[Westheim]

Monday began with Luke Black being placed on the DL with a mild oblique strain. He would miss two to three weeks, which in itself would not void his $1M vesting option for 2010 unless he would incur another injury later or accidentally got superglued to the bench by somebody.

In some twisted way this was a blessing. It didn’t change all of our 2010 plans, and at the same time a roster spot opened to readmit Ricardo Martinez at least on a temporary basis. Why no outfielder? Because injuries and suckage had reduced our AAA outfielders to rubble, and now we had only Jason Seeley, Dave Green, and a bunch of scrum (including Chris Beairsto) there, and while both Seeley and Green were doing well after being moved up from Ham Lake, I had already broken a Yoshi Nomura by throwing him into a fire at age 20 in this decade and we didn’t have to repeat that clip any time soon.

The screams. I still hear his screams.

Raccoons (33-21) @ Titans (30-26) – June 8-11, 2009

We enter Boston for four games, having taken two of three games so far this season, with one postponement into later in the year. The Titans were second only to the Raccoons in runs allowed (202 vs. 190), so low scoring might go on for us. We were almost even in runs scored, them sixth (232 runs), and us seventh (230 runs).

Projected matchups:
Jong-hoo Umberger (3-2, 3.63 ERA) vs. Jesus Cabrera (5-1, 2.29 ERA)
Javier Cruz (4-4, 3.78 ERA) vs. Brian Patrick (5-2, 3.38 ERA)
Nick Brown (4-3, 1.69 ERA) vs. Jorge Chapa (4-4, 2.79 ERA)
Greg Grams (5-2, 3.47 ERA) vs. Ray Conner (3-6, 3.33 ERA)

A pair of righties, followed by a pair of lefties. We might have some issue with our left-handed lineup now with Luke Black out. We only have left-handed outfielders left! (The only right-handed batting outfielder in AAA is Joey McIntyre, batting .108)

Game 1
POR: CF Castro – 2B Nomura – RF Alston – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – LF Pruitt – SS Howell – C De La Parra – P Umberger
BOS: 2B J. Ramirez – 1B Higashi – C Suda – CF J. Gusmán – RF Hayashi – 3B M. Austin – LF Britton – SS K. Sato – P Cabrera

While Castro singled, stole, and scored in the first inning, Umberger’s outing started with a Jesus Ramirez triple and a passed ball charged to De La Painful that tied the game on the 1-1 pitch to Takahashi Higashi. A Sharp error and “Quasimodo” Suda’s home run gave the Titans a timely 3-1 lead. Well, maybe these games wouldn’t be low-scoring after all. Maybe we’d get romped after all.

While Jesus Cabrera was the first starting pitcher to leave the game, it wasn’t quite his fault. He hit an RBI double against Umberger in the second inning, running the score to 4-1, but pulled something and was gone. Rémy Lucas replaced him, loaded the bases on a bloop and two walks in the third, but struck out Daniel Sharp before it could get ugly for him. For Umberger, ugliness never stopped. He wasn’t fooling anyone, and was knocked out in the sixth inning with five runs allowed. The Raccoons got the entire compliment of left-handers the Titans carried in the bullpen to take a look at once Cabrera was gone, and it wasn’t a sight to behold for Raccoons fans. The team had three hits against Cabrera, and only three hits the rest of the way. 6-1 Titans. Howell 3-4, 2B;

Game 2
POR: CF Castro – 2B Correa – RF Alston – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – SS Howell – 3B R. Martinez – C De La Parra – P Cruz
BOS: 2B J. Ramirez – 1B Higashi – LF G. Rios – CF J. Gusmán – RF Hayashi – 3B M. Austin – C J. Silva – SS K. Sato – P Patrick

What looked like a no-doubt 3-run homer by Adrian Quebell in the first inning suddenly dropped down into the glove of Javier Gusmán on the warning track, and the Raccoons settled for a Pruitt RBI single in the top 1st, which Cruz readily gave back in the bottom 1st. Cruz pitched a bit of 2008 Brown game. Lots of full counts, with results varying. The Titans didn’t need many hits, drawing two walks and waiting for the inevitable gapper would probably be enough here. That gapper wasn’t that easy to come by early on, and instead Javier Cruz livened up his .040 average with a go-ahead RBI single in the fourth inning, 2-1.

The Titans got their first hits since the first inning in the bottom 6th. Gerardo Rios and Tokimune Hayashi singled for them to have the go-ahead runs on base, but Mark Austin struck out in a full count. Varying results occasionally yields good results. But all the long counts elevated his pitch count quickly (and there had been a very brief rain delay in the third inning, with the climate remaining moisty) and Cruz was hit for in the top 7th with one out, with Nomura grounding out. But after that Castro doubled and scored on Correa’s single to get the score to an exuberant 3-1. While Martinez added a run with a sac fly in the eighth, we had our favorite 7th-8th-9th guys lined up, ready and rested. While Rockburn got through his inning quickly, Bruno struggled, walked Ramirez to get started, got a double play, and then walked Rios. Donald Sims came in to remove Gusmán and end the inning. That handed things off to Angel with a 4-1 lead, and he retired Hayashi and Austin quickly before the rain came back. The umpires called a rain delay after Julio Silva fouled off the 0-1 pitch – this was outrageous!

Almost three quarters of an hour later, rain had subsided, and play had to resume. Angel Casas was one strike away, but allowed a single and tweaked something in his back. Ted Reese was the only rested reliever available, allowed a single to Kunimatsu Sato, and then Apasyu Britton grounded out. 4-1 Raccoons. Correa 2-3, 2 BB, RBI; Pruitt 3-4, 2B, RBI; Trevino (PH) 1-1; Cruz 6.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 5 K, W (5-4) and 1-2, RBI;

Angel Casas had a tweak with what might be a mildly herniated disc in his back and is for now listed as DTD. It might take a week for him to come back to strength, so we won’t have our preferred 7th-8th-9th for some time. But if your ace closer is thought to miss a week, you don’t disable him for two weeks. You eat the medicine and play a man short.

Although! … There is an extra infielder on the roster, which we could convert into an extra reliever to help us. That isn’t too odd a though, I think.

By the way, Brian Patrick pitched a complete game 11-hitter here, not that anyone raved about it too much.

Game 3
POR: CF Castro – 2B Correa – RF Alston – LF Pruitt – 1B Sharp – C Esquivel – SS Howell – 3B R. Martinez – P Brown
BOS: 2B J. Ramirez – CF J. Gusmán – RF Hayashi – C Suda – LF G. Rios – 3B Higashi – SS M. Austin – 1B Arroyo – P Chapa

The Coons jumped no Chapa for two runs on five hits (and an Alston double play) in the first inning, and Brown scored after singling in the second inning for an early 3-0 lead. But Suda hit him for a leadoff jack in the bottom of the inning and slowly but surely the worst defensive alignment we could possibly come up with outside of actually playing Ricardo Martinez at short started to show. Actually, proven Gold Glover Correa was the first Coon to make an error, still in the bottom 2nd, but in the third it was Sharp with a poor throw back to first that Brown couldn’t come up with that lousy lob, but was charged the error. The Titans capitalized on neither chance, but Rob Howell hit his first career home run in the top 4th (in his 368th AB), 4-1.

On top of shoddy defense, Brown went to hell as well by the middle innings. He drilled Austin in the fourth, then had a man on fifth and added two 2-out walks before bringing up Suda, who popped out to Alston on a full count, but Brown hit an RBI single in the top 6th, plating Martinez with two outs. Pitching-wise he crawled through the sixth and was then done. Mind that incomplete 7th-8th-9th string, though.

So after Esquivel drove in Alston with a 2-out single, but Martinez struck out to leave two men on in the top 7th, the 6-1 lead was handed to Ed Bryan, who retired two out of three left-handers before allowing a single to Gusmán. Cash came in, Hayashi singled, and then Suda grounded to short, with Howell’s throw going well over Sharp at first base for a run-scoring error. After that, the lefty Gerardo Rios was up. Sims came into the game in a triple switch, Quebell to first, Sharp to third, and Sims into the #7 hole, and Rios lined into centerfield to score two runs on the first pitch. Sims didn’t retire anybody in the bottom 8th, with Austin and Arroyo singling before Sims was taken out to get beaten to mush. Marcos Bruno took over, was 0-2 on PH Apasyu Britton before throwing a wild pitch for 1-2, and then allowed a game-tying 2-run double, and of course Bruno failed to leave Britton on base, either, ex-Coon Kunimatsu Sato driving him in. Good news, though: nobody needed to pitch the ninth anymore. 7-6 Titans. Castro 2-5; Correa 3-4, BB, RBI; Pruitt 2-5, 2B, RBI; Sharp 2-5, RBI; Esquivel 2-4, RBI; Brown 6.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 8 K and 2-3, RBI;

I would entirely understand it if Nick Brown would bring a gun and kill everybody in the clubhouse. It’s his prerogative, I’d say. And Kisho Saito would long have slit their throats with his swords.

No love for lefties in Portland. And my seemingly sound mental state as I report on this is entirely fake and has taken me years of screaming at mirrors to maintain, but has mainly been achieved by throwing a 50 pound metal ash receptacle through my assigned suite’s glass door during this game. The splintering noise felt so good. The Titans are probably going to be replacing this with acrylic glass, though.

By the way, we had 15 hits, and they had seven, but they didn’t make a ****teen errors, either.

We flicked Ricardo Martinez (2-for-8 since being recalled) back to AAA for a few days to bring in an additional pitcher. It was John Richardson, though, who had maintained his ERA (7+) and K/9 (almost 9) in AAA, even starting a couple of games. We needed nothing in that regard, just pitch some innings competently, okay?

Game 4
POR: LF Castro – 2B Correa – RF Alston – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – SS Howell – C De La Parra – CF Trevino – P Grams
BOS: 2B J. Ramirez – 1B Higashi – LF G. Rios – C Suda – CF J. Gusmán – 3B M. Austin – RF Hudson – SS K. Sato - P Conner

Wasteful RISP batting went on. While the Raccoons again scored in the first on an Alston sac fly, De La Porcupine would leave the bases loaded when he rolled out to short like a three-year old girl. Alston homered in the third, giving Grams a 2-0 lead, and although Grams opened every inning but one with a 3-ball count, the Titans didn’t get to him until the bottom 6th, in which he drilled Rios, was taken well deep by Suda, and then drilled Austin, and still somehow got out of the mess with a then reduced 3-2 lead. Despite lacking stuff at all (but striking out leadoff man Ramirez twice for some reason), Grams lived through seven innings and handed a flimsy 3-2 lead off to Rockburn and a tired Bruno, who faced mostly left-handers, but of course nobody would ever dare to ruin one of Grams’ leads. 3-2 Coons. Castro 3-5; Grams 7.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, W (6-2);

Raccoons (35-23) vs. Warriors (29-30) – June 12-14, 2009

Ninth in runs scored, eighth in runs allowed, and with a bullpen that made even the Raccoons’ blush with a 5.47 ERA, by far the worst in baseball, the Warriors weren’t really getting back into contention. They hadn’t made the playoffs since 2001, but the Raccoons hadn’t taken a series from them since then, either. The last time we beat them was in 2000. Overall, we have the second-worst all-time record against them (18-27, .400), beating out only our embarrassing record against the Rebels (.278). The Warriors also came in with SIX players on the DL, including former Continental League regulars Bob Butler and Manuel Reyes, also veteran Oliver Torres, and another day-to-day starting pitcher. Martin Garcia (4-6, 4.78 ERA) had pitched on short rest on Thursday, and they would have another guy on short rest to open the series.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (4-4, 3.17 ERA) vs. Ricky Mendoza (6-4, 3.72 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (3-3, 3.84 ERA) vs. Ken Harris (6-4, 3.76 ERA)
Javier Cruz (5-4, 3.58 ERA) vs. Jair Mauceri (0-2, 6.42 ERA)

Those are all right-handers, easing our pains with lineup construction a bit. Angel Casas does not figure like he will pitch on the weekend, so our pen remains a mess as well.

Game 1
SFW: CF Matthews – 2B A. Martinez – 1B Bovane – LF Graham – RF Zackery – 3B O. Rios – C J. Young – SS Spinks – P Mendoza
POR: CF Castro – SS Correa – RF Alston – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – 2B Nomura – C De La Parra – 3B M. Gutierrez – P Baldwin

Colin Baldwin pitched to the best of his abilities, which held the hits to a minimum, but still saw him trailing 1-0 after five innings. The lone run was unearned after a Nomura error, as this particular week of hells continued. The Raccoons had a man on third base in Castro in the first inning, then lay dead for a while until Ron Alston launched his 15th rocket to lead off the bottom 6th, tying the contest. Baldwin turned in seventh damage-free innings before being hit for in the bottom 7th, an inning in which the Raccoons left Castro in scoring position once again.

Bottom 8th, Alston walked against Mendoza, ending his day. Lefty Francisco Rodriguez appeared, with Quebell singling to left, and Pruitt singling to right. Bases loaded, no outs. Howell hit for Nomura, but popped out to short. De La Penne struck out, and Gutierrez grounded out. The bottom 9th started with Esquivel hitting for Law Rockburn, who had maintained the 1-1 tie in the top of the inning. The Coons had Castro on third with two outs and Alston batting against Rodriguez, and rolling it right back to the pitcher for extra innings. Somehow the Warriors didn’t eat up Sims after a Quebell error in the top 10th. Bottom 10th, Dan Nordahl pitching, Quebell singled, Pruitt doubled. No outs, winning run at ****ING THIRD BASE!! Howell grounded out … to third. De La Pitcairn wasn’t pitched to for some reason. Well, the Warriors thought, what can happen with Manuel Gutierrez batting? It’s either a K or a double play. What’s that cracking sound? What’s that white object soaring to right there? WHO’S batting? GRAAAAAAAAAAAND SLAAAAAAAAAAMMMMMM!!!!

5-1 Raccoons. Correa 2-5; Quebell 2-5; Pruitt 2-5, 2B; Gutierrez 2-5, HR, 4 RBI; Baldwin 7.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 8 K;

It has happened. Donald Sims now has more wins than Brownie. And on a walkoff slam by Ahuachapan’s finest. Achapa-what? Right.

They are maddening. They are really maddening.

Game 2
SFW: CF Matthews – 2B A. Martinez – 1B Bovane – LF Graham – RF Zackery – 3B O. Rios – C J. Young – SS Spinks – P Harris
POR: CF Castro – 2B Correa – RF Alston – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – 3B Sharp – C Esquivel – SS M. Gutierrez – P Umberger

Daniel Sharp started inning-ending double plays in both of the first two innings defensively, and led off the bottom 2nd with a double after Pruitt had left two on in the first, setting up an early crooked number this time. Esquivel and Gutierrez both hit singles and Correa would plate them with a 2-out single to take a 3-0 lead. Sharp bounced into a run-scoring double play in the third, 4-0, while Umberger also got another double play turned in the top of the inning, and another one in the fifth! Harris got a double play turned when Esquivel hit into it with two on and nobody out in the bottom 6th, but eventually Umberger knocked him from the game with a 2-out RBI single to get the score to 5-0. But Umberger couldn’t put men on base forever, eventually someone would get him, and someone was Orlando Rios, bashing a 1-out, 2-run double over Pruitt’s head in the top 7th. Umberger came back from that with strikeouts to Joe Young and Bob Spinks, who was 31 and owned a suitcase with many stickers from all over the States on it. Umberger completed the eighth inning with three quick outs, setting up Marcos Bruno for a save attempt, but Bruno was awfully tired. There were two left-handers among the first four batters, and we had a 3-run advantage, and so we started with … Ed Bryan. Yes, our pen is that badly burned out. Bryan was a strike away from a perfect inning before an 0-2 pitch bored in on Rusty Zackery. Rios almost hit an 0-1 pitch out then … almost. Castro, moved to left with Trevino in for defense, made a catch that Pruitt probably wouldn’t have made in the corner in deep left. 5-2 Critters. Alston 2-4; Pruitt 2-4, 2B; Umberger 8.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 4 K, W (4-3) and 1-2, RBI;

Bryan’s fifth save is his first since ’07.

The last time we swept the Warriors was the year Jason Turner tossed his no-hitter.

Game 3
SFW: CF Matthews – 2B A. Martinez – 1B Bovane – LF Graham – RF Zackery – C McClendon – 3B O. Rios – SS Spinks – P Mauceri
POR: CF Castro – 2B Correa – RF Alston – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – 3B Sharp – SS Howell – C De La Parra – P Cruz

Offense was not just slow, it had glacial speed in this Sunday game on national television. The broadcasters were bored by the third inning. In the bottom 4th Alston reached on an error only for Quebell to hit into a double play. Sharp drew a leadoff walk and Howell singled in the next inning, and De La Pasquale chopped into a 6-4-3 without any mercy. The Warriors then catapulted themselves through Cruz in the top of the sixth, with a leadoff single by Jeffrey Matthews, who stole a base, moved up on a groundout, and scored on Dave Graham’s double. 1-0 Warriors, and where were the Coons? Castro singled to start the bottom 6th, Correa … double play. Cruz went eight and remained on the short side of the scoreboard, then was hit for with Nomura to start the bottom 8th, the first of three racing outs in the inning. In the top 9th it was on the Warriors to get a man on with an error (Quebell’s) before Zackery rolled a Reese pitch into a 4-6-3. With the bases cleansed again, Reese walked Henry McClendon and was yanked. Bryan came in, walked Rios, and then allowed three straight hard hits that blew the cover off the scoreboard. The Raccoons were held to one cynical run by Francisco Rodriguez and Dan Nordahl in the bottom 9th. 4-1 Warriors. Alston 2-4; Cruz 8.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 7 K, L (5-5);

Ed Bryan found a dead skunk in his locker after this game.

Thankfully I keep these things stocked well here.

In other news

June 9 – Aside from Portland’s Angel Casas, Vancouver’s CL Pedro Alvarado (3-1, 1.54 ERA, 11 SV) also goes down with an injury, missing about one week with shoulder soreness.
June 10 – SAL OF Pat Buckholtz (.295, 10 HR, 39 RBI) is out for the year after breaking his kneecap. Buckholtz hit for the cycle on the final weekend of the 2008 season.
June 14 – CHA INF Jose Lopez (.265, 8 HR, 32 RBI) cracks his 300th career home run in an 8-5 loss of the Falcons to the Rebels, a solo shot off Bartolo Ortíz. The 33-year old Lopez was a 1994 signing by the Capitals out of his native Puerto Rico and has led his league in home runs four times in his career. He has 1,218 RBI in addition to his career slash of .268/.334/.476.

Complaints and stuff

Monday: Draft! Today’s aspiring youth is tomorrow’s headache and Friday’s rage fit.

Entirely unrelated: Jimmy Eichelkraut is stuck on the A-level Poza Rica Thieves, stealing somebody else’s playing time with a .266/.331/.383 clip with one homer. He also batted .187/.244/.227 in 21 games for the double-A Nogales Nightriders this season.

This winter we successfully made a $2.5M bid for a hideous Dadaist painting at Suckeby’s that I just can’t figure out. I don’t know what to do with it. It’s not generating much countables for us. It doesn’t strike you with beauty, and it doesn’t have any easily discernible meaning. It even has a really, really ugly frame. Should we just stow it away in the attic and forget about it? And Maud’s promotional stuff that De La Purse would keep batters from stealing isn’t true either.

Speaking about stolen bases, Tomas Castro entered the week 7/16 (!!) in stolen bases, but swiped three off “Quasimodo” Suda and two more on Friday to get to 12/21, which is still yuck, but at least not outright shocking.

Angel *should* be good to pitch by Tuesday. We’ll be in Topeka, and have a game on Monday, with Thursday off.

Early last week, I *almost* designated Ed Bryan for assignment. *Almost*. The only thing that held me back was the lack of replacements where you could at least hope for a decent experience with them. And you know we’re broken, so we can’t add from the outside. Since then, he’s been quite well by his standards. I put him into Saturday’s save situation by accident, not looking right. But pssshhh, that’s a secret, don’t tell anyone. But maybe designating him for expunction from the league record wouldn’t be the worst idea I’ve had recently.

Jose Lopez is only the seventh player to reach 300 home runs in ABL history. Top 10 and significant other Raccoons:
1st – Raúl Vázquez – 416
2nd – Dan Morris – 393 (active with VAN)
3rd – Michael Root – 338 (HOF)
t-4th – Gabriel Cruz – 318 (HOF)
t-4th – Anibal Rodriguez – 318
6th – Mark Dawson – 304
7th – Jose Lopez – 300 (active with CHA)
t-8th – Bakile Hiwalani – 284 (active with MIL)
t-8th – David Lopez – 284 (active with SFB)
10th – Mac Woods – 274
…
13th – Ron Alston – 256 (active with POR)
t-17th – Daniel Hall – 223
20th – Royce Green – 220
21st – Tetsu Osanai – 219 (HOF)
46th – Ben O’Morrissey – 177
t-53rd – Neil Reece – 171
67th – Ben Simon – 156
t-72nd – David Vinson – 151
77th – Albert Martin – 148 (active with OCT)
t-80th – Luke Black – 145 (active with POR)
t-95th – Clyde Brady – 138 – (active with DEN)

Looking at the list, Ron Alston is pretty much the only 500 HR threat right now. He will turn 30 just before the All Star game, but he’s already half way there. A few more years in our shoe box wouldn’t hurt his cause, either…

Right now, however, Alston is struggling badly. He had multi-hit games back-to-back to end the week, but for seven days before that he batted 5-for-28. That three hits were home runs masked the issue a bit. Then again, he struck out only five times, but the contact he generated was mostly poor. Except for the three homers.

Rotten luck might be an explanation for a lot with this team. Our team slash is .276/.341/.401, or in relation to the Continental League: 1st/4th/4th!! But we hit for a lot of singles, and you need at least three to score a run, and we’re only in seventh when it comes to runs scored. We’re sixth in both extra base hits and home runs. In theory, our mix is great, but in real life, it’s not working. Add a shaky bullpen.

Uh, I mentioned the forbidden B-word with Nick Brown in the house.

I had him screened secretly, and Nick Brown in fact does not own a gun, which explains a lot of things. He does own a colorful handmade crossbow, bought of a street artist fair downtown, though. Are poisoned bolts a thing?