Click Click: Dem "Sluggers" Top GOP 15-10 in Congressional Game

Heavy Republican losses in November and on Wednesday night wouldn't stop these die hards. (Josh Novikoff)

"Yeah Energy and Commerce!”

“Go back to the minors. Go back to local government. The school board!”

“G-O-P. G-O-P.”

“No you can’t!”

“That’s for not co-sponsoring my bill.”

“Eeeeeaar-maaarrk. Eeeeeaaar-maaarrk.”

And so it went from the crowd at last night’s 48th Annual Roll Call Congressional Baseball Game. Interns saved not patches of grass on the Mall but rows of seats behind the dugouts. Junior staffers donned colorful campaign trail T-shirts and waved homemade signs as if if they were conducting visibility at a state fair. But this time, they were rallying for runs. Press secretaries cheered from the sidelines as their senior legislators pitched balls and strikes. And for several painful stretches, it was mostly balls.

Errors, walks, unearned runs, and relief pitching that would embarrass even the Nationals were the name of the game as congressional Democrats jumped all over their cross aisle rivals, quickly relinquished a six run lead, but eventually came back to beat the Republicans, 15-10. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) walked two in the bottom of the second, setting up a Tim Bishop (D-N.Y.) double in the left-center gap that drove in the first two runs of the game. It was a major league caliber hit on a night when merely putting the ball in play was enough to get the job done against infielders more adept at chairing committees than cleanly fielding groundballs. A throw home for a rushed play at the plate when you should have just gone to first? WTF, Rep. Kevin Brady (R-Tex.)? A perfect throw wouldn’t have even gotten the runner. And it was not a perfect throw.

The Dems were off to a shocking 6-0 lead after two innings, no small feat considering they haven’t won since 2000. But optimism quickly turned to a feeling of “here we go again” for pitcher Joe Baca (D-Calif.) and his team. A double here. Infield single. A walk or two and a bases loaded triple from Gresham Barrett (R-S.C.) and the Republicans had trimmed the donkey lead to 1 before an out was even recorded in the 3rd, and tied it by the end of the inning.

Adam Putnam (R-Fla.) relieved Shinkus in the bottom 3rd and proceeded to pitch the ball everywhere but the strike zone, eventually forcing Shinkus to retake the hill. The Dems crossed the plate 8 times that inning! Would the game end before Metro closed for the evening? We knew the Lerners wouldn't be paying to keep the trains running and as the clock neared 9 p.m., and we were still in the bottom of what was now a 14-run 3rd inning. Mercifully, these things only go seven.