[Westheim]

Raccoons (61-37) vs. Condors (57-42) – July 23-25, 2018

The Coons had taken two of three from the Condors in 2018 so far, and this was actually the second series in a row the Raccoons played against the CL South leaders after sweeping the Baybirds out of the top spot over the previous weekend. The Condors were living off their starting pitching, which was the best in the league with a 2.97 ERA for the rotation, while their offense was middling about, plating the fifth-most runs. They conceded the second-least runs, right behind the Coons, who were sixth in runs scored at this junction.

Projected matchups:
Hector Santos (9-4, 2.62 ERA) vs. Casey Hally (9-4, 2.97 ERA)
Damani Knight (4-5, 4.46 ERA) vs. Zach Hughes (8-7, 2.60 ERA)
Jonathan Toner (14-3, 2.46 ERA) vs. Jorge Gine (7-7, 3.99 ERA)

We’d avoid both their left-hander, Luis Flores (7-6, 3.40 ERA) and last week’s Player of the Week, Andrew Gudeman (9-6, 2.47 ERA), both of which is stellar news. The Condors had a few players on the DL, most critical for their efforts being Jimmy Oatmeal (.255, 15 HR, 55 RBI), who had missed a couple of weeks with a strained hammy now, but could return any minute…

Game 1
TIJ: SS Konrath – 3B Dasher – 1B Tsung – LF Rawlings – C J. Vargas – RF Abraham – 2B Koka – CF Jamieson – P Hally
POR: RF Carmona – SS Walter – 3B Nunley – 1B H. Mendoza – LF DeWeese – CF Duarte – 2B Mathews – C Margolis – P Santos

Santos walked a pair and threw 31 pitches in the first inning, so this one was definitely not starting well. Cookie walked but was caught stealing in the bottom of the inning, and then Craig Abraham reached with an infield single that Santos couldn’t dig out in the top 2nd. Matt Jamieson’s walk pushed Abraham to second and both pulled off a double steal, allowing Hally to drive in the first run with a sac fly to center. So far, Santos had zero strikeouts, and while DeWeese tied the game with a solo shot in the bottom of the inning, Santos allowed a leadoff single to Craig Dasher and a double to Mun-wah Tsung in the top 3rd, putting runners in scoring position with no outs. A pop over the infield by Josh Rawlings, finally a K to Jose Vargas, and Abraham’s grounder to third kept the runners where they were until the inning ended. Santos remained a mess for the most part and barely squeezed through six innings, but not without allowing the go-ahead run on a Rawlings dinger in the sixth, while the Raccoons had hit into double plays in promising spots in both the third and fourth innings. Dahlke batted for Santos to lead off the bottom 6th, walked, and Cookie’s single to left put two on with no outs, although that was not the first time this had happened in the game, and it had never ended well so far. Walter’s single to right loaded the bases, with no outs – the most dreaded of all base/out states around these often unfriendly confines! Nunley ran a full count and struck out, Mendoza ran a full count and walked on a pitch that was disputably not all that much out of the strike zone, but it pushed the tying run across and that was all we cared about. DeWeese didn’t get a chance at the go-ahead run because Jose Vargas lost a Hally pitch early in the at-bat and it hobbled away for a passed ball that allowed Cookie to race home, 3-2 Coons. With first base open, DeWeese was walked intentionally, and the Coons finally made two more outs, Duarte to shallow right and Mathews with a strikeout.

Davis and Thrasher put the Condors’ top of the order away in the seventh, and the bottom of that inning saw straight 1-out singles from Petracek, Cookie, and Walter, the latter being grossly misfielded by Jamison in center for an extra base, allowing Petracek to score and moving the other runners to scoring position with one out. Unfortunately, no more runs came to be, with Nunley bouncing out to first, Mendoza walking onto the open base, and DeWeese striking out. Thrasher got Rawlings with a K to start the top 8th. With the left-handed bats gone for now, Chris Mathis came in for a 5-out save with Ramirez unavailable. Vargas singled to center, but Abraham bounced into a double play to end the eighth, Duarte hit a leadoff triple in the bottom 8th but was stranded, but the Condors didn’t even get on base in the ninth, as the Coons won their fourth straight game. 4-2 Critters. Carmona 2-4, BB; Walter 2-4, RBI; Mathis 1.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, SV (4);

Interlude: Trade

The Raccoons managed to strike a deal after all on July 24, acquiring 28-year old SP Bobby Guerrero (10-10, 3.59 ERA) from the Falcons for 2015 first-rounder AA 1B Michael Wilkerson and 2014 tenth-rounder AAA SP J.J. Rodd.

The right-hander Guerrero throws 95mph and has four pitches, including a cutting version of the fastball, a slider, and a best-sparsely-used changeup. He’s been known to contract some nagging injuries, but the one time the 28-year old, who signed as free agent with the Thunder in 2006 originally, missed significant time in the Bigs was due to a knee injury in 2017. For his career, he is 43-47 with a 4.42 ERA.

Rodd was only in AAA because injuries had thinned out the corps there and had been roughed up for a 6.39 ERA, while Wilkerson was hitting a little, but wasn’t exciting us as a 22-year old in Ham Lake.

Guerrero replaced Nielson in the rotation, who was sent back to St. Petersburg. We now have an all-right-handed rotation.

Raccoons (61-37) vs. Condors (57-42) – July 23-25, 2018

Game 2
TIJ: SS Konrath – 3B Dasher – 1B Tsung – LF Eichelkraut – RF Abraham – 2B Koka – C A. Gonzales – CF Jamieson – P Hughes
POR: RF Carmona – SS Walter – 3B Nunley – 1B H. Mendoza – LF DeWeese – CF Duarte – 2B Mathews – C Denny – P D. Knight

Knight started just like Santos with two walks in the first, but somehow made it through that mess. Cameron Konrath would hit a 1-out single in the third, got caught stealing, and yet somehow Knight managed to allow three more hits with two down and concede the first run of the game on Jimmy Oatmeal’s single into right. Bottom 3rd, the Raccoons were in a terrible spot again after Dasher’s wild throwing error put Denny on second to start the inning. Knight walked, and Cookie singled, loading the bases with no outs. Well, at least they took the lead; Walter singled to center for one run, and Nunley hit a sac fly before the guys that were paid like royal sluggers and had 13 meager homers apiece made two royally poor outs. The 2-1 lead was insufficient to keep Knight afloat, as the Condors were landing hits left and right against him. Konrath hit a 2-out, 2-run triple, plating Joey Koka and Matt Jamieson in the top 4th, which flipped the lead right back their way, 3-2. Knight was knocked out in the fifth after the Condors rapped him for three more hits without him getting an out. Matt Schroeder inherited runners on the corners and no outs and at least allowed only one more run to score, closing Knights’ line at four innings, ten hits, and five runs.

While the Condors had ten hits through five innings, the Coons only had three off Zach Hughes and were in no shape or form to make up a 5-2 deficit. DeWeese hit a 2-out single in the sixth that led nowhere nice, and it took Hughes to be removed after seven for them to amount to anything vaguely resembling a threat. Cookie hit a leadoff single in the bottom 8th off right-hander Brian Gilbert, who then walked Walter and got yanked. Lefty Ethan Knight replaced him with the tying run in the box and no outs. Nunley hit a ball to fairly deep center, where it was caught by Jamieson, and Mendoza and DeWeese made their trademark pathetic outs. Nobody scored, and the Raccoons lost. 5-2 Condors. Carmona 2-4; Jackson (PH) 1-1, 2B;

Game 3
TIJ: SS Konrath – 3B Dasher – 1B Tsung – LF Eichelkraut – C J. Vargas – RF Abraham – 2B Koka – CF Jamieson – P Gine
POR: RF Carmona – SS Walter – 3B Nunley – 1B H. Mendoza – CF Duarte – LF DeWeese – 2B Dahlke – C Denny – P Toner

Jonny had seven interesting pitches in the first inning. Konrath singled on the first, and the second bored in on Dasher to put two on base. Tsung flew out to deep right, moving Konrath to third base on the third pitch, and Dasher tried to steal second base, but was thrown out on the fourth pitch before Jimmy Oatmeal ended up striking out three pitches later, leaving Konrath on third. The first three Coons would all hit extra-base knocks in the bottom 1st, with Cookie and Nunely tripling while Walter settled for a double; two runs scored, but Nunley, who reached third base with nobody out, was left stranded…

Toner needed almost 80 pitches through five innings despite that quick first frame, striking out eight along the way, but he also struggled with Joey Koka, whom he never retired, and had another few 3-ball counts. The Condors remained off the board, though, while the Coons had added a run in the bottom of the third when Walter doubled, Nunley singled, and Mendoza hit a groundout that would have been a double play if Nunley hadn’t taken out Konrath at second base. The top of the sixth saw Toner walk Tsung on four pitches to start off, and when Tsung made for second base, Denny’s throwing error donated him third base with nobody out. Oatmeal popped out, Vargas whiffed, but Abraham came through with an RBI double to left before Koka finally bowed out with a strikeout, Toner’s 11th in the game. Gine didn’t make it through six, being replaced by Ethan Knight after Denny’s 2-out single. Toner remained in the game despite being close to 100 pitches and singled to center, putting them on the corners for Cookie. After Cookie walked, Walter struck out, and the Coons left the bases full…

Toner struck out two more in a clean seventh, but that was it for him, having thrown 111 pitches and the finish line still a bunch away. Bottom 7th, Duarte had a 2-out double before – with Knight still pitching – Jackson batted for DeWeese and was struck by a 3-2 offering. Dahlke flew out to center, and at some point all those stranded runners had to come back to bite us in the furry bums. Actually, that point was the eighth inning, in which Chris Mathis threw six pitches, enough for Dasher, Tsung, and Jimmy Oatmeal to all hit singles and load the bases with no outs. Bases loaded was always a bad spot for Ron Thrasher, but … what are the choices? Jose Vargas hit a grounder in front of home plate. Denny hustled out, but Dasher was already rumpling down that line hard – Denny instead went to second, Walter zinged to first – double play, and a run scored, with Tsung remaining on third base with two outs, and right-hander Alfredo Gonzales pinch-hit – AND STRUCK OUT!! While I was mulling whether we should have Thrasher pitch the ninth, Maud remarked that the clouds looked pretty dark overhead… and just as she said it, they broke and doused the park in a tremendous shower that didn’t last long, but caused enough havoc with the field and mound, which were soaked before the groundskeepers got the tarp on, that the game was delayed for 70 minutes. Delayed, but not called – the bottom 8th had to be played (with no offensive success) just as the top of the ninth, with Ramirez out to face the bottom of the order. Koka struck out before lefty Josh Rawlings pinch-hit and grounded a ball hard to the right side. Dahlke knocked it down pretty deep at second, shot up and fired to first base – JUST IN TIME!! The final out had to be taken from Matt Pruitt, who was batting .309 and pinch-hitting in the #9 hole. He sent Ramirez’ first pitch to pretty darn deep center, but Duarte was alert and able to get there. 3-2 Coons! Walter 2-5, 2B, RBI; Nunley 2-4, 3B, RBI; Mathews (PH) 1-1; Toner 7.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 13 K, W (15-3) and 2-3; Thrasher 1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

GODDAMN ****ING DAMN IT, AM I GLAD WE HAVE RON THRASHER!!

… even though putting him in with all the bases drunk can end in havoc.

Raccoons (63-38) vs. Knights (50-51) – July 27-29, 2018

The Knights had the most runs scored in the Continental League, but still next to no pitching, allowing the third-most runs in the CL, and undoing most of the good things their offense did. The rotation ranked ninth, the pen even 11th by ERA. They had lost four of six games against the Raccoons in 2018, and unless they swept the Critters in this weekend set would lose the season series for the sixth straight season.

Projected matchups:
Bobby Guerrero (10-10, 3.59 ERA) vs. Jared D’Attilo (4-8, 3.73 ERA)
Ricky Mendoza (8-6, 4.54 ERA) vs. Stephen Quirion (5-6, 5.06 ERA)
Hector Santos (10-4, 2.64 ERA) vs. Leon Hernandez (3-3, 4.29 ERA)

They only have right-handed starters. Their offense is obviously built around the home run, with Gil Rockwell leading the CL with 26 bombs and 70 RBI.

For the Raccoons, this begins a series of 20 games without an off day, starting with two series against the CL South and then back-to-back 4-game sets against the Indians and Loggers.

Game 1
ATL: SS Patino – 2B Hibbard – C Luna – LF Rockwell – 1B M. Rucker – 3B W. White – CF Walrath – RF Lyle – P D’Attilo
POR: RF Carmona – SS Walter – 3B Nunley – 1B H. Mendoza – CF Duarte – LF DeWeese – C Denny – 2B Mathews – P Guerrero

Bobby Guerrero’s Raccoons debut didn’t go according to plan. Ruben Luna homered in the first, but the run was made up when Cookie doubled and scored on Walter’s single. In the second inning, however, a walk to Wade White and Jeffrey Walrath’s double put two men in scoring position with one out. While Guerrero struck out Jonathan Lyle for the second out, D’Attilo dumped him with a 2-run single to center. That was all the runs that Guerrero ended up allowing in six innings, but sure was enough to put the Raccoons into a dark hole. D’Attilo generated mostly poor contact, which allowed a few scattered singles to the Raccoons through the innings, but they couldn’t get a real hold of him. They had two men on with one out in the fourth, but DeWeese popped out and Denny struck out. The tying runs were on base again after singles by Nunley and Mendoza in the sixth inning, and then with nobody out. Duarte took the first pitch and hit it into a double play, 5-4-3, and DeWeese flew out to right to end that inning in usual pathetic fashion. Top 7th, Chun came out in relief of Guerrero, although it was more like ‘relief’. He walked D’Attilo on four pitches to start the inning, threw a wild pitch, also walked Devin Hibbard, and somehow got the 41 combined home runs of Ruben Luna and Gil Rockwell to pop out over the infield to escape some major harm to his whiskers. Kaiser and Schroeder kept the Knights where they were offensively after that, with the tying run coming to the plate with nobody out in the bottom of the ninth when Alex Duarte found the gap in left center for a double. With closer Quinn McCarthy being a southpaw, DeWeese was outta here and hit for by Eddie Jackson, who popped out over the plate, and Denny grounded out poorly. Margolis batted for the badly slumping Mathews, took an 0-1 pitch and deposited it behind the centerfield wall to get the Critters even when they were down to their last out!

At this point, there was only one batter left on the bench (Petracek), and the pitcher’s spot was up with Matt Schroeder in it. Since he had gotten only one out in the top 9th and it was unlikely that we would get anything started with the season-long terrible Petracek, Schroeder was allowed to bat to actually end the inning here and then pitch the tenth. Unfortunately, that tenth inning derailed right away when Schroeder drilled Luna, then allowed a true bomb to Rockwell that restored the Knights’ 2-run lead in a hurry. However, McCarthy wasn’t much better the second time around, either. Cookie and Walter opened the bottom 10th with singles, but Nunley’s fly to left next to the line was caught by Rockwell. The absolutely useless Mendoza struck out, and Duarte’s fly to right ended up with Lyle, ending the game. 5-3 Knights. Carmona 3-5, 2B; Walter 2-5, RBI; Nunley 3-5; Margolis (PH) 1-1, HR, 2 RBI; Kaiser 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K;

We are now on about our seventh second baseman and we can’t find one who hits. Mathews is dead ever since getting the Player of the Week nod. This is of course only Ronnie McKnight’s fault for getting hurt and tearing a hole into the lineup. Second baseman trade incoming?

In better news, Cookie has a 12-game hitting streak.

Game 2
ATL: CF M. Reyes – 2B Hibbard – C Luna – LF Rockwell – 1B M. Rucker – 3B W. White – SS Patino – RF Lyle – P Quirion
POR: RF Carmona – SS Walter – 3B Nunley – 1B H. Mendoza – CF Duarte – LF DeWeese – C Denny – 2B Petracek – P R. Mendoza

The Raccoons seemingly rolled over and died as early as the third inning. After getting no runners and striking out three times against the miserable Quirion in their first two offensive innings, the Raccoons’ Ricky Mendoza got laid in the third. Starting with the miserable Quirion, the Knights hat three straight singles to load them up. Luna hit a sac fly, Rucker walked to restock the bags, and then Wade White, perhaps the least powerful batter in the lineup, hit a grand slam to right, giving Atlanta a 5-0 lead. It came as a bit of a surprise when the Raccoons were close to taking the lead in the fourth…

Denny opened the third inning with a triple, which was already unusual, and scored on Petracek’s groundout to make up one run, but the damage wasn’t done until the bottom of the fourth. Walter doubled to right before Nunley whiffed and Mendoza rolled out pitifully. Duarte then singled to center, plating Walter, 5-2, DeWeese singled to right, and two more singles by Denny and Petracek scored a run each, bringing up Ricky Mendoza with runners on first and second and two outs. We longed to roll the dice, Jackson batted for Mendoza – and struck out. Cookie drew a leadoff walk in the bottom 5th, took his 28th base of the year via the steal, but then was stranded due to the gross amount of non-hitting behind him. After getting THIS close to a comeback twice, the Raccoons suffered a regrettable bullpen explosion in the seventh inning, and Chris Mathis was right in the middle of it, but Wade Davis started things by inexcusably walking the pitcher Quirion. He got Marty Reyes on a groundout, before Mathis replaced him. Hibbard made the second out over the infield, before Luna was walked intentionally to get Mathis to face the right-handed Rockwell, who singled to center, plating a run, and then they just kept rolling over Mathis, forwards, backwards, and forwards again until three runs had scored in the now 8-4 contest. When the bottom 7th rolled around and Quirion loaded the bases to bring up Hugo Mendoza with two outs, it was as good a time as any to head for the booze cabinet, because you weren’t going to witness any greatness. In a full count, Mendoza fouled out. That was the last act for the Coons, who surrendered an unearned run to the Knights in the top of the ninth, courtesy of a walk and two singles allowed by Chun and an error by DeWeese. 9-4 Knights. Walter 2-5, 2B; Duarte 2-4, RBI; Denny 2-4, 3B, RBI; Petracek 2-4, 2 RBI; Davis 2.1 IP, 0 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 3 K;

Cookie’s hitting streak ended right away with a grim 0-for-4 performance.

Also, guys, we came in 4-2 and needed only one win to extend our string of season series taken from the Knights. Can we … please?

But before we could get to the Sunday game, the Knights pulled two moves on Saturday night that were a bit puzzling. First, they sent 1B Mike Rucker (.234, 7 HR, 33 RBI), who had been injured for a bunch of the season, to the Warriors for INF Gary Rice (.308, 4 HR, 18 RBI), a veteran of 37 years of age, and #4 prospect OF Adrian Feliz; then dealt Saturday’s winner, SP Stephen Quirion (6-6, 5.07 ERA) to the Aces for two more prospects.

The Knights ended up making a change in the rotation after the trades, but we still ended up seeing a right-hander in Drew King (8-6, 4.18 ERA).

Game 3
ATL: LF M. Reyes – 3B W. White – 1B Rockwell – C Luna – 2B Hibbard – RF Lyle – CF Walrath – 3B G. Rice – P D. King
POR: LF Carmona – CF Duarte – SS Walter – 1B H. Mendoza – RF Jackson – 3B Nunley – C Margolis – 2B Petracek – P Santos

Again, the Knights scored first. Gary Rice hit a double to right center in his first at-bat as a Knight, coming at the start of the third inning. King struck out bunting, Reyes struck out properly, but Wade White flipped a 3-2 pitch into leftfield and Rice, while old, was running all the way and scored before Rockwell struck out to end the inning. Following a leadoff walk by Luna in the fourth, Devin Hibbard homered, running the score to 3-0 against Santos and more or less ending the 5-year run of beating the Knights over the season, since the lineup was doing no great things at all early on against King, and this was a mild understatement. By the time Santos left the game after five and a third messy innings, only one Raccoon had been on base: Matt Nunley, twice, with a single and a walk, and the latter time he had been mopped right up by Margolis’ double play. There were also only three strikeouts on King’s ledger, but two of those on ****ing Hugo Mendoza…

Out of the blue, the tying run came up after all in the bottom 6th. Cookie’s 2-out walk brought up Duarte, who was batting second not for his bat being found again, but with Jackson in the lineup I didn’t want all the lefties in the top half and the righties in the bottom half, and so Duarte was flicked up, and here he singled with two outs to bring up Walter as the tying run. Walter fell to two strikes before lining a 2-2 pitch to right center and onto the grass, Cookie scored, RBI single, and – oh ****. Mendoza was up again. The death of all offense grounded out to short. King issued back-to-back walks to Nunley and Margolis with one out in the bottom 7th, bringing up Petracek, who while relatively effective recently, was still only batting .205 with two homers, and yes, he’s been here all year, and no, he wasn’t hurt or lost in the woods or stuck in the fridge, or whatever. He smoked a pitch up the middle, but not past Hibbard, whose only play was on first base. DeWeese batted with the tying runs in scoring position and two outs, the Knights left King in to face him, but King really didn’t feed him anything that could be driven and DeWeese walked, the third free pass in the inning. That brought up Cookie.

Cookie, seriously. If you clear the bases here, I’ll buy you a Ferrari in any ****ing color you want. Just, clear the bases, okay? When he flew to shallow right, Devin Hibbard and Jonathan Lyle almost took another out, but Lyle made the catch, and the inning ended. After slumbering through the middle innings, the Knights put two on against Davis in the top 8th, and Thrasher came in and came pretty close to defusing the mess once more, until Margolis monstrously threw away a 2-out grounder by PH Mike Wittner that would have ended the inning if played nicely. Thrasher’s mind unraveled after that and the allowed another RBI single to Gary Rice, with three runs scoring in total, all unearned. Another run, earned, scored on the dip**** Alex Ramirez in the ninth inning. In because the bullpen had managed to completely blow itself up in just three days, he allowed a leadoff single to Marty Reyes, who stole second and moved around to score on Ruben Luna’s 2-out single. The Knights would have gotten him for two at least and who knows how many more if Duarte hadn’t thrown out the lumbering Luna at the plate on Hibbard’s double to center. 7-1 Knights. Walter 2-4, RBI; Nunley 2-2, 2 BB;

In other news

July 23 – VAN RF Ezra Branch (.311, 15 HR, 53 RBI) has quite the day in a 5-3 win over the Knights, banging out five hits, including two doubles and two homers, and drives three runs in the victory.
July 23 – SAC 3B Jason LaCombe (.329, 2 HR, 37 RBI) is out for a month with an oblique strain.
July 24 – Fresh off the DL, SFB RF/1B Will McIntyre (.298, 6 HR, 26 RBI) is sent to the Blue Sox for 3B Wes Ladd (.300, 2 HR, 15 RBI) and unranked prospect INF/LF/CF Saverio Carafa.
July 25 – IND SP Dan Lambert (9-6, 3.36 ERA) 3-hits the Thunder in a 5-0 shutout.
July 26 – While the 13-0 rout the suffered at the hands of the Thunder was certainly stinging the Indians already, they had to be even more upset by the fact that they were in fact NO-HIT by OCT SP Brian Furst (9-12, 5.13 ERA), with a walk drawn by Raul Matias everything that stood between Furst and a perfect game. This is Furst’s second no-hitter, joining Henry Selph as the only pitchers to achieve the feat twice. The ABL’s 39th no-hitter comes nine days after the previous one by Tijuana’s Andrew Gudeman, the quickest that no-hitters have ever followed upon another, beating the span of 14 days between the no-hitters of RIC Roger Weaver and NYC Edwin Edmonstone in 1984. This is the third no-hitter for Oklahoma City, with Alex Lindsey in 2008 throwing the only one not belonging to Furst.
July 26 – The Bayhawks have to shut down C Dylan Alexander (.273, 11 HR, 53 RBI) with chronic back soreness. The 33-year old backstop will be idle for a month before resuming baseball activities.
July 26 – San Francisco is also not idle on the trade front, sending CL Ray Kelley (4-4, 4.28 ERA, 29 SV) and prospect Saverio Carafa – just acquired two days earlier – to the Blue Sox for LF Roger Allen (.232, 5 HR, 27 RBI).
July 26 – The Condors send LF Matt Pruitt (.306, 2 HR, 17 RBI) and a prospect to the Capitals for LF/RF Danny Munn (.294, 4 HR, 23 RBI).
July 27 – SFB OF Dave Garcia (.342, 22 HR, 60 RBI) flattens the opposing Crusaders almost on his own with four hits in five trips to the plate, driving in five. What’s more is that Garcia actually hits for the CYCLE in the game, collecting one of each type of base hit in the Bayhawks’ 14-0 mauling of the Crusaders. The 62nd ABL cycle is the second in Bayhawks history, coming over 20 years after the previous cycle for the team by Antonio Rodriguez in 1997.
July 27 – 28-year old RF/3B/CF/2B Rich Arrieta (.344, 4 HR, 25 RBI) is traded from Las Vegas to Denver in exchange for two prospects, including SP Vic Mercado, who was ranked as high as #15 three years ago, but is not ranked anymore.
July 28 – The Aces acquire RF/LF Saverio Piepoli (.295, 11 HR, 51 RBI) from the Buffaloes in exchange for two prospects, including #8 prospect CL Gregg Bell.
July 28 – In another trade, the Bayhawks pick up LF/CF/SS John Harris (.333, 2 HR, 28 RBI) from the Capitals for three prospects.
July 28 – The Cyclones win a 1-0 game from the Pacifics thanks to Jose “Dingus” Morales’ (.343, 24 HR, 61 RBI) solo home run in the fifth inning.
July 29 – Another NO-HITTER! Pittsburgh’s John Key (5-10, 5.01 ERA) nixes the Wolves in a 4-0 game, allowing only three walks, but no base hits. This is the 40th no-hitter in ABL history, and the third of the month, something that had never happened before. It is the fourth no-hitter in Miners history, as Key follows in the steps of Wilson Cordova (1989), Leland Lewis (1993), and Fred Dugo (2014).
July 29 – The Falcons take a 4-3 game in 17 innings from the Titans. They collect only nine hits in the 17 innings.

Complaints and stuff

Busy week!

Dan Lambert was the other guy I tried to trade for, but the Indians had none of it, at least not for the offerings I could make them. So Guerrero it is. I mean, the required level of excellence is not terribly high. Be better than Nielson. That’s it. And Nielson was pretty darn wonky.

Vic Mercado was of course a Raccoons prospect that was sent to Vegas in the ill-advised deal for Ron Richards and Zack Entwistle in 2014.

It’s not a big mark, but with his start against the Condors, Jonny jumped over the 1,200 K mark this week, reaching exactly 1,209 strikeouts. Yup, he’s still 27.

Raccoons’ longest streak of season series wins against individual CL teams:

8 – Condors (2006-2013)
6 – Bayhawks (1989-1994)
6 – Thunder (1989-1994)
6 – Crusaders (1991-1996)
6 – Knights (2006-2011)
6 – Canadiens (2009-2014)
5 – Titans (1986-1990)
5 – Thunder (2004-2008)
5 – Titans (2008-2012)
5 – Knights (2013-2017)