“We’re not about to lose to those guys three years in a row,” a delighted Mike Lupica said in the joyous — for the Writers — aftermath of Saturday’s Artists and Writers Softball Game at East Hampton’s Herrick Park.
The Scribes’ sparkplug when he played, Lupica coached at third base this time, a chore that he said later proved to be just as tough on his lower back as playing, but the pain undergone evidently proved worth the pleasure derived from the Writers’ 9-6 win — their first in the hoary series since 2022.
There were at least two firsts: one, the felling of a fan, a woman whose identity village police withheld because of privacy concerns, by a foul ball off the bat of the Writers’ pitcher — and most valuable player — Paul Winum in the top of the second inning. The other was announced by the board’s president, David Brandman, at the after-party at Camp Rubirosa: The benefit game for the Retreat, the Eleanor Whitmore Early Childhood Center, Phoenix House, and East End Hospice had grossed $80,000 to $90,000.
Leif Hope, the Game’s modern-age impresario, who is in his mid-90s, was toasted in absentia at the postgame gathering.
The foul ball that felled the fan was said to have bounced off another fan before hitting the woman in question in the temple, knocking her to the ground, where she lay on her back, with two policemen and several others tending to her for the better part of half an hour, before Becky Cooper and other E.M.T.s arrived. It was said later that the injury resulted in her being airlifted. (Village police press reports are not released until Tuesday morning, after the deadline for sports stories.)
When play resumed, Winum (pronounced “Win-em”) grounded out short-to-first, after which John Avlon’s nubber went unclaimed by the Artists’ starter, Walter Bernard, Walter Isaacson walked, and Elizabeth Vespe grounded into a force play at second base.
The Scribes went into the top of the third inning trailing 3-0 as the result of Eddie McCarthy’s three-run homer into the tennis courts in the Artists’ first at-bat. A screaming one-out line drive by Ted Jones that scored Alex Lupica from second put the Writers on the board.
And, with Winum continuing to goose-egg the Paletteers, the Writers added two runs in the fourth, one in the fifth, and three in the sixth to effectively put the game away — the r.b.i.s coming off the bats of Ben Goldberger, Lupica, Jones (via a home run), and Ann Liguori.
The Artists got one back in their sixth. The Writers made it 8-4 in the eighth, Chris Vaccaro’s one-out base hit plating Joe Lemire, who had led off with a double and had advanced to third on Daniel Pulick’s groundout to first.
The never-say-dye Artists pulled to within two, at 8-6, in their half of the eighth, but after the Scribes replied with their ninth run in the top of the ninth, the “home team” went down quietly in its last at-bat, onetwothreejustlikethat.
Winum was the consensus M.V.P. “After giving up that three-run homer to McCarthy, Paul pitched a great game . . . and they were a very good-hitting team,” Lupica said amid the celebrating.
Ronnette Riley, the Artists’ manager, had, as usual, bones to pick with Ken Auletta, the Writers’ manager — Zack Greenburg’s out-of-order plate appearances primarily sticking in her craw. “Ken never gets that rule right,” she said later as the players headed for Camp Rubirosa, adding, as she looked out upon the large new scoreboard in left field, “and I think it should say 7.”
