Tuesday night's alright for fighting...

The Moth Balls, my rec league team, have now cycled through to the beginning of their schedule and replayed the Incredi-balls, a team we played in our very first week. The first time round was not a pleasant experience.

They were, for lack of a better term, a bag of dicks.

They were unfamiliar with rules (in particular, they were convinced a ball was still live after hitting the ground) and ignored when the ball had hit them directly. They'd also complained about me throwing the ball too hard.


Jellybean, Lefty and I were not looking forward to playing them again and even discussed printing off the rules to help us in any arguments that may arise.


I knew we were in trouble when early in the game one of their guys made a point of crossing the floor to shake the hand of our teammate Rob. I know this may sound weird, but I never trust a guy who shakes hands too much. You shake hands when you meet someone, when you congratulate them, and that's it. Anything else is insincere.

Although the Incredi-balls had certainly learned some of the rules, they still were pretty bad. They thought the ball was dead if blocked by another ball. They purposely took headers into thrown balls to try and get our players out. One of their guys regularly tried to act injured. When the ball hit them, even squarely, they'd act like they didn't get hit. Some players would have to be hit three or four times for it to "take".

In particular, they were angry with how hard I was throwing. Now, as I've said earlier, I only throw sidearm in this league and make sure I throw very low. So although I might throw harder then most players, at least it's always below the waist. In fact, the only person I hit in the head was a guy who purposely dipped his head into the ball.

So in the last round of the game, I hit a girl with the ball. Absolutely clear. A solid hit in the small of her back. She refused to get off the floor, because I was being "unsportsmanlike".

Then things got out of hand.

I was content to keep playing (I could've hit her three of four more times, for all I cared) but that was the last straw for my team and, apparently, for the Incredi-balls. Both benches cleared so that people could stand chest to chest and argue. One of the Incredi-balls called my team captain a "fat bitch". Both teams got zero spirit points.

What makes this so upsetting is that they were pretty proud of how they behaved. They won the game, so they think they have some kind of moral high ground. They don't realize that they'd get smoked in a competitive league, even an intermediate league, and that the only reason why they beat us was their blatant cheating. It was a frustrating game, but we likely won't have to play these guys again.