NBC World Series preview

Goldpanners back out of NBC World Series; Oilers to represent AK for the title.

The Oilers will fight to bring the NBC crown back to Alaska

This just in: The Goldpanners have officially pulled out of the NBC Tournament in Wichita. Reasons cited were early player departures, injuries, and financial concerns following the two million dollar investment in Growden park. What does this mean (other than no Panner NBCWS trophy)? I can see three things happening. First, nothing changes except their opponent gets a first-round bye. Second, the spot could fall to the next willing team -- likely the last-place Glacier Pilots, for a twist of irony -- and the Pilots will get another shot at the crown they fell just short of last season. Third, the seeds could change. The Oilers could take the Panners' spot and, if another team were to go, that team would take the Oilers' current spot. That's a lot of maybes but I'm going to predict that scenario #1 happens and the Oilers become Alaska's sole representative at the NBC tournament in Wichita this year. I'll operate on that assumption until I hear otherwise, so for the purposes of this preview, here's a look at the Oilers' first-round matchup, and a resounding GO OILERS! (I can finally cheer for a team without appearing biased, I like this.)

2010 Peninsula Oilers NBC World Series Team
NBC Roster: Oilersbaseball.com
NBC Scores & Stats: Pointstreak
First game: Tuesday, August 3, time TBA, at League City Hornets
Tournament Bracket: NBC Website

Notable roster moves: The Oilers have added a couple of Miners to their roster for the trip to Wichita: pitcher & pinch-running specialist Matt Applegate and centerfielder Pablo Bermudez. Neither of these moves surprise me. Bermudez was a star on the league-champion Miners squad and a friend/teammate of Oiler Garrett Wittels at Florida International. Matt Applegate is a student-athlete at Kansas State and a native of Wichita, and with the conclusion of the Miners' season he was probably headed home anyway, so there was really no reason not to add him to the roster. A shrewd addition by the Oilers there.

Opponent scouting report: the League City Hornets are a member of the Houston College Summer League which operates (big surprise here) in the Houston, Texas area. The team's website appears to be no longer in service, and the team doesn't have a roster on the NBC's Pointstreak site, so I can't give you a detailed report on what to expect. I'm inclined to say that they should be a pretty easy opponent since they're from one of the smaller, local-level summer leagues. But on the other hand, they beat the tar out of the rest of that league to the tune of a 14-2-2 record. I predict an Oilers win in the first round but I wouldn't take it for granted.

Road to the Rings: If the Oilers dispatch the Hornets in the first round, they could face a serious challenge directly afterward, a team by the name of the Santa Barbara Foresters. Perfect Game has ranked the Foresters near the top of the summer ball rankings all season long, and they took the NBC World Series championship in 2008. Assuming the Oilers pass the test against the Foresters, they would  move on to face the winner of another bracket fork which features the always-talented Liberal Bee Jays. Despite the fact that the ABL is clearly one of the upper-crust leagues represented in this tournament, if not the outright best, the Oilers won't face an easy road to the championship game.