Burlingame Youth Baseball Association 

Satellite View of Burlingame’s Bayside Park, Home of the Burlingame Youth Baseball Association

eTaxes.com is proud to sponsor the eTaxes.com Eagles in the Burlingame Youth Baseball Association (BYBA) Mudville League. Comprised of 3rd and 4th graders, the team is coached by Bob Furr and plays all its game at Bayside Park field #3.

June 13 Post Championship Update

The Mudville League season ended with an 8-1 victory by Gray’s Painting over Village Host Pizza. My son’s best friend plays for Gray’s, but I have to state that I consider the victory to be tainted. Mudville League rules frankly stink and served to severely handicap Village Host in a way that can best be described as “cheating”. In fact, in discussing what happened with some of the parents after the game, a couple of the kids overhearing us called it just that and I have to agree. Here’s the problem that MUST be changed immediately.

BYBA employs a rule that once a pitcher has pitched two innings, he cannot pitch again for 48 hours. That was a serious problem for Village Host because they played their semi-final game on Thursday night. It was not a problem for Gray’s because they played their semi-final game on Wednesday night. Therefore, for no reason other than BYBA setting up a ridiculous schedule, it was PREDETERMINED that one team would go into the Championship game without being able to use their best pitchers. What a complete joke. We found that absurd rule to be a problem all season long. Over and over again, one team would have a built in advantage because the way the schedule was setup. You would think that for the playoffs and certainly for the championship that the league would either waive the rule or setup the schedule so that this ridiculous circumstance couldn’t occur. Nope. A complete lack of common sense destroyed any chance of Village Host having a chance to win this game and that stinks.

There are a number of silly rules in the Mudville League that I would like to see abolished, but none of those rules handicap ONE team and not the other in any single game except for this absurd rule. I’ll tell you this. While I love being a sponsor and I intended to sponsor teams in other BYBA divisions next year there is no way I will sponsor any teams unless the BYBA does away with a rule that intentionally harms one team and gives an advantage to another.

June 8 2005 End of Season Update

The eTaxes.com season came to an end last night. First, we defeated Gilmartin Group on Sunday 6-4. Despite playing without two of our best players, we played one of our best games of the season and beat a very good team. Pitching, hitting and defense all came together. For some reason, we play very well on the weekends. That set up last night’s game against Polyscapes. They beat us 1-0 three weeks ago in the best pitching duel you could ever see between 8 & 9 yrs olds. Unfortunately, last night was no pitching duel as Polyscapes completely outplayed us, winning 9-1. It seems we don’t play particularly well in weeknight games. Our starting catcher had an ankle injury and was unable to play after the first injury. That really took a toll on our offense as he’s been pounding the ball the past few games. Polyscapes will take on Associated Concrete in the Consolation Championship this Saturday.

What’s most interesting is that the team that finished in last place in the regular season with a 2-10 record, Village Host Pizza, is just one win away from playing for the Mudville League Championship. Village Host has won its first two playoff games and will play Anza Engineering with the winner going on to the title game on Saturday. We have friends on both teams, but I’d love to see the underdog win. Anza was 10-2 during the regular season, but one of the two losses was to Village Host. Broadway Pharmacy finished next to last with just three wins in the regular season and yet they’re playing in the other semifinal game vs. Gray’s Paint & Wallpaper. The underdog has won almost every playoff game so who knows what will happen in these last couple of games.

We had a great group of kids and parents and although we didn’t win as many games as we might have liked, we had a wonderful season. The kids supported each other extremely well and you never heard ANY bickering or arguing all season long. I give a tremendous amount of credit to our Head Coach Bob Furr and our assistant coaches, Kobert Smith & Peter Stevenson for keeping everyone positive all season and for making sure all the players treated each other with respect.

We’ll have our end of the season pizza party at Village Host Pizza next week.

June 1 2005 Update

Well, we had a really rough game last night. Unfortunately, the boys didn’t play very well and we lost to Broadway Pharmacy 8-2. That means we’ll play Sunday, June 5 at 2:30 PM in the consolation round. They’re a great group of kids and this was the first game all year we’ve lost by more than 3 runs. Special kudos to the young umpires. They called an excellent game. Good luck to Broadway Pharmacy as they take on Lefty’s in the next round.

May 27 2005 Update

I received a call tonight from Mudville League Commissioner John Martos. John is a truly great guy. He certainly has far better things to do than to spend time on the phone with me, but he called to give me an answer to how the league broke a three way tie for 7th place. 

eTaxes.com finished 5-7 in a 3-way tie for 7th place. However, by Strength of Schedule (this sounds like the RPI for the NCAA College Basketball Tournament), eTaxes.com finishes in 7th place. That means we play Broadway Pharmacy in the first round of the playoffs on Tuesday, May 31 at 5:30 PM. If we win our first game, we’ll play the following Saturday, June 4 at 8:30 AM vs. Lefty’s Sports Cards.

We’ve won three of our final four games so we’re on a roll. The pitching and defense has been excellent all year long and the batting has really come around the past couple of weeks. (LINK TO BYBA STANDINGS)

                                                 Home                                                 Visitor

3-19-05           2:45     Sat       eTaxes.com                    vs               Lefty’s Sports Cards  

3-23-05           5:30     Wed     Gray’s Paints                  vs               eTaxes.com    

4-6-05             5:30     Wed     eTaxes.com                     vs               Sarco’s Locks Works

4-9-05             10:15   Sat       PolyScapes                     vs               eTaxes.com

4-12-05           5:30     Tue      eTaxes.com                     vs               Dorsey & Whitney

4-16-05           8:00     Sat       Village Host Pizza          vs               eTaxes.com 

4-18-05           5:30     Mon     eTaxes.com                      vs               Asso. Concrete 

4-23-05           2:45     Sat       Anza Engineering           vs               eTaxes.com

4-30-05           5:00     Sat       Broadway Pharmacy     vs               eTaxes.com

5-6-05             5:30     Fri       eTaxes.com                       vs               Gilmartin Group

5-7-05             2:45     Sat       Lefty’s Sports Cards      vs               eTaxes.com

5-11-05           5:30     Wed     eTaxes.com                      vs               Gray’s Paints

5-14-05           8:00     Sat       Sarco’s Lock Works       vs               eTaxes.com

5-17-05           5:30     Tue      eTaxes.com                      vs               PolyScapes

5-21-05           10:15   Sat       Dorsey & Whitney, LLP  vs              eTaxes.com

5-25-05           5:30     Wed     eTaxes.com                       vs              Village Host Pizza

Playoffs 5-31 through 6-11 Batting cage practice is on Sundays at Washington Park from 12:00 – 1:00 pm.

Practices are on Tuesday evenings at Washington Park small field from 5:00 – 6:30 pm.