Portland Raccoons (ABL)

[Questdog]

Previously, Nick Brown seemed to have one slight shortcoming in that his control was less than perfect, but 6 walks in 7 starts makes his control look like a longcoming now......

And why no news of the Portly Pussy being turned into a slugger via trade?......

Also, C Craig Bowen looks to be asking for more PT......he is tied for 2nd on the team in HR's and has a nifty OBP and Wood looks like the worst hitter who has a job in baseball with an OPS threatening to go under .500........defense is all well and good, but a little hitting must be accomplished....

[Trebro]

Brownie is seriously tied for 3rd in stolen bases? Is that an "I don't run much" thing or just more of the Raccoons being the Raccoons?

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by Trebro

Brownie is seriously tied for 3rd in stolen bases? Is that an "I don't run much" thing or just more of the Raccoons being the Raccoons?

Mainly the latter. Ordinarily, Yoshi Yamada, Vic Flores, and Clyde Brady should all been ahead of Brownie, but Vic Flores is something like 0/4, Clyde can't even get a good jump, and Yamada was last seen scrubbing toilets at the airport in St. Pete to earn money for a bus back to the west coast. The rest of the team are just awful runners.

Originally Posted by Questdog

Previously, Nick Brown seemed to have one slight shortcoming in that his control was less than perfect, but 6 walks in 7 starts makes his control look like a longcoming now......

If he can avoid getting his starts wiped out from now on, he might cobble together a semi-decent season.

Originally Posted by Questdog

And why no news of the Portly Pussy being turned into a slugger via trade?......

Also, C Craig Bowen looks to be asking for more PT......he is tied for 2nd on the team in HR's and has a nifty OBP and Wood looks like the worst hitter who has a job in baseball with an OPS threatening to go under .500........defense is all well and good, but a little hitting must be accomplished....

Last week, I had a trade on the table for L.A.'s Jens Carroll in exchange for the Obese Feline. I eventually balked. Carroll was the single (and almost solo) best player available for the Colossus of Rhodes, but he's a third baseman, and his skill set matches Daniel Sharp's remarkably. With Sharp, although he has never sucked for as long at one time, I still believe it's temporary rather than terminal. Although you could always move Sharp to first and sent Quebell back to Quebec.

Bowen's career numbers are even worse than Wood's. Defensively, they don't give another much. Bowen has a lead in the moustache factor, though.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (19-22) @ Bayhawks (17-28) – May 23-25, 2006

Tenth-ranked starting pitching was soiling all of the Bayhawks’ efforts, which included the best bullpen in the Continental League. Their average offense couldn’t keep up with the 4.69 ERA the rotation was piling up. They also had just gotten bad news that OF Jerry Fletcher (.265, 0 HR, 16 RBI), the former Logger, was out for the season with a ruptured achilles tendon.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (5-2, 2.77 ERA) vs. Jose Dominguez (2-5, 4.89 ERA)
Felipe Garcia (1-0, 5.40 ERA) vs. Carl Bean (2-6, 7.47 ERA)
Ralph Ford (3-4, 3.34 ERA) vs. Marc Padgett (1-2, 4.36 ERA)

No clue what’s wrong with Bean Boy. His walks already shot up last season, and he was ineffective in 2004 in general. We traded him right at the height of his ability, it seems. Of course, our reward is now stowed away in AAA so I don’t need to see him mucking up while his enormous belly is jiggling.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – 3B Sharp – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – SS Flores – RF Mays – C Wood – CF Trevino – P Brown
SFB: CF Hudson – SS J. Barrón – C Campbell – LF Beairsto – 3B J. Perez – 1B C. Parker – RF Hartley – 2B M. Valdés – P Dominguez

How scary could a lineup with Chris Beairsto (.243, 6 HR, 17 RBI) and Chris Parker (.235, 0 HR, 11 RBI) in key positions be? The Coons know a story about that, maybe even two. But in all cases, the Raccoons’ lineup had to out-score even the most ex-Coons-laden opposing orders first. Yet, in this particular instance, they tried really hard to out-suck the Bayhawks…

Two singles in the bottom 3rd were enough for the feathered beasts from the Bay to score a run off Brownie, who had come south without the ability to get pitches past anybody. The Bayhawks made contact constantly, and Brown would be held to two strikeouts over seven innings. Granted, he only allowed four hits, all singles, yet that was enough to fall behind – and not get picked up. The Raccoons had NOTHING. With Trevino on first and one out, Brown was hit for in the top 8th, with the right-handed part of our rotten meat rightfield platoon getting assigned to the job. He struck out while Trevino swiped second base. Nomura lined a ball up the middle, but Manuel Valdés caught it. And that was really it. 1-0 Bayhawks. Nomura 2-4; Brown 7.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 2 K, L (5-3);

I hate those ****tards. I hate them all. You know what? All those ****ing free agents this year – NONE of them are going to get another dime from me. They can all go to ****ING HELL!!

Wednesday the Agitator wrote that Brown had not gotten any support from a lineup composed of bystanders, but hadn’t helped himself either. Yeah, right, he didn’t hit a 3-run homer, that sucking bastard. Pseudo-journalist ***holes. Writing **** for 30 years and it won’t ever stop!

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – 3B Sharp – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – SS Flores – CF Crespo – RF Greenman – C Bowen – P F. Garcia
SFB: CF Hudson – SS J. Barrón – C Campbell – LF Beairsto – RF L. Alonso – 1B C. Parker – 3B J. Perez – 2B Da Silva – P Bean

Garcia allowed the #2 through #5 hitters on base in the first inning, which helped the Bayhawks to only one run once Chris Parker whiffed. The bottom 2nd was led off by Maxime Da Silva, who made it 2-0 with a leadoff jack in his fourth major league at-bat … ever. Bottom 3rd, Beairsto doubled, prompting Garcia to load the bases with two walks. Perez grounded to Nomura, who mishandled the ball rather than end the inning here and now, scoring a run, and Bean came up with two outs, he singled past Daniel Sharp to plate two more runs. Another run was waved in by Garcia before he was yanked with two outs in the fourth inning. The Coons’ pen would pitch scoreless ball for the next 5.1 innings, which was of no particular help to anybody, since the offense was all but silenced by Carl Bean, a pitcher with an ERA over seven and almost as many walks as strikeouts. Here, however, Bean struck out eight while walking only three, and carried a shutout into the ninth inning without EVER being endangered, before Greenman hit a double into the gap in left center to break up the SHO. The offense died down soon enough again, and the Raccoons lost soundly. 6-2 Bayhawks. Mays (PH) 1-1; Lucas 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K; Moreno 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 4 K;

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Crespo – 1B Sharp – LF Brady – 3B Searcy – C Bowen – RF Greenman – SS Ingram – P Ford
SFB: CF Hudson – SS J. Barrón – C Campbell – RF L. Alonso – LF Beairsto – 3B J. Perez – 1B C. Parker – 2B Sheehan – P Padgett

When the Raccoons took a 2-0 lead in the top 1st on hits from Crespo, Brady (double), and Searcy, a state of emergency was declared in California. Obviously, at the very least aliens must have had invaded and infiltrated the Raccoons’ squad. Ford handed one run right back, but Brady came up with two men on base in the top of the third and this time wasn’t confident with a two-baser, but hit a 2-run triple! The Raccoons, as they beat up on Marc Padgett, wasted chances in the next two innings, including a leadoff double by Ingram in the fourth on which he was tagged out trying to make it three. Craig Bowen would get the score to 5-1 with a leadoff jack in the sixth inning, and every run was precious since Ralph Ford was virtually without any stuff and just hoped that everything put into play would be suckered up by somebody. That strategy worked well for a remarkable stretch. In the top 7th we had Nomura on third base with two outs and Brady batting. The Bayhawks didn’t bite and walked him intentionally, then brought William Henderson, who erased Steve Searcy to get out of the frame, and in the bottom of the inning Brad Sheehan(!) hit a home run off Ford to get back to 5-2. Ex-Raccoons were in the focus in the bottom 8th with a 1-out double by Beairsto. Jose Perez popped out to second, bringing up Parker, in any case Ford’s last batter. He ran the count full, then struck him out, only his third victim on the day. In the bottom 9th, up by three, Angel Casas went to three balls on the first three batters, walking Sheehan, getting a double play from another former Furball in Pablo Fernandez, then allowed a double to John Hudson, before the pitching coach went out and threatened to stick a knife up Angel’s cuddly toy bear’s throat if he didn’t end this mockery instantly. The next pitch was a sinker that Juan Barrón couldn’t get anything on and grounded out easily to Sharp and Mr. Fluffles lived for another day. 5-2 Coons. Crespo 3-5; Brady 2-3, BB, 3B, 2B, 3 RBI; Ford 8.0 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, W (4-4);

I talk to our pitching coach regularly, y’know?

Raccoons (20-24) vs. Condors (20-27) – May 26-28, 2006

The Condors were virtually the same as the Bayhawks, with a teeny bit more offense (5th in CL), but the worst rotation anywhere in the league, just a bit under five earned runs a game. Their bullpen was not as crisp, though, and ranked only fifth. We had swept them in our first 3-game set of the season, and we still got them without their awesome centerfielder Ramón Perez, who was due back in one week.

Projected matchups:
Kelly Fairchild (2-2, 3.61 ERA) vs. Paul Kirkland (4-2, 5.61 ERA)
Kenichi Watanabe (3-4, 3.81 ERA) vs. Kelvin Yates (4-4, 3.04 ERA)
Nick Brown (5-3, 2.59 ERA) vs. Jorge Silva (2-7, 4.37 ERA)

We will not see a left-hander all week. Not that our platoon options are offering anything but double pain.

Game 1
TIJ: SS B. Boyle – CF Crum – 2B J. Diaz – LF B. Román – C Estrada – RF J. Thomas – 1B C. Solís – 3B R. Harris – P Kirkland
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Crespo – 1B Sharp – LF Brady – SS Flores – 3B Searcy – RF Mays – C Wood – P Fairchild

As soon as Kelly Fairchild started the game with a walk to Bruce Boyle, I felt the headaches coming. Fairchild allowed only one more runner in three scoreless innings before J.C. Crespo cracked a massive home run in the bottom of the third to give the Raccoons a 1-0 lead. That lead was short-lived. Johnny Crum hit a leadoff single in the top 4th, and Bartolo Román flipped the score with a home run of his own. Paco Estrada doubled, Fairchild walked the next two guys, and how in hell he escaped that jam will remain a mystery, but the Condors didn’t score again in the inning, and also wouldn’t touch a dull Fairchild again afterwards. But Kelly ran up his pitch count quickly with his ill control, although he only walked three in the entire game, and was replaced in the seventh. Lucas and Bruno each got two outs to move us the bottom 8th still down by a single marker, and then Trevino hit for Wood against Kirkland, who had whiffed eight and walked none, and lined a double to right to become the tying run with no outs on second base. And to nobody’s surprise at all, the suckers didn’t get him in. Quebell walked, Nomura erased a pair, Crespo walked, and Sharp grounded out. Kaz Kichida walked a pair in the top 9th, without the Condors getting that hit needed to score, and we faced Ricardo Huerta in the bottom 9th, and between Brady, Flores, and Ingram, nobody reached base. 2-1 Condors. Crespo 2-3, BB, HR, RBI; Trevino (PH) 1-1, 2B;

Game 2
TIJ: SS B. Boyle – CF Crum – 2B J. Diaz – LF B. Román – C Estrada – RF J. Thomas – 1B T. Mullins – 3B R. Harris – P Yates
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – 3B Sharp – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – C Bowen – RF Greenman – CF Trevino – P Watanabe

And a leadoff walk by Bruce Boyle – how refreshing! Boyle came around to score on a Diaz double, and oh noes, we’re down 1-0, we’re done. The Inepticoons couldn’t capitalize on a Robbie Harris error in the bottom of the first, and two singles weren’t enough to score in the second either, while Watanabe would walk Diaz in the third and then give up a long one to Román to fall behind 3-0. Yates had struck out 76 in 68 innings so far this season, and showed no intentions to stop, but mixed in a close pitch here and there, including one right smack into Yoshi Nomura’s hand to start the bottom of the third inning. Nomura went down and had to be walked off the field and out of the game.

THE RACCOONS WILL NOT BE PLAYED LIKE THAT! We might be the dirt on everybody else’s soles in the entire sport, but you WILL NOT THROW OUT YOSHI!!

There was some faint movement from the bats in the inning. Brady singled, and then Quebell and Bowen each drove in a run before Greenman became an obvious K to stop the rally at 3-2. Watanabe retired Yates to start the fourth. His first pitch was right into Bruce Boyle – and he went down, and had to leave. Both benches were warned, as there were players hollering on every set of steps into the dugouts. In a perfect world, Watanabe would now outpitch the ugly scavengers, but he was wasting pitches left and right and needed over 90 pitches through five innings. However, when he left, he was due for the win – Adrian Quebell exacted revenge on Yates with a score-flipping 2-run homer in the bottom 5th. That gave us a 4-3 lead, and while Yates had been deadly, striking out eight in six innings before being hit for, the Raccoons unveiled the sinister toys of their bullpen which hacked the Condors to pieces in the next few innings, Bruno and Moreno whiffing five between them in the seventh and eighth. Bottom 8th, Quebell singled to right off Jorge Escobar to get going. Bowen singled up the middle, and Crespo – hitting for Greenman – singled to right as well to load them up with no outs. C’mon, we need a hard shot! It surely looked like it might be a bitter inning at first: Trevino grounded to first, Román fired home, and the unhurried Quebell was out at home. Searcy hit for Moreno, and at least scored a man with a groundout. Ingram hit in the #1 slot, grounded to right – and past Diaz! Crespo scored, 6-3 Coons! And there came Angel, and that meant the pillow that was firmly pressed onto the Condors’ faces was not going to get lifted again. 6-3 Raccoons! Quebell 4-4, HR, 3 RBI; Bowen 4-4, 2B, RBI; Crespo (PH) 1-1; Bruno 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K;

YOU … WILL NOT THROW OUT YOSHI!!!

Yoshi had dislocated a finger, and would be seriously hampered for a couple of days, which he would best spend resting. Bruce Boyle (.259, 6 HR, 25 RBI) certainly got the worse end of it, ending up on the DL with a bruised wrist.

Watanabe has now won three of four after a 4-game spill in which he lost every start. He has no stuff, can’t go deep into games, and is a long shot for the back of even a bottom dwelling team’s rotation, but he is one heck of a little soldier.

Now for the rubber game, with both sides well equipped with bats, spikes, a few knifes on each side, our Japanese players providing a couple of nunchaku, and Brownie was hiding a hand grenade under his cap. Let’s go to war.

Game 3
TIJ: 1B T. Mullins – SS Brantley – 2B J. Diaz – C Estrada – LF B. Román – 3B R. Harris – RF B. Wilson – CF Crum – P J. Silva
POR: SS Flores – 3B Sharp – LF Crespo – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – C Bowen – CF Trevino – 2B Ingram – P Brown

Ted Mullins let the bat speak and hit a leadoff homer off Brownie. The Coons got two on in the bottom 1st, but Johnny Crum made an inspiring catch on Crespo’s drive to center in between and that kept them from scoring, but Bowen came up with a homer to start the second inning for the Coons and that tied it up. Starting with Bartolo Román in the first inning, Brownie struck out SIX in a row until Ron Brantley managed to fly out to shallow right on an 0-1 offering to end the top 3rd. A leadoff single in the fifth made Robbie Harris the first Condor to touch first base safely since Mullins’ rocket, but he was erased on a double play and Brown struck out Crum for his eighth K while barely getting over 60 pitches. He just needed a little help from his friends. He didn’t get any with another soul-stabbing double play hit into in the bottom fifth, but the Condors got three hits, including two silly singles, in the top of the sixth to take a 2-1 lead on him. Bottom of the sixth, Brady singled to left, Quebell singled to left. No outs. Bowen grounded to right, double play. OH COME ON!!! I WILL SKIN YOU OF YOUR PATHETIC PELTS!!

There was still Clyde Brady on third and Trevino batting. The youngster grounded hard to right, where the ball eluded Mullins, and Brady came home to tie the score. On the first pitch to Ingram, Trevino stole second base. The Condors did not put Ingram on intentionally, probably figuring that Brown, who had needed 26 pitches in the top of the inning, would probably be pinch-hit for. Ingram got hold of a good pitch, doubled to left, and Trevino scored easily, before Brown lined out to short. 3-2 Coons, and Brown axed down Wilson, Crum, and Silva for three more strikeouts in the top 7th. Brown reappeared for the eighth on 102 pitches, struck out Mullins, got Brantley on a grounder, and then STRUCK OUT DIAZ!! Angel got warmed up. The Coons got Brady on in the bottom 8th, but another double play hit into by Quebell.

Angel in the ninth. So cometh upon us to save us from blowing Brownie’s lead, for he is the blessed one! And Angel struggled. He got Blair Harris to ground out to Ingram (who had made an error earlier in the game), then walked Bartolo Román. That brought up left-hander Jeff MacGruder to pinch-hit, but MacGruder was not the feared slugger anymore and went down whiffing. Another deep count on Josh Thomas, the third pinch-hitter of the inning, who grounded hard to the right side – to Ingram – he gets it – to first – BALLGAME!!! 3-2 Brownies!!! Brady 2-3, BB; Brown 8.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 13 K, W (6-3);

BROWNIIIIEEE!!!!

Goodbye scavengers! Don’t hit your fat, ugly butts on your way out!!

In other news

May 22 – The Crusaders deal OF Paco Javier (.245, 2 HR, 15 RBI) to the Indians for 3B Ian Burns (0-for-8), and AA 3B/SS Walt Canning, who is not a ranked prospect.
May 23 – The Indians will skip SP Curtis Tobitt (6-2, 1.57 ERA) at least once due to a dead arm.
May 25 – LVA SP David Estrada (4-5, 4.08 ERA) will be out for the next year with a torn rotator cuff.
May 26 – Sophomore CIN OF Jose Silva (.246, 3 HR, 16 RBI) is out for about six weeks with a quad strain.
May 28 – CHA LF/RF Jesus Flores (.321, 4 HR, 38 RBI) will miss a month with a herniated disc.

Complaints and stuff

Nick Brown added another stake in the tie for second place in most strikeouts in a game with 13 for the Raccoons. He holds that tie with Nick Brown and Nick Brown. The record is held by Nick Brown with 14. Only eight times has a Raccoon struck out 12 batters. Honors were done by Steven Berry, Kisho Saito, Ralph Ford, Nick Brown, Ralph Ford, Nick Brown, Nick Brown, and Nick Brown.

Now for an anti-stat, Nick Brown has not received more than three runs of support in ANY of his last six starts. Overall, he has received 31 runs of support in nine games (3.44 R/G), going 6-3 with a 2.54 ERA. He is 2-3 with a 2.59 ERA during his last six starts, while getting 1.66 R/G in support. This team…

Eddie Fernandez will go to rehab early next week and might be back with us by the weekend.

[Questdog]

Nothing like a good fight to bring the boys together!

I am smelling an end to the losing season streak......unless I just jinxed it.....

[pjh5165]

I'm with Questdog, this is the year the Coons get back to decency. I'm glad to see the offseason additions of Bowen and JC Crespo working out so far.

[Westheim]

Our newly added Capt'n Coma hard liquor sponsorship shows the first bad results among the dwindling fan base. This team is bottom 3 in all offensive categories worth mentioning. They just plainly can't. They ... can't.

Sadly.

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2006 DRAFT POOL EVALUATION

The Raccoons will have the third pick in every round of the 2006 Amateur Draft, as well as the second pick of 23 in the supplemental round, which is compensation for the Condors signing Ricardo Huerta.

---

Vince Guerra used to hand me two hand-scribbled pages ripped out of a note pad with a list of guys he liked, some scrawled evaluation points of them, and all that in barely legible handwriting involving guesswork. Like when we drafted Darwin Tyler seven years ago with our first pick – who knew he actually wrote down Jon Merritt’s name to pick first?

Still, Vince’s instructions were pretty clear if you could get past his writing which was a result of only four years of formal education (and even then not during harvest time). I liked Vince.

I liked Vince even more once Whitebread handed me a hard drive with his draft evaluation. “What’s that?” I asked. “The draft pool evaluations.”, Mr. Well Studied replied. After an awkward length of silence, I repeated. “What’s that exactly?” - “The draft pool evaluations” – “I mean, what IS … THAT?” – “A portable hard drive disk. You have to plug it into your PC.” – “Which PC?”

Never has there been such devilry in my office! Neither a personal computer, nor political correctness! And now Mr. Smartass turns round the corner and demands this and that. I should have dumped him into the Willamette and disguised it as an accident when he came to me in April and asked for a number of whiteboards, a thousand or so magnetic metal bars and a label writer. Like there was room in our budget for any of that! We bought a 35-year supply of pencils and erasers back in 1989 (rosier times, you might argue), and he was supposed to make use of that.

Apparently he bought the hard disk machinery from his own money. Must check his salary. It is too generous!

Finally, Chad turned out to be useful. Between sniffing glue and dancing on the dugout in an oversized raccoon costume, he plugged the hard drive into a spare laptop and had me access the data, to have a good look at the stuff together with Honeypaws - much to my dismay, though. Still no proper list of players. And no ratings at all. Just cryptic stuff like wOBA and FIP, and a lot of formulae (I may or may not have accidentally overwritten some while browsing his files).

FIP, I figured, would be something like WHIP. Maybe a short form of that. Faults per Innings Pitched, probably. Today's youth - too lazy to even write four letters down! Anyway. There was this high school pitcher Manuel Rojas, who made zero faults per innings pitched. Does that mean he pitches a perfect game every time he goes out? Strikes out 19 per nine innings? What the **** does FIP- mean? Bad faults per inning? What is this misery!?

Abrams! … ABRAMS!!

(deep, frustrated sigh)

I would love to present a ranking right now, but I wasn’t left with one, and Whitebread seems to have gone to the village for an overpriced coffein-free soy latté.

---

Fixed a nasty mistake (there are often some in the reviews, from typos to nonsensical sentences, and often I just let it be, but this one rolled up my toe nails this morning) in last week’s review. We did not face *no* right-handers, but *only* right-handers. You might have guessed already from facing Carl Bean on Wednesday. I’m **** and you know it.

[Westheim]

We sent Eddie Fernandez to rehab in St. Pete for at least one series, and would see where things would fall – most likely by the wayside – later.

Raccoons (22-25) vs. Aces (24-25) – May 29-31, 2006

The Aces were already 9 1/2 games behind the romping Falcons, with their run production and prevention efforts both having them at the top of the second division in the Continental League. Their bullpen was relatively weak, although both halves of their pitching staff were posting roughly 4.00 ERA’s. They also didn’t field very well, but for all their shortcomings they were 2-1 against the Critters this year.

Projected matchups:
Felipe Garcia (1-1, 6.10 ERA) vs. Rafael De Jesus (4-3, 4.61 ERA)
Ralph Ford (4-4, 3.20 ERA) vs. Bob Bowden (3-2, 3.00 ERA)
Kelly Fairchild (2-3, 3.50 ERA) vs. Jim Pennington (5-4, 3.44 ERA)

Their entire staff was right-handed, so still no southpaw for us.

Game 1
LVA: LF Covington – 3B Warrain – 2B O. Torres – C T. Turner – CF Messinger – RF R. Garcia – 1B Breach – SS F. Soto – P De Jesus
POR: SS Flores – 3B Sharp – LF Crespo – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – C Bowen – CF Trevino – 2B Ingram – P F. Garcia

Vic Flores made awesome plays left and right, and Felipe Garcia a) couldn’t be bothered to field his own position, and b) gave up a 2-run homer to Rafael De Jesus after tardily allowing Alan Breach on base to start the third inning. It was De Jesus’ first career homer, and precisely the point where we started to look how Edgar Amador was doing in AAA (hint: not good). Garcia was allowed to showcase his crummy interpretation of the art of pitching for six and a third innings, eventually being charged with six runs, including a 2-run shot by Tom Turner in the sixth, and a bullpen meltdown in the seventh, where he left with two men on for Ed Bryan to face Martin Covington. The visiting leftfielder plated a run with a groundout, before Bryan and Rockburn went on to issue three straight walks, and only the first one to Inaki-Luki Warrain was intentional. When Kaz Kichida was romped for three more runs in the eighth inning, the rout was officially on. The Raccoons out-hit the Aces 10-9 in this one, but whenever they had a chance, they hit into a two-for-one. 9-2 Aces. Brady 3-4, HR, RBI; Bowen 2-3, BB, HR, 2B, RBI; Ingram 2-3, 2B; Moreno 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Ack.

Game 2
LVA: LF Covington – 3B Warrain – 2B O. Torres – RF R. Garcia – SS Vieitas – C Abrams – CF F. Rivera – 1B Breach – P Bowden
POR: SS Flores – CF Crespo – LF Brady – C Bowen – 1B Quebell – 3B Searcy – RF Mays – 2B Ingram – P Ford

Ralph Ford expended 120 pitches for seven shutout innings while whiffing nine in a game that became more defined by horrendous running and fielding. Before rain halted the game for an hour in the bottom 7th, there had been four attempts to steal bases, three of which had ended in defeat. The lone success was Vic Flores’ first bag of the year (just before June, too!) in the third inning, leading to Crespo’s RBI double before Crespo was one of three runners (alongside Mays and Covington) to get caught. The Coons added two runs in the bottom 5th on an RBI single by Brady and another runner coming home on Fernando Rivera’s awful attempt that was 45 feet wide of home plate. Batting under .100, Rivera was very aware to not help his team in any way. The game also featured resented ex-Raccoon Cesar Salcido, who appeared in relief in the bottom 7th to retire Clyde Brady and end the inning. Bowen drew a walk off him in the eighth before Quebell sent one far, far away, much to the enjoyment of the home crowd, and when Christian Greenman hit for Bob Mays to counter the left-handed Salcido and went deep himself, the crowd went berzerk, jeering both pitcher AND batter! Nomura hit for Rockburn with two out and was drilled by Salcido, which almost sparked the next fisticuffs, with Brady, Quebell, Brown, and a few others actually leaving the dugout, with a few of the Aces reserves doing the same, but nobody that was not on business defending a randomly marked-off parcel of planet Earth inside the foul lines crossed over them and the umpires maintained control. When Vic Flores’ bat spoke for a 2-run home run off Salcido to complete a 5-run inning, the home crowd was ecstatic. 8-0 Raccoons!! Flores 1-3, 2 BB, HR, 2 RBI; Crespo 2-5, 2B, RBI; Mays 2-3; Greenman (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; Ford 7.0 IP, 7 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 9 K, W (5-4);

Despite being outrageously **** and a joy to stomp on, Salcido has still made himself a career since sucking really hard for the 1994-97 Raccoons. He is eight short of 500 career appearances.

The Titans took over first place on this 30th of May. They are still not dead, those suckers. Somehow the Raccoons continue to be only 4 1/2 out, too.

Game 3
LVA: LF Covington – 3B Warrain – 2B O. Torres – C T. Turner – CF Messinger – RF R. Garcia – 1B Breach – SS Vieitas – P Pennington
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – CF Crespo – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – RF Mays – C Wood – P Fairchild

Fairchild was nothing short of adrift in the first inning with two hits and two walks plating a run and loading the bases before Ricardo Garcia hit into a double play to let him off the butcher’s hook. A grievously horrendous Fairchild didn’t make it through even four innings despite the Aces stinking it up and stranding six in the first three innings. In the fourth, he melted away completely, issuing a walk, a balk, a wild pitch, a few singles, and left trailing 3-0 with two on and two out. Moreno walked Forest Messinger to load them up, but Ricardo Garcia fouled out to run the Aces’ LOB to a woofing nine. The bottom 4th saw the so far tame Critters step into action when Brady led off with a double. Quebell singled and Sharp unluckily lined out to Herberto Vieitas at short. Then however, Mays singled, 3-1, and Wood lined a double into the leftfield corner to tie the score. Moreno was sent to bat with another five innings to pitch, grounded to Pennington, and Pennington failed to beat Moreno’s snail pace to first. Yoshi Nomura sent the Raccoons ahead with a hard RBI double that almost ate up Alan Breach on its way to the corner in right, and Flores hit a bloop single to get to 5-3 before Pennington, shelled and shocked, got a pop from Crespo and a lineout to center from Brady. Although Moreno walked Vieitas and threw a wild pitch, the Aces didn’t score in the top 5th, and the Aces would also leave runners on third base against Lucas in the seventh and Bruno in the eighth. The score didn’t change all those innings with the Raccoons doing hardly anything and never touching second base again, while the Aces always fell short. In the ninth against Angel Casas, they didn’t fall short – they didn’t even get moving! Messinger and Garcia grounded out poorly, and Alan Breach went down ripping. 5-3 Coons! Nomura 2-4, 2B, RBI; Flores 2-4, RBI; Quebell 2-4; Wood 3-4, 2 2B, 2 RBI; Moreno 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, W (1-1) and 1-1;

We went on to play a bit with the following off day, which would have been Watanabe’s turn. Instead, we skipped him on Thursday and put him in to pitch Saturday, after Brownie’s turn on regular rest on Friday. Garcia got dropped to the end of the line.

Before the Loggers series, we recalled Eddie Fernandez from AAA, switching him with Santiago Trevino, who had certainly made everybody aware of his presence, but with Fernandez around we don’t need another defensive centerfielder batting .240 … Trevino, who was plucked straight from AA Ham Lake, reported to St. Pete now.

Raccoons (24-26) @ Loggers (20-32) – June 2-4, 2006

There were a number of reasons for the Loggers’ being in last place. Take their last place offense, for example. Or their last place pitching staff, which included the last place rotation ever since the grim reaper had collected Martin Garcia (5-1, 1.52 ERA), who would be out for most or all of June. Even the long-great Bakile Hiwalani was batting .225! Yet, they had flogged the Raccoons to a 4-1 tune this season.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (6-3, 2.54 ERA) vs. William Lloyd (3-5, 3.39 ERA)
Kenichi Watanabe (4-4, 3.95 ERA) vs. Junior Diaz (5-4, 4.54 ERA)
Ralph Ford (5-4, 2.89 ERA) vs. Dani Alvarado (1-9, 6.72 ERA)

Lloyd is the first southpaw we see in roughly two weeks.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – 1B Sharp – C Bowen – LF Crespo – CF Fernandez – RF Greenman – 3B Searcy – P Brown
MIL: LF Bayle – 2B B. Hernandez – CF T. Austin – RF Hiwalani – 1B Batlle – 3B Tolwith – SS K. Scott – C T. Phillips – P Lloyd

Tim Austin’s RBI triple scored Bartolo Hernandez from second base to give the Loggers an early 1-0 lead, but the game was already tied when Nick Brown came to bat in the second inning. He had the bases loaded with one out and singled to right, scoring Crespo, but Greenman was thrown out by Hiwalani, and when Nomura lined out to Jimmy Bayle the score remained 2-1. Brown also expended too many pitches for balls early on. The Loggers also made contact rather easily, and in the bottom 4th had Paco Batlle stroke a leadoff single to left. Tolwith, Brown’s old enemy, struck out, but Keith Scott singled to right, with Greenman’s arm being tested by Batlle, who went to third, but was thrown out. And still, everything came down. Tom Phillips was behind 1-2 quickly, fouled off three pitches, before Brown’s seventh offering was wild. Phillips then grounded to Nomura, who missed it completely for an error. Runners on the corners with two outs, William Lloyd singled up the middle to tie the score. Brown was visibly upset on the mound, walked Bayle, before Hernandez popped out to shallow right to strand a full complement of runners. Brownie got a new lease on a win when Craig Bowen singled in Yoshi with two outs in the top 5th, but soon found himself taken deep by Austin in the bottom of the same inning, and couldn’t get out of the sixth inning at all, with another Lloyd single being the jump starter for two more singles, a run, and then a bases-loading driller to Austin. Rockburn was thrown into the emergency and got Hiwalani on a fly to center to end the inning, but Brown was now trailing, 4-3.

He didn’t lose the game, however. Lloyd was removed after Nomura and Sharp reached in the top 7th, with right-hander Dave Walk (a South Korean!) appearing to face an 0-3 Crespo. That cried out for Clyde Brady to pinch-hit, and the veteran sent a hopper to the right side that eluded Hernandez’ golden glove and vanished in rightfield, with Nomura scoring from second base in the flight of his life. That wasn’t all yet: Fernandez and Greenman also hit RBI singles before the inning ran out and the Coons took a 6-3 lead.

Bottom 7th: Paco Batlle led off with a single past Searcy, and then Tolwith hit an infield single. Uh-oh. Dave Wheaton hit for Scott, but grounded to Nomura, who retired Tolwith on a fielder’s choice. Runners on the corners against Rockburn, Wheaton took off from first and was nailed by Bowen before Phillips flew out to right, leaving the Loggers with nothing at all. But we had gotten the lead through seven, so now it was time to form an orderly row between Marcos Bruno and Angel Casas and prepare for tomorrow’s game.

Unless Daniel Sharp made a stupid error. The play was difficult, a poor grounder by Tolwith, but he still made a big mess, and put a man on with two outs in the ninth. Casas, who was already off the mound, suddenly had to get back on. And you could SEE how much his mental door had been slammed shut when he issued a 4-pitch walk to Dave Wheaton. The pitching coach got out in a hurry to give him a little talk before Tom Phillips stepped in. Casas only got to 1-1 before Phillips drilled a ball to left. The hard line bounced in, but Brady had taken a good route; Tolwith was gonna score, but they sent Dave Wheaton, too, and Brady unloaded a lethal rocket back towards home plate – A PERFECT THROW, right into Bowen’s mitt, Bowen slammed into Wheaton as both tumbled over home plate!! Where’s the ball!!?? BOWEN HAS IT – and Wheaton was OUT!!!! 6-5 Furballs!! Sharp 2-4, BB; Bowen 3-5, 2B, RBI; Brady (PH) 1-2, RBI; Fernandez 3-5, RBI; Greenman 2-5, 2 RBI; Rockburn 1.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, W (2-0);

Well, Brownie, I love you to bits, but … that was pretty **** a game. It was also the occasion for the first run against Angel Casas all season long – and it was unearned for Sharp reasons.

But after this Brownie start was a bit of a bummer for fanboy reasons, the Raccoons had a chance to get back to .500 in their next game. Poor Kenichi. He will allow 11 runs in two thirds of an inning.

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – C Bowen – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – RF Mays – CF Fernandez – P Watanabe
MIL: LF Bayle – 2B B. Hernandez – CF T. Austin – RF Hiwalani – 1B Batlle – 3B Tolwith – SS K. Scott – C J. Reyes – P J. Diaz

… which was pretty much what happened. Paco Batlle’s 3-run shot in the first put the Loggers ahead, and they simply wouldn’t trail again. The Loggers had no other hits in the first four innings, while the Raccoons had eight, with offense always stopping at Craig Bowen, who hit into inning-ending double plays twice and struck out once, leaving them 3-2 short before the Loggers had consecutive 1-out RBI doubles from Batlle and Tolwith in the bottom 6th to knock the wildly unexciting Watanabe from the game. The Raccoons would not get a single hit past the fourth inning, going down without much fuss this time, with Junior Diaz pitching into the ninth inning before finally running out of beat. The Loggers had another run in the bottom 8th, Batlle hurting Rémy Lucas, who did not retire anybody and had to be rescued and reanimated by Domingo Moreno. 6-2 Loggers. Flores 2-4; Mays 2-3, 2B; Kichida 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

There were only four strikeouts in total in this game, two by Diaz, and one each by our Japanese faction.

Also, we made a move. Rémy Lucas had been decent early in the season, but recently he was only creating trouble. He was demoted to AAA, and we recalled Cody Bryant, a right-hander, who had already retired five batters earlier this season while Angel was on the DL.

Rubber game time. The Coons’ have won their last three rubber games.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – C Bowen – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – RF Mays – CF Fernandez – P Ford
MIL: LF Bayle – 2B B. Hernandez – CF T. Austin – RF Hiwalani – 1B Batlle – 3B Tolwith – SS K. Scott – C T. Phillips – P Alvarado

Another day, another chance to score, another inning-ending double play from Bowen, who ended the first despite Nomura and Brady reaching. The bottom 1st quickly showed the next left-hander that didn’t have nothing, with Ford having the bases loaded in a hurry, with the Loggers leaving it at two runs for starters on a Batlle sac fly and an RBI single by Aaron Tolwith. It never stopped being a wild ride for Ford in this game, who through three innings struck out six, but also allowed five hits, four walks, and three runs. He drilled Hiwalani to start the bottom 5th, then converted a Batlle grounder into a double play himself, but the Raccoons couldn’t do anything with Alvarado, and trailed 3-1, their only run scoring after Mays singled, stole second, and came home on Fernandez’ single. Quebell then led off the top of the sixth with a line drive homer to right that wrapped around the inside of the foul pole. Ford went six, Rockburn just so survived the seventh, and in the eighth we had Brady lead off with a single to represent the tying run. Uh-oh, Bowen’s next. Bowen was satisfied with making one out to left this time, and instead Quebell hit into the double play, and the Loggers had waited all week to bring out Robbie Wills in the ninth… 3-2 Loggers. Brady 3-4;

In other news

May 30 – The Stars will be without OF Cesar Morán (.347, 4 HR, 36 RBI) for a month after the 26-year old has come down with a sore shoulder.
May 31 – At age 39, SFW 3B/2B Jim Stein (.423, 3 HR, 22 RBI in 97 AB) joins a new club, reaching 2,500 career hits with a 3-3 day in the Warriors’ 11-9 win over the Rebels. Stein reaches the milestone with a fourth inning single off Richmond’s Esteban Flores. The 26th overall pick by the Capitals in the 1984 draft, Stein was traded to the Loggers while still a prospect and debuted for them in 1989, leaving as free agent in 1994. Since then he has been constantly on the move and is now on his third stint with the Warriors after 1998 and 2002. For his career he has batted .304 with 77 HR and 991 RBI and was an All Star three times. He also led baseball in hits with 222 in 1995.
June 1 – Darkness falls over Topeka: SP Tony Hamlyn (6-2, 2.45 ERA) is lost for the year with a partially torn labrum.
June 2 – Topeka’s Jack Berry (6-4, 2.77 ERA) tries to compensate for the loss of their ace, 3-hitting the Rebelsin a 2-0 shutout.
June 2 – The Indians acquire 2B Cesar Aguilar (.266, 4 HR, 15 RBI) from the Miners, sending over an unranked prospect.
June 3 – Los Angeles’ Stanley Murphy (.293, 6 HR, 36 RBI) has five hits including three doubles and plates four runners in a 16-9 thumping of the Pacifics over the Scorpions.

Complaints and stuff

How good is Tony Hamlyn? He is not even three full years older than Nick Brown, but beats him by 106 wins, 0.50 ER/9 and 1,170 strikeouts. He is the first legit shot the ABL has on a 4,000 strikeout guy. Well, that injury sure sucks not only for the Buffaloes.

We went out of our way by scoring 25 runs this week, which isn’t all that much (4.16 R/G), a mark attained only ONE other time this season in a week with less than seven games. We plated 21 runs twice, 17 runs thrice, and 16 once. Our only 7-game week ended with 31 runs. That was in early April, when we were 7-1.

But April's long gone.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (25-28) @ Indians (29-27) – June 6-8, 2006

A lack of offense was holding the Indians back, them scoring the second-least runs in the CL with the worst batting average of all teams (yes, even below the measly Coons). Their pitching staff was sixth overall, and they had taken three of four from the Raccoons so far. They were missing a few significant players however in SP Alonso Alonso and OF Jesus Alvarez.

Projected matchups:
Kelly Fairchild (2-3, 3.75 ERA) vs. Curtis Tobitt (6-2, 1.57 ERA)
Felipe Garcia (1-2, 7.02 ERA) vs. TBD
Nick Brown (6-3, 2.73 ERA) vs. Bob King (3-4, 4.09 ERA)

The Indians were about to shuffle their rotation. Neither Ramón Jimenez, nor Patrick Moreau had pitched in five days. In any case, we might get three right-handers, since Ramiro Gonzalez had pitched on Sunday.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – CF Fernandez – C Bowen – 3B Sharp – RF Greenman – P Fairchild
IND: CF P. Javier – RF B. Miller – LF Alston – 3B D. Lopez – C Paraz – 1B Fugosi – SS C. Aguilar – 2B J. Miller – P Tobitt

In a revelation, Kelly Fairchild allowed two runs without conceding a hit, solely by drilling leadoff man Paco Javier and walking two more around a few productive outs and Javier stealing second base in the first inning. That was not all, it would get much worse, with four runs in the third inning, which Fairchild did not survive before getting tarred, feathered, and dumped into the White River. In that third inning, he allowed another two walks, and hit another batter. And we’re puzzled as to why our guys get plunked all the time. With two out in the fifth the Raccoons would load the bases, but Vic Flores popped out to Filippo Fugosi, and that was about it for this game. Mild highlights were an awesome defensive play by Yoshi Nomura in the seventh that still didn’t help Law Rockburn not getting scored on, and Clyde Brady hitting a 2-run homer off Ricardo Sanchez once Tobitt was brought in early by the Indians. 7-2 Indians. Crespo 1-1; Mays (PH) 1-1; Bryan 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

The fact that Kelly Fairchild is a dork is nothing new, but we also got bad news after the game. Marcos Bruno retired the final Indian we faced in the game, Jose Paraz, on a strikeout, but didn’t feel well after the game, nor the next morning. A swift examination revealed some mild inflammation in his shoulder, and he was headed to the DL. Two weeks might be enough to get him patched back together. Adam Riddle joined us from AAA.

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – CF Fernandez – C Bowen – 3B Sharp – RF Greenman – P F. Garcia
IND: CF P. Javier – RF B. Miller – LF Alston – 3B D. Lopez – C Paraz – 1B Fugosi – 2B J. Miller – SS Kilters – P Jimenez

Ramón Jimenez (4-5, 5.66 ERA) survived putting pairs of runners on base in the first and second innings, and got a 2-0 lead spotted by James Miller’s home run in the bottom 2nd, but when another two Coons were on in the third, Craig Bowen hit a 2-out double past Ron Alston and the game was tied again. The Indians had runners in scoring position after singles by Jimenez and Javier in the bottom 3rd, and Javier stealing second, with no outs, before Bill Miller popped out to Sharp, Alston whiffed, and Brady nabbed David Lopez’ drive to left. Vic Flores’ 2-out RBI single in the top 4th even gave the Critters the lead, which Garcia instantly put in jeopardy. A single, a hit batter, a wild pitch, and the Jimenez with two outs chipped a soft line to right that required a sliding catch by Greenman to keep everything in one piece. Two outs in the fifth, Alston single, Lopez single, Paraz with a drive to deep center, but Fernandez made it their just in time. All the magic happened with two outs in this game. The Coons loaded them up in the sixth, chasing Jimenez, with Lawrence Bentley surrendering Brady on a fly to short right. Quebell came up and singled a 3-2 pitch up the middle, scoring two runners! Garcia wobbled like a drunken sailor through seven innings without the Indians ever getting that one big hit, but the Raccoons were pretty much blanked by the Indians’ pen as well. Bottom 9th, Angel time, and a leadoff double by Fugosi, coupled with the inability to get in a K on anybody, meant that Angel surrendered his first earned run of the season. He still saved the game, however. 5-3 Critters. Flores 3-5, RBI; Quebell 1-3, 2 BB, 2 RBI; Greenman 2-4; Garcia 7.0 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 1 K, W (2-2);

More shuffle for the Indians, they would pitch Patrick Moreau (5-2, 3.82 ERA) on Thursday. Do they actually know what they want?

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – CF Crespo – RF Mays – C Wood – P Brown
IND: CF P. Javier – RF B. Miller – LF Alston – 3B D. Lopez – C Paraz – 1B Fugosi – 2B J. Miller – SS C. Aguilar – P Moreau

Brown came out with a 2-0 lead after Quebell had gone deep in the top of the first inning, allowed a single to Bill Miller, and then David Lopez fired a drive to left that eluded Brady, but he got a nice bounce off the wall and unleashed for home, hammering out Miller to keep Brown’s ledger clean. Brownie had another hiccup in the second, allowing another runner to reach third base, but the Indians didn’t get much done for a while after that. Sadly, the Coons didn’t, either. Brown struck out a few either before suddenly pitching to lots of contact – but they were mostly groundballs. It was the eighth, Quebell’s rocket was still the difference in the game, and when Yoshi led off with a double into the left centerfield gap, it presented the best chance any team had had at scoring in over an hour. Vic Flores walked before Brady lined out to short, but Yoshi hadn’t strayed far and was safely back at the bag. After Moreau balked, it became imperative for Quebell to do something – and he did. A swing, a drive, three runs on the board! That far, Brownie had only thrown 77 pitches, but now control went away. He issued a walk in the eighth that didn’t get the Indians far, but then also gave a freebie to Bill Miller to start the ninth. That got the pen stirring. Not one moment to soon: Ron Alston went deep and that put the Indians back at 5-2. Jose Paraz would get on base, but Angel choked them before it could get really dicey. 5-2 Brownies! Nomura 2-4, 2B; Quebell 2-4, 2 HR, 5 RBI; Mays 3-4; Brown 8.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, W (7-3);

****, I thought that was a shutout. Meh.

Raccoons (27-29) vs. Blue Sox (32-27) – June 9-11, 2006

The Blue Sox were in contention, 2 1/2 games out of the lead in the FL East. They were only eighth in runs scored and sixth in runs allowed with a -8 run differential, though, so it was not all milk and honey for them. We hadn’t faced them since 2002, and we haven’t actually won any of the last three series against them since taking two of three in ’98.

Projected matchups:
Kenichi Watanabe (4-5, 4.35 ERA) vs. Dennis Fried (3-4, 3.32 ERA)
Ralph Ford (5-5, 3.01 ERA) vs. Carlos Castro (5-4, 4.43 ERA)
Kelly Fairchild (2-4, 4.48 ERA) vs. Toshiro Uenohara (3-4, 3.54 ERA)

We could also face Stanton Taylor (5-6, 4.40 ERA) on Sunday. Both of them last pitched on Wednesday due to some wicked weather in Topeka, where the Blue Sox had swept a double header. Castro, of former Gold Sox fame, is a left-hander.

Game 1
NAS: C J. Esquivel – SS Higashi – 1B C. Gonzalez – RF J. Ortíz – 3B A. Esquivel – LF J. Cruz – 2B Townsley – CF Samuels – P Fried
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – RF Mays – CF Fernandez – C Bowen – 3B Searcy – P Watanabe

16 years later, it still hurt. Fried, 37, was soon hurting as well, with a capital error by Takahashi Higashi, who was at best a makeshift shortstop in case of a worldwide pandemic that was killing only agile players, putting Nomura on base in the first, and the Raccoons chipped a few singles to plate two unearned runs. That pain was soon soothed however, with both Esquivels hitting home runs off Watanabe in the second inning, driving in five runs in total. Watching Watanabe go about his chosen profession made everybody hurting all over, even the select group of Blue Sox followers on the right field line. Watanabe walked five and struck out only one in the game, which happened to the poor sod that was his final batter, Alex Samuels. The Coons soon added horrible defense to their repertoire, with both Mays and Fernandez casually dropping fly balls in this game. Add to that a lineup that couldn’t harm a fly, let alone a 37-year old pitcher who had his best stuff in the 90s, but wasn’t saddled with anything that was his own fault over eight innings in this game. The Sox’ defense bailed again on Dan Hutchings in the ninth, putting Craig Bowen on base in addition to Eddie Fernandez, who had singled, to bring out closer Robert Parsons, who had been the FL Pitcher of the Month in May. It was a quick encounter for Steve Searcy. 6-2 Blue Sox. Flores 2-4;

Ha. Fried. And the Coons suck. Those Esquivels are not related, by the way, and aren’t even from the same island.

Game 2
NAS: 2B Higashi – C J. Esquivel – LF C. Gonzalez – RF J. Ortíz – 3B A. Esquivel – SS Townsley – CF Samuels – 1B G. Henry – P C. Castro
POR: SS Flores – 3B Sharp – LF Crespo – 1B Quebell – CF Fernandez – RF Greenman – C Bowen – 2B Ingram – P Ford

Cohesion was lost early by the home battery. Ford already had a man on when he drilled Samuels in the second inning. Next, Bowen allowed a passed ball, but the runners into scoring position, and both scored on a sac fly by Gilles Henry and a single by Carlos Castro. Quick turnaround then in the bottom 2nd, with Greenman hitting a 2-run triple and scoring on Ingram’s fly to right to give Ford a 3-2 lead that was entirely going to last forever … or maybe just for one batter. Cesar Gonzalez, who couldn’t have driven something with the help of a naval gun when he was a Raccoon, hit a solo homer to tie it in the top 3rd, before Crespo lined up in the cue of outfielders making stupid errors. 3-3 became 4-4 by the fifth, and in the sixth inning, Greenman dropped a caught ball for an error, and that broke the team’s back for good. Two on, two out, Higashi doubled into left center and put the Blue Sox ahead, 6-4. An entire team full of dirtbags! Wonderful. They had no skills, no soul, no spine, and they lost. 6-4 Blue Sox. Fernandez 2-4, RBI;

(groans very loudly)

Matt Cash replaced Cody Bryant on the roster. Bryant was walking guys left and right and was in general no help at all. Another move might follow swiftly, however. Cash had an ERA over four in AAA, but who are we to be nitpicky?

Game 3
NAS: LF MacDonald – SS Higashi – 1B C. Gonzalez – RF J. Ortíz – 3B A. Esquivel – C J. Esquivel – 2B Townsley – CF Samuels – P S. Taylor
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – RF Mays – 3B Sharp – CF Crespo – C Wood – P Fairchild

And the misery continued. After two scoreless frames, Samuels hit a leadoff single in the third and was bunted to second, which was when the Raccoons began to flicker. Samuels reached third base on a passed ball before MacDonald singled him in, and Fairchild then drilled Higashi in what quickly became another 2-run inning. Fairchild had nothing, was down 3-0 in the fifth, and was only spared another two runs because Sharp made a great grab at third base to retire Antonio Esquivel, but couldn’t be helped when he continued to fudge about in horrible ways in the sixth. Townsley and Samuels reached base, Taylor bunted them over into scoring position and that was it for Fairchild in the sixth, but Domingo Moreno couldn’t keep the runners on base, and the Blue Sox moved out to 5-0. The Coons came to bat in the bottom 6th, but before Stanton Taylor could cut Steve Searcy, batting for Moreno, open, the skies opened and doused the park. The rain never stopped on that day, and the game was eventually called two hours later. 5-0 Blue Sox.

In other news

June 5 – The Pacifics’ LF/RF Yohan Bonneau (.289, 9 HR, 22 RBI) becomes the 15th player in ABL history to hit three home runs in a game, hitting all dingers off Dallas’ Elwood Spurrell as the Pacifics win 8-4. Bonneau is the first player to achieve the feat since Claudio Rey in 2004, and the first non-Indian to do it since career home run leader Raúl Vázquez connected three times in 2002. In the same game, the Stars’ Logan Taylor (.476, 2 HR, 10 RBI in 42 AB) lands five hits, to no avail.
June 9 – The Rebels deal C Rodney Gibson (.262, 2 HR, 18 RBI) to the Scorpions in exchange for #76 prospect LF Gil Gross, who’s been stuck in A ball since being drafted in 2003, and another minor leaguer.

Complaints and stuff

18 runs scored…

For better or worse, the Fat Cat (4-1, 2.70 ERA in 6 GS in AAA) might return sooner rather than later and replace one of the two total dorks in the rotation. The other guy might move to the bullpen, or get traded for a box of bananas.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (27-32) @ Gold Sox (30-31) – June 12-14, 2006

The Gold Sox, who had not finished with a losing record since going 74-88 in 1998, and had won a title in 2003, where coming in just a hair under .500; well, dear socks, never mind with your eighth place offense that hardly outscores (+14 RD) your strong pitching, because no matter how hard you smell, the Raccoons are coming in to deliver some free wins. Since 2000 we played them four times, lost three of those series, and won only four games total against them.

Projected matchups:
Felipe Garcia (2-2, 5.70 ERA) vs. Antonio Donis (6-3, 2.45 ERA)
Nick Brown (7-3, 2.68 ERA) vs. Jerry Lane (3-3, 3.96 ERA)
Kenichi Watanabe (4-6, 4.64 ERA) vs. Victor Bernal (5-7, 3.07 ERA)

Donis is of course the guy that couldn’t even go five innings with ease when he was a Raccoon in the late 90s. The Gold Sox had made Donis a full time starter again last year, and he went 16-7 with a 2.75 ERA, going 199.2 innings. He’s 34 now, and his control issues are long forgotten. He has walked 12 batters in 77 innings. Our lineup for the opener had only nine AB against him, with only two hits, those being held by Greenman and Sharp.

Game 1
POR: SS Flores – CF Fernandez – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – RF Greenman – C Bowen – 3B Sharp – 2B Ingram – P F. Garcia
DEN: 2B Correa – LF F. Jones – RF Pujols – SS J. Lopez – CF Gentil – C A. Ortíz – 1B May – 3B D. Mendez – P Donis

While the Raccoons couldn’t do anything after both Flores and Brady hit infield singles in the first inning, Garcia couldn’t get a pitch for a strike past any of the first four batters, three of which reached, and the Gold Sox went up 1-0 in the bottom 1st. Bottom 2nd, two outs, nobody on, Quebell butchered Donis’ grounder for an error, and the next three Gold Sox landed base hits to extend their lead to 3-0. Garcia was just Garcia, completely inept, doing the barest minimum to strike out Donis to end the third with two Sox in scoring position waiting to be driven in. But the bottom 4th was Garcia’s last inning. He walked Jose Correa before allowing doubles to Freddie Jones and Pedro Pujols, 5-0, and Jose Lopez drew another walk. Pujols and Lopez would be stranded through no contribution by Garcia at all, but by Fernandez stretching those legs to intercept a looping Nick May drive to deepest center to end the inning. As might be guessed from the score, the Coons had nothing at all against Donis. Garcia continued to mess in the fifth, hitting Donis with a pitch, and then was hooked and butchered to feed the pigs. Trying to get some mop up innings from Matt Cash was highly unsuccessful as well, and Cash allowed a run in the sixth, then was cut open and disemboweled in the seventh. With two runs already in, Riddle replaced him, and allowed the two runners still on base to score as well. Donis scorched the hopeless Raccoons on three singles and struck out a dozen while walking none in just 92 pitches – and in his first career complete game ever. 10-0 Gold Sox.

Worst game since the George Kirk no-hitter. Maybe even worse. Hard to tell. There’s an emotional component involved, and the knowledge to have made another ****ing ******ed trade. Basically, around a corner or two, we converted Donis and two others into Edgar Amador. So yay, lucky us.

I should be fired…

Oh ya, we have not scored in 24 innings.

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – CF Fernandez – RF Mays – 3B Sharp – C Wood – P Brown
DEN: 2B Correa – 1B May – RF Pujols – SS J. Lopez – CF Gentil – C A. Ortíz – 3B D. Mendez – LF M. Trevino – P Águila

Brown was pretty dominant, hardly giving up sound contact early on, while the Gold Sox got a spot start from Jaime Águila (0-2, 7.71 ERA), who allowed a few hits early, but the Raccoons couldn’t get anything put together once they had a runner in scoring position, which they had in the second, third, and fourth innings. Somewhere in between they suffered another decimation event with Eddie Fernandez, just back from the DL, hurting himself on a defensive play and being replaced by J.C. Crespo. By not scoring through six, the Raccoons lengthened their drought to 30 innings, the longest in recent memory. Brownie however stuttered and allowed doubles to both Correa and May in the bottom 6th to fall 1-0 behind – a fatal mistake of course. Who should pick him up after all? Maybe a leadoff jack by Danny Sharp in the seventh would do, but that was all Brownie would get, being criminally unsupported once more. He went eight, but was left with empty hands. Law Rockburn and Scott Hood zeroed in on the opposition in the ninth and tenth innings, and Adam Riddle took care of the 11th. He was sent to the plate in the top 12th when Crespo reached base with a leadoff single, and was to bunt J.C. to second. The bunt was horrible, but thrown away by reliever Andres Gamez, and all hands were safe. Daniel Sharp doubled to left, plating Crespo, then waited in scoring position with riddle and watched in disbelief as Searcy grounded out poorly and Greenman struck out, and Yoshi Nomura continued to not get anything done and popped out to shallow center. That put Angel Casas into a 2-1 game and his recent struggles made you long for additional cushion. After retiring Lopez and Gentil on groundouts, Alfredo Ortíz and Zak Davidson both hit singles, with another left-hander in Freddie Jones up, but Jones popped out to Vic Flores and this game was over. 2-1 Raccoons. Brady 2-4, BB; Crespo 2-4; Sharp 3-5, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; Brown 8.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 6 K; Rockburn 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K;

Jaime Águila lowered his ERA by almost two and a half runs. And the non-support for Brownie is just infuriating. I just want to beat them senseless…

Eddie Fernandez will go back to the DL with a back strain. He might be back at the very end of the month, but it could become early July, too. For now, no batter was called up, but we added Edgar Amador to slide him into the rotation in place of the completely incompetent Garcia, who was to join the bullpen, but in fact he might soon end up being AFM’ed – annihilated from membership. We have quite a bit of junk in that pen now. Time for Marcos Bruno to heal up! While Rockburn can handle the eighth inning competently, the next best thing to him is now Kaz Kichida, and that is not a great statement to make.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – CF Crespo – RF Mays – 3B Sharp – C Bowen – P Watanabe
DEN: 2B Correa – LF F. Jones – RF Pujols – SS J. Lopez – CF Gentil – C A. Ortíz – 1B May – 3B Davidson – P Lane

Lane had almost as many (33/39) walks as strikeouts, and was not very enduring, but we had seen on Monday what not very enduring pitchers can do against these Horrorcoons. The Raccoons loaded the bases on two hits and a walk in the first inning before with one out Crespo lifted a ball to Bryan Gentil in center, Flores was sent, and thrown out at home. Another scoreless duel developed, in which Watanabe survived Craig Bowen’s clumsiness that allowed Zak Davidson to reach on a passed ball to start the third inning, only to crash violently in the fifth, where Jerry Lane hit a 2-out RBI single past a no less clumsy Sharp to give himself a lead, only to lose it almost instantly in the top 6th by walking Nomura and then surrendering two singles that went through between May and Correa, first to Brady and then the game-tying single to Quebell, and Brady scored on a groundout by Crespo to now put Watanabe ahead, 2-1. Pedro Pujols doubled with one out in the bottom 6th and was on third base after Lopez singled, but Watanabe converted Gentil’s grounder for an out at second base and escaped when Ortíz grounded out to first. Bowen upped to 3-1 in the seventh and Lane was gone after singles by Nomura and Flores, but left-hander Kevin Jones, sporting flashing red sideburns, retired Clyde Brady to keep the runners stranded. All of this was just a warmup to a colossally awful bottom of the eighth, where we tried not to use Law Rockburn after two innings the previous day, used Kichida, and it promptly blew up in our fuzzy faces. The Gold Sox plated three runs against a sorry parade by Kichida, Rockburn, and finally Moreno, and then we looked at Scott Hood in the ninth, trailing 4-3. Hood had struck out four in two innings on Monday, but allowed a leadoff single to Sharp before Bowen and Searcy whiffed. Nomura didn’t poke at every piece of junk and drew a walk, bringing up Flores, who ripped the first pitch into the outfield where it split Gentil and Pujols and got to the wall! Sharp was in, and Nomura was waved around and scored!! Hood balked Flores to third before Brady struck out, and here came Angel, walked Davidson on four straight, and that one was only ever going to go away. Shawn Roberts singled, Jorge Lopez singled, and Casas went down in flames. 6-5 Gold Sox. Flores 3-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Crespo 2-3, RBI; Watanabe 6.1 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 3 K;

Great. Bruno on the DL, and Angel has turned into one of the sponges. **** my life.

Kevin Jones was a Raccoon for nine games a few years back, posting an ERA over 11. Why is it that everybody ****s up once he wears a brown uniform?

Raccoons (28-34) vs. Crusaders (33-31) – June 15-18, 2006

The Crusaders come in for four. We are 2-1 against them, but they crumpled us to a 6-12 tune last season and with this team, it only ever can get worse. They were giving up the least runs in the league, so how about a nice challenge for our numb lineup? Their own offense was average, sixth in the league, but they again weren’t really playing to a lopsided positive run differential, coming in at +39, while the Raccoons had dropped to -30 after the most recent smotherings.

Projected matchups:
Ralph Ford (5-6, 3.20 ERA) vs. Russell Benson (5-4, 2.06 ERA)
Edgar Amador (0-5, 6.64 ERA) vs. Angel Javier (7-2, 2.14 ERA)
Kelly Fairchild (2-5, 4.80 ERA) vs. George Kirk (4-3, 3.43 ERA)
Nick Brown (7-3, 2.53 ERA) vs. Greg Connor (4-6, 3.03 ERA)

You see that pitching alignment, and you know it’s gonna be a long, sad weekend, with four right-handers on deck for the Crusaders that can all be nasty, and one of them has a particular knack for the Raccoons…

Game 1
NYC: CF R. Pena – C J. Lopez – RF S. Martin – LF M. Ortíz – 3B J. Henry – 2B Burns – SS Guerin – 1B Nava – P Benson
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – CF Crespo – LF Brady – RF Mays – 1B Sharp – 3B Searcy – C Wood – P Ford

Neither pitcher had much in the way of stuff and with frequent traffic on the bases it would come down to hitting in the clutch and to a bit of luck. Both teams plated one run in the first inning, and the Crusaders were up 2-1 in the bottom 3rd with Nomura and Flores on, as Crespo batted with one out. Crespo sent a hard grounder to second, where Ian Burns nabbed the ball, flipped it behind his back to Concie at the base, and Concie fired to first for the double play. Well, if you got circus plays like that turned against you…

Despite the acrobatics on display, Clyde Brady’s leadoff double in the fourth put the Crusaders in a bad spot, and a passed ball on Jorge Lopez didn’t help either. Brady scored on Mays’ groundout and the game was tied. Ford was just surviving without any stuff, but in the bottom 6th Vic Flores hit a leadoff single to right, then had a running start on Crespo’s single, made it to third while drawing the throw from Stanton Martin and was safe, with Crespo moving up. Runners on second and third, no outs, Brady represented the only vague impression of danger around and was walked intentionally, which worked out splendidly for the Crusaders, who held the damage to one run on Bob Mays’ sac fly before Sharp and Searcy sucked their team out of the inning. Ford held on through eight, on remarkably few pitches, because the Crusaders hit an unusual amount of soft pops all over the place. In the bottom 8th the Coons loaded the bases once more on a string of singles off Anthony Duhamel. Bob Wood with two out grounded to the mound, but against the direction Duhamel was falling to, and nobody could make a play for a bases-loaded RBI single to shove the score to 4-2. Bowen hit for Ford and singled to right, plating Mays and Quebell, and the lead was 6-2. Kaz Kichida got assigned the ninth, and issued two walks without retiring anybody. No-no-no, you won’t get a chance to blow this one. Ed Bryan was thrown in against Jose Nava, a switch-hitter who was weaker against lefties, and Nava hit straight into a double play before Daryl Anderson made the third out to Bob Mays. 6-2 Raccoons. Nomura 3-5; Flores 2-3, BB, 2B; Crespo 2-4; Brady 1-2, BB, 2B, RBI; Quebell (PH) 1-1; Bowen (PH) 1-1, 2 RBI; Ford 8.0 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 5 K, W (6-6); Bryan 1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, SV (1);

Steve Searcy (.167 in 72 AB) was demoted after this game. He was just not contributing anything. Yoshi Yamada, who had been fairly warm the last few weeks in AAA, rejoined the team to play a more versatile version of an offensively helpless backup.

This was also the day of the draft, the report on which will come in a separate post.

Game 2
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B Grant – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – SS Rice – 3B J. Henry – C D. Anderson – 1B Nava – P A. Javier
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – CF Crespo – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – C Wood – RF Greenman – P Amador

Whatever Amador appeared to have found again in AAA, he had left it there. Once Daryl Anderson’s rocket sunk into the bleachers in left center, it was 6-0 Crusaders. In the first inning. After Roberto Pena had made an out, the Crusaders had knocked five straight singles, leading up to Anderson’s big stroke. It was a game that was best witnessed drunk and/or asleep. The Coons scored two runs in the bottom of the first before Amador drilled Ortíz and allowed a single to Martin in the top 2nd. We pulled the parachute right there and threw in Felipe Garcia to make himself useful. He couldn’t make this blowout any more awful than it was. The Crusaders attempted a double steal, but Bob Wood threw out Ortíz at third base, which greatly helped in escaping that inning. Astonishingly, the Raccoons made a vague comeback attempt. It didn’t LOOK pretty, with all the flapping paws and waving tails, and Garcia continuing to give up runs, but Clyde Brady hit a 2-run homer and 2-run triple to get the Raccoons back into the game, only to fail miserably and pop out to end the seventh when he actually came up as the tying run there. That was also their last gasp in the game. 9-7 Crusaders. Flores 2-4; Crespo 2-4, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Brady 2-4, HR, 3B, 4 RBI; Yamada (PH) 1-2;

They score seven runs for the first time since May – and they lose. Goddamnit.

Edgar Amador was cleansed off the roster and banished to St. Petersburg with his 7.75 ERA, while Felipe Garcia, who allowed eight hits for three runs in five innings in long relief here, was designated for assignment. Again.

We added Tim Webster and Santiago Trevino from AAA.

Game 3
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B Grant – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – SS Rice – C J. Lopez – 3B Burns – 1B Nava – P Kirk
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Crespo – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – C Bowen – CF Trevino – P Fairchild

Kirk surrendered a hit in time, a single to Sharp in the second that was following walks to Brady and Quebell. Bowen hit into a double play but Brady scored to make it 1-0. Another chance was wasted in the next inning. Fairchild was pitching a very good game with lots of groundballs, but with Fairchild, as pathetic a starter as they come, you were never safe, and even less so with a 1-0 lead. Fairchild made it into the sixth with that lead, but not out of it. Pena was on second base with two outs, and in succession Ortíz and Martin had RBI hits to flip the score to 2-1 for the road team. Fairchild got out of trouble with Lopez on third base in the next inning, but where was that offense when you really needed it? Hard asnooze, it turned out. Quebell singled and Sharp walked in the bottom 7th before Bowen hit into another two-for-one. The Raccoons only got Quebell in to tie the game because Trevino legged out an infield single after grounding to the second base bag. Trevino stole his way to second base, but Bob Mays, hitting for Fairchild, failed, and the score remained tied. We used Moreno, Rockburn, and Bryan for two outs each to finish regulation, with the Crusaders riding Kirk for nine innings, and Bryan continued in the 10th, but allowing a leadoff single to lefty Ming Kui. Pena bunted Kui to second, upon which Adam Riddle came in and got Bob Grant on a groundout. That put left-hander Martin Ortíz at the plate, with the right-hander Stanton Martin after that. Well, either one can kill you here, as both were batting .320 with power, but I’d fancy Riddle’s chances better against the latter, so Ortíz was put on intentionally. Stanton Martin sent Riddle’s first pitch to the Pacific, while Charlie Deacon struck out Bowen, Trevino, and Wood in the bottom of the inning. 5-2 Crusaders. Sharp 2-3, BB; Fairchild 7.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 4 K;

…!

On Sunday, the Raccoons were awarded the contract of LF/RF Jose Lugo after claiming him off waivers from the Pacifics. Lugo, 30, batting right-handed, is batting a gruesome .185/.267/.272 in 81 AB this season, but we’re banking on him returning to his 2001-02 form when he OPS’ed over .800.

That was before he tore up both of his knees, by the way.

Tom Ingram was demoted to get Lugo onto the roster.

Game 4
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B Grant – RF S. Martin – LF M. Ortíz – 3B J. Henry – SS Rice – C J. Lopez – 1B Nava – P Connor
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – RF Mays – C Wood – CF Trevino – P Brown

Another odd start in Brownieland. While he struck out five in the first two innings, laboring over 41 pitches, the Raccoons scored single runs in both innings, once after a Nomura triple that barely amounted to a run on a Quebell sac fly, and then on a leadoff shot by Bob Mays. Brownie threw many balls, and then in the fourth suddenly was befallen by rotten luck again. Stanton Martin led off with a single to center. Ortíz hit a single to center. Jerry Henry hit a single to center! Martin was sent for home on that single, but was cut down in a very close play by Trevino. Lopez walked after Rice flew out to center, but Nava struck out to end the inning with the Crusaders still not on the board – somehow. Brownie struck out the side in the fifth, which gave him nine strikeouts on the day – and none of those with less than two balls! He got through the meat of the order once more in the sixth, but was done after that, having thrown 108 pitches. After the Raccoons refused a generous donation in form of a throwing error by Lopez on Mays’ stolen base attempt in the bottom 6th that put Mays at third with one out. Wood failed, Trevino didn’t get a chance, and Greenman hit a fly to left center, but Ortíz caught that. So it remained 2-0 for the Furballs, and a gasping bullpen had a to somehow collect nine outs without cocking up – and that had to start with Kaz Kichida. While Kaz walked a man, he got through the inning. In the eighth, Bryan retired Pena before Rockburn killed off the next two guys to complete the bridge to Angel. And for Angel, the struggles just continued. He struck out Ortíz, got Henry on a grounder to Sharp, and then – walked Rice, walked Lopez. Ape Britton hit in the #8 hole, a left-hander. Was there any juice in Moreno? Nah, the whole bullpen was aching and creaking, and other than capital pushover Matt Cash there was nobody available. Angel had to solve this one. One strike to Britton, two strikes to Britton, and then a drive to deep right, and everything fell to dust. One Crusader over the plate, two Crusaders over the plate, and the boos made it one gloomy place to be at that point. The boos hardly yielded to cheers when Craig Bowen hit a walkoff homer in the bottom of the ninth. 3-2 Raccoons. Nomura 2-4, 3B; Flores 2-4; Mays 2-4, HR, RBI; Bowen 1-1, HR, RBI; Brown 6.0 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 9 K;

Nick Brown can’t wait to get out of this ****hole. Three and half more years. He has to get out. He won’t get to 100 career wins on this capital **** team.

In other news

June 14 – IND OF Paco Javier (.211, 2 HR, 15 RBI), whom the Indians had acquired from the Crusaders just a few weeks ago, has to undergo Tommy John surgery to repair a torn UCL, and is out for the season.
June 15 – Sophomore sensation CHA 3B Javier Rodriguez (.345, 2 HR, 23 RBI) not only ranks top 3 in batting in the Continental League, and leads all of baseball with 30 stolen bases, he now also has crafted the CL’s first 20-game hitting streak of the season with a first inning single in a 3-2 Falcons win over the Warriors.
June 16 – And there’s two: DAL 2B/3B Hector Garcia (.357, 5 HR, 49 RBI) completes his own 20-game hitting streak with a last-chance double in the Stars’ 7-2 win over the Wolves.

Complaints and stuff

Depressing fact: We are 2-10 in interleague play this year.

Depressing fact: We can’t score runs, we can’t hold leads, and we can’t ever come back from anything, and if we do come back from anything, and take a lead, we can’t hold it.

Depressing fact: IT. HAS. BEEN. TEN. YEARS.

[Westheim]

2006 AMATEUR DRAFT

Coming in with the third pick in every round (including the first of course) and the second pick of 23 in the supplemental round, the Raccoons were well enough positioned to land an impact player –

… if only I could find out what exactly we were going to draft. It didn’t help, I had to do this with Whitebread. In fact, Whitebread would do it pretty much by himself, since once I had explained that we needed to draft the guy who pitched only perfect games, he explained that while I was right, Rojas would go first overall most likely, and in fact FIP was something entirely different, but I think right at that point my pills and the booze began to work and I didn’t take in anything from his 25-minute monologue.

Taking glances at the screen of Whitebread’s laptop on draft day, there was no rhyme nor rhythm to his seemingly endless tables of names, stats, and numbers. There were colors, too. I guessed the players with green background were the good ones. I was told they were not. The red ones were. Then I consigned myself to fate.

The first overall pick in the 2006 Amateur Draft lay with the Condors, and they drafted Mr. Perfect, SP Manuel Rojas, to which Whitebread reacted with an analytical “That is rather unfortunate”, before he quickly deleted seemingly random patches of data from his tables, just in time before the Miners used their #2 pick to select SS Tom McWhorter. Then Whitebread sprung into action, and picked a player from the middle of the table. He had a red background. The top 5 would be completed by SP Bill Conway to the Rebels and SP J.J. Wirth to the Pacifics.

2006 PORTLAND RACCOONS DRAFT CLASS

Round 1 (#3) – LF/RF Jimmy Eichelkraut, 18, from Pinellas Park, FL – besides a name that makes me chuckle, Jimmy has a lean frame that generates a surprising amount of power to all fields and beyond, with considerable speed to steal bases; he might struggle with strikeouts and his throwing arm isn’t very strong, probably limiting him to duty in leftfield in the future
Supp. Round (#26) – SP Dave Self, 18, from Philadelphia, PA – right-hander whose fastball has some sink to generate groundballs, and already has a good curve and slider compliment to that; his stuff comes entirely without any control so far, and he will have to work hard on that
Round 2 (#50) – OF Dave Green, 18, from Baltimore, MD – explosive speed and great range with strong defense first, but also with a solid contact bat and the ability to let the junk just go by could make him maybe not the next Neil Reece, but maybe a tier below that
Round 3 (#74) – SS Pat Whitehouse, 21, from Bethlehem, PA – quirky guy that sucks up every ball hitting vaguely to the left side of the infield, with a laser beam for an arm and also the ability to steal bases; knows how to draw a walk, but his bat will hardly ever amount to more than singles
Round 4 (#98) – SP Marco Gomez, 19, from Russellville, AL – right-hander that throws five pitches, none of which are particularly impressive, but at least he has quite nice control over his arsenal; can’t throw harder than 90mph, though, so he will need that control and command if he wants to make it as a corner nibbler
Round 5 (#122) – LF/RF/1B Santiago Celis, 20, from San Marcos, TX – not particularly bad at much, but also doesn’t excel at any one thing, except his rocket arm
Round 6 (#146) – C/1B Tom McNeela, 18, from Rainsville, AL – his ability to call a good game has been questioned, and his bat shows not the slightest signs of power, so he would not be a good match at first base, either
Round 7 (#170) – 3B/RF/LF Dave Peyton, 20, from Middletown, CT – another rocket arm, but he can’t get his body moving; poor runner and fielder, who seems sometimes reluctant to swing and draws lots of walks
Round 8 (#194) – 1B Tony Hernandez, 18, from Woodland Beach, MI – more or less your prototypical first baseman with shoddy fielding, whose swinging for the fence – except he’s not really good at the latter, either
Round 9 (#218) – OF Geoff Fink, 18, from Maywood, NJ – good defender with considerable speed, but what good does speed do if you don’t reach base?
Round 10 (#242) – SP Willie Navarette, 18, from Bicknell, IN – can throw batting practice all day long
Round 11 (#266) – INF Danny Zigay, 18, from Ingersoll, Canada – can play all over the infield with good range, but is also error prone; can chip a few singles, but can’t outrun a dead duck
Round 12 (#290) – SP Dave Morgan, 18, from Houston, TX – left-hander that might end up in the bullpen immediately because he’s toast after 55 pitches

All players were assigned to the A level team in Aumsville. We drafted almost exclusively high school players this year, not by design, but it just happened that way. There was no ready-now player available this year, and besides, the Raccoons can’t be helped by just one player, they need at least a dozen.

Asked about Eichelkraut’s future, Whitebread explained that it was hard to quantify the future, and a lot more. He didn’t say All Star, MVP, or Savior of the Franchise, in short, nothing I had been longing to hear.

[Westheim]

Trade

Late at night on Sunday, the Raccoons threw in the towel, as we talked to several teams about a trade, and eventually signed off on a trade with Dallas past midnight.

The Stars received SP Edgar Amador (0-6, 7.75 ERA) and RF/LF Christian Greenman (.165, 1 HR, 9 RBI), while the Raccoons acquired 22-year old LF/CF Tomas Castro (.296, 9 HR, 38 RBI), who was in his sophomore year. To make this all work, the Raccoons also had to take on the lardy remains of almost 36 years old SP Angel Romero, who had spent some of 2005 and all of 2006 in AAA, where he’s gone 7-2 with a 1.37 ERA this year, and the remainder of his $2.04M salary. Embarrassingly enough, Romero will slot right into our rotation once Tim Webster has made one start on Wednesday.

Castro was the FL Rookie of the Month once last season. His bat is promising, as he can hit for average and power to all fields and depths, but he’s not walking and he’s a bit prone to striking out. While he is second in the Federal League in stolen bases with 20, he is not a good defender, possessing neither good range nor a good throwing arm. Despite that, he might well be better than any outfielder the Raccoons currently have.

Right now, the Critters “win” this trade. Like Romero, Greenman was headed for free agency, but with that ****ty output of his, he would not yield compensation anyway (neither will). The Stars are confident they can get Amador pointed northwards again. Without a doubt he will be Pitcher of the Year in 2007 going 22-4 with a 2.15 ERA, and spin a 2-hit shutout in game 7 of the World Series.

But I no longer have to hate Greenman’s guts, and that counts for something.

Raccoons (30-36) @ Titans (36-32) – June 19-21, 2006

What ever had happened to the Titans’ offense, which was now third-to-last in the league while anxiously awaiting the return of 2005’s surprise slugger Jim Brulhart, it didn’t hamper their chances all too much as they were sitting just half a game out of first place and were eyeing free wins in this mid-week 3-game set. Their rotation was third, as was their bullpen, in the CL, so runs would be at a premium for the Raccoons – additional batter or not.

Projected matchups:
Kenichi Watanabe (4-6, 4.35 ERA) vs. Jorge Chapa (6-5, 3.07 ERA)
Ralph Ford (6-6, 3.12 ERA) vs. Jason O’Halloran (7-4, 3.60 ERA)
Tim Webster (0-0, 4.50 ERA) vs. Bryce Hildred (5-5, 3.63 ERA)

The first two are of course left-handers and with the recent roster jugglings, our batting personnel is badly out of whack splits-wise, with seven of the thirteen batting left-handed, including recent arrival Tomas Castro.

Game 1
POR: SS Flores – LF T. Castro – CF Crespo – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – 2B Nomura – C Bowen – P Watanabe
BOS: SS M. Austin – 2B Heffer – CF Garrison – RF G. Munoz – 3B Nichols – 1B Metting – C Rosa – LF Arroyo – P Chapa

The Raccoons taunted Jorge Chapa with their sticks early, plating single runs in both of the first two innings. Despite that, disaster was looming with the Titans stranding two men in scoring position in the first, with Watanabe plating them their first run in the next inning. They had the bases loaded with two out and Dave Heffer batting, and Watanabe threw a horrendous pitch into the dirt in front of home plate, from where it bounced off a befuddled Bowen’s shoulder and to the backstop, bringing home a run. Heffer would strike out, but Watanabe imploded in the fourth when the Titans unwound five consecutive 2-out base hits, including a game-tying double by Chapa, to score three runs and take a 4-2 lead. The fifth inning saw Watanabe give out 2-out walks to the impossible Freddy Rosa and the almost-quadragenarian Luis Arroyo before allowing another hit to Chapa, a single that eluded Vic Flores. Tomas Castro’s arm was nothing special at all, but it was enough to nail Freddy Rosa at home plate. That was it for Watanabe, five innings, four runs on eight hits and five walks while whiffing two.

There was still room for further degeneration into a kindergarten play group’s level, though. Domingo Moreno, often used, walked Mark Austin to start the sixth, then was additionally stabbed by Quebell’s error on a Rudy Garrison grounder, failing in his take-ball-out-of-glove skills. Munoz grounded out, moving Austin to third, upon which we requested one out from Kichida without any outrageous explosions. Kichida’s first pitch to Brian Nichols was wild, the second pitch was as well, and then he singled in Munoz, who barely made it across home plate due to laughing so hard. Matt Cash was thrown into the game to see his mop up qualities, which were plainly non-existent. Craig Bowen threw out Munoz trying to steal to help Cash out of the sixth, while the seventh became Cash’s ticket back to St. Pete – forever. He walked four, allowed two singles, and balked, plating four additional runs for the Titans. 10-4 Titans. Flores 2-4, 2B, RBI; Castro 2-4, RBI; Nomura 2-4;

Cash was put on the bus without an explanation. If he doesn’t know why he gets run out of town, it’s even worse. We called up 23-year old Puerto Rican Claudio Salazar, a right-hander who had just been promoted to AAA, to be available on Tuesday before Marcos Bruno could be activated on Wednesday. Salazar was our ninth-rounder in 2000. Control is not his strong suit.

Expect daily roster changes now. F.e. Angel Romero is still in DFA limbo until Tim Webster will have made his start on Wednesday. It is possible that Romero will start the next game right away with Kelly Fairchild’s outing getting voided. Maybe Fairchild will be voided, too. I am also unhappy with the outfielders, infielders, and catchers.

Game 2
POR: SS Flores – CF T. Castro – 3B Sharp – LF Brady – 2B Nomura – 1B Lugo – RF Mays – C Wood – P Ford
BOS: SS D. Silva – 1B Heffer – C Rosa – CF Garrison – 2B Metting – 3B M. Austin – RF A. Jenkins – LF Walls – P O’Halloran

The Titans batted around in the first inning against a remarkably out of control Ford, and drew massive advantage of an error by Vic Flores on an easy grounder that could have ended the inning when it was still 1-0 only. Instead, the Titans scored four times, three unearned, and scrambled the Raccoons into even more disarray, with what few relievers were available beginning to stretch early.

In reality, that was a decoy. There was no way Ford was getting relieved early. He would throw 110 pitches, and when the Titans scored ten runs of him, it would be so. Time to man up, you girls, you!

Sometimes, on very dark days, 114 pitches will amount to five plus innings of 6-run ball, and will end with a leadoff walk to the opposing pitcher. Claudio Salazar made his major league debut in a 6-1 losing effort, and made it 7-1 before the inning was out after back-to-back 2-out singles by Rosa and Garrison. Somewhere in between ends of Ralph Ford’s most recent horror start, Bob Mays had knocked his knee into Daniel Silva’s shin and had to leave the game, being replaced by Crespo, who was completely fooled by a Jason O’Halloran blooper to left that bounced in and past him for a 2-out RBI double in the seventh inning. O’Halloran, besides trotting into second base with a wide grin, also expended only 101 pitches in a complete game effort, striking out five. 8-1 Titans. Nomura 2-3;

Wednesday’s roster changes entailed the demotion of Claudio Salazar (2 IP, 2 ER) to AAA, the activation of Marcos Bruno from the disabled list, the deactivation of Bob Mays (knee contusion) onto that same disabled list, and the addition of Cesar Pena, the half of the Eddie Torrez yield from the Warriors that we didn’t immediately discard, despite batting .229 in AAA.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – LF T. Castro – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – CF Trevino – C Wood – SS Yamada – P Webster
BOS: SS D. Silva – 1B Heffer – RF G. Munoz – C Rosa – CF Garrison – 2B Metting – 3B M. Austin – LF Walls – P Hildred

After three scoreless innings with little offense at all, the Raccoons got leadoff singles from Brady and Quebell in the fourth inning. Sharp grounded out to first, putting the runners in scoring position, only for Trevino and Wood to be retired on pop outs that didn’t even reach the infield dirt. Kurt Metting’s leadoff single in the bottom 5th finally got the Titans moving. Metting stole second off Wood, and was at third with one out, when the Titans executed a wonderful suicide squeeze with Tom Walls, on which Danny Sharp had no choice but to go to first. Webster’s line was largely held together by the defense and not through his own doing. Foremost Yoshi Yamada turned two strong double plays and made a flying catch on a line drive after only being in the starting lineup for Vic Flores being generally sore from playing every day. Clyde Brady had an assist from the outfield for the second consecutive day, in this case throwing out Mark Austin at home on Tom Walls’ double to right, which ended the seventh inning and also Webster’s day, who was hit for after Yamada hit a leadoff double in the eighth. Crespo struck out, but Nomura doubled in a Double Yoshi Attack to tie the score, but was then left on by Castro and Brady.

The next time somebody tried to steal it was Garrison, but Wood threw him out, which also sent the game to extra innings tied at one after scoreless relief from Rockburn and Bryan. Manuel Martinez had taken care of the ninth for the Titans and was left in for the tenth, but allowed a leadoff single to Yamada, who stole second while Crespo struck out. Flashback to the eighth, where one Yoshi had plated the other Yoshi. Now the other Yoshi was on second again and the one Yoshi was at the plate and got a mistake from Martinez, who was not himself past 20 pitches (as we knew well ourselves). Nomura TATERED a rocket out of the park to give the Raccoons the lead, 3-1! Angel Casas got five strikes past Titans to start the bottom 10th before boring in on Mark Austin. It didn’t matter, though. When Tom Walls grounded to short, Yamada turned his third double play of the day, and the Raccoons got away with a win. 3-1 Coons. Nomura 3-5, HR, 2 2B, 3 RBI; Yamada 2-4, 2B; Webster 7.0 IP, 8 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 3 K;

This was really not a rousing hitting display from the Raccoons. Aside from the Yoshis, we only had two more hits by Brady and Quebell.

Never mind his rock solid start, Tim Webster was handed back to AAA after the game, with veteran Angel Romero being added to the rotation. He was assigned the Friday start in Oklahoma, with Fairchild not getting a turn this time.

Raccoons (31-38) @ Thunder (40-32) – June 23-25, 2006

The Thunder were performing beneath their potential. While they were third in runs scored and second in runs allowed in our league, they were only eight over .500 and trailing the Falcons by more than a week’s worth of games in the South. Somehow they were also 0-3 against the Raccoons this year. They were missing two good pats in Joey Humphrey and Tomas Cardenas, but pain was on the way regardless for these Raccoons.

Projected matchups:
Angel Romero (0-0) vs. Aaron Anderson (10-0, 2.41 ERA)
Nick Brown (7-3, 2.36 ERA) vs. Francisco Garza (6-5, 4.72 ERA)
Kenichi Watanabe (4-7, 4.54 ERA) vs. Pancho Trevino (7-6, 3.93 ERA)

Garza could potentially be skipped at short notice with the Thunder having their off days falling conveniently, which would move Vaughn Higgins (6-5, 2.61 ERA) into this series. All four are right-handers, we won’t see their southpaw Luis Martinez (4-5, 3.91 ERA).

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF T. Castro – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – C Bowen – CF Crespo – P Romero
OCT: LF V. Sanchez – SS Butler – CF Nixon – C F. Hernandez – RF Gonzales – 1B Heathershaw – 2B Palacios – 3B H. Castro – P A. Anderson

24 years after Jorge Romero’s retirement, another Romero suited up for the Raccoons. While the former was held to 55 wins in his career and retired at age 35, the current edition was as old, but had 172 games since 1991.

Past accolades – Romero’s first strikeout as a Raccoon (to ex-Furball Jesus Palacios) was his 2,400th – didn’t translate into success necessarily however, and not only because the Thunder sported an undefeated pitcher in late June. Amazingly though, Anderson was stuck three runs by the Raccoons in the third inning after a leadoff double by Flores past the limited reach of Max Nixon (the second leadoff double past Nixon for the Coons in this one), which seemed initially to get wasted as well before Quebell beat Palacios to a single to right, and Sharp tripled into the leftfield corner, to then score himself when Bob Butler dropped Craig Bowen’s poor pop. Romero had to labor quite a bit in the early going to get through the Thunder, which meant relying on the defense, since his stuff was not really impressive anymore. He had a few easy innings in the middle of the game, with Anderson surrendering a fourth run, but the Thunder drew two walks off Romero in the bottom 7th before Bob Butler hit a 2-out single to load the bases. That put Nixon in the line of fire, and Romero got a visit from the pitching coach. Nobody was ready, to this was Romero’s guy, and he got a soft grounder to third on a 1-2 pitch that Sharp converted to first base to keep the Thunder off the board. Romero’s day ended regardless after a leadoff walk to Felix Hernandez in the eighth, and the Coons’ pen produced drama immediately. Rockburn struck out Gonzales before Bradley Heathershaw – he has a winner’s name after all! – doubled to right center. Neither Ed Bryan, nor Angel Casas managed to keep the runners on the base paths, and the Thunder moved back to 4-2. Casas retired them 1-2-3 in the ninth, though. 4-2 Coons. Flores 4-4, BB, 2B; Sharp 2-4, BB, 3B, 2B, RBI; Romero 7.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 4 BB, 2 K, W (1-0) and 2-4;

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF T. Castro – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – C Bowen – CF S. Trevino – P Brown
OCT: LF V. Sanchez – SS Butler – C F. Hernandez – RF Gonzales – 1B Heathershaw – 2B Palacios – CF E. Campbell – 3B H. Castro – P F. Garza

Stupid **** kept happening to Brownie, who fanned four in the first two innings but still fell 1-0 behind on two singles to either side of Nomura and then a passed ball charged to Bowen. After that early setback, things developed better for him despite Garza retiring the first ten Coons in order. After that was a walk to Vic Flores, which Tomas Castro cashed in with a homer in his first meaningful hit as a Raccoon. Brady singled and scored on Sharp’s double to make it 3-1 Coons, before Brownie struck out Jorge Gonzales to open the fourth, which got him to 100 victims on the year.

Just as soon as all seemed well, it wasn’t, and the bottom fell out in the bottom 5th, and it did so completely. After striking out Earl Campbell and Hector Castro to start the inning, Brownie allowed a 2-out single to Garza, and suddenly couldn’t throw strikes anymore. He allowed three walks in the inning and two more singles while the Thunder flipped the score to 4-3 in their favor, and after Palacios generously flew out to Brady with the bases loaded, Brown vanished in the clubhouse with the trainer.

While that gave nobody a good feeling at all, the Raccoons rallied to tie the score in the seventh after a 2-out RBI double by Nomura. Neither Brown nor the trainer returned while Kichida and Bruno held the Thunder at bay until Sharp hit a double off the centerfield wall to start the ninth inning. The Thunder had on-and-off closer Sancho Rivera walk Bowen intentionally. Trevino grounded out, moving the runners into scoring position. Batting for Bruno, J.C. Crespo broke through with a blazing 2-run triple into the right center gap, and also scored in the inning before Angel struck out the side. 7-4 Brownies? Sharp 2-4, 2B, RBI; Crespo (PH) 1-1, 3B, 2 RBI; Kichida 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

No explanation for Nick Brown’s sudden departure was given by the team that Saturday, because we had no clue ourselves and needed to run tests.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF T. Castro – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – RF Lugo – CF S. Trevino – C Wood – P Watanabe
OCT: LF V. Sanchez – 2B Palacios – C F. Hernandez – SS Butler – RF Rangel – 3B Heathershaw – CF Gonzales – 1B Nixon – P P. Trevino

As usual, it was a terrible struggle for Watanabe, who wasn’t fooling anybody and despite some great D behind him fell 1-0 behind in a third inning that was led off with a double by the opposing pitcher. The Raccoons would tie the score in the fifth on a throwing error by Hernandez when Jose Lugo tried to steal second base, and moved to third on the errant throw, from where he scored on Bob Wood’s groundout, but Watanabe fell behind again in the bottom of the inning, 2-1, and he didn’t get out of the sixth anymore. It didn’t take much offense to overcome a 2-1 deficit, but Trevino had the Raccoons in his death grip and never allowed an earned run in the game, striking out eight over eight innings, not allowing another runner past first base, and Sancho Rivera shut the door for good in the ninth. 2-1 Thunder. Nomura 2-4;

In other news

June 19 – The Canadiens deal INF Haruki Nakayama (.301, 4 HR, 25 RBI) back to the Buffaloes, receiving C Gabriel Ortíz (.270, 3 HR, 20 RBI) and a non-prospect in return.
June 19 – The Buffaloes also pick up CL Javier Navarro (3-2, 2.18 ERA, 11 SV) from the Rebels, along with cash, while parting with a package of four prospects, none of whom are ranked, but A INF Luis Ochoa, 21, looks like he has the ingredients for future success.
July 19 – Dallas’ Hector Garcia (.348, 5 HR, 49 RBI) has his hitting streak end at 21 games at the hands of the Scorpions.
July 20 – CHA 3B Javier Rodriguez (.342, 2 HR, 25 RBI) also has his streak cut off after 23 games, going 0-5 against the Aces in a 4-3 loss.

Complaints and stuff

In his first start for the Stars, Edgar Amador made it into the eighth, but surrendered five runs on ten hits, six walks, and five strikeouts to take a loss and go to 0-7.

Meanwhile our medical staff is arguing whether it would be better to ice Brownie’s elbow or bandage his wrist, or rather check for bleeding.

I have zero confidence in this.

Anybody still dreaming about a winning season? C’mon, let your voice be heard loud and clear!

[Questdog]

I ALWAYS am dreaming of winning seasons!

The addition of Romero gives me more hope than ever as long as Brownie is not out for too long. If Brown is out for the year, then these are sad, sad days.

If Brown is gone, then maybe you could skip the reports of the Raccoons games and just give us updates on the minor leagues and our prospects.......

I want to know more about Eichelkraut. I have read that his name means acorn herbs in German, but I have also heard rumors that it means something dirty....

What are Acorn Herbs, anyways?

What number will he wear? Does he have a girlfriend? Will he accept underwear tossed from a middle-aged man like Tetsu used to?.....I miss Tetsu.....What color bat will he swing? Does he have a shoe contract yet and if so, with who? I need some new shoes and do not want to buy the wrong brand. When will he be in Portland? And when he comes, will he need a place to stay, because I have some room........

[Westheim]

I have this dream.

I have this dream where I am standing at the edge of a bottomless pit. It’s not day, neither is it completely dark. There’s a greenly glimming band of light on the horizon, 360 degrees around. There is noise coming out of the bottomless pit, and also the same faint green light as on the horizon. The noise is that of a crowd. In irregular intervals, the noise of a bat meeting the ball is heard, but the crowd noise never changes. Must be one uninspiring game going on down there. It is also windy, and a bit cold to be outside without a jacket.

Then Daniel Hall walks up to my right side. He carries a translucent bag over his back, containing all the bones he broke and ligaments he tore when he was with the Raccoons, and a cap dirty brown cap reading “Franchise Hits Leader”.

“I miss you”, I tell him. “I know”, Daniel replies. “We could use you”, I tell him. He politely shakes his head. “My time is over”, he says, before he drops the bag, calmly steps forward and drops into the bottomless pit.

Then Kisho Saito walks up to my other side. He holds his Hall of Fame plaque with his likeness in gold, wearing a Raccoons hat. The plaque reads “Didn’t win 250 games”.

“I miss you”, I tell him. “I know”, Kisho replies. “We could use you”, I tell him. He politely shakes his head. “My time is over”, he says, then hands me the plaque. Now I realize an edge has broken off. He says a few words in Japanese, then steps forwards and drops into the bottomless pit.

I look at the plaque until Neil Reece walks up to the side Daniel Hall turned up at. He’s 40 years old, and wearing a high school team’s uniform, having been demoted there by his club. He walks with the help of a crutch.

“I miss you”, I tell him. “I know”, Neil replies. “We could use you”, I tell him. He politely shakes his head. “I have to go to bed early. There’ll be a test in Trigonometry tomorrow”, he says, then takes out his dental prosthetics. “Take care of these”, he says before limping forward and dropping into the bottomless pit.

I stand alone for a while, in the not-quite-darkness. I listen to the sounds of bats meeting balls. Nobody ever hits a home run in that game in the pit.

Then suddenly Nick Brown turns up on my left. An overpowering pitcher in his best years.

“I miss you already”, I tell him. “I know”, Nick replies. “When will you be back”, I ask him. Nick looks down, then up. “I don’t know. How long until it grows back?”

Then he turns fully towards me, and only now I see that his left arm has been amputated through the shoulder. The zig-zag scar over where is shoulder blade used to be is just barely glowing green. I cautiously touch the scar. It is cold.

“You think”, Nick asks, pointing with his remaining index finger, “there’s something in Daniel’s bag I can use?”

That’s where my dream ends, and everybody else’s in my neighborhood as well, as my horrified, high-pitched cartoon girl screams wake up every living being in a 6-block square at 2pm, every night.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (33-39) @ Knights (35-39) – June 26-28, 2006

Tumbling on to the next town, the Raccoons looked at the Knights, who trailed in the South by 13 games despite scoring the second-most runs overall. They were however conceding even more than they scored, a -13 run differential in total, thanks to the flat out worst pitching staff in the league. The rotation’s 4.75 ERA was second-to-last, and there was nobody topping that 4.32 ERA the pen put up for them. The Furballs were 2-0 against them on the year with one rainout waiting to be compensated for in August.

Projected matchups:
Ralph Ford (6-7, 3.24 ERA) vs. Jong-suk Lee (5-7, 4.36 ERA)
Angel Romero (1-0, 1.29 ERA) vs. Vicente Perez (4-7, 6.12 ERA)
Kelly Fairchild (2-5, 4.58 ERA) vs. Johnny Collins (6-7, 5.04 ERA)

We face the shallow end of their pitching staff, who are all right-handers.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – 3B Flores – LF Castro – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – CF Crespo – C Bowen – SS Yamada – P Ford
ATL: LF R. Lopez – C J. Clark – CF J. Morales – RF J. Garcia – 2B J. Gutierrez – SS Luján – 1B Ware – 3B T. Pena – P J.S. Lee

Somewhat surprisingly there was no scoring in the early going, with neither team getting any good contact off the opposing pitcher, but when Brady singled and Quebell doubled to start the top 4th the Raccoons sure appeared to be ready to bust through the Knights’ defenses. Oh, if only they could. Crespo whiffed, Bowen popped out, Yamada didn’t get a chance and Ford was obliterated by the tiny Korean on the mound. It took until the sixth to get something on the board. Brady led off the inning with a walk, then was barely safe at second when Quebell failed on the former part of a hit-and-run. Bowen doubled Brady home, 1-0 Coons, and in the seventh Lee was broken up with force. After Nomura and Flores started the inning with singles, Castro and Brady flailed. Quebell was only safe because Gutierrez couldn’t get anything on a throw to first on Quebell’s grounder up the right side of second base. Then, the sound of thunder, as Crespo doubled home a pair. Bowen walked, and then Yoshi Yamada unloaded with a scorching triple into the gap in right center.

The Raccoons should not have been comfortable with their 6-0 lead, though, for the next pitcher blown up was their own. Ralph Ford was cruising into the eighth when suddenly the Knights chipped a few singles, scoring a man, but surely Ford would get out the left-hander Jose Morales to get out of a jam. No, he wouldn’t, but Morales got one out instead, a 3-run homer that axed the lead to 6-4. The Raccoons got a run in the top 9th on a pinch-hit RBI single by Daniel Sharp, but inserting Rockburn to give the regular back end some rest in the bottom 9th was a terrible move. He faced two batters and gave up two doubles. 7-5, Luján at second and no outs, we began to drift and brought in Moreno. His relief was temporary. While he got right-handed pinch-hitter Anastasio Munoz to pop out to Nomura, Tony Pena’s line drive to right was warning that we were in dangerous terrain. Brady made a sparkling catch on that, but Alejandro Rodriguez then hit a double to score Luján, and Moreno walked Rodrigo Lopez. Allright, bring on Angel. The Knights had one more left-handed pinch-hitter, Avery Johnson, who quickly had two strikes on him, then had a ball in his ribs. Bases loaded, Morales was back at the plate, hungering for more than a 3-run homer – but fouled out to the screen. 7-6 Raccoons. Quebell 3-5, 2 2B; Crespo 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Sharp (PH) 1-1, RBI; Yamada 1-2, 2 BB, 3B, 3 RBI;

That was unpretty.

Also unpretty: Tomas Castro since joining the Coons. In 30 AB he’s gone .133/.161/.267 with seven strikeouts.

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – CF Crespo – RF Lugo – C Wood – P Romero
ATL: LF R. Lopez – C J. Clark – CF J. Morales – RF J. Garcia – 1B A. Munoz – 2B J. Gutierrez – SS Luján – 3B T. Pena – P V. Perez

Nomura was drilled to start the game, but Perez got invoiced for that in time once Flores doubled and Brady went deep, 3-0 Coons. 3-0 soon became 3-1 with a leadoff jack by Rodrigo Lopez, and 3-2 in the next inning on a 2-out RBI single by the annoying Perez. Angel Romero walked three in that inning, and was obviously not the answer to any pitching-related problem. While Romero represented a hot air balloon with a tiny hole that was spinning out of control in the general direction of a mountainside, Perez was clubbed senseless outright, with Quebell homering to get to 5-2 in the top 3rd, and Nomura shoving a 2-out RBI single past Munoz in the next inning to get to 6-3.

Romero didn’t last through five. He got yanked with one out in the bottom 5th, with the Knights already crawling in on him again and the score at 6-4, with a man on first. Adam Riddle got the last two outs in the inning, then botched a bunt in the top 6th to get Jose Lugo out at second base. Remarkably, the Coons still scored in the inning, with Nomura singling, Flores singling, too, and then Brady ripped his third extra-base hit of the day, a 2-run double to right. In a game of waiting for which team would collapse faster, the Raccoons held back a bit, riding Adam Riddle for two and two thirds of 1-run ball that gave them a 9-5 lead after seven before Brady got a second take on Patrick Mercier pitching long relief for the Knights. Mercier had already given up Brady’s 2-run double in the sixth, and in the eighth gave him an RBI single that got the Coons to 10-5.

And yet we were still not done. Kichida pitched a quick eighth, got Lopez and Clark to start the ninth, then was taken deep by Morales. Well, big deal, we will have Ed Bryan sit down Jorge Garcia, then we’ll have pretzels. Garcia singled, and Bryan walked Munoz. Suddenly it was save situation, but Angel was really unavailable. For the moment, the Knights sent a left-handed pinch-hitter in Alejandro Rodriguez, who grounded to first – AND QUEBELL BLEW IT!!

Bottom 9th, 10-6 Coons, two outs, three on, shortstop Antonio Luján up. And here comes Marcos Bruno. Bruno dispatched Luján on three pitches, and we just so got away with this one, too. 10-6 Critters. Nomura 3-4, RBI; Flores 2-5, 2B, RBI; Brady 4-5, HR, 2 2B, 6 RBI; Riddle 2.2 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 3 K, W (2-1);

While the whole team dodged bullets the last two days, Nick Brown did not. On Wednesday we finally got confirmation that he had suffered a shoulder strain and would be out for most of the remainder of the season. We might vaguely target late August for his return (disclaimer: does not include a rehab assignment).

Bloody ****ing hell of demonic ****s.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – LF Castro – CF Trevino – C Wood – P Fairchild
ATL: RF R. Lopez – CF Ware – LF J. Morales – 1B J. Garcia – 2B J. Gutierrez – C J. Clark – SS Luján – 3B T. Pena – P J. Collins

After crumbling Knights pitching the previous day, Clyde Brady hit into an inning-ending double play in the first inning, but then plated the first run of the game in the third, scoring Yoshi Nomura with a 2-out single. Bottom 3rd, Luján singled, was caught in a double play, and then the Knights STILL loaded the bases, if only for Jose Morales to have his drive to center caught by Santiago Trevino. Then the Coons were due to load the bases with no outs in the fourth, Sharp and Castro with singles, and then Trevino drawing a walk. Bob Wood came through with a single, 2-0, and then a rapidly unravelling Collins brushed Fairchild on the thigh to force in another run, 3-0. Two more runs scored for the Coons against the hopeless Collins, who drew advantage from Nomura lining out on a 3-0 pitch. How does Kelly Fairchild handle a 5-0 lead? Jorge Garcia clanking one off the foul pole to get the bottom 4th going was hopefully not an indication.

Oh **** yes, it was. Five singles, three runs for the Knights after that – in the fourth inning. That got them right back to 5-4. Fairchild would be loaded with a dozen hits and five runs once the Knights were done with him after five innings, and the game was tied. The Knights wouldn’t stop hitting at all. They raped Kaz with bats in the bottom 7th, which just didn’t end. They put four runs on Kichida, and one more on Rockburn, who couldn’t get out, either, and Moreno had to help, then was tagged with two extra base hits himself in the eighth inning. The Raccoons were run off the premises with 11 unanswered runs against them in a horrible rout. 11-5 Knights. Nomura 2-4, RBI; Flores 2-5, 2B, RBI; Brady 2-4, BB, RBI; Castro 2-4;

Raccoons (35-40) @ Indians (42-36) – June 29-July 2, 2006

The Indians had both 313 runs scored and runs allowed. The latter matched the Raccoons’ runs allowed, and the teams tied for fifth place in the Continental League in that regard. The Coons were however 48 run short of the Indians, to whom they had dropped four of seven this season. Two of their starting outfielders, Paco Javier and Bill Miller, were on the shelf with injuries.

Projected matchups:
Tim Webster (0-0, 3.00 ERA) vs. Patrick Moreau (6-5, 4.37 ERA)
Kenichi Watanabe (4-8, 4.66 ERA) vs. Bob King (5-6, 4.30 ERA)
Ralph Ford (7-7, 3.34 ERA) vs. Curtis Tobitt (9-2, 1.46 ERA)
Angel Romero (1-0, 3.97 ERA) vs. Ramiro Gonzalez (6-9, 3.81 ERA)

Webster had been recalled from AAA to fill in for Nick Brown. We now have three left-handers in the rotation with Romero and him, and we’ll face one in Gonzalez on Sunday.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – LF Castro – C Bowen – CF Crespo – P Webster
IND: CF A. Solís – 2B J. Miller – LF Alston – 3B D. Lopez – C Paraz – 1B Fugosi – RF MacKey – SS Kilters – P Moreau

Moreau and Webster were the starting pitchers and yet a pitching duel broke out. The Raccoons had a single by Brady, who then stole second base in the first inning, and that was the team’s furthest advance for way too long. Webster lacked stuff and pitched in and out of trouble, getting a few good defensive plays to support him. The Indians reached third base once in the middle innings, but didn’t score then, and the game remained scoreless through seven innings. Vic Flores’ single to start the eighth could provide a score, perhaps. Brady grounded out, moving Flores to second base, and Quebell’s liner could not be snagged by James Miller, putting runners on the corners for Sharp. While the Coons were the kings of the double play hit into, Chris Kilters had to move away from second base on Sharp’s grounder and made a wimpy throw. They got Quebell, but Sharp was safe, and the Coons were up 1-0. Webster put a man on in the bottom 8th, with Jose Lugo (yes, they have one, too!) singling, and when Marcos Bruno was assigned to retire one batter, Cesar Aguilar doubled and Lugo scored to re-tie the game. At first David Lopez appeared to end the game with a rocket to deep right off Rockburn in the ninth, but Brady caught that on the warning track, and Rockburn held on for extras. Bryan also held on for an inning, but Domingo Moreno allowed singles in the 11th to Aguilar, Alston, and Paraz to be handed the loss. 2-1 Indians. Quebell 2-5; Sharp 2-5, RBI; Castro 2-5, 2B; Webster 7.2 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 4 K;

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – 3B Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – LF Castro – SS Pena – C Wood – CF Trevino – P Watanabe
IND: 1B Fugosi – SS Kilters – LF Alston – 3B D. Lopez – C Paraz – RF MacKey – CF J. Lugo – 2B J. Miller – P King

The Critters originally took the lead on a Trevino double, a bunt by Watanabe, and then a sac fly by Nomura (because we know we can’t get two hits in one inning), but Fugosi plated their Lugo in the bottom of the same, third inning to get the score to 1-1 again. And then the Coons DID get two hits in one inning in the fifth, but by the time the second hit fell in, Watanabe’s, the guy who had had the first, Trevino, had already been caught stealing. All that worked markedly better in the sixth, when Castro singled, stole the base, and was singled in by Bob Wood. Watanabe got through seven innings, with David Lopez getting stranded on third base in the inning. They had Jose Paraz on first, and the runners were in motion in a full count. MacKey struck out, Paraz was nailed by a country mile, and the home crowd was in disbelief. Marcos Bruno pitched a quick eighth, striking out two, and the Raccoons couldn’t add on in the ninth against Iván Lopez, although Nomura singled, was run for by Yamada, but we ran out of outs rather quickly, and the 2-1 lead was turned over to Angel Casas as it was. He struck out Alston, but Lopez reached on a single only to get forced by Paraz with a grounder. Then came MacKey, and disbelief ceased – for the home crowd – at the sound of thunder. 3-2 Indians. Nomura 2-4, RBI; Flores 2-5; Castro 2-4; Watanabe 7.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 6 K;

I was hung over on Saturday morning, but it was enough to send Eddie Fernandez to a rehab assignment – again. Then I went back to sleep.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – LF Crespo – 3B Sharp – C Bowen – CF Trevino – P Ford
IND: CF A. Solís – 2B J. Miller – LF Alston – 3B D. Lopez – 1B Fugosi – C L. Paredes – RF J. Lugo – SS C. Aguilar – P Tobitt

I was awoken by noise, tumbled to the nearest TV in the clubhouse and found out that the Indians had just taken a 2-0 lead on a wild pitch in the bottom 4th. That wild one plated their Lugo, who had before that tripled in Luis Paredes. Ford had issued leadoff walks, including to Paredes, in three of the four innings, too. The 3-run fifth that followed that 2-run fourth quickly sent me drinking again. I was not quite comatose enough yet to not witness a defensive mockery in the bottom 7th where Domingo Moreno got a perfect double play inning-ender grounded to him, and threw it away, eventually allowing two more runs to score. 7-0 Indians. Crespo 2-4; Trevino 1-2, BB;

The Indians made a move to acquire 2B Ron Brantley from the Condors on Sunday. He was batting .283 with 2 HR and 15 RBI in just 106 AB. They sent over two outfielders from their AAA team, including 26-yr old Jesus Alvarez (.273, 0 HR, 2 RBI in 44 AB).

Game 4
POR: 3B Flores – 2B Nomura – 1B Sharp – LF Brady – CF Crespo – C Wood – RF J. Lugo – SS Pena – P Romero
IND: CF A. Solís – RF MacKey – LF Alston – 3B D. Lopez – C Paraz – 1B Fugosi – 2B Brantley – SS Kilters – P R. Gonzalez

Angel Romero’s response to a 3-run first inning by the Furballs, in which J.C. Crespo had the biggest knock with a 2-run double, was to load the bags with the 3-4-5 hitters, then walk Fugosi and allow a single to Brantley to get the score back to 3-2. The Coons tacked on a run in the second, and Romero’s response still was to blow it, and blow it with force. In the bottom 4th, he allowed a hit to Solís, then was taken deep with consecutive home runs by MacKey and Alston, the former being just barely over the wall, the latter being a true moonshot. The next three batters all singled, and Romero was purged. Six batters faced, six hits. Kichida surrendered two more singles to have five runs score in the inning, giving the Indians a 7-4 lead, then was taken deep by David Lopez to make it 8-4 in the fifth. The Raccoons rallied in the sixth, knocking out Gonzalez and continuing to nibble on Ricardo Sanchez, with Nomura and Sharp plating three runs total with back-to-back bases-loaded singles, but they were denied a blast and Crespo ended the inning with a gentle fly to left. And just as the Raccoons were back in it, they pulled out of it. Bryan, Moreno, and Rockburn provided scoreless relief, but the Raccoons didn’t even reach base anymore. 8-7 Indians. Nomura 2-2, 2 BB, 2 RBI; Crespo 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Wood 2-5, RBI; Quebell (PH) 1-1, 2B; Rockburn 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

(groans in between sobs)

In other news

June 27 – New York’s Stanton Martin (.325, 9 HR, 45 RBI) keeps getting hurt and will return to the DL with a sore hammy.
June 27 – Also to the DL: LAP LF Ken Potter (.251, 14 HR, 45 RBI) who should only miss the minimum time with an elbow sprain.
June 27 – CIN SP Takeru Sato (9-5, 4.78 ERA) is out for the season with a torn back muscle.
June 29 – Hotshot ATL LF Jose Morales (.278, 14 HR, 50 RBI) goes onto the DL with a back strain. He should be out for three weeks.
June 29 – The Falcons decide they needed pitching and acquire SP Rafael De Jesus (6-5, 3.59 ERA) and promising A level C Jamal White from the Aces for postseason hero C Eduardo Durango (.319, 6 HR, 20 RBI) headed to Las Vegas.
July 2 – Boston’s Ray Conner (6-9, 4.53 ERA) 2-hits the Loggers in a 4-0 shutout.

Complaints and stuff

Of course it was the shoulder, the only thing nobody checked for three days.

Jimmy E. (the rumors about the naughty word are true, by the way, for both the acorn and the brushwork), through 14 games in A ball is batting .208 with no power at all. Nobody is showering him with anything so far, neither undergarments, nor shoe contracts. He talks a lot to mom on the phone, so I guess she's the only woman in his life. Which is good. He's got to concentrate on clubs and balls.

Tim Webster will take over the rotation spot of Nick Brown until he makes me weep (so, like Garcia, Fairchild, Romero, and Watanabe, and Ford for three starts out of every five). They’re both left-handed, that’s all that’s worth comparing or matching. Webster’s a nice guy, but he’s as much of a pushover as anybody else. Ford has good and dark days. Nobody else on the team has anything but at best foggy, misty days. Next we will overwork our bullpen to implosion. Not much will change about this following table soon due to Ford getting pummeled regularly right now.

Portland Raccoons career strikeout leaders:
1st – Kisho Saito – 2,322
2nd – Scott Wade – 1,417
3rd – Nick Brown – 1,064
4th – Logan Evans – 1,022
5th – Jason Turner – 997
6th – Ralph Ford – 945
7th – Miguel Lopez – 934
8th – Randy Farley – 862
9th – Christopher Powell – 774
10th – Wally Gaston – 684

Some guy named Edgar Amador spun a 5-hit shutout against the Capitals this week.

Just kill me.

Just ****ing kill me.

[Westheim]

This Portland Raccoons telecast is presented to you by:

Capt’n Coma – does what hard liquor does,

Dr. Bob’s Hospital for Unnecessary Surgery for Women,

And: Los Pollos Mexicanos – better than just fast food!

Raccoons (35-44) vs. Canadiens (40-40) – July 3-6, 2006

The Elks, whom we are 2-1 against this season, will be our four-and-four partners as the All Star Game is about to come upon us. They are third in scoring runs in the CL, and are just below average as far as their pitching was concerned, with a +17 run differential. Their rotation was solid, but their bullpen gave them nightmares, with a 4.32 ERA that ranked last in the league. But you know we lost five straight, right?

Projected matchups:
Kelly Fairchild (2-5, 4.87 ERA) vs. Scott Spears (1-9, 5.03 ERA)
Tim Webster (0-0, 2.38 ERA) vs. Daniel Dickerson (11-4, 2.12 ERA)
Kenichi Watanabe (4-8, 4.22 ERA) vs. Juichi Fujita (9-5, 3.45 ERA)
Ralph Ford (7-8, 3.57 ERA) vs. Rod Taylor (9-7, 4.40 ERA)

We have a knack for missing left-handed starters this year. Their only southpaw, 2-6 Carlos Camacho, went on Sunday, and will again on Friday.

Game 1
VAN: 2B Dobson – 1B Harmon – C G. Ortíz – LF J. Gonzalez – CF E. Garcia – 3B Suzuki – RF P. Flores – SS M. Ramirez – P Spears
POR: 2B Nomura – 3B V. Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – LF Castro – C Bowen – CF Trevino – SS Yamada – P Fairchild

Just about everybody on the Raccoons got a hit off Spears in the first two innings as the team moved out to an early 3-0 lead in support of the chronically underwhelming Kelly Fairchild. However – a few fans had brought a really big cardboard sign to the park, that just read “Dork on Duty”. Everybody knew whom it was referring to.

The Dork struck in the third inning, didn’t retire any of the first five Elks that strolled into the batter’s box, which included a leadoff walk to Jerry Dobson and then a homer by Henry Harmon, before he loaded the bases with a combo of singles and walks. When Mitsuhide Suzuki hit into a game-tying double play, the Dork had nothing else to do than fill the bases up again, and even the early-ruffled Scott Spears got an RBI single in. The Elks put up a 5-spot, and the Raccoons looked very sad indeed. Much about this game was standard Portland baseball. First, it was July, and it was drizzling on and off. Second, they were playing ****ball. After a Quebell single to start the bottom 3rd, not much happened, except for Fairchild being tagged for another run eventually before being banished from the premises in the sixth. The Raccoons put up a minor rally in the bottom 6th with a triple by Castro, a double by Flores, and Trevino getting plunked and hurting. Soon enough, somebody (Yamada) hit into a double play, and they stopped their rally one run short at 6-5. The Elks still ran out Spears in the seventh, although they might want to trust their bullpen at some point. Flores got on, Brady got on, and then Castro singled up the middle to score them both and give the Raccoons a 7-6 lead.

Then the tarp came on, and the attendance hoped it would stay on, but didn’t. After a delay of 46 minutes, play resumed. The Coons added a second runner against reliever Tommy Briggs, but didn’t score in the inning. However, if the start to the game had at best been unfortunate, the finish to it was rather textbook execution. Marcos Bruno got three groundouts on six pitches, and when Angel Casas replaced him in the ninth, the Canadiens only saw lightning go past them, resulting in three strikeouts. 7-6 Coons. Nomura 2-5, RBI; Flores 2-5; Castro 3-4, HR, 3 RBI; Lugo (PH) 1-1, RBI;

Santiago Trevino had been beaned in the leg pretty good and we were waiting on the evaluation.

Game 2
VAN: 1B Harmon – RF Theobald – C G. Ortíz – 3B Suzuki – CF E. Garcia – 2B M. Ramirez – LF P. Flores – SS J. Phillips – P Dickerson
POR: 2B Nomura – SS V. Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – LF Castro – 3B Sharp – CF Crespo – C Wood – P Webster

While Webster wobbled early and surrendered two runs in the second inning, courtesy of a triple hit by ex-Critter Miguel Ramirez, and the Raccoons hit into a double play in the first, left two stranded in the second, and hit into yet another double play in the third, eventually, someone came through, and it was the quirky Quebell with a 1-out triple in the fourth inning. Quebell scored on Castro’s fly to left before Sharp singled. Then came Crespo and hit an absolute rocket off Dickerson that was going all over the batter’s eye in centerfield and flipped the score to 3-2 Coons. Webster was not out of the woods, however. In the sixth he allowed 2-out singles to Enrique Garcia and a suddenly unretireable Ramirez, before Pedro Flores’ line drive to center was just barely caught up with and snagged by Crespo. Webster drove in a run with two outs in the bottom 6th in a strange game. How strange? Nobody struck out until Sharp whiffed against Dickerson in the seventh. Webster was still around in the eighth with a 4-2 lead, but then surrendered a leadoff single to old bone Theobald and a double to import Gabriel Ortíz. Attempting to mix and match, Marcos Bruno came in to face Suzuki, but surrendered the game-tying double. Domingo Moreno relieved him, found himself not facing the left-hander Garcia, but rather righty Ramón Trinidad, and struck him out before doing the same to Ramirez and Flores. The Coons stranded a pair in the eighth and Quebell hit into a double play to send the game to extras – both against Albert Matthews, another former Furball – where Kaz Kichida found himself turned into a coat once again. Old man Theobald led off the 10th inning with a triple and they rolled from there. The Raccoons obviously failed to answer that call. 6-4 Canadiens. Crespo 4-5, HR, 2 RBI; Wood 2-4, 2B; Pena (PH) 1-1;

Tim Webster, the man without decisions. This was one of those crap games, where all is well for so-and-so long, and then BLAAAMMMM!!!

Bob Mays was eligible to come off the DL in between games two and three. At first we thought he might switch places with Santiago Trevino, but he had no more than a very painful bruise on his shin, and would be only hampered for a few more days, being listed as day-to-day. But looking for a roster spot for Mays, Trevino’s was an obvious choice. However, the ABL did not allow players listed as injured to be outrighted to the minor leagues. Instead, Bob Mays was elegantly parked on a rehab assignment until we could sort our stuff out.

Game 3
VAN: 2B Dobson – 1B Theobald – LF J. Gonzalez – 3B Suzuki – RF Richardson – C F. Diéguez – CF P. Flores – SS Rivas – P Fujita
POR: 2B V. Flores – LF Castro – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – CF Crespo – SS Pena – C Wood – P Watanabe

After Jose Gonzalez homered off Watanabe in the first, the Raccoons got Vic Flores, who had had an 11-game hitting streak cut off in the last game, on base with an error, and then Castro by taking one too close for comfort before Brady hit an actual clean single to load the bags. While Quebell and Crespo would strike out, Sharp singled for one and Pena for two runs as we took a 3-1 lead. Shoddy fielding would be the theme of the day. After the Raccoons moved to 4-1 in the third, they got Castro on base to start the fourth inning on a throwing error by Dobson, followed by doubles by Brady and Quebell to plate two more runs. Quebell’s double basically ate up Theobald and stole his cap and pants on its way to deep right. In the top 5th it was Vic Flores with an error that led to an unearned run on Watanabe, who didn’t allow anybody on base himself in the inning and the score was 6-2 with Fujita out of the game, then reached base in the bottom of the inning on an uncaught third strike! Watanabe was not gifted with great talent, but he was a soldier after all. Soldiering he did. Theobald reached with a single to start the sixth, moved around the bases, but was stranded on third when ex-Raccoon Daniel Richardson struck out. In the bottom of the inning there was Brady getting hit, a wild pitch, and Brady scoring eventually against Cal Holbrook. Top 7th, Cesar Pena made an error to start the inning, and the Canadiens came screaming back into the game as Watanabe ran out of juice. Jerry Dobson’s double cut the lead to 7-4, Rockburn replaced Watanabe, but allowed an RBI single to Theobald, 7-5. Rockburn couldn’t solve the eighth inning and put Gabriel Ortíz (double) and Pedro Flores (single) on the corners with two outs. Angel Casas came out to pitch a 4-out save. For some quick pain relief, he struck out Alex Rivas to end the eighth. After the Coons did precious little in the bottom 8th, Casas returned, and with him the pain. Ramón Trinidad singled, and then he walked Dobson. I saw my evening already evaporate into a 16-inning, 12-11 loss when he poured eight straight strikes into Paul Theobald, Jose Gonzalez, and Mitsuhide Suzuki, before Suzuki put the ball in play, but right to Flores, who didn’t dare making an error. 7-5 Critters. Brady 2-4, 2B, RBI; Quebell 3-5, 2B, RBI; Sharp 3-4, BB, 2B, RBI; Yamada 1-1; Watanabe 6.2 IP, 6 H, 5 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 5 K, W (5-8); Casas 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K, SV (20);

What a steaming, ****ty mess of a game. I mean, neither team did themselves any favor with their crappy fielding and pitching. Theirs was a bit crappier than ours, but in total seven of the dozen runs in the game were unearned!

And well, it’s being called four-and-four, but not only everybody’s fielding was **** – the weather was as well. Rain wiped out the final game of this series completely, and was rescheduled for September 8 in form of a double header to start our final 3-game set of the season. That double header will sit squat in the middle of a 20-day string of games, but at least that’s with rosters expanded. Not that we have any clue where to find any more suckers to start games.

We have now as many as five games less played than some other teams.

Raccoons (37-45) @ Loggers (33-52) – July 7-9, 2006

The two teams with the worst offense would square off in this pre-All Star game series. The Loggers were actually soundly worse than the Coons, plating 279 men to Portland’s still atrocious 303. To make things worse, the Loggers were also allowing the second-most runs in the league, and probably still wondered why they were bottom in the division. It certainly was not for their play against the Raccoons. They had taken six of eight from us.

Projected matchups:
Ralph Ford (7-8, 3.57 ERA) vs. Roy Thomas (1-5, 6.35 ERA)
Angel Romero (1-1, 7.53 ERA) vs. William Lloyd (4-7, 3.78 ERA)
Tim Webster (0-0, 3.03 ERA) vs. George Norris (4-9, 5.95 ERA)

We get one more southpaw before the break in Lloyd. After that it’s back to the Elks north of the border, with at most one left-hander in the series that following weekend.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – LF Castro – 3B Sharp – CF Crespo – C Wood – P Ford
MIL: LF Bayle – 2B B. Hernandez – CF T. Austin – RF Hiwalani – 1B Batlle – SS T. Johnson – 3B Tolwith – C T. Phillips – P R. Thomas

Ford walked Bayle and hit Hernandez, and once Hiwalani doubled them in, the Loggers were in a 2-0 business in the first. Ford continued to be just plain awful. When Quebell hit a home run that counted for one, Ford gave up a home run that counted for two to Paco Batlle, and just like that trailed 4-1. The Loggers would only get three hits off Ford in seven innings, but he gave up enough other runners to make those three hits count for more than enough. Other than Quebell, no Raccoon had the slightest faint of an idea what to do with Roy Thomas’ trash can stuff, and the Raccoons lost a very quick one to start this series. 4-1 Loggers. Quebell 3-4, HR, 2B, RBI; Trevino (PH) 1-1;

Game 2
POR: 3B Flores – 2B Nomura – 1B Sharp – LF Castro – CF Crespo – C Bowen – RF Lugo – SS Pena – P Romero
MIL: LF Bayle – 2B B. Hernandez – CF T. Austin – RF Hiwalani – 1B Batlle – SS T. Johnson – 3B Tolwith – C T. Phillips – P Lloyd

After Yoshi Nomura hit a triple and was singled in by Tomas Castro for an early 1-0 lead, the lard stain that had walked twice as many as he had struck out in a brown uniform started his outing by walking Jimmy Bayle (and it was not close). Not that Lloyd was much better. Romero survived two first inning walks, and then Flores doubled in Pena in the second to make it 2-0. Lloyd walked the sacks full before Bakile Hiwalani caught Castro’s drive to right on the warning track. Then, the bottom 2nd. What started innocently enough with an infield single by Tom Johnson, soon bloomed and blossomed, as Romero was pitching like UTTER DOG ****. Soon line drives began to hiss in every direction. Lugo snagged two of them, otherwise the inning might have continued forever. To be fair, Romero didn’t witness the end of the inning. After Hiwalani crushed a massive 3-run home run, which casually ran the score to 6-2 Loggers, Romero gave up yet another hard single to Paco Batlle. Nine up, seven on, and one was sent off. Kaz came on, got the ball from the pitching coach and was told that this was all his. Typically, when it counted for nothing but innings pitched, Kaz was all spot on, and logged 4.1 innings with only three base runners and no runs against him. The Raccoons had crawled back to 6-4 by then, and in the eighth Nomura hit his third extra-base hit on the day, a double, to plate Cesar Pena and represent the tying run with two outs. Too bad Daniel Sharp struck out swinging. Bruno held the Loggers away in the bottom 8th, but Robbie Wills quickly retired Castro and Crespo in the ninth. We then hit Quebell for Bowen, and Adrian hit a single, and left the game as quickly as he had entered with Yamada running for him. Yamada went when Bob Wood, hitting for Lugo, very interested looked at a high ball from Wills, and appeared to be thrown out, but the ball came loose from Hernandez and Yamada was safe. The count was 2-1 and any single would do. Wood cut sharply into Wills’ next pitch, but grounded out to short. 6-5 Loggers. Flores 2-5, 2B, RBI; Nomura 3-3, 2 BB, 3B, 2 2B, 2 RBI; Crespo 2-5; Quebell (PH) 1-1; Pena 2-3, 2B, RBI; Kichida 4.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 4 K;

Colossal ****head Angel Romero (1-2, 10.13 ERA, 15 BB, 6 K in 16 IP) was designated to the tanner after this game. We would not need a fifth starter for 14 days with the Break after the Sunday game, then four in Vancouver, then an off day. So we activated Eddie Fernandez, who was 8-for-23 in his rehab assignment to AAA.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – LF Castro – CF Fernandez – 3B Sharp – C Wood – P Webster
MIL: LF Bayle – 2B B. Hernandez – CF T. Austin – RF Hiwalani – 1B Batlle – SS T. Johnson – 3B Tolwith – C T. Phillips – P Norris

Bases loaded in the top 1st, Fernandez left them loaded. Two men on in the second, Flores made sure they didn’t score. By contrast, girly poker Aaron Tolwith slammed a 3-run homer off Webster in the bottom of the second inning. The Raccoons accumulated on base again in the third, and managed to tie the game, Webster hitting the 2-out RBI single to made both teams even at three, before Flores found the bags loaded and struck out to leave them loaded. Fourth inning, bases loaded for Wood, and he struck out. Webster then loaded the bases on a Batlle single and eight balls. Tom Phillips would double in a pair, with Brady throwing out Tolwith at third base. Norris bunted, Bayle grounded out to short, but after four innings the Raccoons trailed 5-3 while leaving ELEVEN men on base. Webster hit a leadoff double in the fifth, advanced on a balk, but hardly managed to score on a soft Brady single with two outs, and that it took this long was bad enough! Neither starting pitcher lived to see the sixth inning in a 5-4 mind-boggler. Nomura reached on an error by Hernandez in the seventh, but Flores erased him on a double play and I had the manager send him to the salt mines after that. Pena took over at short. The Loggers elected Gabe Garcia to pitch the eighth inning, a right-hander, while we had Brady, Quebell, and Castro up. It was justice being served when Brady doubled, and the other two walked to load the bases with no outs. BASES LOADED. For the HUNDRETH TIME IN THE ****ING GAME!!

All that tension was too much for Garcia, who threw a wild pitch to a scared Pena to plate the tying run (and keep Tim Webster thoroughly undecided). Pena singled to left on the next pitch, Brady scored, but Castro was thrown out at home, and injured in the collision with Tom Phillips. Marcos Bruno pitched the seventh AND eighth LIKE A BOSS to hand that newly-found 6-5 lead straight over to Angel Casas, who faced the bottom of the order in the ninth. He struck out Tolwith and Wheaton before Mac Woods zinged a grounder up the first base line, but more or less right to the waiting Quebell. 6-5 Coons. Brady 4-5, 2 2B, RBI; Castro 2-3, 2 BB, RBI; Pena 1-1, RBI; Sharp 2-4, BB, 2B, RBI; Bruno 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K, W (3-1);

Total LOB: 15; Individually, Flores left seven, and Wood six.

Tomas Castro did not strain or tear or break anything, but had only a tight hamstring. He would be fine past the Break.

Not that we’d have missed his .650 APOPS.*

*Adjusted Portland On-Base Plus Slugging

In other news

July 3 – The Falcons lose SP Tommy Wilson (8-4, 3.93 ERA) for the season with a torn rotator cuff.
July 3 – Looks like season over as well for TOP OF Javier Gusmán (.282, 9 HR, 35 RBI), who has suffered a partially torn labrum.
July 3 – 1B Jose Valenzuela (.287, 9 HR, 40 RBI) goes from the Buffaloes to the Rebels, along with a minor leaguer, in exchange for LF/RF Dale Moore (.357, 1 HR, 5 RBI in 70 AB).
July 4 – The Bayhawks deal SP Curt Powell (8-7, 3.97 ERA) to the Warriors to grab last year’s sixth overall pick and #68 prospect SP Zack Yeadon.
July 6 – The Titans run into a buzzsaw, getting 2-hit by New York’s Angel Javier (11-2, 2.41 ERA) in a 6-0 shutout.
July 7 – The Blue Sox strike big, landing INF Oliver Torres (.331, 0 HR, 33 RBI) in a trade with the Aces. He costs them four minor leaguers, including #72 3B Felipe Flores and #5 (!) CL Dave Hughes!
July 7 – The Condors deal SP Brian Patrick (6-9, 5.94 ERA) to the Pacifics for #80 prospect SP Erik MacMahon and another minor leaguer.
July 7 – NAS RF/LF Pat MacDonald (.289, 1 HR, 18 RBI) has to undergo surgery for a torn labrum and is out for the year.
July 8 – The Knights flip SS Antonio Luján (.289, 4 HR, 41 RBI) to the Warriors and receive 3B Mike Crowe (.241, 1 HR, 7 RBI) and #73 prospect SP Lance Tinker in return.
July 8 – After the deal for Tinker, the Knights send SP Anthony Mosher (1-1, 4.03 ERA) packing, with the Blue Sox picking the southpaw up, and receive two third-rate prospects.
July 8 – A pair of 3-hitters in 6-0 shutouts is pitched, as NAS Stanton Taylor (9-8, 3.86 ERA) does the favor to the Cyclones, while VAN Scott Spears (2-10, 4.90 ERA) lifts his mood facing the Titans.

Complaints and stuff

Big shock. No Coons nominated to the All Star Game. Oh noes, how can it be …!

We will pay Angel Romero another million until this season will kick the feet up. What a wonderful investment.

By the way, Foulguts Greenman is batting .311 for the Stars.

I just can’t anymore……..

[Westheim]

PORTLAND AGITATOR

RACCOONS HAVE TO SHAVE OLD FUR TO RETURN TO WINNING

By P. Oysen

Sunday the perennially hopeless Raccoons limped into the All Star Break with a come-from-behind, 6-5 win over the red-lantern-wielding Milwaukee Loggers when their opponents basically gave up to try and let Gabriel Garcia take the brunt of what amounted to a destined-to-be-in-last-place team’s rally, a rally that basically amounted to two whole runs in the eighth inning.

You can only applaud the resilience that long-time squad member Marcos Bruno and sophomore closer Angel Casas have shown, spinning three shutout innings of 1-hit ball at the tail end of a game that started as all Raccoons games start these days. Tim Webster (0-0, 3.89 ERA) took the ball, realized he was a mere mortal, and instantly consigned himself to fate. It might sound like a gracious sacrifice like Sparta’s 300 offered in antiquity, but in fact it was not. It was pathetic. The fact that Webster has not taken a loss in five starts in the major leagues this year must wholly be attributed that somebody else repeatedly keeps throwing games away on the other side of the box score, because he can’t help to not lose by himself, or do anything worthwhile himself, except showing up, binding his shoes – we have to assume he can do that by himself – then get whacked.

You could replace Tim Webster with anybody else in the rotation. Everybody shows up, and everybody gets whacked. The only pitcher on the staff that doesn’t get whacked, unfortunate Nick Brown (7-3, 2.62 ERA), strained a shoulder so he could escape onto the disabled list.

Since then it was been a rotation of constant failure, five days of doom, and then rinse and repeat. In eight games in July, no Raccoon has spun a quality start. And just one start ago, Angel Romero surrendered half a dozen well-earned runs in not even two innings before being designated to retirement from the same rampantly clueless front office that shipped him in not even four weeks prior. Romero came with a hefty price tag, costing future star Edgar Amador and suddenly-revived Christian Greenman, who’s batting over .300 for the Dallas Stars once he was able to break out of the poisonous Portland clubhouse.

It is a clubhouse that reeks of failure and surrender. A decade of living at other people’s feet leaves marks and mental scars.

The most scarred of all must be Clyde Brady. He has been a Raccoon since 1998, when he was 22 years of age. He was a big prospect then, supposedly the main yield in the trade with the Condors the Raccoons struck in the winter post-1997, which sent over David Brewer but within reason can be called the worst American disaster since the sinking of the Teutonic in the Atlantic in ’12. Then, thousands lost their lives, and the 1997 Raccoons dropped 40 games from 1996 and right into baseball’s purgatory, where they have remained ever since. Clyde Brady has been part of this since May 3, 1998. He gets a pass for 1997, where long-term mismanagement by the inept, decrepit, and potentially corrupt front office came to a head in a combustion that could have levelled Texas City a second time. He does not get a pass for anything since that day in May, when the Raccoons beat a disjointed, last place Indians squad 7-2 on the road. Since then, the Raccoons have won 603 games and lost 752 for a crisp .445 winning percentage over the best part of a decade. And Clyde Brady has been at the front and center of baseball anemia in more games than anybody likes to voluntarily admit to outsiders in this timeframe.

Clyde Brady has been a starter on either outfield corner ever since he came to the big leagues. He ranks in the top 10 in most countable franchise categories, f.e. he has played the sixth-most games behind the franchise’s poster boys Daniel Hall and Neil Reece – neither of which even managed 2,000 hits –, Mark Dawson, Tetsu Osanai, and Marvin Ingall, and if allowed to keep running out unchecked for the remainder of the season would pass both Ingall and Osanai for fourth place – the latter only if he appears in all games left in this season. Is that a treatment a Hall of Famer, as unlikely as his surprise election by the since-rightfully-abolished Secret Ninja Committee was, like Osanai deserves? Being passed in any batting category, or his much loved breakfast buffet line, by a career .742 OPS hitter?

Clyde Brady has not done anything worthwhile in his major league career. He has never surpassed a .761 OPS in a full season. He had a .911 OPS in 2001, but missed 91 games to injuries, and those injuries more than likely voided his traditional second half meltdown. He has never won a memorable award. He has never been an All Star. He has never led the league in anything. He ranked in the top 5 in a meaningful category in the Continental League exactly once, when he drew 93 walks, second most, in 2002. Players that walk are nice to have, but Brady plays a power position. He finished in the top 10 in home runs exactly once, last season, when he hit 22. So, not only does he not produce, he is also miscast at his position, for which his skill set is not fitting at all. And to add insult to injury, he has cost the Raccoons a fortune, being in the last year of contract that will have paid him $4.8 million by the end of the season.

Clyde Brady is 30 years old, and he has never been anything else but a burden on a team that is burdened more than enough by its generally inept front office that pulls jaw-dropping moves – like that trade that brought in Angel Romero.

Romero was acquired by the Raccoons on June 19 along with Tomas Castro, with the Stars receiving Edgar Amador and Christian Greenman. The former, whom the management and coaching staff never understood to properly accustom, has spun a shutout since, and the latter has merely doubled his batting average in Dallas. Meanwhile in Portland, completely unheralded and unproven Tomas Castro is batting for 159 points of OPS less as he did with the Stars, clearly a bubble that has burst, while the contract attached to Angel Romero cost the Raccoons more than half a million dollars despite removing Greenman off the books. Half a million dollars should be a sizeable sum for a front office that constantly seeks to excuse himself by claiming that ownership does not leave them with enough money to field a competitive team, but then they go out and pull moves like this.

Remember that this is still the same GM that traded future Hall of Famer Dennis Fried for two and a half days of Raúl Castillo in 1991. This is the same GM that can not draft a worthwhile player in the first round of any amateur draft – and the Raccoons have had strong picks for way too long – and also the same GM that fraternizes with the janitor with hard liquor while his team is losing on the field, as we have shown our dear readers repeatedly. How Richard Westfield is still employed by beloved owner Carlos Valdés jr. has to remain a mystery. One can only hope that Valdés will clean up soon.

On draft picks; the Raccoons announced with much celebration, little short of an immoral and decadent Roman triumph, the signing of third overall pick Jimmy Eichelkraut after last month’s 2006 draft. Eichelkraut was advertised as a strong guy with raw power to all fields, and a future star in the big leagues. One month into his career, Eichelkraut is batting .206 in single-A ball, and has only three extra base hits, and no home runs. Congratulations, here is our next Chris Beairsto.

If the big step back towards success, purging the front office staff, can not be achieved, at least a small step should be made. That small step would be to just do nothing. Do not hand Clyde Brady a new contract. Not one for six years, which the greedy, self-involved underachiever will undoubtedly seek, not one for two years, not even one for one year. Clyde Brady is not worth of employment of any team that seeks to conclusively leave the wet cellar of the division, even more so if they’ve dwelling in those unpleasant confines for now ten, long years. There are children in sixth grade in Portland that have not had a winning home team in their lifetime. Step one back to winning: do not waste any more money on undeserving players. Players like Clyde Brady. The roster is full of them, but Brady is their secretly crowned king.

[Westheim]

I have non-gaming-related social obligations tomorrow – how I hate those – and probably won’t be able to fashion an update, and today, due to shenanigans found below, I can’t finish with a weekend set, but I didn’t want to put up only the back end of the four-and-four with the Elks. So, this update starts with the post-ASG weekend set and ends with the Titans midweek.

The Continental League beat the Federal League 3-2 in this year’s All Star game. Antonio Donis and Curtis Tobitt were the starters, and neither allowed a run. Jerry Dobson claims the deciding knock with a 2-run homer off Ian Johnson in the eighth inning. With Randy Farley, Dan Nordahl, and Jesus Palacios three more ex-Raccoons appear in the game, but none of them does anything spectacular.

Raccoons (38-47) @ Canadiens (43-44) – July 13-16, 2006

The Raccoons were 4-2 on the year against the most repulsive of all creatures, the Elks. Good offense, not-quite average pitching was still their way, but it hadn’t been that long that we had squared off after all.

Projected matchups:
Kenichi Watanabe (5-8, 4.11 ERA) vs. Rod Taylor (10-7, 4.31 ERA)
Ralph Ford (7-9, 3.66 ERA) vs. Scott Spears (2-10, 4.90 ERA)
Kelly Fairchild (2-5, 5.18 ERA) vs. Carlos Camacho (2-6, 5.44 ERA)
Tim Webster (0-0, 3.89 ERA) vs. Daniel Dickerson (11-5, 2.35 ERA)

We started the series with another rainout. Turns out the weather is **** all across the Pacific Northwest, all year long. Thursday’s contest was pushed to Friday, as we were by now six games behind some other teams, but we’d play a double header on Friday. This may or may not put a crimp into the plan to make it to next Saturday without a fifth starter. The Canadiens also juggled their rotation, since all their guys were more than perfectly rested now.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – SS V. Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – LF Castro – 3B Sharp – CF Trevino – C Wood – P Watanabe
VAN: 2B Dobson – CF E. Garcia – C G. Ortíz – LF J. Gonzalez – 1B Theobald – RF Richardson – 3B Rivas – SS J. Phillips – P Dickerson

The Raccoons had runners on second base in the second and fourth innings, but never anybody on third base, while Watanabe faced the minimum in the first three innings of the opening half of Friday’s double header, before the situation worsened quickly. Enrique Garcia’s fourth inning single spun out of control with two wild pitches before Jose Gonzalez and Paul Theobald hit consecutive 2-out RBI hits to send the Elks up 2-0. Dickerson was dialed in, expending only 46 pitches in the first five innings. Granted, the fact that Watanabe twice hit leadoff singles in the game and twice some bloke grounded into a double play didn’t help the Coons, either. For Dickerson, it was all cruising until that same defense that had sucked up every pathetic grounder for seven and two thirds innings stopped doing that. Nomura hit a clean single before Flores reached on an abysmal error by Alex Rivas, who threw a ball completely past Henry Harmon at first. There came Clyde Brady, and if someone had thrown a tear gas grenade into my office, the effect couldn’t have been more profound. Brady’s grounder to the mound was so embarrassingly poor, Dickerson had time to order and consume a pizza before throwing him out at first. 2-0 Canadiens. Watanabe 8.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 5 K, L (5-9) and 2-3;

Bright sides: no relief pitchers used.

Game 2
POR: SS Yamada – LF Crespo – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – C Bowen – CF Fernandez – 2B Pena – RF Lugo – P Ford
VAN: 2B Dobson – CF E. Garcia – LF J. Gonzalez – 3B Suzuki – RF P. Flores – C F. Diéguez – 1B Trinidad – SS J. Phillips – P R. Taylor

When Ralph Ford plunked Pedro Flores and issued walks to Fernando Diéguez and Ramón Trinidad to start the second inning, the pitching coach let him know that Senora Valdés jr. wished to add to her collection of furs, and we had to pick ingredients by game’s end. It worked, as Ford got Phillips to pop out to first before whiffing Taylor and Dobson. Nevertheless, the game was as much about tunnel construction as it was about wardrobes. Taylor blasted a path to victory through a remarkably pathetic lineup, striking out eight of the first eleven batters he faced. Then Quebell doubled to right, but didn’t stop at second base. Flores nabbed him at third base. Then it was suddenly the Raccoons to have the bases loaded with nobody out in the fifth inning. Bowen had walked with Fernandez pushing a single past a diving Dobson by a whisker’s width, and Cesar Pena grounded hard to Suzuki for a potential double play, but Suzuki took a bounce to the chin and kicked the ball away for no play at all. Lugo only hit a sac fly, and while Ford singled, Yamada and Crespo would strike out to leave only one run for the Critters. By the sixth inning, however, that flimsy 1-0 lead was history. Ford walked leadoff man Jose Gonzalez, who reached third base on a combo of stealing second and advancing to third on Bowen’s laughable throw to centerfield on which Pena leapt in vain – the ball passed ten feet above him. Flores singled in the run to tie the game, and when Diéguez reached as well, Ford was yanked in a 1-1 game he couldn’t be trusted with. Law Rockburn cleaned up, then was hit for with Brady with two outs and Pena on third base in the seventh. Brady became the 12th striped tail on Taylor’s belt, and since Daniel Sharp found it necessary to hit into an inning-ending double play in the eighth with J.C. Crespo waiting on third base, and Bruno and Moreno did their jobs, the game went to extras. Top 10th, Nomura hit for Moreno, was drilled, and scored on a Crespo double, which made it Angel time in the bottom of the inning. Angel faced the reliever who had given up the run in the 10th, Juan Sanchez, since the Elks had spent their bench – and Sanchez singled. Angel Casas was hell-bent on losing this game, also adding a walk, but Yoshi Yamada, while useless with the bat, snagged a liner off Suzuki’s bat and also made the final play on Diéguez grounder to end the game. 2-1 Raccoons. Crespo 2-5, 2B, RBI; Quebell 3-5, 2B; Fernandez 2-4;

Good thing Watanabe went eight. That little soldier.

After this game, Jose Lugo was waived and designated for assignment, batting .207 for the Raccoons and not even .200 in total this season. Bob Mays rejoined us from his rehab assignment.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS V. Flores – LF Crespo – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – CF Trevino – C Wood – P Fairchild
VAN: 2B Dobson – CF E. Garcia – C G. Ortíz – 1B Theobald – 3B Suzuki – RF Richardson – LF P. Flores – SS J. Phillips – P Spears

While the Raccoons were silenced completely by a pitcher with a .167 winning percentage, the Elks only waited for Gabriel Ortíz to come to the plate. After Enrique Garcia had reached on a single that a horrible misplay by Trevino turned into a double in the first inning, Ortíz launched a no-doubter to put his team up 2-0. The next time he came up, two Elks were on, another moonshot, 5-0 in the third. Games can be over this quickly.

It took the Critters until the seventh inning to get a paw onto the table on which a bowl held juicy grapes. Spears held them to two hits through six innings before Crespo snipped a single in the seventh and Brady got hold of a mediocre fastball and sent it well on its way to Alaska. Spears continued to drift in a 5-2 game, put Quebell on, put Trevino on, before with two outs Bob Mays hit for Bob Wood, fell behind 0-2, then cleared the bases on a tremendous homer to right. That also tied up the score, knotted at five.

After Jerry Dobson was just barely stopped at third base in the seventh, Riddle and Bruno kept the Canadiens at bay and got the game to extra innings again. Batting for Bruno, Cesar Pena singled to start the 10th but instantly was caught up in Nomura’s double play en route to 0-5 on the day. By the bottom 12th, we had arrived at Kaz, who gave up a 1-out double to Dobson. With the lefty Enrique Garcia next, we added him intentionally even if that meant facing Gabriel Ortíz, but at least Ortíz was a right-hander. EVEN if Ortíz had already gone well deep twice. Here, he grounded to Sharp, five to four to three, see ya in the 13th. Or later. In the 14th, the Elks resorted to walk machine Ralph Davis, who issued freebies almost nine times per nine innings. Sharp drew a leadoff walk and was run for with Yamada, as we emptied our bench, but he couldn’t steal and moved up on outs – which put him at third with two outs and Kaz at the plate. Desperate, Yamada got a sign to go if he liked. He liked, and he was out at home.

No action until the 17th, when the Raccoons left Trevino on third base, while Angel Casas ran completely out of juice in his third inning, allowed a double to Gonzalez and then walked the bags full. Law Rockburn, last pitcher available, came into the game and struck out Paul Theobald for the platinum sombrero and an 18th inning of play. Long man Cal Holbrook had a hit off Rockburn in the 18th – yet still on result. It took those two teams of scum a dozen innings to score again, and then it was – of all things! – a leadoff jack off Holbrook in the 19th, hit by YAMADA. Trevino singled, Mays singled, and the Elks had nobody available right now. Rockburn’s bunt was misfielded by Holbrook to load the bases before Yoshi livened up an 0-7 day with an RBI single. Bowen, batting third, would plate another run to make it 8-5. No closer available: Rockburn faced Gonzalez, Dobson, and Garcia in the bottom 19th. Pop fly to center, groundout to third (Flores there), groundout to first, ballgame. 8-5 Raccoons…! Bowen 2-5, BB, RBI; Yamada 1-2, HR, RBI; Trevino 4-8; Mays (PH) 2-6, HR, 3 RBI; Pena (PH) 1-1; Fernandez (PH) 1-1; Riddle 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K; Bruno 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K; Moreno 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K; Kichida 3.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 6 K; Casas 2.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 4 K; Rockburn 2.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K, W (3-0);

Four Raccoons went 1-for-8 or worse in this game. You can probably find them yourself.

And then…

Interlude: Trade

We were able to cut our losses with Angel Romero, thanks to the perpetually ******ed general management of the Pacifics. 13 years ago they took Tetsu Osanai’s contract off our hands, now they happily took Romero, who had cleared waivers, but refused an assignment to AAA.

The Raccoons received 28-year old C Antonio Ramirez (.262, 6 HR, 37 RBI), who was defense first, and a lot of pain after that. He was in his third year as the Pacifics’ primary catcher, and had posted a .605 OPS last year. For his career since 2001 between Salem and Los Angeles, he was .251/.316/.368 with 22 HR and 215 RBI.

To get Ramirez onto the roster, Bob Wood, batting .198, was sent to St. Petersburg.

Romero started his career with the Pacifics and played for them from 1990 to 1997, including a 22-10, 2.45 ERA season in 1995, when he ran away with the FL Pitcher of the Year award. We’ve had good to great last-breath starting pitchers before (Juan Correa, Manuel Movonda), but Romero was NOT that.

Raccoons (38-47) @ Canadiens (43-44) – July 13-16, 2006

We had used every reliever for four or more outs, excluding Ed Bryan who had walked his only batter faced in the eighth inning, on Saturday, so the bullpen was kind of short with breath for the Sunday game. An off day was smiling at us after that, but now it was on Tim Webster to get a decent start in. Hey, maybe he might actually win a game!

Game 4
POR: 3B V. Flores – 2B Nomura – CF Fernandez – RF Brady – LF Crespo – C A. Ramirez – 1B Sharp – SS Pena – P Webster
VAN: 2B Dobson – RF Theobald – C G. Ortíz – LF J. Gonzalez – 1B Harmon – 3B Suzuki – CF P. Flores – SS Rivas – P Camacho

Yoshi Nomura had spent the series gagged and bound, but had a clutch 2-run single in the third inning to score Webster and Flores and get the first numbers onto the scoreboard. Crespo would add two more runs with a double in the same inning, and this was the start Webster had to win now, leading 4-0 in the middle of the third. He managed to face the minimum through four innings, allowing one hit, before Harmon hit a double in the fifth and the Elks had two on before Alex Rivas grounded out to end the inning. They had two men on again in the seventh when the inning ended with Pedro Flores lining out to Vic Flores. Vic Flores would also end the first Coons threat since the third inning when he stranded Quebell and Pena in scoring position with a soft pop to … Pedro Flores. The score was still 4-0, the pitcher for the road team was still Tim Webster in the bottom 9th, and he faced the 2-3-4 batters. Paul Theobald lofted an easy fly to Fernandez. Gabriel Ortíz struck out in a 1-2 count. The same count saw Jose Gonzalez hit a single to right. That brought up Henry Harmon and we got Riddle and Bruno ready, the only guys we could reasonably expect to throw something other than scrambled eggs today. Harmon also fell to two strikes, then froze on a pitch that started outside, but cut back over the plate – ballgame! 4-0 Coons! Webster 9.0 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 4 K, W (1-0) and 1-3;

Tim Webster, 26, now has 12 career starts. He spun a complete game last year, but this is his first shutout! Really not shabby, not all fifth rounders manage to toss a shutout eventually. He was our fifth round pick in 2000. He might have no stuff whatsoever, not have the faintest luck, and despite being black he looks kind of pale and malnutritioned, but nobody else on this ****ty staff managed a shutout so far this year!

Raccoons (41-48) vs. Titans (50-44) – July 18-20, 2006

The harder you looked, the less likely the Titans were to go to the playoffs. They were hardly scoring runs, ranking 10th in the league (although they had the 11th place Raccoons beat by 40 runs), and were just barely above average in keeping the opposition from scoring. Their run differential was a paltry +2. Was that really the same team that had owned the division for all of this century? At least they got a slight advantage over the Raccoons, beating them five out of nine so far this year.

The Titans had intensified their bid to return to the playoffs on the weekend, however, acquiring SS Dave Hutchinson (.319, 5 HR, 56 RBI) from the Wolves for five prospects. Two of these are ranked: #65 AA CL Ruslan Kobulidze and #118 AA OF Jaime Marino.

Projected matchups:
Ralph Ford (7-9, 3.58 ERA) vs. Bryce Hildred (6-7, 4.55 ERA)
Kenichi Watanabe (5-9, 3.97 ERA) vs. Jorge Chapa (8-6, 3.25 ERA)
Kelly Fairchild (2-5, 5.34 ERA) vs. Jason O’Halloran (10-6, 3.19 ERA)

Chapa and O’Halloran might be switched or even pushed back. Both pitched in the Titans’ double header on Friday. Opening a 2-week homestand, we switched Ford and Watanabe since both had pitched in our very own double header on Friday, but Ford had been removed in the sixth inning while Watanabe had gone eight frames in a losing effort. This series runs through Thursday, and we will need another pitcher by Saturday. A crazy voice in my head tells me to spot start Kaz on Saturday, and delay the inevitable to next week, but …

Game 1
BOS: LF Walls – 1B Heffer – SS Hutchinson – RF G. Munoz – C Rosa – CF Garrison – 2B Metting – 3B M. Austin – P Hildred
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – LF Castro – C A. Ramirez – 3B Sharp – CF Fernandez – P Ford

No batter reached base for three innings until Dave Heffer singled up the middle in the top 4th. Things threatened to take a turn for the nasty when Heffer stole second and was on third on Hutchinson’s infield single, but Ford recovered to strike out Munoz and Rosa, which already gave him half a dozen whiffs on the day. Hildred also fanned six through four, but was still perfect, but perfect went out of the window quickly in the fifth. Castro walked, and Ramirez then added his first hit as a Raccoon, a single. Sharp flew out, but Eddie Fernandez got something on the board with a double to left. Ramirez was held and stranded; while Ford hit a hard grounder, it was well into Hutchinson’s range. All was swell for Ford through six innings, striking out eight. In the seventh, he walked Hutchinson, then had Munoz single into center, and Fernandez botched the pickup, putting the runners into scoring position. Then Rosa grounded out to Sharp, who kept everybody put while surrendering the snail-paced catcher, and Garrison popped out to second. Metting was put onto the empty base to pitch to the lefty Mark Austin, and Austin became Ford’s ninth trophy. After that it was three quick outs for Ford in the eighth, but he was now over 100 pitches and that on short rest, so he would not get a run at a shutout, regardless of production in the bottom of the eighth (there was none). Marcos Bruno got the assignment after Casas had thrown roughly 50 pitches on Saturday. He retired Hutchinson and Munoz easily before PH Luis Lopez singled up the middle. Daniel Silva, the pest, ran for him. Rudy Garrison singled to center, Silva turned for third base, Fernandez unleashed a rocket, and Silva was out!! 1-0 Raccoons!! Ramirez 2-3; Ford 8.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 9 K, W (8-9);

Amazingly, the Raccoons have not surrendered a run for 34 consecutive innings! Where’s that coming from!?

Game 2
BOS: 2B D. Silva – 3B M. Austin – SS Hutchinson – RF G. Munoz – CF Garrison – C Rosa – 1B Heffer – LF Walls – P M. Castro
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – C A. Ramirez – RF Mays – 3B Sharp – CF Trevino – P Watanabe

Mauro Castro (8-4, 3.89 ERA) had not pitched since the All Star game and was inserted into this game, pushing the veteran left-handers back.

Freddy Rosa annoyingly ended a 37-inning scoreless streak for the Coons’ pitching staff with a bases-loaded, 2-run double in the fourth inning off Watanabe. That was with no outs, and the Titans plated three total in the inning after Hutchinson, Munoz, and Garrison had all singled to start the inning. The 3-spot killed a 1-0 lead for the Raccoons, who were hitless, having scored on Flores walking, stealing, moving up on a wild pitch, and scoring on Quebell’s sac fly in the first. Then it had been dry, but it started to rain in the third and a 55-minute delay was enforced right after Watanabe had disintegrated. Watanabe allowed another two runs in the sixth, which he didn’t finish. Antonio Ramirez would finally break up the no-hitter in the seventh inning with a 2-out single, but they were sitting in a pretty deep hole by then.

But the game was not over. Sharp led off the eighth with a double, Trevino singled him in, and then Crespo hit a pinch-hit home run to quickly assault Castro and the Titans and cut their lead down to a single run, with no outs in the inning. Three singles by Nomura, Brady, and Quebell loaded the bases with one out. The Titans STAYED with Castro! And he struck out Ramirez! And then the Titans STILL stayed with Castro! And Mays got them – a soft bouncer eluded both Heffer and Silva on the right side, and Brady got a perfect jump going from second base to score the go-ahead run behind Nomura on that single!! Risto Mäkelä put the pinch-hitter Yamada away, but suddenly the Titans were blinking in a state of shock, looking at an armed and ready Angel Casas in the ninth. Luis Lopez grounded out to Yamada at short, Mark Austin struck out, and Dave Hutchinson sent a drive to deep right that the ranging Bob Mays caught on the warning track. Boo-yah, comeback!! 6-5 Critters!! Mays 1-3, BB, 2 RBI; Crespo (PH) 1-1, HR, 2 RBI;

That’s a 5-run comeback to win five straight games, which might inspire a mediocre game, but next up is a less-than-mediocre pitcher.

Game 3
BOS: 1B Heffer – 3B M. Austin – SS Hutchinson – RF G. Munoz – CF Garrison – C Rosa – 2B Metting – LF Walls – P O’Halloran
POR: 2B Flores – CF Fernandez – LF Crespo – 1B Quebell – RF Mays – 3B Sharp – C Bowen – SS Pena – P Fairchild

The Dork on Duty plunked batters in the first and second, and both times escaped with two men in scoring position when Fernandez threw his frail body at screaming drives to center, making the catch successfully both times to keep the Titans off the board early. After a clean third, an error by Pena put the meltdown in full gear however, as Fairchild started to serve batting practice and was quickly clubbed for two runs before Fernandez had to stretch that fragile body again to end the inning with two men on. The defense kept the damage against Fairchild to those two runs, one earned, while O’Halloran did what he did to the Raccoons. Precise pitches, poor contact – he was not the power pitcher of earlier years anymore, with only 89 K in 135.1 IP this season – and more often than not really shabby results for the opposition. We were still trailing 2-0 in the bottom 9th, facing old friend Manuel Martinez. Clyde Brady started with a PH appearance for Law Rockburn, grounded to deep short, and was still thrown out. Flores made the second out before Castro hit for Fernandez and singled. Hope got choked to death quickly, though: Crespo flew out to right on a 3-1 pitch. 2-0 Titans. Castro (PH) 1-1; Nomura (PH) 1-1;

Well, you can’t win them all. Five in a row is decent for a team with no spine, no luck, and no chance.

In other news

July 10 – The Thunder decide to retool and trade C Felix Hernandez (.245, 7 HR, 36 RBI) to the Cyclones for OF Wes McCormick (.371, 5 HR, 17 RBI in 35 AB) and unranked outfield prospect Tom Reese.
July 13 – The Loggers grab two prospects, including interesting but unranked outfielder J.R. Richardson, for their run-over MR Alan Crowley (1-3, 7.38 ERA, 1 SV), who’s picked up by the Warriors.
June 16 – DEN INF Jose Correa (.303, 2 HR, 28 RBI) will be on the shelf for the rest of the month, having suffered a knee sprain.
June 18 – The ABL season is in its fourth month, and NYC LF/RF Stanton Martin (.311, 10 HR, 50 RBI) is on his fourth DL stint. Bruised wrist, three weeks.

Complaints and stuff

Full box score for the 19-inning game: http://www.ootpdevelopments.com/boar...ml#post3918168

Well, Kaz is still aligned for Saturday, and I think I’m gonna do it. Our AAA rotation:
Rhett Carpenter (4-5, 5.50 ERA)
Felipe Garcia (2-7, 3.82 ERA)
Cesar Lopez (1-5, 6.22 ERA)
Sergio Vega (3-5, 3.80 ERA)
… and a variety of strange birds rotating through the final spot since the departure of Amador to L.A. and Brown to D.L.

Jimmy Eichelkraut hit his first professional home run on Friday, a 3-piece key in beating the Indians’ affiliate, the Birmingham Freedom, 10-7. His OPS through 30 games is still a pathetic .542 …

We are currently watching 20-year old AA 3B Ricardo Martinez, who’s having a good season with a .785 OPS. He will never amount to much, but the Raccoons spent years with Cam Green, and he was a bat-first third baseman. Daniel Sharp is falling out of favor sharply here…

[Westheim]

Very quick update – the trade was done yesterday already – and thankfully no extra innings. Gotta get going. See ya.

Trade

On Friday, the Raccoons took on the salary of 32-yr old Cuban right-hander SP Jose Dominguez (10-8, 3.91 ERA) from the Bayhawks. The Raccoons give up 23-year old OF Desidério Chamissa, who has not played above A ball this season.

Multiple reasons for this trade. Chamissa looked like he was really coming in late 2004 in AA. Then somebody slammed the brakes. By now, we have better prospects in the outfield, Eichelkraut getting going like glue or not. There’s f.e. Matt Pruitt in AAA, who should get a look in September, and we just traded for a 22-year old in Tomas Castro. Also, re-dumping Lardstain Romero freed up enough salary space to take on the remaining $745k of Dominguez’ contract for this year. (He is also promised $1.68M next year, but hey, tomorrow’s problems can be solved next week) When Whitebread threw up a red hankie on Chamissa, we looked for suitors, and the Bayhawks will happily accept any shady prospect as they have gone into rebuilding mode.

Dominguez, besides being expensive, is 118-133 with a 4.30 ERA for his career, but you also have to mention that the best any of his teams (this includes seven years with the Elks) has ever done was a 82-80 season. He has ALWAYS been on trash can teams! His K/BB is not quite 1.9, which is not superb, but he is a groundball pitcher, which is important in Portland.

He will NOT be able to take the start on Saturday however, having pitched on Wednesday, so he will remain designated for assignment a few more days until we figure out whom to demote in the outfield.

Raccoons (43-49) vs. Falcons (59-35) – July 21-23, 2006

Coming in with the best record in the Continental League and unbeaten by the meekly Critters in three games so far this year, theFalcons were riding a CL-high 522 runs scored (soundly more than five per game) to overcome their middling rotation and creaky bullpen. Their run differential was well over 100 to the good, and you probably had to expect a lot of pain coming the Furballs’ way.

Projected matchups:
Tim Webster (1-0, 3.09 ERA) vs. Dylan Jones (8-7, 4.64 ERA)
Kazuhiko Kichida (3-4, 3.47 ERA) vs. Alfredo Collazo (6-5, 3.55 ERA)
Ralph Ford (8-9, 3.36 ERA) vs. Larry Cutts (10-1, 3.05 ERA)

There had been a rainout, and the Falcons might well switch Collazo and Cutts, or skip Collazo. Jones and Cutts are both southpaws.

Game 1
CHA: 3B J. Rodriguez – RF Reya – C F. Chavez – 1B Tsung – 2B H. Green – LF J. Flores – SS Starks – CF P. Estrada – P D. Jones
POR: 3B V. Flores – 2B Nomura – CF Fernandez – RF Brady – LF Crespo – C A. Ramirez – 1B Sharp – SS Pena – P Webster

A combined seven runners were stranded by the teams in the first two innings alone, with the Coons plating a pair in the bottom 1st, Flores and Brady hitting doubles while Nomura was just denied and Crespo hit a single to plate Brady, with the Falcons taking a run back in the second which they started with three men on base and no outs. While Webster looked like he would get the walloping he was due in those earliest innings, he settled in nicely afterwards and would not allow another hit through the seventh, although he casually walked three. When it counted, he was on, however, and handled the Falcons’ young wonder Javier Rodriguez especially well, holding him dry, 0-for-4, with two strikeouts. Bob Mays hit for Webster to start the bottom 7th but flew out harmlessly. Flores singled past Rodriguez then. Nomura once again got hit by Dylan Jones, and a Fernandez single loaded them up for Clyde Brady, who at first fell behind 1-2, then grounded right back to the pitcher, and then wasn’t even punished for it when Jones had the ball clunker off his glove – twice. Jones struck out Crespo and Ramirez, but the Raccoons had added a valuable run to make this a 4-1 game. When Daniel Sharp reached base to start the bottom 8th, Yamada ran for Sharp, Quebell hit for Pena, and we still managed to tumble into a double play. Thankfully, the pen was up to the task and held the Falcons hitless past the second inning. 4-1 Coons. Flores 2-4, 2B; Brady 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Sharp 2-3, BB, RBI; Webster 7.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 4 BB, 5 K, W (2-0) and 1-2; Casas 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K, SV (24);

Game 2
CHA: 3B J. Rodriguez – RF Reya – C F. Chavez – 1B Tsung – LF J. Flores – 2B H. Green – CF Burke – SS Starks – P Cutts
POR: 3B V. Flores – 2B Nomura – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – CF Fernandez – RF Mays – C Bowen – SS Pena – P Kichida

Another day, another 2-0 lead in the first, again with Brady driving in the first run with an extra-base hit, this time a triple to bring home Nomura. The Coons then had Bob Mays on third base with no outs in the bottom of the second inning, but balked at the chance and didn’t bring him in. 2-0 remained the score for a while. Kichida pitched like Webster the day before, allowing mostly poor contact, but walked a few here and there. Kaz was also the next player to score a run, crossing home plate on a Quebell single in the fifth. Kaz had singled himself, followed by Nomura. Brady had seen the two Japanese guys on base, thought something was wrong with his eyes and blinked at strike three down Broadway, but Quebell came to the rescue. Bottom 6th, still 3-0, Kichida’s spot was up with the bases loaded and no outs. Mays had singled, Bowen had singled and moved up when Mays had swiped third base. Cesar Pena then was walked intentionally.

The Falcons were predominantly batting left-handed, but Kichida had been silencing them very well so far, and we had used our left-handers quite a bit in recent days, and then Moreno hadn’t even been able to pitch the eighth by himself on Friday. So, Kaz grabbed a bat, grounded to Cutts to get Mays forced at home, and the Coons only added one run on Flores’ sac fly before Kaz completely fell apart in the seventh and left with the bases loaded and only one out. Steve Moore was already announced as pinch-hitter for Cutts when we made the move to Marcos Bruno, who got the switch-hitter to 0-2 before Moore grounded to Quebell, whose only play was on the batter and a run scored. Javier Rodriguez then cut Bruno’s first pitch sharply to the right side, where Nomura intercepted the ball deep at the edge of the dirt, sprung up and fired to first – OUT!!

Bruno pitched an interesting eighth in which two balls were hit hard to deep left, and Brady snagged them both to keep the Falcons at bay, still 4-1, but it didn’t stay that way, and not for something the Raccoons did. Angel Casas struck out Hubert Green and Jake Burke to start the ninth before Leslie Starks hit a looping double into the corner in right. Pedro Estrada hit for the pitcher and singled, plating Starks, which got the top of the order back into play. Javier Rodriguez was 0-for-8 in the series and lusting for a big at-bat, yet he grounded back to Angel and the game ended with a simple flip to first. 4-2 Raccoons! Nomura 2-4; Bowen 3-3, BB; Kichida 6.1 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 3 K, W (4-4) and 1-3; Bruno 1.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Yay Kaz! He did very, very well in this spot start, and I am quite happy about that. We will activate Dominguez after the series finale, which will see a quite random outfield mix to find somebody to get demoted and get us back to 12 pitchers.

Game 3
CHA: 3B J. Rodriguez – SS Starks – C F. Chavez – 1B Tsung – 2B H. Green – LF J. Flores – RF Burke – CF P. Estrada – P Collazo
POR: 2B Nomura – SS V. Flores – LF Castro – 1B Quebell – C A. Ramirez – RF Mays – 3B Sharp – CF Trevino – P Ford

Javy Rodriguez was too good a young player to go unsuccessful for an entire series, but when he did hit a single in the third game, it plated a run in the third. Paco Estrada had hit a single with one out, had been bunted over and scored on Javy’s one-baser. Getting bunts down was such a thing. When Quebell drew a leadoff walk in the fourth, Ramirez just failed and got Quebell tagged out at second, and the Raccoons didn’t score. The Raccoons would not get past first base at all until the seventh inning. Ramirez was on first with two outs in the inning when Santiago Trevino tripled into the gap in right center, and Ramirez scoring tied the game. Ford probably had another inning in him, but now was hit for with Brady, who masterfully struck out. The team also left Vic Flores in scoring position in the eighth, then saw Ed Bryan get torn to shreds in a 2-run ninth inning before staring into Luis Hernandez’ loaded arm in the bottom of the inning. Three Furballs up, three Furballs down. 3-1 Falcons. Ford 7.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 7 K;

Only four hits in this one. Apart from that triple we didn’t see anything specatular by any outfielder. Or infielder. Or catcher.

Or even reliever.

In other news

July 23 – A broken hand will cost DAL INF Armando Rodriguez (.368, 6 HR, 39 RBI) roughly one month of games and possibly a shot at the batting title.
July 23 – Rodriguez’ team mate DAL SP Jose Flores (12-3, 3.29 ERA) 2-hits the Rebels in a 9-0 shutout.

Complaints and stuff

Antonio Ramirez, .188 in Portland, lines in neatly in our Catching Hall of Shame 1991-2006 (right next to the women’s toilets). Rumor has it that he once broke the nose of a coach standing 60 feet away when he practiced “bunting”, in his case falling right into a pitch with a bat across the face. In our decade-long search for a decent catcher we have come to the conclusion that professionals are not worth the bother. We are about to sign a beer league catcher to a deal. His offensive and defensive skills are roughly zero, but the comedic value will be hard to measure in mundane things like dollars or defensive efficiency.

Word’s been spreading that Clyde Brady wants a new contract with us. I lifted one section of the blinds by the width of a finger to see the mob carrying torches and clubs and forks outside. Bet that Agitator has written something about him or me, and Maud has been hiding it from me.

(absentmindedly bobbles the head of a Daniel Hall bobblehead)

Oh, as we’re talking about Maud… she has cooked some promotion, and August 26 will be Daniel Hall Appreciation & Bobblehead Day. That’s a Saturday game against the Knights, the day after our double header. First 15,000 fans receive a Daniel Hall bobblehead with 223 of them being signed.

[Westheim]

We demoted Santiago Trevino on Monday and added Jose Dominguez to the 25-man roster. It’s not that Trevino was doing anything particularly badly, but he also wasn’t providing any sparks. But well, who was?

Raccoons (45-50) vs. Bayhawks (47-53) – July 25-27, 2006

The Bayhawks sported the best bullpen in the league, and didn’t help them any. Their rotation ranked eighth in ERA, and their offense was not that much better than that, and all in all they were readily defeated. But we know something about the feeling, too… We are 1-2 against them this season.

Projected matchups:
Jose Dominguez (10-8, 3.91 ERA) vs. Marc Padgett (1-4, 4.34 ERA)
Kenichi Watanabe (5-9, 4.19 ERA) vs. Tyler Sullivan (8-8, 3.87 ERA)
Tim Webster (2-0, 2.84 ERA) vs. Jeremiah Bowman (5-5, 4.52 ERA)

Dominguez will make his first start against the team he was acquired from. That can only ever end badly.

Game 1
SFB: LF Beairsto – 2B J. Barrón – RF Keshishian – C B. Campbell – 1B C. Parker – 3B J. Perez – CF Hudson – SS Sheehan – P Padgett
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – C A. Ramirez – LF Castro – 3B Sharp – CF E. Fernandez – P Dominguez

And just like that, the newest acquisition the Raccoons had made on their annual way to oblivion surrendered a leadoff home run to Chris Beairsto, whom we didn’t want to entrust with putting pine tar on bats anymore, and the Bayhawks were up 1-0. Dominguez drilled Tirgen Keshishian, walked Brian Campbell, then got singles flicked over the infield by Parker and Perez to fall 3-0 behind in the first. The Raccoons made up a run in the second inning, aided by a Bayhawks error, but Dominguez never stopped sucking. His Coons debut lasted three and two thirds, ending with a no-doubt 2-run homer by Brian Campbell that ran the score to 6-1.

Although he well deserved it, Dominguez did not get the loss. Marc Padgett was old and weak, and in the bottom 4th we saw Sharp singling home Castro for the second time on the day, before Eddie Fernandez hit his first homer of the season to collect Sharp and get back to 6-4. This was a game of pairs. Sharp had two RBI singles, and Fernandez would have another home run, his latter chasing Marc Padgett with a 3-run shot in the bottom 6th! With the resulting 7-6 lead we tried to get two innings from Domingo Moreno, but PH Pablo Fernandez (how many ex-Raccoons DO they have!?) doubled with one out in the eighth and Law Rockburn appeared to get out of the inning with Fernandez starved at third base. The Raccoons had nothing against the strong Bayhawks pen (including Salvadaro Soure, a Vince Guerra discovery), and when Angel Casas walked Keshishian to start the ninth inning, things got dicey. Angel however was indeed sharp – and struck out the next three batters. 7-6 Coons! Castro 2-4, 2B; Sharp 2-2, BB, 2 RBI; Fernandez 2-3, 2 HR, 5 RBI; Riddle 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K, W (5-1);

After this game, the Bayhawks traded Chris Parker (.269, 2 HR, 27 RBI) to Milwaukee for two prospects, one decent, one not.

With that win, we’re seven games out behind the crumbling Indians. We are only in fifth place but how can you sell inventory when you are only seven games out? I mean, it’s nuts! We are in no place to challenge for the division! We can’t add players, either. Every addition that comes here plainly fails. This season alone there have been four: Angel Romero, Jose Dominguez, Antonio Ramirez, and Tomas Castro. But how can you slap 7 GB in late July in the face and deal away your least horrible players?

At the same time, you don’t want to trade prospects for a less than ridiculous chance at the playoffs.

Game 2
SFB: LF Beairsto – 2B J. Barrón – RF Keshishian – C B. Campbell – 3B J. Perez – 1B J. Cruz – CF Hudson – SS Sheehan – P Sullivan
POR: SS Flores – 2B Nomura – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – CF E. Fernandez – 3B Sharp – C Bowen – LF Castro – P Watanabe

Another day, another mouthful of runs in the first inning. Watanabe got shoved around for four, showing nothing but stuff that wouldn’t suffice to throw batting practice. Add ****ty weather to that ****ty first inning and you have all the ingredients for pain ready at your hands. But the team would rally again. Castro hit a 2-run triple with two out in the second inning to cut the gap in half, and Watanabe just so held on to that 4-2 deficit until hitting a single to start the bottom 5th. Vic Flores doubled, and suddenly the tying runs were ready to be driven in. Yoshi Nomura’s grounder ticked off the glove of a stretching Jose Perez for an RBI single, and Brady hit a sac fly to tie the score. And then, Quebell with the double play, while Watanabe had nothing better to do than hit the leadoff man Campbell in the sixth and collapse like a house of cards. Two runs were already in when Ed Bryan came to the rescue and stranded the third runner on base, but the damage was done. Eddie Fernandez drew a leadoff walk in the bottom 6th, stole second, and came in to score on a Bowen single, but that still had the Raccoons a run short at 6-5. Rockburn had pitched the top 7th and remained in for the eighth as we faced right-handers, but he put two men on anyway. When Pablo Fernandez was sent to hit for Brad Sheehan, Marcos Bruno appeared to get a grounder to end the inning. In the bottom 8th it was a grave throwing error by Jorge Cruz that allowed Quebell to reach second base as the tying run with no outs, but Fernandez, Sharp, and Bowen failed colossally and couldn’t knock Sullivan from the game, and the lineup didn’t succeed against closer Johnny Smith, who had blown just one save all year, either. 6-5 Bayhawks. Flores 2-5, 2B; Bowen 2-3, RBI;

Of course the Raccoons have no chance at the division! You fool!! They have no pitching, and no hitting, and they have foremost no pitching, but primarily no hitting!

Game 3
SFB: CF Hudson – 2B J. Barrón – RF Keshishian – C B. Campbell – 3B J. Perez – 1B J. Cruz – LF L. Alonso – SS Sheehan – P Bowman
POR: 2B Nomura – LF Castro – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – C A. Ramirez – CF E. Fernandez – 3B Sharp – SS Yamada – P Webster

A daily tradition now, the Bayhawks took the lead in the first inning, although this time it was only one run as Tim Webster more and more was becoming the ace of the staff. The Coons took the lead in their half of the first with a 2-out, 2-run single by Ramirez that scored Castro and Quebell. Webster hardly ever got a strike past anybody, and the defense did most of the dirty work. That sometimes worked, and sometimes didn’t, and the Bayhawks tied the score in the fourth, only to run into Quebell and Fernandez in the bottom 4th. The latter doubled in the former, restoring the Coons to the lead, and with two on and two out Webster snipped a soft line past Cruz that landed just fair to score Fernandez and move to 4-2. After both teams stranded a pair in the fifth, Webster got a few more easy outs and finished seven innings on 109 pitches. Bruno quickly dealt with the eighth, and just like in the opener, the Bayhawks got a runner quickly in the ninth against Angel, but still racked up three strikeouts to get suffocated. 4-2 Coons. Quebell 1-2, 2 BB, 2B; Webster 7.0 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 1 K, W (3-0) and 1-3, RBI;

Raccoons (47-51) vs. Aces (45-57) – July 28-30, 2006

The Aces came in having dropped four straight, with a horrendous pitching staff that had allowed 510 runs (exactly 5 R/G) the main reason for their dwelling in the cellar. Both halves of their staff were posting 4.50-ish ERA’s, which came out to a 9th place for the starters, and 12th place for the pen. The season series is evenly split at three wins for either rotten outfit.

Projected matchups:
Kelly Fairchild (2-6, 5.10 ERA) vs. Juan Valdevez (0-5, 5.61 ERA)
Ralph Ford (8-9, 3.25 ERA) vs. Jim Pennington (9-7, 4.04 ERA)
Jose Dominguez (10-8, 4.20 ERA) vs. Bob Bowden (7-8, 3.66 ERA)

We will get the semi-decent part of their rotation, unfortunately. They also have Jesus Elmore in there, who is 4-11 with a 5.55 ERA and was in our system for a while. Plus a total bum with a 9-ish ERA in four starts.

Game 1
LVA: LF Covington – 3B Warrain – C Durango – RF R. Garcia – 1B Breach – CF Messinger – 2B F. Soto – SS Vieitas – P Valdevez
POR: 2B Nomura – 3B Flores – LF Castro – 1B Quebell – C A. Ramirez – CF Fernandez – RF Mays – SS Yamada – P Fairchild

Another classic for our collection of horrendously agonizing first inning, Marvin Covington started the game with a clean single to left, then stole second uncontested when the clumsy Ramirez dropped the ball. That did not matter much when Fairchild walked Inaki-Luki Warrain anyway. Eduardo Durango scored Covington with a single, 1-0, and Fairchild mixed in a wild pitch to Ricardo Garcia, who then singled, 2-0, before Yoshi Nomura spoiled the party by starting a double play on Alan Breach, that still scored a run, 3-0. I left my window to the field and instead had Whitebread compile a report on our AAA starters.

Fairchild never stopped being bull****, and was knocked out in the fifth inning, even topping Watanabe and Dominguez by being charged with seven runs in four and a third. Kichida replaced him, and by then the Coons were hopelessly behind, scoring only one run when Fernandez, who had himself quite a week, singled home Quebell in the bottom of the fourth. Then they did rally, but were extraordinarily stupid about it. In the bottom 5th, one run was already in when Quebell batted with two out and runners on the corners. He doubled to right and the runner from first, Flores, was sent around third and got thrown out at home. Then at 7-3 in the sixth, Fernandez was on first with one out and Mays batting. Mays completely missed a fastball in a hit-and-run and Fernandez was thrown out. Mays homered on the next pitch. No, it wasn’t gonna happen. Adam Riddle was tagged for a run in the top 8th, we got a run in the bottom 8th, but the damage done by Dork on Duty was too big to be overcome. 8-5 Aces. Quebell 2-4, 2B, RBI; Ramirez 2-4, 2B; Fernandez 2-3, 2B, 2 RBI; Kichida 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K and 1-1;

Trade

After I was done weeping over Whitebread’s AAA report, Kelly Fairchild (2-7, 5.51 ERA) was eliminated swiftly. We traded him to the Warriors for a 2005 second round pick that had just been promoted to AA ball, right-handed reliever Derrek Fredlund, 20 years old.

We called up Felipe Garcia (3-8, 3.69 ERA in AAA), because the tenth time around, everything will be so much better.

Raccoons (47-51) vs. Aces (45-57) – July 28-30, 2006

Before the start of this middle game I went down into the clubhouse, had the pitching coach assemble the remaining four starters and then grabbed Law Rockburn and Adam Riddle, had them take off their shirts and then showed the starters the various reddish spots on their bodies.

“You see that!? They’re all sore! All over their bodies! STOP OVERWORKING THEM!!”

Game 2
LVA: 1B Breach – 3B Warrain – C Durango – RF R. Garcia – LF Cameron – 2B F. Soto – CF Covington – SS Vieitas – P Pennington
POR: 2B Flores – CF Fernandez – RF Brady – 1B Quebell – C A. Ramirez – LF Crespo – 3B Sharp – SS Pena – P Ford

A miracle happened at the park on Saturday – the office of the resident Catholic archbishop started investigations immediately – when Ralph Ford did NOT give up a run in the first inning, and didn’t allow a hit until he had struck out seven batters, and that was in the fourth inning. Ford pitched with a 1-0 lead that was critically endangered after Francisco Soto’s leadoff double in the fifth, but he cut down the Aces to keep Soto at third, and got a second run of support in the bottom of the inning when Crespo singled in Quebell with two outs. A string of three 2-out singles ended with Sharp grounding out poorly to short. Top 6th, Alan Breach led off and became Ford’s 10th victim, and he struck out Garcia and Soto in the seventh to reach a dozen! Covington became #13 as Ford was reaching for a new franchise mark, but when Vieitas doubled on a 1-1 pitch in that top 8th, the tying run came to the plate and Ford also reached 101 pitches. But: that tying run was a left-handed pinch-hitter in Artie Hill, with the left-hander Breach after that. Ford claimed he had this, but Hill singled, and right-hander Tom Turner was taking Breach’s spot, which was the exit call for Ford. Marcos Bruno came on and got a double play grounder from Turner, with Cesar Pena having to reach wide to intercept it, but still started the two-for-one. The initial plan was for Bruno to finish the game, but his turn came up with two on and two out in the bottom 8th. Facing righty Don Davis, Tomas Castro hit for Bruno, singled to right, and pinch-runner Yoshi Yamada would score easily from second base, and another run scored on Vic Flores’ infield single to get us to 4-0. Since Pena had been hit for, Yamada stayed in the field at short and made an error to start the ninth, Warrain reaching against Rockburn. Law got the next two guys without getting sabotaged, with Yamada grabbing a liner by Ricardo Garcia, before Moreno came in and struck out left-hander Don Cameron. 4-0 Coons. Flores 2-5, RBI; Quebell 3-4, RBI; Ramirez 2-4; Castro (PH) 1-1, RBI; Ford 7.1 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 13 K, W (9-9) and 1-2;

Screaming helps tremendously.

Game 3
LVA: LF Covington – 3B Warrain – C Durango – RF R. Garcia – 1B Breach – CF Messinger – 2B F. Soto – SS Vieitas – P Bowden
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Flores – CF Fernandez – LF Brady – 1B Quebell – 3B Sharp – RF Mays – C A. Ramirez – P Dominguez

Aaand another first inning deficit. Dominguez opened with a bean served to Covington that the not-quite-as-inept Ace converted for a leadoff double and soon enough scored to put his team up 1-0. In the bottom 2nd the Raccoons drew three walks, but the completely inept Bob Mays hit into a double play and nobody scored. The Inepticoons drew five walks and hit into two double plays before Quebell had their first hit in the fourth inning, a single, that was soon followed by a Sharp double, nothing at all from Mays, the piece of ****, and an intentional walk to Ramirez. Dominguez would have made the final out if not for Inaki-Luki Warrain’s missed grab and an unearned run scored before Nomura flew out to left. The already despised Dominguez had allowed seven hits and two runs in four inning, but by the time he was beaten with with wet towels in the dugout he was actually in the lead. The bottom 5th had seen a Flores single and a Brady double play, but in the bottom 6th Sharp singled with one out, and even the numb nut Mays walked. Ramirez singled to left, the bags were full and Dominguez was hooked for Tomas Castro to bat and single to right, plating two runs to flip the score to 3-2. That was it for offense, however, since Nomura hit the ball hard all day, and never got one past the outfielders, and Flores also flew out, albeit softly. Ed Bryan struck out the side in the seventh, and Bruno, in action for the fourth time in five days, pitched a perfect eighth with one K. The team continued to fail royally on offense, and thus Angel had no cushion facing Breach, Messinger, and Soto. Breach lifted out to left before Forest Messinger sent a grounder to the third base side, and Angel’s off side, of the mound. Sharp raced in, made a bare-hand play, I saw red lights flashing with capital letters blaring out ERROR! ERROR! – but his throw to first was nothing short of amazing and Messinger was hustling, but out. Don Cameron hit for Soto, but grounded out to Nomura, who finally HAD reached base in the bottom 8th – when he got hit. 3-2 Coons. Quebell 2-3, BB; Sharp 2-3, BB, 2B; Ramirez 2-2, 2 BB; Castro (PH) 1-1, 2 RBI;

In other news

July 25 – The Indians pick up INF/LF Jose Lopez (.307, 10 HR, 64 RBI) from the Miners for unranked AAA outfielder George Jones.
July 25 – The Stars grab OF John Alexander (.262, 13 HR, 49 RBI) from the Capitals in exchange for SS/2B Kunimatsu Sato (.298, 1 HR, 4 RBI in 57 AB) and #11 prospect SP Jarrod Morrison.
July 27 – A stretched elbow ligament will put VAN SP Daniel Dickerson (12-6, 2.14 ERA) out of commission for the next 12 months.
July 27 – Former Furball CL Ricardo Huerta (1-3, 2.18 ERA, 28 SV) is dealt from the Condors to the Gold Sox for two middling prospects.
July 28 – The Stars trade LF/RF Artie Barnes (.275, 8 HR, 57 RBI) to the Wolves for prospect Jaime Marino, who was in the Wolves’ organization for only 13 days since a trade with the Titans, and a minor leaguer.
July 28 – Onto the DL with a quad strain: SAC INF/LF Dave McCormick (.319, 12 HR, 57 RBI);
July 30 – INF Brian Nichols (.286, 3 HR, 37 RBI) and cash is sent to the Condors by the Titans for SP Paul Kirkland (9-8, 4.33 ERA) and #79 prospect OF Ron Richards.
July 30 – The Gold Sox deal INF Jose Lopez (.274, 23 HR, 77 RBI) to the Falcons for SP Rodrigo Gomez (12-1, 3.62 ERA) and a minor leaguer.
July 30 – INF Bob Butler (.292, 3 HR, 46 RBI) is traded from the Thunder to the Scorpions, with OF/1B Haruyoshi Takizawa (.261, 3 HR, 19 RBI) making the return trip.

Complaints and stuff

Funny thing. Dickerson has 164 innings pitched. He will qualify for the ERA title, and how likely is it that Tobitt maintains his sub-2 ERA pace? It’s half his ERA from last season!

Ralph Ford is now the only Raccoon other than Nick Brown with a 13+ K game. That pesky Herberto Vieitas! If not for that double, he would have had a bit more breathing space available.

The Raccoons actually squeezed into the upper half in the power rankings, coming in at 12th at the conclusion of this 4-2 week.

And my hesitance to make any moves at the deadline will certainly come back to hurt the team eventually. Yes, they might be seven games out, and yes, they are second from the bottom in the division. That’s not enough reason to do nothing. Either go in and move, or back out and sell. I didn’t do either, and we will continue to linger.

Diamonds and the Raccoons in the second division – those things last forever!