The opening ceremonies also recognized seven players. Five of which were inducted into the PoliceSoftball.com Hall of Fame. These players were Dan Spinelli, Don Fradette, Scott Affholter, John Anderson and Carl Gaskins. These players and all other Hall of Fame inductees will also be recognized at the PoliceSoftball.com World Series. Two other players, John Scollo and Mike Kletzsky were honored with Sportsmanship honors.

After the pomp and circumstances of the opening ceremony were over, the teams got down to the business of playing softball. All teams played two round robin games for double-elimination playoff seeding. The playoffs opened with the Steel City Enforcers inking a 20-9 win over the Greene County Ohio squad. Wayne-Oakland nipped the St. Louis Lawmen 8-7. Minnesota posted a 24-10 victory over the Motor City Blues. Jacksonville PSC rolled Concord 34-6. The Bluegrass Lawmen upset hometown favorites the Michigan Lawmen 15-13. NYPD Blues posted an impressive 23-6 mark over Team Five-O (Georgia). The South Florida Lawmen defense held the Ohio Lawmen to 4 runs in a low scoring 8-4 win. The SoCal Alliance matched up against the Buckeye Lawmen for the first time since the two teams faced off in the Policesoftball.Com World Series last October. The game was extremely tight for the first 5 innings but then the Alliance broke out and won 26-11.

In the winner’s bracket, Wayne-Oakland won another low scoring affair by besting the Steel City Enforcers 7-4. In a true heavyweight match-up Jacksonville PSC prevailed over the Minnesota Lawmen 18-11. NYPD Blues steamrolled the Bluegrass Lawmen 21-6. SoCal Alliance battled South Florida Lawmen to a 22-12 victory. The SoFlo team showed they are a team on the rise with a very bright future. Outfielder Alex Rizo epitomized this by hosing two Alliance players at home. Alliance player Ryan Coe said Rizo has one of the quickest releases of any outfielder in cop softball.

The loser’s bracket witnessed some surprising early exits by teams expected to go deep in this tournament. The Michigan Lawmen suffered an upset at the hands of Team Five-O and were eliminated. In the battle of the Buckeye State, the Buckeye Lawmen eliminated the 2005 World Series Champions the Ohio Lawmen 11-4. Afterward several of the Ohio Lawmen players commented that this was their most disappointing performance in team history and they vowed to show up for the World Series re-focused and dialed in. Concord eliminated the hometown Motor City Blues 25-7 and the St. Louis Lawmen sent Greene County packing 22-8.

As the day progressed so did the number of teams being eliminated. The St. Louis Lawmen fell to South Florida Lawmen 20-18. Bluegrass off’d Concord 23-13 and the Minnesota Lawmen nipped Team Five-O 10-7. At this point, Team Five-O was being talked about as a potential darkhorse to win the tournament. This team hasn’t been seen much on the circuit but they look like they have the talent to be a major player in the game. The Buckeye Lawmen also bested the Steel City Enforcers 15-12.

By late Saturday afternoon there were still four unbeaten teams in the winner’s bracket. In what many would consider an upset the scrappy Wayne-Oakland squad rallied in the 7th inning to defeat the defending champs, Jacksonville PSC 26-25. The SoCal Alliance continued their winning ways by defeating the NYPD Blues 16-7. On Sunday morning in the undefeated game, the SoCal Alliance posted an impressive 22-7 win against the Wayne-Oakland juggernaut. SoCal would now wait for the loser’s bracket to be played out.

In the loser’s bracket the Bluegrass Lawmen eliminated the South Florida Lawmen 14-13 while Minnesota took down the Buckeye Lawmen 14-11. Jacksonville PSC was intent on making it back to “the dance” and they later eliminated Bluegrass 21-6. Minnesota defeated NYPD Blues in a slugfest 25-17. Jacksonville PSC and Minnesota faced off in one of the most see-saw battles of the tournament. Minnesota had a chance to slam the door in the bottom of the 7th and the winning run on 2nd base with only one out but the Jacksonville PSC defense had other plans and held on to force extra innings. In the 8th inning Jacksonville PSC plated too many runs for Minnesota to answer which left Minnesota in 4th place. Jacksonville PSC squared off against Wayne-Oakland in a heavily anticipated rematch and this game lived up to the hype. It went a full 7 innings once again and once again Wayne-Oakland pulled a rabbit out of the cap to advance with a 20-19 win. This game started off with Jax commanding the tempo but the green and gold squad refused to die and kept chipping away.

The championship game pitted the local favorites Wayne-Oakland against the SoCal Alliance. Wayne-Oakland would need to double-dip the SoCal crew but that was not beyond the realm of possibility since double dipping has already happened at other events a few times this year on the cop circuit. SoCal knew they had their hands full with the fiery Wayne-Oakland squad but the odds favored SoCal which was boasting a 35-3 record on the year going into the game. SoCal opened with a strong first inning but Wayne-Oakland answered. It appeared the game was going to be a high scoring affair but then the bats fell quiet. Both teams played solid defense and denied the other of big numbers inning after inning. When the dust settled the balanced attack of the SoCal Alliance overcame the gutsy efforts of Wayne-Oakland and SoCal claimed the championship with a 16-9 victory. The team celebrated by dousing coach Del Pickney with a bucket of ice water. Pickney said, “Tournament directors Kevin Reese and Andy Wurm did another outstanding job coordinating a great weekend. I saw some very talented teams play throughout the weekend and on any given day there were at least a dozen of them who could have won this. Fortunately my guys stepped up against some very tough competition. Big thanks to our sponsors Zada Enterprises and Easton who have been a huge help to us”

Dan Spinelli was asked his thoughts on the tournament and the newly inducted Hall of Famer was impressed by the talent laden teams who had come together and he is excited about the future of police softball.


MVP-Robert Roque SoCal Alliance

MVP Defensive Player-Mike Sykes Wayne/Oakland

All World Players
Tim Morris SoCal Alliance
Mark Tolliver SoCal Alliance
Steven Speogle Wayne/Oakland
Mike Decicco Wayne/Oakland
Doug Cullen JPSC
Scott Bridges JPSC
Ken Fry Minnesota Lawmen
Bobby Lambert Minnesota Lawmen
Flip McGovern NYPD Blues
Butch Castor Bluegrass Lawmen

Overall it was a great weekend for the cop brotherhood and for cop softball in general as teams gobbled up points for ranking purposes. This tournament was the final East Boombah Points Chase tournament and it went a long way to help solidify the points chase going into the season’s final turn.


CURRENT TOP 10 POINT LEADERS
EAST
1t. Jacksonville PSC-49
1t. New York Metro-49
3. Maryland State Police-46
4t. NYPD Blues-36
4t. Ohio Lawmen-36
6. Michigan Lawmen-34
7. Wayne-Oakland-33
8. Minnesota Lawmen-26
9t.Buckeye Lawmen-24
9t. New Jersey Shamrock Enforcers-24
9t. South Florida Lawmen-24

WEST
1t. California Quake- 56
1t. SoCal Alliance-56
3. A1 Towing/HardCor 48
4. Sacramento Police Softball-38
5. West Coast Aftershock-37
6. Concord Combo-35
7. State Razed-33
8. LAPD Blue-30
9. DEA Combo-29
10. Sacramento Razorbacks-26