Softball: Playing the name game with the Gondoliers

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The Venice Gondoliers have a mouse and a beast. No joke.

Never have I seen nicknames listed on Maxpreps until I checked out the Venice softball team’s roster. Right there I spotted Jasime ‘Mouse’ McNeal and Michelle ‘Beast’ Aver. Honestly, I giggled, then I got serious when I saw their stats. These girls are good.

McNeal is hitting .479 with 19 runs scored and Aver is at .474 with 16 RBIs. All this Venice team needs is a moniker for Danielle Mestas, who’s hitting .652 with a brain-jarring nine homers and 35 RBIs while chalking up an 11-1 record on the mound with 139 strikeouts in 88.1 innings. Let’s just call her awesome.

With the Mouse, a Beast and Mestas, Venice (13-1-1, 6-0-0) looks like the obvious pick to sweep the Western League -- that’s also no joke.

-- Anthony Stitt

-- Image from www.wikipedia.org