John Koeplin was now retired as a full time player, pursuing his life-long ambition to enter the priesthood, and by season's end, Jeff Applegate, who had struggled for several years with a bad knee, also called it quits. The rest of the team was otherwise exactly the same as in previous years. The opponents were also the same, but strangely we were winning games that a year before would have been losses. In fact, the team was actually blowing out the opposition once in a while. No one could explain why, but no one wanted to. We were having fun again.

Traveling to play in the Morgan Hill Umpire's Tournament in June, the guys put together a solid weekend to capture the championship trophy. Posting wins of 17-7, 4-3, and 11-1, AWA reached the finals against Pepperidge Farms. The guys trailed 11-3 as late as the fourth inning, but AWA rallied back to pull out an impressive 15-13 win. It was our first championship of any kind since the 1978 campaign.

Then, capping the season in a tournament at Cupertino's Memorial Park, AWA pulled off one of its most inspired wins ever in the frigid cold and rain against a very good Curtis Machines team. Overcoming deficits of 9-1 in the fifth and 16-13 in the seventh, the guys battled for nine innings before emerging with an emotional 17-16 win.

This was old style AWA softball!

The season ended with AWA posting a 20-16 won-loss record. And for the first time in many seasons, we had the look of a happy team on the rise. Infused by the talents of youngsters Brian Christie and Greg Brown, the team looked like a team poised to win another league title.

AWA continued to play better through 1983, posting a couple of strong finishes in tournament play and returning as a contender in league. More importantly, the guys were now becoming family men, as babies were now being introduced into the AWA fold. The problems surrounding the team seemed to take a back seat to the more important issues at home. As a result, we were definitely a happier squad again.

The issue now was injuries. And plenty of them. Tom Sukup went down for the season with a broken collarbone after an outfield collision with Steve Sammut, and the rest of the team struggled to play through the pain of an unusually high instance of leg injuries and muscle pulls.

The injury list reached its longest in one tournament late in the year, when five players went down with serious injuries. Neil Christie, despite a severely torn hamstring, refused to come out, flopping down behind home plate to catch. Even consummate extra hitter Sam Zender, who never played in the field, took glove in hand and played right field. Our last game in that tournament, one of the most memorable in team history, saw the battered team hang tough against Sullen Beauty Supply, only to lose a see-saw 13-12 verdict in extra innings. It was a merciful ending to the weekend, but a devastating blow to the season.

The call went out for new, healthy blood, and two new players were pressed into action. Bruce Christie, the fourth of the famed Christie brothers, made his debut in '83, as did longtime family friend Al Brown. These two talents would soon take over the left side of the AWA infield.

Though the '83 campaign didn't produce a title of any kind, the guys still played very well, going 18-15 for the season and showing some very good play on the field. Late in the year the team showed the kind of offense and defense in a "C" level tournament that raised everyone's expectations for the future. AWA muscled up and rolled to wins of 18-5, 9-7, 20-7, and 21-9 before stumbling and finishing third place against some very tough opposition. It was a terrific weekend of softball for AWA, and the camaraderie among the guys was as good as ever. Now if we could just win something.

The team won 22 games in 1984, but the BIG ONE, a championship of any kind, still eluded us. AWA finished the first half of the '84 league season in a four-way tie for first and in a league playoff game for the first time since 1979. Opening against long-time rival E&H Auto Wreckers at Mise Field, the team engaged in what is now known as the "Demise at Mise", the longest and possibly the most frustrating game in AWA history.

Facing a strong wind blowing straight in from center field, both offenses were stifled, and AWA avoided an embarrassing 1-0 loss by scoring an unearned run in the bottom of the seventh. Much to the chagrin of the teams who were scheduled to play after us, the two teams battled it out for a marathon 15 innings before E&H eked out a 3-2 win, eliminating AWA from the playoffs and ruining a lot of batting averages.

AWA had developed a reputation for defense, and the team rode the play of their talented glovemen to nab a couple of tournament trophies, one for fourth place in the Mountain View SST Tournament and another for third place in the Santa Clara Umpires Tournament at the end of the year, in which pitcher Earl Yagi punctuated his fine year with two shutout victories.