Coulda, woulda, shoulda ...

Senior Greg Blohowiak and redshirt freshman Michael Porcaro, members of the Milwaukee baseball team, will be blogging all season long on the UWM website.

Blohowiak is back for his third season of blogging, while Porcaro gets his first go at it. Today is their third entry for the 2012 season.

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Minnesota Wild’n Out

The great thing about playing baseball is the quick turnaround and how it forces you to have a short memory. Three games in two days; four games in three days; so be it. Heading off to Minnesota on Thursday to play a four-game set in the Metrodome versus the Golden Gophers is a welcome challenge, especially after the sour taste the ECU weekend left in our mouths. Practice all week was intense and it prepared us both mentally and physically for the four games in three days.

I cannot continue this blog without mentioning the all too-usual stop at a Chinese buffet on our way to Minneapolis. What great food those places have to offer, not to mention the soft-serve ice cream machines that pump out four gallons of ice cream for our team alone (maybe 1 gallon just for Kaleb “Gulk” Engelke, to drop on the floor as we’re leaving).

There is nothing better than coming out of the bathroom to Gulk, toothless and all, staring in awe at the clump of chocolate/vanilla mixed ice cream on the ground at his feet, along with several others, Coach Bigler was tickled pink with amusement.

All in all, the trip there was, blahh, a few movies and some card games consumed the six hours of travel. We arrived at our AMAZING hotel, The Reniassance Inn (fully functioning hotel with an in-house ice rink and waterpark), and quickly took cover in our rooms examining the cozy beds, or cots (as Paco is very accustomed to, being strapped into his standing up in the early part of the night), and wasted the night away exploring the hotel as well as kickin’ it with teammates or family members who made the trip. To sum up the excitement of seeing friends and family members in Minneapolis I give you Pitcher Cale Tassi’s take on it. (It's ok, he won Pitcher of the Week, but who knew most of his family has a different last name..?



Seeing all the parents there this weekend, including my own (Bartman and Debra), was a breath of fresh air, as well as a reminder of the amazing support system this team has. The players are extremely appreciative of all the support, both fanatically and financially (in the form of dinners and snacks during the game) that the parents offered. Seeing all the familiar faces so far from home is indeed liberating and it is something that we will never forget. I hope that the support is maintained throughout the year, whenever plausible, as we want to share a special experience with all supporters and hope to create some new supporters throughout. Thanks again all who came to the Metrodome, we appreciate it dearly! Paco and I also appreciate the positive feedback from some parents about the blog, whether it be our 7th grade writing level (right Mr. Capasso?) or the behind the scenes perspective we provide.

I don’t have much to say about the games, as I hope those who are reading this also were either at the games or watched via GameTracker (or listened). If nothing else hopefully you all read the game capsules and saw that we split the series 2-2. Ask anyone who was there, other than the Gopher followers, and they would say we easily had the opportunity to sweep the series.

Our pitching and defense has been outstanding thus far and the big hit was eluding us, and once that happened you could see a switch being turned on. Jon Capasso found a way to get that big, if not HUGE, hit in game three to propel us to victory and after that, you could sense a calmness - as if a big sigh of relief was let out from all on the team.

Hitting is contagious and I think you saw a taste of what we’re capable of in the batter's box. The Gopher pitching is pretty good too, with a lot of arm strength and ability, our hitters did a great job grinding it out and not giving in. All in all we split 2-2.

I think I am going to cut off my portion and hand it off to Mike “Paco” Porcaro to try to fill in any gaps that I am missing, and I’m sure I’m missing a lot.

Quick thoughts from Blow....

We really missed sophomores Tell Taylor and Derek Peake on this trip as they are both fighting injuries ... we hope to have them back as soon as possible ... UPDATE on Peake too - he had surgery on his finger and will be out for about 3 weeks ... prayers for a quick recovery! THANKS again to the friends and family, and even some Panther alumni who came by! Hennepin Avenue in Minneapolis has Water Street beat any day of the year ... that street is just jam-packed full of people all day every day ... soo many interesting shops and clubs ... very upscale though ... every time a plane would fly over the Metrodome, I was afraid the roof was going to collapse ... I HATE the ViQUEENS ... The skyways that basically connect the whole city are amazing! Milwaukee needs them ... dearly! Ricks...Shoutout to the fellow Panthers who did amazing this weekend, whether it was winning championships or just matches, great job Men's/Women's Swimming and Diving, Men's/Women's Indoor Track and Field, as well as Tennis, Women's Basketball, and Men's Basketball! Good luck during your spring seasons Women's Soccer and Volleyball! I'm sure your coaches are having a great time getting the competitive flames going during the spring ... I know for sure Volleyball Head Coach Susie Johnson, who is awesome, is ... she is always looking ready to jump on the court at any time and I'm sure she still has it in her to keep up with her players!

There is soo much more I want to touch upon ... but I’ll stop ... here’s Paco (pictured)!

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Man, does it feel good to type this with a couple of wins under our belt. I’m extremely happy with the way our team battled back after dropping the first two games of the series. It sure was nice gaining some momentum as we head to San Diego this week.

Like Blow said, seeing all of the parents and family there was really refreshing. It was nice to look up in the stands and see those familiar faces. Panther Nation sure does travel well!

We arrived at The Reniassance Inn at around 10:30 Thursday night. This hotel was so nice!! They treated us like professionals. When we arrived they had water and popcorn set aside for our team. They even had cozy cots set aside in the rooms so the third person didn’t have to sleep on the floor. With the first game not until 6:35 Friday night some of us didn’t know what to do with so much down time. To pass the time on Friday, I ate Subway not once, but twice, and surfed the web while watching Ryan Braun tear up his press conference. Brauny’s Free!!!!

A lot of us got to enjoy some nice dinners with our families after the games. On Friday night, The Old Spaghetti Factory was a hot spot for dinner. Saturday night, my family and I went out with the Capasso and Pearson families to JD Hoyt’s while other guys enjoyed some burritos at Qdoba. One of the best things on the road is getting to enjoy some good restaurant food. Sure does beat the ham sandwiches I make at home.

Sunday’s game was big. We needed a win to get the split. Preparation began early in the morning with breakfast as most of us enjoyed a nice buffet downstairs in the hotel. We headed to the Metrodome at 10:45 ready to hunt some Gophers. Right when we got there freshman Justin Jaquish, AKA Quish, was informed that he would be making his first career start that day. Quish rose to the occasion, throwing into the sixth inning allowing just one run on five hits while striking out five. He settled in nicely after the first inning and looked like a seasoned veteran as the game went on. Great job Quish!!

Luke Meeteer, also a freshman, did a great job this weekend playing in centerfield and in the lead off role. He tracked down nearly every ball hit his way with his blazing speed. Big shout out to Mitch Ghelfi, another freshman, who won the brother battle in game 4 when he singled off his brother, Drew Ghelfi, who pitches for the Gophers.

All in all, it was a good weekend and now we get to take our talents to San Diego. Our pitching and defense has been awesome so far and hopefully the warm San Diego weather will heat up our bats! We got the monkey off our back this weekend getting the first win out of the way so now it’s time to go bananas!

Paco Thoughts ... Aaron Rodgers defending Brauny on Twitter was awesome! Our athletics program is pretty good ... FOUR Conference Championships this weekend!! Congrats track and swimming!! Good luck to the Men’s basketball team as they prepare for the conference tournament!

Cali, here we come!!!!!!!!!!!

For Openers...

Senior Greg Blohowiak and redshirt freshman Michael Porcaro, members of the Milwaukee baseball team, will be blogging all season long on the UWM website.

Blohowiak is back for his third season of blogging, while Porcaro gets his first go at it. Today is their second entry for the 2012 season.

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Oh Carolina, you keep callin’ me home

I think that’s an Eric Church reference. For anyone who knows me, knows that any reference to country music is few and far between. The three-game set this weekend against the Eastern Carolina Pirates was the first of the 2012 season.

It felt really good to get outside and see the ball off our hands and off the bat. The result of the weekend was most definitely not in our favor, and we have plenty of things we have to do better. We must give ECU credit however, they hit the ball well and pounded the zone on the mound, and coupling those things together will garner positive results.

The excitement amongst the team is very high, and who can blame us? We flew out of Midway in Chicago into Raleigh, NC. Greenville, where ECU is located, was a short bus ride away (1.5 hours). Greenville is a beautiful place, well for the two gamedays, with green grass and warm temperatures. I'm writing this as we’re riding the bus back to Raleigh to fly back home and the weather is quite Midwestern early spring (rainy and foggy). We woke up this morning to workout at the facility at ECU. Needless to say, that place is amazing. No wonder athletes such as Chris Johnson, Vonta Leach, and George Koonce were produced there.

There really isn’t much for me to say at this point right now. The games were a great opportunity for us to see where we are at, as well as what we need to work on. We are working very hard at correcting or honing our skills to put on the best performance game to game that we can. We may not win every game but you can bet that this team will play hard and will work as hard as we can.

There is some unfortunate news to relay. Derek Peake, sophomore outfielder, squared around to bunt a ball in game three and was hit in the finger, breaking it. He is not sure how long he will be sidelined for until he meets a specialist, and any update to us will be relayed to the readers of this blog. Prayers for a speedy recovery, he is a great player and teammate. Have a great day all!

Quick thoughts from Blow.....

Being polite to strangers is definitely preached down here ... Kudos to Mitch Ghelfi on his first collegiate hit this weekend ... Eric Semmelhack, Mike Schneider and Cale Tassi really put on a good performance on the mound, despite some adversity ... I forgot how important eating breakfast is ... thank you continental breakfast (especially the waffle maker) ... ALSO, I forgot how important sunscreen is when it is sunny out ... I'm a bit burnt ... the max squat by an ECU football player was 837 lbs ... Chris Johnson ran a 4.25 40 time there as well ... crazy crazy crazyyyy ... Here’s Paco!

Welcome back nation. Thanks to everyone who followed along this weekend whether it was through GameTracker, blog or another resource. Also, big thanks to the families that made it down to East Carolina to cheer us on. Much appreciated!

Well, this weekend didn’t go exactly as we had hoped it would, but you got to swallow it and move on. We've got to use this as a learning experience for the rest of the season. We made our fair share of mistakes this weekend and now we need to find a way to correct them.

In game one, we got a very good start from junior Eric Semmelhack. He settled in after the first batter and kept us in the game. From a hitting standpoint, we were held in check. Their starter controlled the tempo and pounded the strike zone. It was just one of those days where you got to tip your hat to the opposing pitcher for throwing a great game. I’ll tell ya one thing though, Jon Capasso made one of the sweetest plays I’ve seen when he robbed a home run in left field (Pictured at left). Follow him on twitter @joncapasso.

Game two was a rough one. We didn’t play Panther baseball. Highlight of the game was in the third inning when Derek Peake (@Peake_A_Leake7 follow him!!) clutched up with a 2-out RBI double to plate our first run of the year. From there it went downhill and we ended up losing 16-1.

Cale Tassi (@caletassi10) gave us a phenomenal start in game three. He only gave up just one run through six innings of work. He put is in a great position to win and kept ECU’s hitters off balance all game long. Our hitters had much better approaches at the plate than the previous two games. Unfortunately, good teams don’t go away without a fight and ECU rallied late to sweep the series.

Tough series, but it’s time to get back to work and get ready for Minnesota.

Paco’s thoughts ... ECU’s field is really nice; I especially loved their grass. According to an ECU fan Kaleb Engelke, AKA the Gulk, is on the All-American “flow” Team. I’m still trying to figure out why southern accents make people sound so friendly.

Until next time ... follow me on twitter folks @MdotPaco1

First Pitch Right Around the Corner...

Senior Greg Blohowiak and redshirt freshman Michael Porcaro, members of the Milwaukee baseball team, will be blogging all season long on the UWM website.

Blohowiak is back for his third season of blogging, while Porcaro gets his first go at it. Today is their first entry for the 2012 season.

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What up Panther Nation? My name is Mike Porcaro (Paco) and I will be replacing the legendary Sam Sivilotti on the blog this year. I am a redshirt freshman and play second base. I look forward to writing these blogs with Blow as we share the team’s journey in pursuit of a Horizon League Championship.

Last year, being a redshirt I obviously didn’t pick up any game experience, but at the same time I learned a ton about the game of baseball. Being at second base, I was around Cole Kraft all the time. I just tried to be a sponge when I was around him. I tried to soak up as much information from him as I could because he had been around for four years and experienced basically everything.

Cole and the rest of that senior class deserve a lot of credit. We had a really young team last year but they taught the young guys how to go about their business. They weren’t just great players they were great leaders. They might be off the roster this year but the lessons they taught us will live on.

As far as this year goes, we are still a pretty young team on paper. At the same time, we have a lot of talent. The coaches know it, we know it and now it’s time for college baseball to know it. We are just going to have to play good team baseball and execute. Things might not go our way at times because that’s just how baseball is but our mentality has got to be strong. Coach Doffek always stresses to us how important our mentality is going to be. When the going gets tough you got to have mental toughness.

Couple more things before I head out. Thanks to everyone who came out this past Sunday to our Bowling Event. It was another successful event! Thanks to all the sponsors for their support! Big thanks to our Director of Baseball Operations, Steve Sanfilippo, who put on the event and all the other hard work he does behind the scenes.

If you follow us on Twitter, thank you, if you don’t, hit the follow button @UWM_Baseball.

Later Panther Nation!


Shimmy Shimmy yeaaaaaaa!!

Holy moly did that year fly by! I welcome you all back to the Diamond Chronicles and hope that this year we can both entertain and educate. I want to first thank SID Chris Zills for allowing Paco and myself (Blow) continue this. Even with his reserves about it he allowed us to throw words at the community. Secondly, I welcome Paco with open arms to this experience because I think he will offer some great insight as well as some excitement only the youth (himself) can infer.

We are literally three days away from playing our first game of the 2012 season. We travel to East Carolina to play a three-game set against a team who is a perennial contender and 40-game winner a year ago. Our offseason went very well IMO, with our youth taking a step forward as well as our veterans honing their own skills. I truly believe that this year is unlike any of the other three that I have experienced leading up to a season. Our team is showing an extreme hunger to succeed, ambition, and hard work. I’m not saying the previous teams haven’t shown that but I am sensing a lot of it a lot of the time. Maybe this is because we’re so young and the unknown is invigorating, or that the dynamic of the team is that much different this year. Exciting, I know!

This is my final year of baseball here at UWM and with that thought brings a mixed bag of emotions. Excited, sad, happy, relieved, mad, but the number one emotion is calm. I am calm to the thought that this is my last year. There’s nothing I can do about aging, but there is something I can do about dealing with it. This year I am going to be as calm as a cucumber, ignoring the countdowns to the final home game, final road game, my last conference tournament, whatever it is. The team is my main focus and I want to be apart of an experience that is like no other and I want to be here to share it with you all along the way. Thanks for reading and I look forward to blogging with Paco the duration of the season!

Quick thoughts from Blow ... the Packers really really really really put me into a deep depressive state for about three hours after that game ... The "Dan Patrick Show" on FSN from 9-11 is quality, please watch it, none of this Skip Bayless stuff ... Sizzling sevens ... the most prevalent topic of conversation this year on our team will be “Finding Bigfoot” aka We’re going Squatchin’ in Ohio (Gunnar, Josh, Eric, Kaleb, and Cale know all about that) ... Please please please watch Breaking Bad and Mad Men ... amazing shows ... our newcomers are all quality players and even better guys ... Happy Valentines day! ... Peace out

follow me @gbloho15 <--------------------- do it!!

Back in the Saddle Again

Senior Sam Sivilotti and junior Greg Blohowiak, members of the Milwaukee baseball team, will once again be blogging all season long on the UWM website.

They are back for their second go around and today is their sixth entry.

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After an emotional weekend against UIC, we headed out to Cleveland for a three game set with Cleveland State. As it always is, the expectation is to go into a weekend series and to win every game. With Cleveland State at the cellar of the conference, it was reinforced throughout the week at practice how important this series actually was.

Typically, when teams come off an emotional win, or series of wins, it is only natural to have a letdown. With that possibility lingering, we knew that we still would have to go out and play competitive baseball in order to accomplish our goal.

At no point in time can we expect to go into a game and go through the motions and expect to win. Unfortunately, the weekend did not completely play out the way we expected. After arriving in Cleveland late Thursday evening, we received our room assignments and got to bed. The weekend schedule changed a little bit due to the weather that was moving into the Cleveland area – we were going to play a Friday doubleheader and a single game on Saturday in hopes of playing the game in order to get back to Milwaukee Saturday evening.

Friday morning came fast. Up early and off to the ballpark it was. Nine hours at the ballpark awaited us and mentally we needed to get ready. After the standard batting practice and infield outfield routines, both teams were ready for battle.

Game one started a little slow for us as we continued to fight the cold and our own mistakes at times. The first five innings of that game were a struggle.

Fortunately, we were able to win the last four innings and propel ourselves to a victory. In the team huddle following the game, Coach Doffek and Bigler reemphasized that our performance was subpar and that we need to elevate our intensity if we wanted to win the second contest. Ironically, the same things the coaches highlighted following the first game was the downfall for us in the latter contest.

A few crucial errors, leadoff walks and untimely hitting lead to our defeat in the second game. We simply did not execute all three phases of the game in order to win. It is extremely difficult to analyze a game following a defeat when we know that the other team did nothing in order to win. We simply beat ourselves and did not play to our potential. The team now had something to sleep on and build off of in order to close out the series.

Game three was set for 1:00 p.m. Saturday afternoon, but after rain showers in the morning the start time was pushed back an hour and a half. With game three underway, things seemed to be in control for the most part until the middle innings. After putting up a couple of runs and pitching out of a jam, it seemed as if we were in control. The fifth inning was a little different story. Cleveland State showed their resilience and fearlessness as they plated a couple of runs to cut our margin in half.

Fortunately, Mike Schneider came in and pitched out of another dicey situation to get us back in the dugout. From there on out, the pitching staff shut the door on Cleveland State and we were fortunate enough to walk out of there with a weekend series win. Following game three, everyone was ready to get back on the bus and get home in preparation for a huge upcoming weekend with Wright State.

As a team, we understand that we did not play our best baseball last weekend and that we need to shore some things up before battling Wright State. The Raiders will come to the Hank this weekend with something to prove. Rob Cooper, Wright State’s head coach, always has his team ready to play and this team they have a little extra motivation: we beat them in the Horizon League Tournament Championship in order to go to the NCAA Championship.

This weekend will be extremely important for us, as two titans clash in order to top the conference standings. Come out and support us at The Hank as this weekend should be filled with some high intensity fun to watch baseball.

The Road Show Continues ...

Senior Sam Sivilotti and junior Greg Blohowiak, members of the Milwaukee baseball team, will once again be blogging all season long on the UWM website.

They are back for their second go around and today is their fifth entry.

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Sunny with a chance of freezing...

Welcome back all! I am even welcoming Sam and I back, since we took the week off following our Ohio University stop due to the much-needed spring break. Our Ohio trip was lackluster, especially after going 1-3 on the weekend. Not much to be said there, so as we geared up for the week without classes and a ton of free time. There is no doubt we’d be energized to play some baseball in Fort Wayne, IN.

To say we were expecting a complete turnaround in weather, like we were traveling somewhere south, is a stretch. However, we definitely thought by heading a tad south and a tad east we could escape this Milwaukee bitterness. That was completely false. We jumped off the bus on Thursday following a five-hour ride and immediately called for our sweats. This past weekend was something out of the ordinary. We got into the hotel with some time to waste, which is a complete 180 considering we usually get in around 11 pm-1 am local time. Some of us took advantage of the time and went to the local Walmart which was close by. The deals at Walmart are totally worthwhile and I don’t understand how they don’t have a monopoly on the grocery industry yet, but nonetheless I loaded up with Powerade, beef jerky, cashews and some other goodies and got back to the hotel.

The next three days were kind of a blur. Maybe I can blame the cold weather or the long days, but really asking me to remember specific details of each game would be hard at best. What I can remember was how cold it was (20-30 degrees and 10-20 mph winds on any given day), how much I tried to forget about how cold it really was, the benefits of having a jet engine as a heater in the dugout, and our overall record on the weekend.

The first game was won, 5-4, after coming back in the later part of the game to take the lead and win. The second game we found ourselves on the bitter end of a 5-4 score, following a solid effort from Chad Pierce and Gunnar Eastman. I myself allowed the game-winning hit, but I (as for a lot of others) still will not agree with the 2-2 ball call by the umpire on the guy who got the hit. In the third game, a.k.a. the marathon game, we ending up winning, 5-1, following a suspension in the game due to darkness.

It was the second game of the doubleheader which was also supposed to be a seven-inning game. This game was tied at one all the way until the next day, Sunday, in the 12th inning, when we poured on four runs. In the fourth game we ended up struggling to get in a rhythm offensively and we lost 3-0. A weekend split at IPFW.

We can take alot out of the games we played this past weekend. There are areas of our game where we all need to improve. We are stressing it ten-fold considering our first conference series is this coming weekend at The Hank (<<< Home Field!!!).

There are certain aspects of this game that we cannot allow to happen and at times we struggle with disallowing them to happen, however, we are very confident in our abilities and are confident we will succeed. The record for us thus far is something that you can take with a grain of salt. We beat a couple big-time schools, and have played well against some as well. We also have “choked” or basically not played well in other games.

Our true identity is not made in these first 20 games, as we strive to becoming the best team we can as conference play begins. This weekend versus Butler is going to be very fun as well as very telling as to what type of team we’ll be. I urge you all to come out to The Hank (Hampton/Green Bay Ave.) and watch some quality baseball. Whether it is because you enjoy baseball, you know one of the guys on the team, or you just want to show support for a team that will never give up, we would definitely appreciate it!

Sivvy is taking the week off to complete some school work and whatnot. He’ll be back next week for sure to break down our hopeful series win versus Butler. Til next time!

Quick Thoughts From Blow ... this weather is stupid ... cold then warm then somewhat warm then super cold ... figure it out mother nature ... we want to practice and play at The Hank ... Opening day tomorrow!!! Go Brewers! Go Orioles! (<< Personal reasons) ... if MLB Opening day doesn’t get you in the mood for baseball, I don’t know what will ... our trainer Kevin “Flo” Florentino has a lot of sweet pairs of shoes ... my face is still wind/sun/both burned from this past weekend ... I wanna see Limitless, someone let me know if its good ... lastly, it’s gonna feel so amazing not having to travel on Thursday, get into a hotel, and play ... sleeping in my own bed, cooking my own meals and seeing family is gonna be a breath of fresh air this weekend! Good day to all!

California Here We Come...

Senior Sam Sivilotti and junior Greg Blohowiak, members of the Milwaukee baseball team, will once again be blogging all season long on the UWM website.

They are back for their second go around and today is their fourth entry.

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Pump the brakes...

Another weekend for baseball and yet another tiring travel schedule. Boy oh boy, was Wednesday morning a riot. First of all, I was very happy to only have two days to dedicate to classes this past week. Second of all, it is, however, a very good way to get a little behind in a couple of classes. Oh well.

Wednesday started off as horribly as it could have, with a ton of snow. The snowflakes were literally the size of golf balls as we drove to the Klotsche Center to pack our bags in the bus that would pick us up at the College Avenue park and ride. Alas, there was no bus scheduled (or it just didn’t show up) to pick us up and eventually bring us to the airport. This seemed to be a problem, and if you knew anything about us you’d know we were clowning about it the whole time asking if we had to take cabs or hop on the city bus. Nonetheless, we have a good amount of guys who drive to the park and ride themselves, so getting the majority of us there was not the issue. It was getting the 30+ guys from the park and ride to the airport that was the issue. We had people dropping off others at the airport then turning around to pick up some more and eventually our assistant head coach Cory Bigler grabbed a UWM van to transport about 15 guys and all their bags to the airport.

Amid this cluster of testosterone and morning breath was the feeling of excitement and anxiety as well knowing we are headed to beautiful California but would have to hurdle the most debilitating obstacle of them all, the airport.

If you think getting 35 guys to the airport in a snowstorm was miserable, imagine getting 35 guys checked into a flight, getting their bags tagged and getting them all through security by the time our flight left at 9:40. My expectations were low for Airtran, based on all the horror stories one can hear about an airport. However, they really did a very good job at accommodating us. They had us check in and baggage stowed in the matter of 15 minutes, and since it was already 8:45 we really needed to high tail it through security. Turning the corner towards our gate and seeing the LONG line for the security checkpoint was not the best sight ever. To make a long story short, we made it through in time, barely, and we boarded the plane.

While in route to California we hit some minor bumps in the air and before we knew it we had landed. I have never been to Cali before and let me tell you, I could live there. It only took me about five minutes of being outside to decide that 65 and sunny was right for me (especially after what we’ve seen this winter). We landed in San Francisco, but our hotel was in San Jose, a 40 minute commute. We arrived in San Jose and drove through the downtown area anticipating our destination. We passed several very large and elegant hotels and thought “could it be” (Hangover reference) but to much of our avail we landed a much smaller, nice hotel in the Ramada. This place was about seven blocks away from the heart of downtown but had some eateries within walking distance, no one was going to complain since it was sunny and warm, we’ll walk anywhere in that.

We settled in around 1 pm and some of us decided to walk about the town, get some food, or what not. I went to a nice little diner that is comparable to a Big Boy. My roommate, Kyle Spurley, and I then trekked back to the hotel and continued on to pass out for a good four hours.

I’ll fast forward to the morning on Thursday where we ate some pretty plentiful continental breakfast, not to mention freshmen Ryan Solberg consumed half his body weight in waffles. We were leaving to go to the field at 3:15 so we had from 10 until then to do what we wanted, whether it was go for a walk to campus, or relax, we had some time to kill. I would love to continue on writing, however, I’m going to cut it short and somewhat give Sivvy a nice assignment for the rest. Exams and homework will catch up with ya in the whole scheme of things.

Really Quick Quick Thoughts ... San Jose is very nice, however I wouldn’t recommend that as a destination for a family vacation .... a 106-flavor soda machine must be brought to Milwaukee ... as does a Baja burrito Mexican food place thingy ... Kyle Spurley is the worst at MLB The Show 11 ... Gunnar Eastman needs to learn how to shuffle and deal cards quicker ... the UWM Union MUST get a Jamba Juice ... yummmmmmmmm ... Lastly, airport security is soooo annoying, and you can ask Josh Uhen about that, but it’s completely necessary. Thanks TSA for doing a great job at keeping us safe!

Here’s Siv..

Rejuvenated, and rested, I finally am able to collect my thoughts. Another disappointing weekend on the diamond side of things but a good experience for us all. Thursday evening we took on San Jose State. They came in as the #30 team in the country and basically took it to us. Offensively we were OK, but defensively and pitching the baseball was a let down. That message was reinforced after the game. We need to do a better job of playing all three phases of the game.

Ironically, the next day we came out and took a completely different approach against UC Davis. It started off in the morning, when we went on a nice 30 minute team jog around downtown San Jose. Surprisingly, to me at least, I wasn’t aware that San Jose had around 1 million people in the surrounding area. Huge city. Not what I was expecting at all. As we were running, I had the pleasure of sharing the jog with Coach Bigler and Chad Pierce. Running is never fun whether its for conditioning purposes or just to get a little jog in. Fortunately, with the sense of humor that Coach Bigler has and the collaboration of Pierce and myself throwing a few one-liners in there, the jog was actually quite pleasant. I also think its important to note that the “scenery” around San Jose is NOT bad at all either, which helps open your eyes to things a person might not always see, hahaha, which should be taken as a compliment to all the women out there!

On the baseball side of things, Jordan Guth did a great job keeping us in the game but we just couldn’t get our sticks going. UC Davis brought out a lefty throwing 84 mph, but had a very good mix of pitches. We just couldn’t seem to get anything going as his changeup basically kept us off balance all night. UC Davis was a solid team but were not overly impressive. On the other side, you have to tip your cap because they did nothing to beat themselves. They made all the routine plays and commanded the zone on the pitching side of things. One day it’s the pitching, the next day it’s the hitting. Right now we simply aren’t doing enough to deserve the breaks that other teams are getting.

Following the game against Davis, we went back to the hotel and basically sat around and reevaluated our season at that point. Mentally we needed to check ourselves and come out the next day and play good fundamental baseball against Santa Clara. Outside of our first trip to Tennessee, I’d say that our game against Santa Clara was our most complete game of the year. Chad Pierce gave us his best start of the year while throwing through an impingement in his right shoulder. He straight battled for us and had a “no hitter” through four-plus innings. Defensively, Sam Koenig made a number of great plays at third base that helped save and eliminate the potential for a few big innings for Santa Clara. We were having fun! Kids out there diving around in the dirt, beautiful weather, we were winning, it just seemed like our confidence was at its highest.

Offensively, we were only able to muster a couple of runs, but it was more than enough as we shut out Santa Clara and played a great all around the game. The weekend was looking half decent as we now had a chance to leave California with at least a split.

Unfortunately, Sunday was another disappointment. As we take a step forward, it's two steps backward. We need to hit the ground running and not stop. San Jose came out and put up a few runs in the first inning and the tempo was set. They continued to pile on a few more as the game went on and the offensive surge just couldn’t keep pace as we were playing from behind. They ended up going on to winning the game and closing the door on the opportunity to leave Cali with a split. At the conclusion of the game, our team meeting only provided more fireworks as we were informed of our 6:30 am conditioning session on Tuesday morning when we got home. NO FUN whatsoever.

Following the game, a former player of ours, Jeff Gordon, invited our entire team to some fine dining. Gordon’s father is an investor in a restaurant in Campbell, Calif. (a town next to San Jose), and we were gladly willing to chow on some fine dining. The food was excellent. The restaurant even had touch screen soda machines that had over 100 different flavors of soda. The coolest soda machine any of us had ever seen. The food was great, the atmosphere was fun, and we were able to relax and actually enjoy the trip a little bit more. A big thanks goes out to Jeff! Back to Milwaukee it was around 12:00 pm Pacific time (the team at the airport pictured). The plane was a little, typical way to end a weekend after losing three of four, and we did not reach Milwaukee until about 6:30 am local time.

A long weekend finally came to an end. This weekend we had to Athens, Ohio to take on Ohio University. A four game set is slated for the weekend. Continue to follow us and continue to support us. “Its not where you start the year but where you finish it.”

Thanks for following, and keep checking in for more!

Is it Spring Yet?!?

Senior Sam Sivilotti and junior Greg Blohowiak, members of the Milwaukee baseball team, will once again be blogging all season long on the UWM website.

They are back for their second go around and today is their third entry.

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Holy Barnacle Batman...

What a totally random title for this weeks "Diamond Chronicles". If I could choose a word for the past two weeks, 'random' would be up there. Starting in Clarksville, Tennessee, with two games cancelled due to weather and our lone game on Sunday lengthened by rain delays and numerous “lightning is within 10 miles” warnings.

The doozie, however, was in the 10th inning - Illinois State had two runners on with no outs and, alas, another lightning warning that actually turned into us retreating into the gym due to the tornado sirens blaring outside. As we watched two Austin Peay basketball players shoot around and quite frankly in unimpressive fashion, not dunk, we wondered if the field would still be around when we returned. Long story short, it was, and that game is history. The final game vs. Austin Peay was cancelled and we returned home.

Siv and I did not ignore the Diamond Chronicles this past week. We were actually caught in a very tough position with the amount of schoolwork we had to finish before the Thursday bus departure time. We apologize for not fulfilling our duties as far as blogging goes however, to be brutally honest, we wouldn’t have much good to say. As far as this weekend in Arkansas goes, the same could be said, but we’ll do our best to describe how the team is feeling as a whole following it.

We departed at noon on Thursday and made our way on a 12-hour (or 10, or 14, or 11, depending on which guy on the team you talk to) trip to Fayetteville, Arkansas. Movies, cards, dumb bus games and some school work later, we arrived and checked into the Clarion Inn.

We all practically hit the sheets right away with the exception of a couple rooms who took the opportunity to stay up a little later to become more acclimated with one another. Breakfast, busing and batting practice all concluded we found ourselves standing on the line at Baum Stadium for the national anthem. It was a really hard fought game, and we gave them everything they could handle and then some, however as you can see we came out on the wrong end of the result. This loss definitely left us with a sour taste in our mouth because of our overwhelming ability to beat ourselves. At this point I can confidentially say that we have yet to really get beaten. We have found a way to break down, one way or another, during the course of two or three innings and give the opposing team the advantage.

It is staggering to see how hard we work and fight during practice and games to get better only to take a step backward during a select 10 minutes of a game. We dug ourselves a six-run deficit early on and proudly we climbed back into the game only to see our efforts squashed following a few walks, errors and a balk in there and lose, 15-6. That final score was not indicative of the game whatsoever. But whatever right, we had to bite our lip and come out with a chip on our shoulder the next day and play the game we love.

Saturday’s game was one that I thought would end in a 20-19 score. The way that both teams scored runs in the first half of the game was scary. Our offense jumped out to a lead only to see it go away. We then built up another lead of three to only see the same happen. That game ended 13-9 which slowed from my anticipated final, but was still a high-scoring game, especially since the new bats this year.

That game featured nine total errors (three for us and six for them) and a handful of walks and hit batsmen. It was another game in which we left with a sour taste in our mouths. We felt embarrassed to be out there for two straight days and perform the same way both days. We mimicked our game one mistakes and mental mishaps and probably added a couple new mistakes. It really isn’t a good feeling, as some of you can attest, to be in the driver's seat of a game to only see the momentum shift so dramatically that you feel as though you’ve had no say in it.

That's how I feel the game went, one momentum swing after another. But hey, we still have another game to play, and we can only log this game into our memory bank and continue onward. Our goal is to continue to get better day after day while playing baseball the right way, whether that is taking a positive and repeating it or taking a negative, such as the last two games, and learn from it.

Quick Thoughts from Blow...The dumb bus games we play (hat game, travel game, “shooting game..?”, camping game, and “this is how you play the game” game) are really fun to do with the freshmen, especially when they are completely flabbergasted ... the expression is priceless ... however, last year pitcher Cale Tassi was sooo confused and mad he went and looked up on google the different games while on the bus, so he didn’t feel left out. Can you say bush league?! ... Freshmen Mike Porcaro is yet to grab the rim ... we’re waiting Mikey P ... Arkansas is a really fun place to play but I hate it so much ... thanks a ton to the Candyman who takes pictures for the opposing teams and brings them treats (tootsie rolls, jolly ranchers, bubbleyum, and even better Peanut butter cookies). We need to get some Diamond Girl tryouts at UWM ... the Clarion Inn was better last year ... mainly because NCAA’s for Track and Field were held at Arkansas and everyone stayed there ... made for a sweet hotel atmosphere ... lastly, I wanna thank The Dave Matthews Band for keeping my sanity on this bus ride ... there is a certain artist and song for everyone, I urge you to find yours. Dave Matthews Band “What You Are” is mine...

Here’s Sam…

Alright everyone, back from a week off and boy do we have some things to catch up on. As Blow mentioned, our week of absence was not intentional but merely influenced by the amount of homework and tests we had to prepare for. All in all, we have been pretty busy between traveling, playing ball and maintain our school schedules. With that being said, we have been playing some baseball along the way.

Blow mentioned our trip to Austin Peay. Definitely was not the results we were looking for. The first game was a total debacle … simply didn’t pitch the ball, hit the ball or field the ball efficiently enough to give ourselves a chance to win.

Ironically, Sunday’s game with Illinois State was the complete opposite of the first game for the first 24 outs. Illinois State took it to us on Saturday, but we came out with something to prove. We wanted to earn some respect and dignity back. We played well and endured the two or three rain/tornado delays that took place throughout the day. Unfortunately, with an 8-4 lead going into the top of the ninth it simply wasn’t enough. They ended up scoring four in the top half and took the game into extra innings. We managed to shut them down in the tenth but as another tornado warning came through the area we needed to the clear the field. All three teams (Illinois State, Austin Peay and us) went into the Dunn Center, Austin Peay's Basketball Arena, and had a little comedic relief watching some of their basketball and football players shoot around.

Eventually, we took the field an hour and a half later and weren’t able to hold off the storm as Illinois State scored five in the top of the 11th to cap off the day with a sour taste in our mouths.

Practice that week was not fun or entertaining to say the least. A lot of groundballs, mechanical work and running was essentially the agenda for the week. We knew we had something coming after the poor performances over the weekend. Although a little hot and bothered by the performance on the weekend the coaches and players alike understood that we needed to put that behind us and prepare for the nationally-ranked Razorbacks.

On to the bus again Thursday and another journey in front of us.

We arrived in Fayetteville, AR, late Thursday evening and received our room assignments. Everyone pretty much went to bed except maybe myself, Doug Dekoning and Eric King. Instead of sacking up for the night and getting some quality sleep we decided to watch four consecutive episodes of “U.S. Marshalls” on A&E and bunked up around 3:00 in the morning. The next morning and the next three days consisted of the same thing. Up early, eat breakfast, get to the field, play our game and back to the hotel and off to dinner. The three game set had its fair share of ups and downs. Blow did a good job of summarizing so I would prefer to not relive the replays of those games considering we could of came out of there with a series win.

Up next, the California sunshine as we head to the west coast to play four games against San Jose State, Santa Clara and UC Davis. Follow us along the way and we will be more efficient in our postings as this one took a while. Once again, we will keep grinding it out, stick with us and the results will be there when its all said and done. Remember its not where you start the year but where you finish it! We’ll see you all next week!