[Westheim]

Raccoons (26-19) @ Falcons (24-20)

Harmless Raccoons were easily defeated by veteran William Williams (1-5, 4.41 ERA) in the series opener, held to five hits. Ackerman went deep (7.1 IP), but his inability to strike out batters hurt him and cost the game, first with a 2-strike triple to John Powell and later with back-to-back 2-strike hits in the next inning. 2-0 Falcons. Banda 2-4, 2B;

Game 2 had “Mauler” Correa as the opposing pitcher. Trailing 1-0 in the top 6th, Hall doubled in Banda to tie the game, but was left at third in the inning. Hall then made one of his rare errors to help score two in the bottom 6th. An RBI triple by Sanchez set up a prime chance to tie the game again with two outs in the top 7th, but Herrera made a poor infield out and Rigsby flew out to center. Hall was again left to die at third base in the top 8th. Cunningham was taken deep by Irwin Webster in the eighth. 4-2 Falcons, and the Raccoons again had only five hits.

Back-to-back RBI doubles gave the Coons a 2-0 lead thanks to Hall and Dawson in the last game. Trying to salvage at least one in this series, and that one would have to be Powell, who gave the two runs back in the bottom 1st. But Hall created a new, 4-2, lead with a 2-run shot, his 12th, in the top 3rd. By the fifth, the Coons still led 4-2 and Hall was 3-3 with a triple missing for the cycle. But Hall’s final at bat of the day resulted “only” in another single, part of a 2-run eighth inning, which saw the Raccoons grow Powell’s lead to 6-3. Powell had surrendered a run in the sixth after nicking leadoff batter Gilbert Dougan, who clearly made no efforts to get out of the way, but the umpire had nothing of it. The Falcons chopped one off against Wally Gaston in the eighth, before a 1-hour rain delay kept everybody waiting (it had again been raining on and off throughout the game, even the weather hated Chris Powell). Grant West made short work of the Falcons in the ninth, making Christopher Powell FINALLY a winner in 1984 on the 53rd day of the season and in Powell’s 11th start. Hall 4-4, BB, HR, 2B, 3 RBI; Dawson 3-5, 2B, RBI; Walker 2-4, RBI; Powell is now 1-2 with a 3.38 ERA.

Raccoons (27-21) vs. Bayhawks (20-26)

The Raccoons won the series opener, 3-2, with a fairly steady Charles Young on the mound, who allowed the two runs amid nine hits, but they lost Daniel Hall, who remained on the ground after colliding with 3B Claudio Rojas after a triple in the sixth inning. The crowd was on it’s feet – but not Hall, who was carried off. Hall 1-2, BB, 3B; Green 2-3, HR, 2 RBI;

Game 2: the Coons beat the Bayhawks 3-2 again, with a fairly steady Vicente Ruíz on the mound, who allowed the two runs amid six hits. They missed Daniel Hall, who was in the hospital for evaluation. Thompson 2-4; Sanchez 2-4, RBI;

Late that evening Coon City got the (good?) news. Dannyboy only(?) had a badly strained quad and was out for another week or so. Of course this removed by far the most potent bat of the team for the rest of this road trip. He had a history of hamstring and back injuries that would undoubtedly have sidelined him for longer. Replays also seemed to indicate him sliding back first into Claudio Rojas’ knee at third base, but – we take this and carry him around on a golden chair for a few days. Hall was leading the CL in homers, average, and WAR at this point.

Home runs by Herrera and Green got the Raccoons an early 3-1 lead in the first inning of the last game, but Jerry Ackerman blew it in the fourth in spectacular fashion, including making an error on a grounder that could have ended the rally before it even really began. Four runs scored, Ackerman was yanked, and the Raccoons lost 6-5 despite good relief outings by Soto (3 IP, 1 ER) and Gaston (2 IP, 0 R). Wally even got close to a win once again in the bottom 9th, when a San Francisco error enabled Sanchez to drive in two, but the rally fell short and Sanchez was hung out to dry at second by the Bayhawks.

Raccoons (29-22) @ Thunder (24-27)

The series was opened between Kinji Kan and Ralph Hoyles, last season’s aces, who now combined for an ERA over 9. The Raccoons ate up Hoyles for seven runs in three plus innings. While Kan walked the bags full with nobody out in the bottom 2nd, he then struck out two and got an easy grounder to Thompson to end the threat. And while the Coons led 7-0 after chasing Hoyles, that wasn’t even half the scoring they did in the game. Without hitting a single home run, they plated 15 runners on 24 hits and a few walks and even left ten runners on. The Thunder were clobbered big time, only scoring two unearned runs (…) off Jason White in the eighth. 15-2 Raccoons!! Banda 4-5, 2B; Workman 5-5, BB, 3B, 3 RBI; Dawson 2-5, 2 RBI; Green 4-6, 3B, 4 RBI; Thompson 3-5, BB, 2 2B, 2 RBI; Bowling (PH) 1-1, RBI; Kan 6.2 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 3 K and 2-4, 2 RBI;

This was the second 5-hit game for Matt Workman in his major league career. There is only one other Raccoon to ever have more than four hits in a game, six in a game against the Loggers back in 1977. That was Freddy Lopez. Don’t remember that name? Neither do I, not very well at least. He was a third baseman who appeared in 238 games for the Coons between 1977 and 1979, hitting .213 in a total of 531 AB’s. That 6-hit game was his quarter of an hour in the spotlight. He never got another chance once the Raccoons dumped him and is since retired.

Christopher Powell made a strong start the next day. He gave up only five hits, unfortunately three of them in the bottom 4th, where the Thunder scored two. But that was all the damage, while he went eight frames, which was good enough for – a no-decision, again. The Raccoons only tied it in the eighth after being dominated by Hunter Frazier throughout the game. Powell would still have had gas for the ninth, but faced five straight lefties in the lineup and I was not to take any risks and brought out a lefty in Justin Neubauer, but the Thunder quickly replaced Troy Scott with righty Jose Gonzales. Neubauer held him off, and Cunningham pitched two scoreless frames in overtime. The bottom 12th saw Guy King lead off with a triple against Soto. That was as good as doom here. We walked the next two batters to create force plays on every base. Soto then struck out righty slugger Alfonso Aranda, but the next batter, Gary Reed, grounded a slow one to right, and it was slow enough for King to score before Green fired home. 3-2 Thunder. Herrera 3-5, Workman 2-4, 2 RBI; Dawson 2-5, 2B; Walker 2-5, 2 2B;

Charles Young was blown up in game 3, surrendering five runs in four innings, four alone in the second. Included was a home run by opposing pitcher Ray Shaw. The hapless Furballs had the bags full with no outs in the sixth and scored one miserable run. They did a little batter with bags loaded and one out in the eight, scoring at least two. Still: Raccoons lost, 6-3. Herrera 2-5, 2B; Dawson (PH) 1-1, RBI;

Raccoons (30-24) @ Crusaders (19-33)

Great news! Daniel Hall had recovered much quicker than anticipated from his quad strain and was available again for the series in New York!

A hitless game through three innings, game 1 saw a Steve Walker home run in the fifth as the first run, and the Raccoons scored three more in the inning for a 4-0 lead. Hall was brought in early after seven innings to make it easier on him, but by then the team led 5-0. Jason White allowed a run in an ineffective no-out outing in the eighth. 5-1 Raccoons. Hall 2-4, RBI; Workman 2-4, BB, 2 RBI; Ruíz 7.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 5 K and 1-1, BB;

Game 2 brought the last we would see from Jerry Ackerman for a while. He completely blew up in the third inning, where the Crusaders plated six runners against him and hapless Burton Taylor. The Crusaders led 9-4 after three innings… The Coons put up a late rally in the eighth, which was ended masterfully by reliever Joshua Bernard, who struck out Herrera, Banda, and Rigsby, all with the bags full, and also mowed them down in the ninth. 11-6 Crusaders. Green 2-5, 2 RBI; Walker 0-1, 2 BB, RBI;

As indicated, Jerry Ackerman was demoted to AAA for general incompetence. He was 2-5 with a 4.75 ERA and could not get anybody out. He had 9 K’s in 47.1 IP this year, and to make things worse he walked batters in scores sometimes. We called up Carlos Moran, for whom this was his last option year and also his last chance. He had a 3.52 ERA in various roles in two months at AAA ball.

The last game in the series got away from Kinji Kan quickly with three runs in the first inning. That was not the main story of the game, that was the performance of New York’s starter Dave Paul. He pitched a magnificent game, retiring batter after batter, pitching 22 perfect outs. With one out in the eighth, he faced Matt Workman. Workman worked a 3-1 count and got a pitch right in the wheelhouse, drilling it to deep right, where it just barely failed to go over the fence. The slow Workman had hit a double and Paul’s effort went up in smoke. Still, it was not enough to win the game. 5-1 Crusaders.

Things were unraveling fast here, with a loss to a sub-.400 team.

In other news

May 23 – Bob “Butcher” Haines becomes only the fourth pitcher in ABL history to pitch a NO-HITTER, in a 4-0 Pacifics win in Washington over the Capitals. Haines walks three and fans three in the performance, which takes 104 pitches. It is Haines’ first start of the season after 15 relief appearances, and his 100th start overall. The previous no-hitter was pitched on September 6, 1980 by Milwaukee’s Bill Warren. This is the first no-hitter pitched in the Federal League.
May 27 – Las Vegas’ slugger Chris “Missing” Lynch (.296, 12 HR, 39 RBI) will miss two weeks with a strained hamstring.
June 1 – Jim Harrington (7-4, 3.35 ERA) tosses a 1-hitter in a 4-0 win of his Condors over the Aces.
June 1 – IND SP Alex Miranda (7-5, 2.90 ERA) also has a great game, hurling a 3-hitter in a 7-0 defeat of the Titans.
June 2 – Ouch! Sacramento loses veteran starter Morton Jennings (6-4, 4.50 ERA) for the season. He has a torn ulnar collateral ligament and will require Tommy John surgery. The 32-yr old is 89-78 for his career with a 3.59 ERA. He has one career shutout: against the Raccoons :-P
June 4 – The Indians acquire veteran reliever Geronimo Tortima from the Bayhawks, with whom he only appeared in seven games this season. In exchange, outfielder Greg Douglas and a minor leaguer go to San Francisco.

Complaints and stuff

Despite being injured, Daniel Hall still received Player of the Week (May 20-26) honors! During the 5 1/2 games he played that week, he went 8-18 with 3 HR, 7 RBI. Due to his injury, Hall also missed out on a opportunity to become Batter of the Month of May, which went to Michael Root, Knights rightfielder. (You may or may not remember me expressing relief when Engjell Vulaj missed two of our series against Atlanta last season and they played Root, whom I underestimated by A TRUCK FULL OF BRICKS there…)

We received a trade proposal from the Washington Capitals on May 31 which at first glance seemed like we found money in that. They offered 27-yr old reliever Jamel Teissier for our AAA middle infielder (and frequent call-up last season) Brandon Roland. I knew Roland, he had nothing even remotely resembling a major league career. I also knew Teissier fairly well, who had for a few years been the Loggers’ closer and who struck out about 10 per nine frames while in Milwaukee. The Capitals used him in setup with similar numbers. But there were three problems: a $348k contract until season’s end, his expectation to be a closer, and the fact he was a right-hander. I considered him overpaid, inferior to Grant West (and even Cunningham and Gaston) in most aspects, and Gilberto Soto had made a splash at filling the seventh spot in our pen – so I declined. I saw no use for him with us.

The Buffaloes played Ramón Borjón on waivers on May 31. He batted .273 in very limited playing time, so it was hard to say what he was really capable of. I was not thrilled by Raúl Herrera’s performance so far, but Borjón had been one of those chronic underachievers as well.

Who is Dave Paul, our opponent in game 3 in New York? He is a former Raccoon, although I don’t know whether his name has been mentioned here so far. He was traded before the 1977 with three other players to the Capitals to acquire Ben Simon. He pitched for the Capitals, Cyclones, Capitals again, and since this year the Crusaders, with 200 games (161 starts), a 49-58 record and a 4.15 ERA.

Right now things are really not running well for us. We can not get the pitching in line. Ackerman has gotten the boot, Evans is injured for another month, Young is highly inconsistent, Ruíz and Kan are also inconsistent, and Powell is not the Powell from 1980-82. The last resort could be to make room on the 40-man roster for Carlos Gonzalez, but the original plan was to call him up in September for a few first sniffs at major league ball. He is 3-7 at AAA, but for a poorly scoring team. His ERA is 2.16, but Todd Raines also had an ERA under 3 before being called up (and he continues to have a 2.47 ERA there). Is “Deranged” Gonzalez ready for the major leagues? See his profile below.

Next up: home stand against the Canadiens and Cyclones. Then road trip to Dallas. We will face the Titans at home and during that series the draft will be held.