A championship and numbers...

WE WON!!!!!

An unbelievable season was capped off by an amazing championship game. Diego Markwell threw a 1-hit gem to take the best of 7 Holland Series 4-2 over the Amsterdam Pirates.

Back in Holland for my 1st year after dabbling in in the minor leagues for a year with the Blue Jays, I came back, determined to make this a positive move back here. With a very solid team at my back, I was able to put together the best season of my life.

I learned so much about pitching, how to attack hitters, and about pitches to make in certain counts and situations. All of this helped my team (Door Neptunus (Rotterdam, NL)) to a 39-3 record during the season, 7-2 in the playoffs, including a staff that compiled 17 shutouts in 51 games. Personally I finished with a 9-0 record, 0.39 ERA, 36hits and 83 k's in 69 innings. You can find the league stats here.

We had a rough time scratching out the first few games of the Holland Series as the Amsterdam Pirates played great baseball, and we played shaky baseball. Either way, we provailed and got stronger throughout the series. This was my third year playing in the Dutch Headclass, and my third playoff appearance, finally winning a Championship.

The celebrations were great, our bus ride home was MC'd by our outspoken Australian pitcher (and finals MVP) Dushan Ruzic. He had players one by one come up and sing anything, say anything... it was for the most part hilarious, including such songs as "We are the Champions", and several dutch chants that I couldn't follow... just sang along like I knew what I was saying.

It was great to be there with veteran players like Jeroen Sluijter making his last bus ride as a player, and being able to experice a championship with other players maybe playing their last games also (including myself).

Time for a few weeks of National team practices, then a trip to the Intercontinental Cup in Taiwan for 2 1/2 weeks at the end of October.... Then Finally back to Canada!!