The umpires and the weather will both be calling today’s Greensboro Grasshoppers’ game

Bill Hass on Baseball from www.gsohoppers.com……

Bill says that the umpires will be a very big factor, in whether or not they can play today’s Greensboro game at Kannapolis….According to Bill and Donald Moore, the Grasshoppers president and GM, Kannapolis will try their darndest to make sure that this game is played and played to it’s entirety……If the Greensboro-Kannapolis game is rained out, it will not be made up….Same story on Greenville at Hickory….The South Atlantic League web site says that the first playoff game would be played on Wednesday, but other sources are saying the playoffs would begin on Thursday in Greensboro…..We shall see….
from SAL site:Wednesday, September 7, 2011:
Hickory
@ TBD
TBD

Savannah
@ TBD
TBD

Here’s Bill’s take on the last day of the regular season, with the Greensboro Grasshoppers in the South Atlantic League….

How the Northern Division standings play out will depend, in part, on today’s weather.

This is the final day of the regular season. There are three scenarios in which the Hoppers make the playoffs and two in which Kannapolis makes it. Let’s deal with the latter because they are a bit simpler.

If Kannapolis beats the Hoppers today and Greenville beats Hickory, the Intimidators are in.

If the Hoppers-Intimidators game is rained out but the Hickory game is played and the Crawdads lose, Kannapolis is in. The Intimidators would finish the second half tied with Hickory at 39-30 and the Hoppers would be 38-30. In this case, a tie for first is as good as finishing first.

In all other scenarios, the Hoppers are in. They can win today, or Hickory can lose, or both games could be rained out, or just the Hickory game could be rained out — if any one of those happens, Greensboro makes the playoffs.

Both games are scheduled for 1 p.m., but rain is a threat at both sites. Normally, decisions on whether to play are in the hands of the home team before the game and the umpires after the first pitch is thrown.

But Donald Moore, Hoppers president and general manager, said that the umpires would have the only say in today’s games, meaning they could call it off at any time at either site. Naturally, Kannapolis would like to play to have a better chance and no doubt the umpires will give the Intimidators every opportunity to do that. But the umpires there have no control over the Hickory game.

A rainout on the final day of the season is a game lost. It would not be made up on Tuesday.

If the Hoppers get in, they will begin the playoffs against Hickory in NewBridge Bank Park on Thursday. The best-of-three would switch to Hickory for games Friday and, if needed, Saturday.