Miscellaneous

Complete Story & Photos

Dutch Baseball

Nothing much changed in the assignments, as all named pitchers have started before this season. The lone exception is RHP Cliff Foster, who will make his first start on Sunday for Mr. Cocker HCAW, which will meet Konica Minolta Pioniers.
On Saturday, there will be an interesting match-up in Bussum in the first game between HCAW and Pioniers, as RHP Patrick de Lange (HCAW) and RHP Roger Kops (Pioniers) will start. The two are both 3-0 and are the only two pitchers this season with three victories.

Amsterdam Pirates hasn't decided yet who their starters will be against ADO. This because the team currently has three injured pitchers, being RHP Tom Stuifbergen, RHP Raban Schalm and RHP Maarten Mulder. Probable starters might be RHP Kevin Miner and RHP Pim Walsma.

DOOR Neptunus only named a starter for Saturday-evening's game against Instant Holland Almere '90, being LHP Diegomar Markwell. A starter for Sunday has not been named yet, but might be RHP Leoš Kubát, who has started the last two weekends in Game Two. Another possible starter is RHP Kevin Heijstek, but as Neptunus has a Thursday-game coming up, he might start that game, as he did last week.
(May 4)

At Haarlem, Corendon Kinheim was leading only 3-1 after six innings, then added eight runs in the next two at bats, when seven walks were issued, to win 11-1 vs. Sparta/Feyenoord. In this game, a total of 13 walks were registered.

At The Hague, ADO scored seven runs in the second innings and won 11-5 vs. Amsterdam Pirates in a game that saw 12 walks.

At Rotterdam, DOOR Neptunus trailed 4-0 in the second inning, but won 9-4 vs. Instant Holland Almere '90, that committed eight errors. Any walks here? Yes, 'only' seven.
(May 6)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Almere, Instant Holland Almere '90 shutout DOOR Neptunus, 3-0 on a combined 6-hitter.

At Amsterdam, ADO won 8-4 vs. Amsterdam Pirates and at Rotterdam, Corendon Kinheim won 6-2 vs. Sparta/Feyenoord.
(May 7)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

Game Recap, Line Score & Box Score

Mr. Cocker HCAW, ADO, Corendon Kinheim and Instant Holland Almere '90 are coming back with the same starters as last weekend (in the same order). HCAW has an extra arm in its bullpen now RHP Nick Stuifbergen has completed his suspension he was handed at the end of last season.
Sparta/Feyenoord moved RHP Elton Koeiman in the rotation, while RHP Satoru Fujii returned to Sunday's game.
Konica Minolta Pioniers and DOOR Neptunus, who met each other on Thursday-evening, have not announced their starters yet. Only Pioniers confirmed that LHP Richard Orman starts on Saturday. Neptunus probably will start with LHP Diegomar Markwell on Saturday, but that isn't confirmed yet. Neptunus has still to do without RHP Martijn Nijhoff, who is on his way back, while LHP Ferenc Jongejan will be out for the season.
Amsterdam Pirates also hasn't announced its starters yet, because of injuries, but RHP Pim Walsma and RHP Kevin Miner probably will be the starters again, only it is not known yet who will start on Saturday and who on Sunday. RHP Maarten Mulder, one of three injured pitchers, might start his rehab coming weekend in the First Division-team of Pirates. The status of RHP Tom Stuifbergen and RHP Raban Schalm is that they will probably see no action yet coming weekend.
(May 11)

In Pool B of the First Division, DOOR Tridents (which is the second team of Neptunus) remained unbeaten and won its ninth game in a row, a 6-3 victory vs. Sparks Haarlem.
Sparta/Feyenoord 2 snapped a 7-game losing streak by winning 8-7 against Jeka.
(May 12)

At Rotterdam, Sparta/Feyenoord broke an 8-game losing streak with a 15-6 win vs. Instant Holland Almere '90, which committed ten errors. In its first eight games, Sparta/Feyenoord had scored only nine runs.

At Amsterdam, Amsterdam Pirates extended its losing streak to nine games, as the team lost 7-1 to Corendon Kinheim.

At Hoofddorp, ADO won 6-1 vs. Konica Minolta Pioniers in an interesting pitching match-up between Rob Cordemans and Richard Orman.
(May 13)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Almere, Sparta/Feyenoord narrowly won 4-3 vs. Instant Holland Almere '90. Japanese pitcher Satoru Fujii went the distance and earned his first win.

At The Hague, ADO was leading 4-0 after five innings and starting pitcher Akira Okamoto gave up only one basehit in seven innings. But after he was relieved, Konica Minolta Pioniers came back with two runs in the eighth and ninth inning to tie the score, then took the lead in the eleventh inning. But in the home eleventh, ADO scored twice to win 6-5.

At Haarlem, Amsterdam Pirates played a good game, but was unable to get into a rally and lost its tenth game in a row, this losing only 5-4 vs. Corendon Kinheim.
(May 14)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

Due to two important soccer-games on the Neptunus-complex, the baseball-team of Neptunus will play its home team against Sparta/Feyenoord on Saturday instead of Sunday. The next day, Neptunus travels to 'neighbour' Sparta/Feyenoord. Both games will start at 2:00 PM.
(May 17)

One pitcher will make his first start of the season, being RHP Robbert van der Pol of Amsterdam Pirates, which has the availability again of RHP Maarten Mulder in the bullpen. Last weekend, Mulder already pitched briefly. Still on the disabled list are RHP Raban Schalm and RHP Jan-Willem Geerts.
Pirates is playing against Instant Holland Almere '90, which still has to do without RHP Erik Remmerswaal, who has an inflammation in his elbow. It is predicted he will be available again in about a week.

Mr. Cocker HCAW switched its rotation for coming weekend against ADO.
Last weekend, RHP Nick Stuifbergen returned to the pitching staff after sitting out a suspension, but the Bussum-team will be without utility-player Rodney Michel for probably a month. Michel, who returned to the line-up last week after also sitting a suspension, injured himself last Sunday. While diving to stop a basehit, he dislocated his arm and is expected to be out for at least a month.

DOOR Neptunus only named a starter for Saturday, as the starter for Sunday will be announced after Saturday's game. But that either will be RHP Kevin Heijstek or RHP Leoš Kubát.
(May 18)

At Haarlem, Corendon Kinheim registered a huge 17-0 shutout-win vs. Konica Minolta Pioniers on 17 basehits.

At Rotterdam, DOOR Neptunus won big vs. Sparta/Feyenoord, 15-5 and saw its leftfielder Melfried Comenencia collect his 500th career basehit.

At The Hague, ADO nipped Mr. Cocker HCAW, 2-1. Winning pitcher Rob Cordemans raised his record to 5-0.
(May 20)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Rotterdam, Sparta/Feyenoord was leading 10-2 after three innings vs. DOOR Neptunus, but the score was tied at 10 apiece after seven. In the eighth, Jeffrey Sprott homered to give Sparta/Feyenoord an 11-10 win.

At Hoofddorp, Corendon Kinheim won its ninth game in a row, beating Konica Minolta Pioniers 5-1 on a fine pitching performance by David Bergman.
At Bussum, ADO registered its eighth consecutive win and handed Mr. Cocker HCAW its fifth loss in a row, winning 5-3.
(May 21)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

The lefthanded Hinojosa was not successful in the two appearances he had with Pioniers this season.
On April 27, he pitched to four batters in the game against DOOR Neptunus and walked three of them, while being credited with three earned runs.
On May 6, he pitched one-third inning against Mr. Cocker HCAW and gave up two hits and two runs, of them earned.
(May 21)

Yurendell DeCaster was recalled to the Major League-team of the Pittsburgh Pirates on Saturday to fill the spot of infielder/outfielder José Bautista, who will be in the Dominican Republic for the funeral of his grandmother.
DeCaster, who also can play in both the infield and outfield, was recalled for his defensive qualities and also because of his hitting. This season, he hits .252 with four homeruns and 18 RBI's in 40 games with the Indianapolis Indians, the triple-A team of the Pirates. On Sunday-afternoon, DeCaster made his debut when he entered the game against the Cleveland Indians as a pinch-runner in the ninth inning. Pittsburgh lost the game 3-2. During Spring Training, DeCaster was one of the last players to be send back to the minor league. Last winter, he had an impressive season in the Venezuelan League and became a serious candidate to be on the Opening Day Roster for the Pirates.

DeCaster has played in 23 games for the Dutch National Team, including two during the World Baseball Classic last March in Puerto Rico. DeCaster becomes the player from Curaçao to play in the Major League since Ivanon Coffie played in the highest league in 2000. Since last year, Coffie plays for Instant Holland Almere '90 in the Dutch big league. The first player from Curaçao and from the Netherlands Antilles was Hensley 'Bam Bam' Meulens with the New York Yankees. In 2000, Meulens participated with the Dutch team in the Olympic Games in Sydney (Australia) and later became one of the coaches of the Dutch squad. Since last year, Meulens is the Hitting Coach for the Indianapolis Indians, where Yurendell DeCaster is one of his players.
(May 21)

Four pitchers will make their first start of the season on Thursday and all will do it in a home game.
LHP Gregory Gustina starts for DOOR Neptunus vs. ADO. This will be an interesting match-up, as Neptunus will face its former pitcher of the last 12 years, RHP Rob Cordemans.
RHP Nick Stuifbergen makes his first start for Mr. Cocker HCAW against Corendon Kinheim.
RHP Bobbie van Duuren, who recently has been added to the roster from the second team, makes his first start for Amsterdam Pirates and meets Sparta/Feyenoord. Konica Minolta Pioniers sends newly acquired Raul Quiroz to the mound to start against Instant Holland Almere '90. The righthanded American arrived Tuesday-morning and is the replacement for Venezuelan lefthander Erkly Esteban Hinojosa Viloria, who was released and left last Sunday.

Other news...
Mr. Cocker HCAW has do without rookie outfielder Nick Makkinje the coming weeks. Last Sunday, Makkinje injured himself in the game against ADO and is out with a torn hamstring. Besides that, C/1B Sidney de Jong is also slightly hurt, as is Utility Rodney Michel.
Instant Holland Almere '90 shall not use RHP Erik Remmerswaal the coming series. He is still out with an inflammation of his elbow and might start a rehab in two weeks by throwing in the second team.
DOOR Neptunus-lefthander Ferenc Jongejan underwent surgery last week on his shoulder and, as mentioned earlier, will be out for the season.
ADO appealed a 6-game suspension given to outfielder Kalian Sams, meaning he probably will be eligible to play in the coming series against DOOR Neptunus.
Corendon Kinheim will miss catcher Tjerk Smeets on Thursday, as they did last Sunday, as he is abroad for his work.
Amsterdam Pirates probably will have to do again without DH Fausto Álvarez in the coming series. Álvarez injured his leg on May 14 vs. Corendon Kinheim.
(May 23)

The national teams of The Netherlands and Italy open the series this year in The Netherlands, where the first three games will be played. All these games are to be played in the Neptunus Familystadium in Rotterdam and are scheduled for July 7, 8 and 9.
The next three games will be played in Italy. Is the Netherlands using one location for the three games, Italy will use three different sites for its part of the series. The games scheduled for July 10, 11 and 12 will be played respectively in Grosseto, Nettuno (both close to Rome) and Messina (which is on Sicily).

At Amsterdam, Amsterdam Pirates won its third game in a row, beating Sparta/Feyenoord 6-5, thanks to two homeruns by Ralph Lagas.

At Hoofddorp, newly acquired American pitcher Raul Quiroz made a fine debut for Konica Minolta Pioniers, but ended up with a no-decision, as his new team won 2-1 vs. Instant Holland Almere '90 after scoring the winning run in the ninth inning.

At Bussum, the game between Mr. Cocker HCAW and Corendon Kinheim had to be canceled. A lot of work to the field in the hours leading up to the game proved to be for nothing, as a new rain shower made the playing field unplayable. The game is re-scheduled for next Tuesday.
(May 25)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Haarlem, Corendon Kinheim trailed 3-1 when it scored five runs on only one basehit in the eighth inning to win 6-3 vs. Mr. Cocker HCAW, which now has lost six in a row. For Kinheim, this was its tenth consecutive victory.

At Rotterdam, Sparta/Feyenoord trailed 3-0, but got some help from two errors to win 5-3 vs. Amsterdam Pirates, which had a 3-game winning streak. The game was stopped in the eighth inning because of rain.

At Almere, the game between Instant Holland Almere '90 and Konica Minolta Pioniers, scheduled for Saturday-evening, was canceled because of rain after a 30-minute delay. The game is re-scheduled for next Tuesday-evening.
(May 27)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Rotterdam, DOOR Neptunus won big vs. ADO, 11-1 and Diegomar Markwell became the first pitcher this season with six victories.

At Amsterdam, Amsterdam Pirates handed Sparta/Feyenoord a convincing 12-0 shutout-loss in which 17-year old Kevin Miner went the distance for the home team.

At Hoofddorp, Konica Minolta Pioniers trailed 4-2, then turned around the game to take an 11-7 lead, but finally won only 11-10 vs. Instant Holland Almere '90.
(May 28)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

Because of the disappointing results so far, the team is in last place with a 2-12 record, both the board of Almere '90 and that of the Foundation VIP (Almere's Business Club), has reviewed the first part of the season, which is now one-third in the books. It was decided to name a Commission Top Baseball Almere, effective immediately. The mission for this commission is to guide the big league-team of Almere in both organizational and technical matters, a press release stated. The commission has been asked to do everything that's needed, in cooperation with the team staff and the players, to come to better results.
Named to the commission were Arie Wels (former Chairman of OVVO Amsterdam), Marco Wels (last years Head Coach of Almere '90), Dick van Putten (member of the board of Almere '90) and a to be named person from within the club. The committee will be chaired by Gerard Stenzler, who is very wellknown in Dutch baseball. He had a coaching career that spanned more than 30 years in different divisions with Arsenal, AMVJ, De Spartaan (which he led for 28 years) and Kinheim, as well a being the Head Coach of the national team of France during the European Championships of 1973. Most recently, until last season, Stenzler was the General Manager the last few years with Kinheim. Besides that, Stenzler also was the longtime Chairman of De Spartaan.

With the appointment of this committee, the board of the Foundation VIP decided to leave its policy of governing from a distance, also because of the results of recent years. The board has a great confidence in both the team staff and the group of players and expects that with the naming of this commission the 2006 season can be influenced positively.
Since it first played in the big league in 2001, Almere has not finished above seventh place. Despite having good players on its roster, it finished in ninth place in the first half of the season from 2001-2003, then remained in the big league through the promotion/relegation pool every year. After finishing in seventh place in 2004, Almere last season finished in eighth and last place. Since 2001 until Sunday, the overall record for Almere is 42 wins, 130 losses and five tie scores. Its highest win-total was 12, accomplished in 2004.
(May 28)

At Bussum, the game between Mr. Cocker HCAW and Corendon Kinheim ended in a unique 0-0 tie and was stopped after nine innings because of the 10:50 PM curfew-rule. Therefore, the game couldn't go into extra innings, as it already had lost almost an hour earlier in the game. Before the start of the third inning, the game was delayed for 58 minutes because of the lowstanding sun during sunset.
With the tie score, Kinheim's 11-game winning streak ended. Also, HCAW's losing streak of seven games ended.

At Almere, Instant Holland Almere '90 won 7-3 vs. Konica Minolta Pioniers to end a 6-game losing streak.
In the game, there was a strange situation in which the batter/runner passed the previous runner after an overthrow, resulting in two runners on the same base. No one was called out, as the runners were awarded the next base on the overthrow. A discussion and an ejection followed, while it originally should have been a double play. More in the recap.
(May 30)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Almere, home playing Almere 2 kept its streak intact, as it lost its 14th game in a row, this time loseing 14-4 to Mr. Cocker HCAW 2.
(May 31)

Dutch Softball Women

At Zoetermeer, A4 Terrasvogels remained unbeaten and won 6-1 and 5-0 vs. Birds.

At Haarlem, Van der Peijl DSC '74 shutout Euro Stars, 10-0, to register its first win, but lost Game One, 4-3.

At Oosterhout, Twins won twice vs. Centrals, 5-4 and 5-3.
(May 6)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Zoetermeer, Van der Peijl DSC '74 also had two shutout-victories, winning 7-0 an 6-0 vs. Birds.

At De Bilt, Sparks Haarlem won twice vs. Centrals, 10-1 and 7-0.

At Enschede, Euro Stars won 1-0 vs. Computer SOS Tex Town Tigers in a game that was delayed 29 minutes because of thunder, then lost 4-3 in the tie-break in Game Two.
(May 13)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Haarlem, Sparks Haarlem won 6-3 vs. Van der Peijl DSC '74.
At Zoetermeer, Computer SOS Tex Town Tigers shutout Birds, 4-0.
At Oosterhout, Twins won only 1-0 vs. Euro Stars.
(May 16)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Haarlem, Twins won its first game on the road, beating Van der Peijl DSC '74, 6-0, but then lost Game Two, 7-0.
At De Bilt, Centrals and Computer SOS Tex Town Tigers also split. In the opener, Centrals won 7-0, in the next game, Tex Town Tigers came back and won 10-3.

Except for the opening game between DSC and Twins, all other seven games ended prematurely, as all these games ended with a 7-run (or more) difference.
(May 25)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

Selected for the Canada Cup are:
Pitchers:
Kristi DeVries (Ohio State University), Judith van Kampen (A4 Terrasvogels), Areke Spel (Euro Stars) and Rebecca Soumeru (Macerata, Italy).
Position Players:
Noémi Boekel, Kinge Bouma, Marloes Fellinger, Lynn Geertman, Chantal Versluis (all Sparks Haarlem), Debby Connor (Euro Stars), Nathalie Gosewehr, Femke Haage, Petra van Heijst, Marieke Jansen (all A4 Terrasvogels), Sandra Gouverneur (Nuoro, Italy), Saskia Kosterink (Computer SOS Tex Town Tigers), Daisy de Peinder, Marjan Smit (both Twins) and Ellen Venker (Van der Peijl DSC ’74).
Linda Hoenderdos (A4 Terrasvogels) has been appointed first back-up player.
(May 29)

At Santpoort, A4 Terrasvogels won 4-1 vs. Van der Peijl DSC '74 and Judith van Kampen earned her ninth victory.

At Enschede, Twins rallied for seven runs in the eighth inning to break a 5-5 tie vs. Computer SOS Tex Town Tigers, which had tied the score with three runs in the home seventh. Twins won 12-6.

At Capelle a/d IJssel, the game between Euro Stars and Sparks Haarlem rained out and was re-scheduled for Thursday-evening.
(May 30)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

Dutch Softball Men

At Heemstede, RCH-Pinguïns won its first game of the season, 11-8 vs. TIW-Survivors, but lost Game One of the double-header, 15-10.

At De Bilt, Centrals shutout Storks 5-0, then was leading 5-1 in Game Two, which had to be stopped in the middle of the fourth inning. After ejection of a Storks-player, the team became incomplete. According to the rules, the game was stopped and forfeited to Centrals.
(May 6)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

At Haarlem, AIMS EHS split with Centrals, winning Game One 4-2, then losing the next game, 5-4.

At Spijkenisse, Spikes shutout RCH-Pinguïns twice, 8-0 and 5-0.
(May 13)

Game Recaps, Line Scores & Box Scores

	STANDINGS	W	L
1	Brasschaat Braves	8	1
2	Borgerhout Squirrels	7	2
	Royal Greys Merksem	7	2
4	Hoboken Pioneers	7	3
5	Mortsel Stars	5	4
6	Gent Knights	1	7
7	Namur Angels	1	8
8	Royal Antwerp Eagles	0	9

Royal Greys, which was in first place since the season had opened, on Saturday won 4-1 vs. Borgerhout Squirrels, but then lost 1-0 in Sunday. As a result, the two teams now share second place.

Brasschaat Braves won twice against Namur Angels, 11-2 and 5-0 and moved into first place, because of the losses by Borgerhout and Greys.

Antwerp Eagles remained winless and is now 0-9 after losing 4-2 and 6-1 to Hoboken Pioneers, which therefore remained in fourth place.

Mortsel Stars, which is still in fifth place, won twice against Gent Knights, 9-6 and 7-2.
(May 4)

Bonds hit his 714th homerun when he led off the second inning for the San Francisco Giants against pitcher Brad Halsey of the Oakland A's.
The homerun came after 12 days without one, as he hit number 713 on May 7 in Philadelphia. Since then he went 4-for-29, walked ten times and was hit by a pitch once.
(May 20)

Robert Fontana was a member of Italian champion Fortitudo Bologna, where he played in centerfield and also was used as a reliever.
Last Friday-evening, Fontana went 0-for-3 in a 3-1 victory of Bologna in the second game of a 3-game series against T&A San Marino. The day before, Bologna had won, 1-0. After completion of Friday's game, Fontana was en route on his scooter to a restaurant close to Gianni Falchi Stadium for an after game diner when he got involved in an accident with a car. Sadly, the Bologna-centerfielder didn't survive the accident.
After learning of the accident, the third scheduled game between Bologna and San Marino, to be played on Saturday, was canceled, while there was a moment of silence before the start of other games in the Italian league.

Robert Fontana started his career in the Italian Serie A/1 in 1990 as a player for Mediolanum Milano. In the following years, he would play for Caserta, Paternò, Codogno, Parma and Bologna. Last Friday, Fontana played in his fourteenth game this season for Bologna. He was 6-for-43 this year.
Fontana, who was a very valuable player for the clubs he played for, also played for the Italian National Team, with whom he participated in the European Championships of 2003 in the Netherlands and last year in the Czech Republic, amongst other events.
Robert Fontana will surely be missed by all his baseball friends in Italy and abroad.
Grand Slam * Stats & News and the Dutch baseball family offer their condolences to Robert's family and the team and organization of Bologna.
(May 21)

The outfielder of the San Francisco Giants hit his 715th homerun (a 2-run shot) in the fourth inning of a 6-3 loss at home vs. the Colorado Rockies off pitcher Byung-Hyun Kim.
(May 28)

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