The 3rd season of the Outlandish Baseball League is now underway! With every margin of victory sitting at 2 or 3 runs, this looks to be a close competition for every division this year. Each team will have just 10 games to try to reach the top 2 spots in their division to advance to the second round robin. We'll start with the Nexus Division, where the league's founding teams are starting to see just how close the competition has gotten since season 1 in their now reassembled division.
Nexus Division
The Fire Emblems set the tone for their attempt at returning to the championship series this season in New Delsta Stadium, with the Emblems winning 2-0 thanks to just three extra base hits off of Temenos Mistral. Byleth Eisner was instrumental in keeping the Octopath Travelers off the board in the 6th and 7th innings, striking out 4 in just 2 innings and holding off an Octopath rally on the brink of tying the game in the 6th.
Over in Stoker Field, Terra Branford continued to show her pitching dominance she has maintained through both previous seasons of the OBL, striking out 12 against the Belmont Curse on the way to the Baron Red Wings earning their own 2-0 victory. The complete game shutout is yet another stellar start for Terra, who is likely to be the pitcher to watch for once again this season.
Shards United was hoping to get off to a better start this year after barely winning their division last season, but was stymied by some terrible luck against the Golden Suns. Artemi Kisleva's usually sure bat found nothing but double plays both times he came up to bat with a runner on first, and Kalipa'i Noma'a - United's main power bat - saw a diving Feizhi rob him of a sure double, potentially a triple, laced into right field in the 6th. Garet batted in both runs for the Suns against Nasira al-Tabib, whose normally sure pitching has been waning since the midpoint of season 2.
The 2-0 victory for the Golden Suns is an auspicious start for a team undergoing a reorganization after season 2, where the formerly named Camelot Aces lost about half of their team with the golf and tennis academy students returning to their original sports. Now tied with two of the three best teams from season 2, the Suns look to keep pace with the Emblems and Red Wings in this first round robin.
Terminus Division
Over in the Terminus Division, the six teams added between season 1 and season 2 struggled to figure out their team identities in their first games. The Ivalice Alliance benefitted from an early pitching change by the Tohjo Trainers, keeping Blaine from notching another complete game to his total from last season. After just 4.1 innings and 2 earned runs, the Trainers decided to pull Blaine early and actually managed to catch up to the Alliance with a long rally in the top of the 6th, only for Sabrina to give up a dagger of a homerun to Frimelda Lotice in the 7th inning. The Alliance walked out of the game with a 4-2 win, and a triplet of bruises from wayward pitches hitting three different batters during the contest.
The Pelican Stars, meanwhile, discovered a new appreciation for the late-game rally. Down 1-0 in the top of the 9th against the season 2 champion Crystal Braves, the Stars managed to string together 6 hits in a row, knocking out a waning Y'shtola Rhul and preventing Cid Garlond from even getting warmed up as the Pelican Stars took a 3-1 lead late. The 13 hits by the Stars was the most by any team after 1 game, and a sign that, perhaps, the Pelican Stars have what it takes to win this newly formed division.
Over in Balamb Gardens, the UA Heroes needed a hero of their own but could not find one, only managing 3 hits against a dominant Rinoa Heartlily start for the Balamb Guardians in their 2-0 loss. Shoto Todoroki also looked a bit unsettled in his first start of the season, only pitching 3 innings, giving up 5 hits along with those 2 runs - both solo homeruns by Tifa Lockhart and Barret Wallace.
Margins Division
On to the Margins and Expanse Divisions, where the myriad of newly added teams for season 3 are showing some interesting signs of what their teams are made of.
Akyn Anthan of the Menovar Redtails shows some promising competition for Terra Branford's top spot amongst pitchers with his own dominant complete game shutout, willing the Redtails to a 2-0 win against the Blood Gulch CobraHawks by only giving up 2 hits and 4 walks while striking out 9. Those 2 runs for the Redtails were thanks to a walk-off homerun by Fisia Laralmyr, utterly destroying the CobraHawks's Vanessa Kimball's chances at her own 9-inning shutout. Both teams came out of the game surprised at their starters' performances, as neither imagined themselves to be pitching-focused teams, though that will now be put to the test with both pitchers needing to get rest over the next 4 games.
The Star Warriors came out on top in a fittingly chaotic game against the Chaos Emeralds in Dedede Arena, winning 3-1 with just 4 hits and the two teams' pitchers combining for 2 earned runs. Sonic, in particular, had a day to forget, committing an error and being caught stealing despite having 2 hits in the game. Knuckles and Shadow, meanwhile, attempted to bolster the Emeralds' chances in this game, with Knuckles going 3-for-4 and scoring the lone run while Shadow kept the Star Warriors from taking an even larger lead thanks to robbing a homerun. The Emeralds' struggles allowed Zan Partizanne to notch a complete game with 9 strikeouts despite giving up 8 hits, with the Star Warriors looking to be a strong defensive team early on.
The surprise of this first round was in Tennozu Park, where the Piffle Dragonflies fell to the Shinagawa Aces 4-1 thanks to an extremely unlikely source of runs. The park roared as Maya Fey, the leadoff hitter for the Aces, managed to catch a pitch from Shidou Hikari perfectly square, causing the wind to catch the ball and send it sailing barely over the fence for a 3-run homerun in the 7th inning.
Expanse Division
On the topic of power bats, there were plenty of homeruns in New Eridu, as the Bangboo defeated the Ravnica Gatewatch 4-2 with 3 homeruns in the contest. Gideon Jura looks to be an early contender for the anchor of the Gatewatch, scoring both runs for Ravnica with a homerun and scoring from 1st on a double by Elspeth Tirel. The Bangboo, meanwhile, look to have a well-rounded team despite only having 5 hits in the contest. Plenty of hard-hit balls by the Bangboo just happened to fall into the reach of the Gatewatch, though Lighter and Qingyi made sure their hard hits were well out of reach with both of them homering during the contest.
The highest run total of the round belonged to the Remnant Hunters, who defeated the Metro City Fighters at Haggar Memorial Stadium 5-2. Sun Wukong managed a 3-for-4 outing with 2 RBIs in the 2nd inning, while Ruby Rose accounted for the other 3 RBIs for the Hunters off of a 2nd inning 2-run double and a later sacrifice fly to extend the lead. Penny Polendina was able to ride the lead through the entire game, only giving up 2 runs to an Alex Galligan homerun in the 2nd inning as well.
Finally, the Mario All-Stars showed their baseball prowess by defeating the Velvet Masks 4-1 thanks to a 3-run rally in the 5th inning. Yoshi and Luigi ended up being the benefactors of the rally, with Yoshi earning 2 RBIs and Luigi 1. Futaba Sakura attempted to help the Masks hold off the rally in the 5th inning, only to leave the contest without a single out recorded, earning her the first infinite ERA of the season. The dominant bats of the All-Stars were spread throughout the lineup, with only Magikoopa unable to record a hit during the contest in Peach's Courtyard. It will be interesting to see if they can keep up the momentum that they've earned early.
Round 1 Awards
The Pitcher of the Round award was a closer contest than expected, but Terra Branford's 12 strikeout complete game shutout of the Belmont Curse is hard to argue against. A continuation of her dominance in both of the previous seasons of the Outlandish Baseball League, the Baron Red Wings are once again benefitting from an incredible performance by the most reliable pitcher the league has seen to this day.
The Batter of the Round award needs to go to Garet of the Golden Suns. Though he and Sun Wukong of the Remnant Hunters had similar box score lines, the difference between the two is the Golden Suns being completely reliant on Garet's 2 RBI in his 3-for-4 outing to win 2-0. Sun Wukong's contributions were also great to have, but Ruby Rose helped shoulder some of the weight for the Hunters in their game.
The Game of the Round award is a tough one to call due to most of the games ending so similarly. I'd have to give it to the back-and-forth contest between the Tohjo Trainers and the Ivalice Alliance. A pair of rallies by the Alliance in the 4th and the Trainers in the 6th kept the offenses alive, while Mustadio Bunansa's dominant 3.2 innings of pitching was able to shut down the Trainers late. A grudge may also be brewing from that matchup after the Trainers hit 3 batters of the Alliance through the game. We'll have to keep an eye on their next matchup in Round 2 to see if the Alliance retaliate or let their bats speak for them.
