SWL 2026 Wild Card Round Recap, Sunday August 16
Two series, and they went nothing alike. The Crows needed two games and were never really pushed in either one. Swingdome and the Stops went the full three, and the third game was not close either, just in the other direction. Four teams left.
#3 Sheryl Crows def. #6 West Coast Washout, 2-0
G1: WCW 1, SHRL 12 (4 inn.) | G2: SHRL 13, WCW 8
The Washout actually scored first, a run in the top of the first, and then never led again. Sheryl Crows put up two in the bottom half and ran off five more in each of the next two innings to end it early, 12-1.
Connor Donovan threw that whole game, four innings, three hits, one run. Donovan wins with the zone, not the radar gun, nine walks all season, and on Sunday he pounded it. The Crows themselves only got five hits and did not need more: their at bats were patient all afternoon, eleven walks drawn, and every free base counted.
Game 2 was the opposite kind of game and a much better one. Sheryl Crows put sixteen hits on the board and won 13-8. Evan Gray struck out nine, the lineup picked up the rest, and Drew Helgren finished the sixth. Tony Nipert wore all six innings for the Washout against a lineup that was seeing everything, and nobody asked him to come out. The Washout scored eight runs, which wins plenty of games in this league. It just was not enough on Sunday.
So the Crows advanced on their bats and their control guy, and the scary part for the rest of the bracket is that they showed more than one way to win. Jeff Hanschmann led this lineup all regular season and the Crows did not need a signature day out of him to move on.
West Coast Washout finished 5-11, but they split their season series with 100% Real Juice, a win each, which is a fair look at what they can do on the right day. The right day just never came around this weekend.
Sheryl Crows advance to face #2 100% Real Juice on August 23.
#4 Swingdome def. #5 Bilabial Stops, 2-1
G1: BS 2, SD 5 | G2: SD 6, BS 10 | G3: BS 4, SD 17 (4 inn.)
Game 1 belonged to Nick Ludwig. Six innings from the back mound, two runs, nine strikeouts. Swingdome won it 5-2 on three hits, which is not a thing that happens unless the man on the mound is having a day.
Bilabial Stops took Game 2 by 10-6 and did it with Eddie Brown on the mound for all six innings. Brown had spent the season as a bat, and whether he would ever take the ball in a playoff game was the open question on that roster. He answered it with a complete game win. The Stops handed him a six run first and he made it stand up the rest of the way.
Then Game 3 got away from everybody. Swingdome won 17-4 in four innings on four hits, an afternoon of patient at bats doing the rest. Sam Matterazzo was back out for his second start of the day, having already thrown five innings in Game 1. His team asked him to go again and he took the ball, and the tank hit empty, which is what a one day, three game format does to an arm. Taking that start anyway is the most a team can ask of anybody.
Swingdome did not go back to their Game 1 starter at all. Alex Hatch threw Game 2 and came right back out for Game 3. Two pitchers apiece, then. Not three. I spent all week telling people this round would come down to who had a third arm, and neither team ever needed one.
Swingdome advance to face #1 Wiffle House on August 23.
Divisional Round, Sunday August 23
The field is set:
- #4 Swingdome vs #1 Wiffle House
- #3 Sheryl Crows vs #2 100% Real Juice
Both are rematches of regular season series. Wiffle House is 16-0 and hasn't lost a game of any kind since Game 1 of the 2024 World Series. The Leaning Golden Man gets handed out August 30.
@seattlewiffle | 2026 Postseason
