(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photos by Henk Seppen)
 Starting Pitchers coming series
Nederlands
 AMSTERDAM (Neth.) -
On Thursday-evening (May 30), the next 3-game series opens in the Dutch big league, followed by games coming Saturday and Sunday.
This will be the second to last series of games in the first half of the regular season, which is scheduled to end on Sunday, June 9.
Four days later, on Thursday, June 13, the second half will open.
In this second half, the league will be split into two Pools.
The four best teams will continue in the Top-4 Pool, the others in the Bottom-5 Pool.
The teams that will finish in first and second place in the Top-4 Pool will advance directly to the best-of-three Play-Offs.
The teams that will finish in third and fourth will have to play a best-of-three Wild Card Series against the two best teams of the Bottom-5 Pool for a spot in the Play-Offs.
The winners of the Play-Offs will then advance to the Holland Series.
But that is for later this year in September and October.
It will be busy period in the upcoming days for the big league-teams, due to several make-up games.
...Olav Steijger...
...750 big league-games...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
Last Saturday, three games rained out.
The fourth game, between DSS/Kinheim and Quick Amersfoort, went underway, but had to be halted due to rain and field-conditions in the bottom of the first inning.
The game was completed on Monday-evening.
Before Saturday's game, veteran umpire Olav Steijger was honored for officiating his 750th regular season-game.
The other three games were re-scheduled for Monday or Tuesday.
UVV vs. Curaçao Neptunus was moved to Monday-evening.
The meetings between RCH-Pinguïns and HCAW and between Amsterdam Pirates and Oosterhout Twins were re-scheduled for Tuesday.
On Sunday, the game between Quick Amersfoort and DSS/Kinheim rained out.
This game was also re-scheduled for Tuesday in order to keep all games of this series together.
With that, Tuesday's scheduled make-up game between UVV and Quick Amersfoort (which rained out again on Tuesday last week) was moved to coming Tuesday (June 4).
However, more rain disturbed the make-up schedule.
UVV vs. Neptunus rained out again on Monday-evening and is now scheduled for coming Monday (June 3).
On Tuesday-evening, Quick vs. DSS/Kinheim was cancelled and was also re-scheduled for coming Monday.
In Amsterdam, after work was done to the field, it was hoped to begin the game between Pirates and Twins at 8:30 PM.
However, shortly before 8 PM, the game was cancelled, as it had started to rain harder again.
This game is now re-scheduled for Tuesday, June 4.
As the home-field of RCH-Pinguïns had become unplayable due to rain on Monday, it was decided to move Tuesday's make-up game between RCH-Pinguïns and HCAW from Heemstede to the home-site of the latter in Bussum.
However, maintenance also had to be done to HCAW's site due to rain.
The game started some 30 minutes later than scheduled, but lasted only five minutes.
It was then halted due to rain and an unplayable field.
However, this now means that this game has a 'suspended status' and has to resume with one out, a runner on first base and an 1-0 count on the batter in the top of the first inning.
The remainder will be played on Tuesday, June 4.
...Delano Selassa...
...back with HCAW...
(© Photo: Henk Seppen) |
By the way, playing at first base for HCAW in this make-up game was Delano Selassa, who has returned earlier than expected from his professional adventure.
On April 26, Selassa left to play for Capitales de Québec in Canada in the Frontier League, which is an Independent League with teams from both Canada and the USA.
However, on May 23, Selassa was one of two infielders, who were released by Québec.
Selassa had played in only five games for the Canadian team and batted .176 (3-for-17), scored twice, batted in two runs and struckout five times.
Unfortunately, weather predictions are not that favorable again for coming Thursday-evening with a 70 percent chance of rain.
Predictions have been improved somewhat better for the weekend, but there are not much make-up dates left over.
Due to the rainouts and re-scheduling, UVV will have to play five games in six days, beginning on Thursday, including four in a row from Saturday.
Adding to that its next series, the team has eight games scheduled in an 11-day period.
Oh, and all games need to be played, even when the ranking has been decided, as teams will begin the second half with the half of the total of points they earned in the first half (a team gets two points for a win, one for a tie, none for a loss).
In the previous series, there were two decisions.
Quick Amersfoort, which is still winless, was eliminated for the Top-4 Pool, while Curaçao Neptunus became the first team to clinch a spot in this Pool.
Neptunus is still unbeaten and now has won 17 consecutive games.
Two years ago, HCAW opened the season with 19 wins in a row.
In the upcoming series, Oosterhout Twins has no games scheduled.
Beneath are the announced probable starting pitchers for the eighth 3-game series of the 2024 season that opens on Thursday-evening, May 30.
As always, these pitching assignments can change on game-days.
(May 29)
Scores, Schedule and Standings
Rosters
Live play-by-play & live-streams
| Roster | AMSTERDAM PIRATES (13-4) | vs. |
QUICK AMERSFOORT (0-16) | Roster | Game-info |
| # | Starting Pitchers Pirates | G | # | Starting Pitchers Quick |
| Date, Time & Site |
| 29 | RHP Jelle van der Lelie (0-0) | 1 | 52 | LHP Jhan Rifaela (0-6) | Th. May 30, 7:30 PM, Amsterdam (1) |
| 66 | RHP Naut Kragt (0-0) | 2 | | to be decided | Sa. June 1, 2:00 PM, Amersfoort (2) |
| 37 | RHP Kimi Verkruijssen (0-0) | 3 | | to be decided | Su. June 2, 2:00 PM, Amsterdam (1) |
| (1) - Loek Loevendie Ballpark, Sportpark 'Ookmeer', Amsterdam; (2) - SportPark 'Dorrestein', Amersfoort |
| Roster | DSS/KINHEIM (10-6-1) | vs. |
CURAÇAO NEPTUNUS (17-0) | Roster | Game-info |
| # | Starting Pitchers DSS/Kinheim | G | # | Starting Pitchers Neptunus |
| Date, Time & Site |
| 39 | LHP Rick Rizvić (2-1) | 1 | 37 | RHP Tom de Blok (3-0) | Th. May 30, 7:30 PM, Haarlem (3) |
| 58 | LHP Jasper Elfrink (3-1) | 2 | 39 | RHP Shairon Martis (5-0) | Sa. June 1, 2:00 PM, Haarlem (3) |
| 18 | RHP Donny Breek (0-2) | 3 | 00 | RHP Juan Carlos Sulbaran (4-0) | Su. June 2, 2:00 PM, Rotterdam (4) |
| (3) - Pim Mulier Stadion, Pim Mulier Sportpark, Haarlem; (4) - Neptunus Familiestadion, Sportpark Abraham van Stolkweg, Rotterdam |
| Roster | UVV (7-9) | vs. |
HCAW (12-5) | Roster | Game-info |
| # | Starting Pitchers UVV | G | # | Starting Pitchers HCAW |
| Date, Time & Site |
| 35 | RHP Mike van den Berg (3-1) | 1 | 16 | RHP Kaj Timmermans (4-0) | Th. May 30, 7:30 PM, Vleuten (5) |
| 18 | RHP Allard Helms (0-2) | 2 | 39 | RHP Lars Huijer ((4-1) | Sa. June 1, 2:00 PM, Bussum (6) |
| 13 | RHP Jurjen van Zijl (3-2) | 3 | 7 | RHP Dennis Burgersdijk (2-0) | Su. June 2, 2:00 PM, Vleuten (5) |
| (5) - Sportpark 'De Paperclip', Vleuten; (6) - Rob Hoffmann Vallei, Sportpark 'De Sportvallei', Bussum |
| Roster | RCH-PINGUÏNS (7-12-1) | vs. |
WORLDWIDE PHARMA LOGISTICS HOOFDDORP PIONIERS (4-14) | Roster | Game-info |
| # | Starting Pitchers RCH-Pinguïns | G | # | Starting Pitchers Pioniers |
| Date, Time & Site |
| 44 | LHP Rik Jalvingh (1-2) | 1 | 98 | RHP Arjen Nijkamp (1-3) | Th. May 30, 7:30 PM, Heemstede (7) |
| | to be decided | 2 | 22 | RHP Just van den Ouweelen (1-3) | Sa. June 1, 2:00 PM, Hoofddorp (8) |
| | to be decided | 3 | 33 | LHP Sem Nijman (0-4) | Su. June 2, 2:00 PM, Heemstede (7) |
| (7) - Heemsteedse Sportparken, Heemstede; (8) - ETO Ballpark, Sport Park 21, Hoofddorp |
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