With the softball season becoming a distant memory, the SL End of Season party an 80’s drunken haze and the AGM less than two weeks away, let me take the time time on behalf of the 2017 SL committee to thank everyone for their good sportsmanship, dedication to their team and our league. Below is a a recap of our season and the EOS MVP winners.
The End of Season party was an 80’s theme held at Old Wesley. The food was exceptional, everyone’s spirits were high and we had a great night celebrating the division winners, MVP’s and the league itself. Nothing like a bit of self-congratulatory to make everyone feel good. The MVP awards were done a little bit different this year. We used the top 3-4 MVP vote-getters in each division to become the nominees and then let the membership vote their favourites in. Considering we only have 400+ members the response from over 140 different voters was incredible, and that was even after we deleted votes from email addresses like softball.maniac@notarealemail.com.
MVP nominees and winners below:
Prem Division | 1st Division | 2nd Division | ||||||
Female | Female | Female | ||||||
Ashley Downs | Dynamoes | Kate Mc Carry | Beachers | Muireann O’Farrell | Homers | |||
Suzanne Hannon | Reapers | Kristina McLaughlin | Base Devils | Sinead O’Rourke | Deadly Suspects | |||
Kim Kelley | Martyrs | Sinead Moore | Usual Suspects | Ciara Roe-Schotsman | Wicklow Wolves | |||
Laura Whitehill | Sauce Monsters | |||||||
Male | Male | Male | ||||||
Ken McCarthy | Dynamoes | Alex Shepherd | Base Devils | Mike Fives | Homers | |||
Wayne Cullen | Hippety’s | Johnny O’Brien | Thunderbolts | Pearse Newman | Hippies | |||
Dave McClelland | Reapers | Henry Spitzer | Sauce Monsters | Declan Maher | Mustangs | |||
Conor Lennon | Usual Suspects | Gary Bergen | Thirsty Camels |
For the first year we also had people vote on Rookies for each division.
In Prem, the qualification was just to play in Prem for the first time and our winner was the MVP nominee Sue Hannon from the Renegade Reapers. In 1st division the rookie of the year was Niall Lavery from the Dodder Dynamites and in 2nd division the rookie was Sabrina Flood from the Homers.
All in all, it was a very successful night – capping off a successful 2017 season. Our costume winners were both from the Suspects – Rosita Guidera and Claire Barry Murphy, and we’d like to thank everyone who took the time to dress up.
Just a few more bits of news to remind everyone. The Softball Leinster AGM is scheduled for the 4th of November in the Grand Canal Hotel. We’ll start the AGM at 1pm and once done we will take a short break and reconvene to discuss byelaw issues and ideas that the incoming committee will look to tackle for the 2018 season. We will be sending out an AGM agenda in the next few days and are still looking for volunteers interested in being on our committee in any capacity. Please let us know if you’re interested in taking on committee position by emailing us at info@softballleinster.ie. Thanks!
Jonathan Spielberg
Chairperson, Softball Leinster