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At the beginning of the 2010 BVB season your Cardinals will be without the services of two of it’s original roster members. Greg Moore and Dave Kerr have decided to hang up the cleats, closing a chapter of their lives and indeed the Cardinals franchise.

The first ever franchise meeting occurred in the winter of 2005 as a collection of individuals met at the Mainway cages to meet the rest of the clan looking to play in a Men’s baseball league. There was a frightening realization coming out of that meeting as the 15 players combined had exactly zero years worth of pitching experience. Oddly the team was stacked with catchers – it was just a question if anybody could get the ball close enough to the mitt? Well this varitable assortment of players needed leadership, and Jay Hodgson agreed to accept the franchise under his name and begin the task of managing a group of over 30 baseball misfits. The on-field coaching responsibilities fell on the mighty shoulders of Greg Moore. Coaching in any men’s league is a very tough responsibility as the individuals have to manage the line-ups and sometimes fragile ego’s of the players on the team. For 4 years ‘Moose’ took on this job selflessly, opting many times to put himself at the bottom of the lineup and on the bench so that other players could get more out of their BVB experience. He coached the team to a Legends Cup victory in just it’s 2nd season. Moose spent the majority of his playing time at 1st base and he played the position very well, getting his big frame in front of some ground balls and scooping the many errant throws from the rest of his infield. Moose also hosted an annual pool party, which always occurred after an early Nelson game. This past year, everything ran smoothly until a man of significant girth obliterated his steel reinforced diving board… No one but Moose can be sure if this was the straw that caused him to more seriously contemplate retirement.

Dave Kerr held two titles in his final year of being a Cardinal. He was the oldest player on the team by a few years. He was also the most in shape, by far greater a margin than he was the eldest. Dave occupied CF for the majority of his tenure as a Card and earned himself recognition as having great speed and a cannon for an arm. He routinely lead the team in stolen bases, having only been thrown out once in his 5 years. Dave was a fiery competitor who had infectious enthusiasm for the game and many times was a sparkplug for some big innings thanks to his speed and hussle. This past year, ole man Kerr was often times the last guy at the park and he noted that 2009 was the most enjoyable year in the five that he enjoyed in BVB.

In the end, two good ball players and two great friends decided that other commitments would now have to take priority in their respective summers. For that decision fellas - we understand. We know that the feeling is mutual when we collectively say that you’ll be missed by all this year. The post-game pops and barbecue’s won’t be the same – but the invitation will remain open to you both to join us throughout the summer.

On Friday November 6th the BVB gathered at Kings Court in Burlington to wrap up the 2009 season with a presentation of individual and team awards. The night always signifies that the cold weather is upon us and that it’s time for the rust to settle in.

The Cards were prominent in the evenings festivities as Vaughn Wamboldt captured the Homerun title alongside the Brewers Jon Eidt. Both players were new to the league and prime examples into the continued improvements seen in the caliber of players the BVB consistently attracts. It was the 4th consecutive year that a Card has earned the trophy. The team also hit a league high total of 12 regular season bombs with the next closest team total being the Red Sox at 8. Tim Barnes and the Tigers Scott Ranney each hit 3 playoff bombs to lead the individual playoff HR race and the Cards also hit a league leading 5 for the post-season.

Walter Lutz and Lee Mackey were recognized for their overwhelming commitment and effort to the growth and success of the BVB. Both individuals have elevated the BVB from a typical beer league to a league several notches above that and it was great to be able to have them recognized as a conclusion to the 10th year of the league.

In the team awards The Brewers were awarded the Lutz Cup for finishing in first place overall. Talk of the ‘The Curse’ was heard throughout the evening as very few teams who have proven to be the best during the regular season have duplicated their dominance in the playoffs. The Brewers will be one year wiser next year and will know not to be so foolish as to finish in first again?!? The Cardinals were also formally presented with the Vintage Silver Cup, which they captured after sweeping the Cubs and Red Sox in the Silver bracket of the playoffs. A disappointing loss to the Hens in the first round of the playoffs sent them to the Silver division, and while the Silver Cup is a title the team doesn’t take lightly, it is safe to say that their ambition was for the Gold Cup. The winners of that trophy turned out to be the Hobo’s who topped the Tigers and Brewers to capture the overall league championship.

So with that the offseason has officially arrived. Any news in Cardinal land will be posted to this website over the course of the winter. In the meantime, we wish everyone in the BVB and their families a safe winter.

On a beautiful night for baseball on Wednesday the Cardinals captured the inaugural version of the newly anointed Vintage Silver Cup by topping the Red Sox 12-1. The story of the series was undoubtedly the pitching of the Cardinals which surrendered a total of just 6 hits and 1 unearned run in the two games with the hard hitting Sox. Last night it was the combination of Mark Thomas, Andrew Schwalm and Chris Cooney that kept the Sox bats at bay.

Cooney was also an offensive juggernaut as he swatted a double and triple on the night. Tim Barnes was huge in this series though as he belted his 3rd homerun of the playoffs and 2nd in as many games with a 3 run bomb in the 3rd inning. At the time the game was only 1-0 so it helped propel the team to the win from there. Plenty of Cards got in on the action the rest of the way to help bring across the 12 runs.

While a Silver Cup win is an accomplishment to be proud of, it is safe to say that both the Cards and the Sox had hoped to be vying for the Gold Cup instead. The same motivation and fire that drives both teams wasn’t there in this series to the same extent it would otherwise be. For the Cards part there is a great deal of regret at having to say the, “We’ll get ‘em next year” chorus. It’s tired. Believing that you are the team to beat means absolutely nothing when you yourselves get beat. And until we win the Vintage Gold we are NOT the team to beat. Unfortunately we’ll have to wait until next year to earn the distinction of being BVB’s best, by winning the games that matter most.

The offseason promises to have plenty of Poker nights and several players play hockey together which will be starting shortly as well. Stay tuned to this site for other Cards news in the coming weeks and months. As always, a big thank you needs to go out to our sponsors for their continued support. It is an enormous help and we couldn’t do it without you!

Last night the Cardinals and Red Sox began their best of 3 set for the Vintage Silver Cup. This trophy has in essence replaced the former Legends Cup trophy and the matchup marks the third time in as many years that the two teams have met in the playoffs. The Cards have dominated the regular season matchup the past few years but have themselves been dominated by the Sox once the postseason has hit.

The Cardinal pitching trio of Mark Thomas, Billy Lawrence and Chris Cooney hurled a 2 hit shutout of the Sox while the Cards bats hit the ball hard and capitalized on several defensive mistakes from the Sox to push across 9 runs and take a 1-0 series lead. After scoring 3 in the first the Cards put up a mercy in the 3rd inning, thanks in large part to Tim Barnes 2nd homerun of the playoffs, this a 3 run shot to right field. Once again it was another solid defensive effort from the team who have only commit a few errors throughout the playoffs so far. The next game is scheduled for Wednesday evening at Nelson park.

Following the game there was a brief ceremony for both teams as the League and the Red Sox players paid a tribute to Manager Lee Mackey. Both the League and the Red Sox have reaped the hard work and dedication that Mackey has provided the BVB over the better part of the past decade. The Cardinals would like to give our thanks to Lee for his role in making the BVB website what it is as well as his many years of service on the BVB board. Best wishes in all your future personal and professional endeavors Lee – you’ll be missed by many.

Game Two in the best of three series vs the Cardinals and Cubs took place on Friday night, and the Cardinals managed to close out the series with a 10-5 win. The Cards had a little too much hitting and pitching for the Cubs in this series, though it should be noted that the Cubs displayed some great all round ball throughout. Their defense turned an excellent 5-4-3 double play at a critical point, they had some outstanding catches by their outfielders and a great throw out at the plate from left field by their shortstop Robbie Hall. It’s a lot easier to be gracious in victory than defeat, but the Cub’s are a great group of guys and it was good to see an already difficult team to play against make even more improvements this year.

For their part the Cards also played some excellent ball. They were steady as a rock on defense and only gave up runs in the first inning of the game. Russ Pereira, Chris Cooney and Mark Thomas went the final 6 surrendering only one hit after the shaky start. Offensively Tim Barnes cracked a HR and the team got plenty of offense from an assortment of players to bring the runs across. It could have been a dangerous series coming off of their disappointing loss to the Hens in the previous round of playoffs, but the team played very well in both games of the series.

The Cards now have a long lay off before playing the winner of the Red Sox/Marauders series. They will be without the services of ace fireballer Chris Cooney whose work schedule left him out of the entire Hens series and now the Vintage Silver finals as well. Otherwise the long layoff will hopefully help heal some of the nagging injuries to a long list of wusses (oops I mean players) on the Cardinals bench.

The Vintage Silver Cup semi-finals began last night at Ireland Park as your Cardinals faced the Cubs. Despite being owners of a losing record this year the Cubbies have proven over and over that they can beat anyone when they put the whole package together. In knowing this the Cards came to the park fully prepared and swung their bats en route to a 15-5 victory.

Steve Maher pitched the first two innings before giving way to Jason Saker who came on in the 3rd and 4th. Saker did a great job after a long pitching lay-off by hurling a shutout in his two innings of work. Jason in turn handed the ball to Chris ‘Big Country’ Cooney who went the final 3 in dominant shutdown fashion. The Cards were thankful to have Country out last night as freak injuries and team absences left them real short on arms. I’ve seen fewer limps and hanging arms in fracture clinics than I saw on the Cardinals bench last night.

Offensively the Cards hit the ball hard from top to bottom. Clean-up hitter Vaughn Wamboldt came up to bat with the bases loaded twice, but only managed to muster 6 RBI’s in those at bats. His grand slam in the bottom of the 3rd only cleared the fence by a few feet. However it did also clear a Boeing 747 making its final descent into Pearson Airport, so the ball did technically travel a substantial distance.

It was a good win against a resilient team last night. Evidence of the Cubbies resiliency occurred in the top of the 2nd inning when after having just surrendered a mercy inning in the first they put up a 5 spot on the Cards in response. It was definitely a loud statement made by the Bears. Fortunately the Cards held in strong the rest of the way to take a 1-0 series lead. The next game is scheduled for this Friday night at Ireland Park again.

The rubber match of the play-ins took place last night as your Cardinals faced the Mudhens to determine which team would be vying for the Vintage championship and which team would be relegated to the Legends playoffs.

The Mudhens jumped all over the Cards starter in the first inning, pounding the ball to all parts of the park. The Cardinals responded in their half of the 1st when a bases loaded double off the bat of Jeff Gilleland cashed in all 3 runners. Andrew Schwalm came in to pitch in the 2nd and 3rd innings and surrendered just one run. That was answered offensively by Mark Thomas who hit a single to cash in a run and knot the score at 4 through 3 complete. The Hens exploded for 3 in the 4th inning, thanks to some control problems from the Cards hurler and a defensive miscue which allowed two runs to cross. The Cards responded with one run in their half of the 4th to bring the game to a 7-5 score with 3 left to play.

Mark Thomas came on in the 5th with a hanging arm, but was courageous and dominant in keeping the Hens from scoring anymore runs the remainder of the game. In fact he only surrendered one softly hit groundball in the final three innings – a huge effort given how much pain he was pitching through. In response the Cards could not get any runs in the 6th which meant they needed two runs in the final inning to send the game to extra innings. With the top of the line-up coming to plate, the Cards received a few hits and a few errors to bring in one run and have the bases loaded with two away. In this classic confrontation however, it was the Hens pitcher who came out on top earning a strikeout to end the game and the Cardinals Vintage aspirations.

To say that the result of this series is disappointing is as big an understatement as this writer can come up with. The Cards were left in disbelief that they didn’t emerge as winners of this series. Perhaps they underestimated the Hens and were too full of confidence that they were the superior team. They certainly felt as though they had an advantage in pitching, hitting and defense so the result was elementary, right? Well the Hens were full marks in proving the Cards wrong on this front. They played a great series in all aspects of the game, getting extremely effective pitching, clutch hitting and with the exception of one inning, outstanding defense throughout the series. Talk after the game on the Cards side of things expressed frustration that the better team did not win the series. But the proof is in the pudding – the Hens won the series 2 games to 1 and the Cards did not play bad baseball or give either loss away… They were just simply outplayed. Congratulations to the Hens for a well-earned series win and best of luck in the Vintage bracket.

The Cards will now compete for the Legends Cup and will start by facing the Cub’s who are going to be anxious to take a bite out of the Cardinals as well. This will be a best of 3 series to determine who will move on to the Legends championship series. First game is scheduled for Tuesday at Ireland park.

Game 2 of the Hens/Cards went on Sunday night and though the Cards came with high hopes to put the series to an end, it was the Hens who had other ideas. They took the game by a 7-3 margin, sending the series to a deciding third game on Tuesday night.

Andrew Schwalm started for the Red Birds and was his regular solid self. Thanks to his efforts, a Steve Maher RBI single and a bases loaded walk the Cards took a 2-0 lead after two innings. In the 3rd and 4th the Hens hitters took advantage of a rare off night by Cards hurler Steve Maher. Maher’s knuckle ball, easily the best in the league couldn’t find the mark which caused a few walks. Add to that the fact that the Hens could sit on his fastball and it made for a tough couple innings as they racked up all 7 runs off of him. Mark Thomas pitched the 5th and 6th and was outstanding but the Cards bats could only muster one more run in the game.

The story of the series so far has been some outstanding defense from both clubs. It can also be noted that in the matchups between the Hens pitchers and the Cards hitters, that the chuckers are doing a much better job of staying within themselves than the batters. The savvy and experienced pitchers that the Hens have are doing a great job of making the Cards try to do too much and consequently a lot of pop-up and easy ground ball outs have been made. The high octane offense of the Cards are spending too much time trying to hit 3 run bombs with no one on base rather than just trying to make solid contact. Hopefully they’ll learn their lesson in time for Tuesday’s matchup. Gametime is 7:00pm at Nelson field.

Game One of the play-ins began on Friday night as your Cardinals faced the Mudhens at Ireland park. The winner of the series will move on to play for the Vintage Cup while the other team will compete for the Legends championships. And while both teams have captured the Legends Cup in previous years, it is safe to say that Vintage Cup is the one that both teams want on their collective mantelpiece.

The game started out as playoff games should, with great pitching and very solid defense. It was clear that the game was going to be a low scoring affair. In the bottom of the 3rd with a runner at 2nd, Jeff Gilleland deposited a homerun to left-center to break the scoreless tie at the time. An inning later, a sharply hit Rob Whitteker single drove in Jason Saker from 2nd to make it 3-0 through 4 complete. The Hens responded in the top half of the 5th with a run on a sacrifice fly. That proved to be the final run in the game though, as Cards hurler Mark Thomas shut the door the rest of the way, as did the Hens pitcher at the time.

No matter which side you were on it was impossible to say that this wasn’t a great game. There were several highlight reel plays from both teams defensively and both teams were treated to some outstanding pitching. The Cards started with Steve Maher who surrendered two hits to the first 3 batters, but shut the door the rest of the way. Billy Lawrence came on for the 4th and 5th and was nothing short of dominant only surrendering one hit. And Mark Thomas sealed the victory with 3 of his usual quality innings, giving up just two hits to a very good hitting club.

The win gave the Cards the ever important leg up in this best of three series, but they know that the Hens will respond with their best when they face each other in game 2. That match-up is scheduled for 7:00pm on Sunday evening at Ireland park.

This past weekend marked the end of the regular season for your Cardinals, meaning that they’ll be scoreboard watching to see where they finish in the standings. After 20 games the Cards finished with a 13-5-2 record. With the number of games remaining for the teams around them, that doesn’t mean much as the standings could change quite dramatically in the final week of play.

The Cards faced the Giants on Friday and earned a decisive win. The Giants pitchers battled through a tight strike zone and some tired arms but just couldn’t muster enough to keep the game close. It was a great game for Cardinal players Dave Kerr and Jason Saker who were offensive catalysts for the team. Post-game festivities occurred over at Nelson field in light of the fact that there was no 2nd Ireland game to watch, so the Cards were entertained by the Red Sox/Tigers game. Jason Saker continued his hot night by barbecuing up a meat extravaganza for a hungry horde of jackals. Aside from the ‘beer guy’ showing up an hour after the games conclusion so that he could go home and make himself pretty, it was a great night.

The Cards played their final game of the year last night against the Tigers squad. It was an opportunity to guarantee themselves 2nd place or higher with a win, but unfortunately the Tigers had other ideas. Both teams played an outstanding first 3 innings, with great pitching keeping both teams off the board and away from any real threat of scoring. The Tigers got their first hit of the game in the 4th inning with a solo shot on a nice swing that just cleared the glove of rightfielder Rob Whitekker. In the following inning, they tacked on another 3 runs thanks to some good hitting and aggressive baserunning – both of which compounded a couple defensive miscues. The Cards got on the board in the bottom of the 5th with what could rightly be described as a phantom homerun off the bat of Vaughn Wamboldt. The ball jumped off his bat and was hit a mile in the air, but by all Tiger accounts bounced once before going over the fence. The umpires collaborated and decided it was a round tripper much to the disappointment of the Tiger players. From the dugout it looked like a bomb, but the Tigers were in a much better position to make the call so it appears to have been an erroneous call. It ended up being a moot point as two singles followed the phantom play so the run would have counted anyway. Nonetheless it was Wamboldt’s league leading 4th HR of the year and he was the first to admit there may need to be an asterisk by the last dinger! The Tigers tacked on another couple runs in the 7th inning to make a comeback even tougher. Tim Barnes did his best by hitting the 3rd HR in the game and his 1st of the year in his last at-bat. The Tigers ended the game with a 6-2 win and were the better team last night. They pitched exceptionally, made no errors, caught 2 steal attempts and hit the ball well in clutch circumstances. The Cards did get great pitching from Steve Maher, Andrew Schwalm and Mark Thomas. The Tiger runs were more a result of clutch hitting than their overall number of hits but that is exactly what all teams are looking for in late August leading to September.

The Cardinals are now off for two weeks as the rest of league concludes their play and jockey for playoff seeding. The time off is a good news/ bad news story for the Red Birds who get a chance to rest some aching muscles and get healthy leading up to the playoffs. However two weeks off at this time of the year may take away from some of the sharpness that they have worked hard to put together. Stay tuned to this website for updates on who the Cards ‘play-in’ opponents will be.