It was humid, partly cloudy, and the time was around noon on the tenth day of July, 2004. The festivities had just begun for Blackfest 2004, the Pleasantview Wiffle League’s All-Star extravaganza. Blackfest is the tournament that consists of excessive Faygo drinking, extreme Wiffleball playing, and black-people-food eating.

As the sun peaked over the horizon and the temperature increased, I arose from a deep summer slumber. The day began like a typical summer Saturday; I woke up too late and thought, “Crap! I slept in later than I wanted too.”

The day started off slow. As I waited for Louie and Rob Doenges, Freddie Fredrick and Korey “Bilbo Jr.” Hullinger to arrive, I thought about how we were going to have to rush to get things ready before everyone got there. Matt “Jim” Dunham showed up shortly after. The first issue we addressed was the center field fence; we had to put it up.

There was about a forty foot gap between the left and right field fences, so the boys and I grabbed some steal stakes and drove them into the ground with the sledge hammer, then we placed some old field gates next to them and tied them to the steaks with some wire. When we were done, the fence looked complete. The white gates extended from the left field foul pole, and they curved all the way around to the carport, or as it is now known, the party deck.

After we felt that the fence situation was under control we took some batting practice as we waited for more people to come. Within fifteen minutes people started to arrive and sooner than we new it, we had enough people to start the Home Run Derby. Since I am the commissioner of the Pleasantview Wiffle League (PWL), the name that I gave to our Wiffleball league, I was in charge of making the brackets for the Home Run Derby and later that day the tournament.

There were eight participants in the event, the main participants being Matt “Meat” Helmstetter, Louie, Bilbo Jr., and me; the other four were unimportant because they were eliminated in the first round. The real drama began in the second round, after all the losers (Jim, Fred, etc.) had been eliminated in the first round. First, Meat and Bilbo Jr. duked it out, resulting in a major upset, leaving Meat with the defeat.

Louie and I were involved in the next hit-off. We both hit two homers forcing us into a play-off, where we both hit the same number again with one. Then the dramatic second play-off came, when Louie hit one home run and I came to the plate. I jacked one homer right away, which put the pressure on. Then, with only one out left, I cranked another homer to defeat Louie. It put everyone into frenzy, because everyone likes to see Louie lose because he’s such a dick (or dickhead or any other slur which relates to Louie being so cocky).

The final round matched Bilbo Jr., the under dog, verses me. This round wasn’t as extreme as the previous. Bilbo Jr. came to the plate first and hit only one dinger. After he was done, I came up to bat and hit to easy homers to seal the victory for myself.

After participating in the Home Run Derby, we were all mighty hungry. The menu for our feast included the following: fried chicken, corn on the cob, biscuits, cornbread, green beans, baked potatoes, and Meat’s specialty, Texas Barbecue Beans, and we had lemonade to drink.

We started to make the corn and potatoes on the grill on the back porch of my house which is beyond the center field fence and the gigantic maple tree, which has since then started to fall apart, due to the ice storms that would hit the following winter. We prepared all the food here. While I grilled all the taters and corn, Louie ran off to Lee’s Famous Recipe to get the chicken. After Louie returned with the chicken, and the food was ready, we brought it to the party deck behind the right field fence under the carport, where we devoured our feas

Once we were all done chowing down on the food we moseyed on down towards home plate, which is between the chicken coop and the office. The office is actually a milk house. Way back when my grandpa owned the farm he used to milk cows. The milk house was where all the milk would be prepared. Since then, we’ve used it as a storage facility, a hangout, and finally our Wiffleball “equipment shed.” You may hear this building referred to as the milk house or the office, so now you know what we are talking about.  

Any who, we finally started the tournament. I had set up a green, wooden bench with a tan cushion that we used as our dugout. It sat on the side of the left handed batters box, well out of the reach of any normal human beings arms length.  I sat on it as everyone crowded around me. I collected names for everyone who was going to play in the tournament. With some help from Freddie and some others guys huddled around me, I was able to choose names from a hat. Four teams of three were created. Then I put them into a double elimination bracket.

The first game set my team, consisting of Greg “Luffman” Luthman, Craig “Durr” Darr, and myself, against Freddie, Bilbo Jr., and Jason Brown. Freddie’s team had our number throughout the game, the held us to only a couple of runs, while their hitting just tore my usually wicked pitching apart. The defeat sent us down to the loser’s bracket but we knew that that first loss wasn’t going to prevent us from winning it all (not really, after that loss we thought we were going to lose in the next round).

The other first round game posted Meat, Justin Brown, who is Jason’s cousin, and Jacob “Giraffe” Bryant versus Louie, Jim, and P.J. Stillwell, who is me and Meat’s cousin. It was somewhat of an upset when Meat’s team lost because they had Meat, a Jack of all trades on the Wiffleball field. He can pitch right and left handed, he switch hits, and he can play solid defense (but he can’t jump high because he’s not black).

Louie’s team squeaked by them with a close win going into the bottom of the third, which was the final inning, because at the time we were concerned whether or not we would have been able to finish the tourney before dark. Now all tournament games consist of three innings. (My have the times changed.

The third game faced Meat’s team versus my team, setting brother against brother in what would be an exciting game with a thrilling end. Each inning each team would score, keeping the game very close, until the top of the third. Meat’s team scored about four runs putting us in a deep hole. Luckily, we were home because the final inning was one that would set the tone for the rest of the tourney. We would answer their four runs, and then surpass them when I hit a walk-off solo home run, one of the many that I would hit. This advanced us to the next round while eliminating Meat’s team.

Meanwhile, in the winners bracket, Freddie’s team just clobbered Louie’s team (no big surprise, since Lou sucks) sending them down to face my red-hot team in the loser’s bracket.

The game that matched my team against Louie’s team was one that would make our offense, as well as our confidence, soar like a little birdie that just left the nest then grew up to be a fierce eagle that eats Louie for breakfast. In the first inning, we allowed two runs and we didn’t score, but we weren’t phased. Because in the second inning, we just unleashed our power hitting seven home runs combined, including my four, Luffman’s two and Durr’s one, while smacking down eight runs. 

The next inning we added four more runs to the score with me hitting three more homers. Obviously this shellacking of Louie highly insuperior team shot us strait to the ‘ship with loads of confidence and an upper hand mentally.

The first game in the ‘ship was tighter than my hands would have been around Freddie’s neck if we would have lost. Both teams, Freddie’s and mine, scored early and often, and by the time the bottom of the third rolled around it was tied, but the advantage was ours, because I was up to bat, and I was hotter than the couches that we were going to set on fire later that night. And I, of course, delivered with the game winning homer, again.  My whammy of a home run forced the ‘ship into a second and final game.

Finally we reached the final game. This game was for all the marbles, for the whole magilla, it was for the PWL Blackfest 2004 Tournament Championship.

Since the sun was setting and many people were getting restless and started to riot (not really), our teams agreed to shorten the game to one inning. The coin flip, which had been used throughout the tournament, was essential, in that it would determine who would have home field advantage. The coin was flipped up, I yelled out heads, the dramatic music was played, and finally the coin came dawn and … (pardon the dramatic pause, I just want to make it exciting) the heads side was up.

I cheered and, of course, chose to be the home team. Fred’s team only scored two runs on Bilbo Jr.’s home run, and when we came up we were sure we could catch them (once again, not really). First up was Durr (Oh crap.We're screwed for sure.), who, like he did so many times before, got out. Luffman came through with a double and I hit him in with a two run blast over the left field fence, tying the game at two to two.

The trend continued when Durr got out, again (surprise, surprise), Luffman smacked another double, and then I completed the, awesomely extreme comeback from the first round loss, to the PWL Blackfest 2004 Tournament Champions, with my second homer of the game, drilled to the same spot as the last bomb. Durr, Luffman, and I went crazy! We were jumping up and down and yelling with joy! We celebrated into the night, getting loaded on Faygo, partying with chickadees, and chillin’ with righteous fans, who envied our stellar performance on the Wiffleball field.

There was an All-Star game after the tournament, but the teams were “rigged.” The teams had me, Meat, P.J., and someone else against Fred and Lou and some other people. That’s right the teams were really fair. I didn’t play and Meat hit two homers over the house. Meat’s team raped the other team. Freddie, I’m sure, was pissed, but who cares. Now it’s history.