I'd try levelling your horizon in that second shot, too. I know that sometimes the viewing angle means the boards will be a little crooked. What I do in these cases is to use either the vertical glass supports or the net posts as a guideline. If these are straight up and down then the shot will look okay even if the shooting perspective means the tops of the boards are not quite level.
As far as the pp exposure goes, make sure you are using a properly calibrated monitor. Otherwise, what looks good to you will be off for the rest of us.
I shoot exclusively in RAW, which gives me better pp control than shooting JPG. Of course, I don't have media or other rushed deadlines (ie: getting prints to parents before end of game) to deal with.