to take home the championship. Right behind them is Pago’s, who lost both of their games to Rokzoo by a single run.
On Thursday, Pago’s wrapped up the season strong with a 16-5 win over the Dirty Rats in the first game and a 5-4 nail biter over A Day in the West in the second. With the double header sweep, Pago’s finished the season with an 8-3-1 mark and heads to the postseason as the No. 2 seed.
Pagos’ will take on Red Rocks Rotary in their first game on Thursday. The winner of that will face the Red Mountaineers and Slapnut Magoos winner. Red Mountaineers and Red Rocks Rotary both finished the season at 2-10.
Despite the loss to Rokzoo, Slapnut Magoos finished the season strong. They recovered from that defeat with a 13-2 win over the Red Mountaineers. With the doubleheader split, Slapnut Magoos finished the season off at 7-4-1 and head into the postseason as the No. 3 seed.
The No. 4 vs. No. 5 game will match up A Day in the West and Dirty Rats, who both finished the season at 5-7. The loss to Pago’s was the only game for the Dirty Rats on Thursday. A Day in the West, meanwhile, beat Red Mountaineers 15-1 before losing the finale to Pago’s.
“This is a nice tuneup for next week, for the tournament,” Day in the West captain Pedro Ortega said. “We’re getting everyone back now. Vacation time is almost over. With everyone coming back, we have a full team. And we feel pretty good about that.”
The winner of the Dirty Rats vs. A Day in the West tilt will take on a waiting Rokzoo team in the second round.
A single postseason loss will not eliminate anyone from championship contention. After losing, a team will go into the loser’s bracket. The team that prevails from that bracket will then take on the undefeated winner’s bracket champion in the final on Aug. 15.
If the winner’s bracket champion wins that game, it will be the champion. If the loser’s bracket champion prevails, the two will immediately square off in a winner-take-all rematch.
