How Many Copperheads Does it Take to Change a Tire?

The 2010 Southern Ohio Copperheads are used to fixing their swings and repairing their techniques, but how would they do at fixing a flat tire?

While driving back to the Nelsonville dorms from the GLSCL All-Star game yesterday, one of the two vans carrying Copperheads players hit a flat tire.

The seven players and pitching coach Jonathan Nichols, along with Assistant General Manager Jessie Martin and Media Director Ben Strunk, spent twenty minutes figuring out how to jack up the 12-passenger van and unload the spare tire from the trunk. After twenty minutes they realized they needed to move to more level ground.

Another twenty minutes goes by, but the teamwork of Seth Streich, David Starn, Andrew Waszak, Luis Pollorena, Tory Doerr, Cameron Flynn, Strunk, Nichols, and vocal support of Wes O’Neill finally got the job done.

The van started up and the tires rolled, but the night was not over yet. As the team worked to fix one van, they neglected to turn off the lights from the other van, which caused its’ battery to die. While the players’ muscles were enough to put one van back on the road, they did not possess the natural ability to spark car batteries, nor did they possess jumper cables.

The team left Nelsonville at 8:30 am for a long day in Cincinnati which was made incredibly longer by this unique situation. The flat tire happened around 2:00 am and the dead battery around 2:45 am.

In a sticky situation, the players came up with different ideas how to find jumper cables. Some decided to walk down the road to a creepy house to see if they could help, some checked an abandoned car for unlocked doors that might open the trunk, and others just stayed at the van and found targets for a rock throwing competition.

When none of the options panned out, except for some bullseyes on a telephone pole, O’Neill began calling for roadside assistance. Fortunately, as soon as he dialed the number a woman stopped to see if the team needed help and supplied a battery charger.

The vans finally got under way again and, despite extremely dense fog, eventually made it back safe to Nelsonville around 3:15 am.

Summer baseball is filled with on-field memories, but it’s the off-field memories that build team relationships and make the experience memorable.