Portland Raccoons (ABL)

[Questdog]

I drool over Alston, but as I recall that Santos kid was projected by your scout to be a beast. If that is so, I would not want to trade him for 2.5 years of a great bat. If Alston continues his productivity, the Furious Furries would not have much shot of retaining him past 2010.

If I am mistaken and Santos is projected to be just pretty good, then by all means bring us Alston!

[Westheim]

Before the Bayhawks came in, we considered making them an offer for David Lopez. Commonly playing third base, Lopez also had a lot of experience at first and in left field. Although he was 34, he was still an adept defender. He also led the Continental League with 23 home runs. He had 269 for his career. Plus, he was a right-handed batter.

But he was a bad choice. Not only was his contract bigger than Ron Alston’s at $2.44M a year, that contract would also run through 2011, his age 37 season. While we would have some trouble fitting Alston’s remaining contract for even 2008 into our budget, it would become borderline impossible with Lopez. Plus, the Bayhawks are also rebuilding. Most likely the last thing they wanted was to take on another big contract.

There weren’t that many top-of-the-line bats on hopeless teams. There were two on the Knights, Jose Morales and Jorge Garcia, but Morales was under team control, Garcia’s contract was quite favorable to the team, and they were merely 8 1/2 games out and not looking to sell.

So, Alston.

That gives our starting three as Alston-Castro-Black. Well, Alston has to play a corner. Castro has a weak arm. Black can play center, and Fletcher can play all three spots. Pruitt is another weak-armed guy and can only play left or first. But the odd man out would be Trevino. He has not been used as much else than a defensive backup for Castro, and if the gravest tradeoff we can make (other than potentially dealing away somebody on the big league roster) would be to lose our best defensive centerfielder, and we could haul in Alston, that would be - … don’t know, don’t know any words that express an outcome this perfect. Trevino wouldn’t be lost, he has options (Pruitt has options, too, but nah).

Our budget space was limited to $670k, less than what Alston was due over the remainder of the season. We had to make room of at least $119k in the trade, so minimum players like Cássio Boda weren’t getting us ahead by a lot.

The Indians had a Chris Kilters-shaped hole at third base, so they were insisting on a third baseman. They weren’t particularly picky about it, so I threw Daniel Sharp into the deal. Sharp’s remaining contract amounted to about $120k, so the deal was feasible financially. Now the Indians felt entitled to pick through our farm system, and Hector Santos was right up on their list. I tried to not give up Santos. Santos might not be The Next Big Thing, but perhaps just a sliver below that.

I told Ramón Pena, their GM, to come up with somebody else. Hey, how about Ryan Miller? He’s totally going to be a thing! Pena agreed, Miller was just a breakout waiting to happen. But it wasn’t enough. The thing was that the Indians weren’t interested much at all into our pitchers. They had a star in Curtis Tobitt, and a few other good starters, and a really strong bullpen. They didn’t need our spare parts like Boda. They were looking for hitting prospects. Or Santos. They’d dig Santos.

If Sharp is traded, we don’t need a third baseman back. My first reaction was to ask for Kilters in return in the deal, but we don’t need him. Melvin Pollack is a competent backup all around the infield, also for third base. We had a pair of Gutierrezes in AAA, both batting over .320 with no power, to happily take Sharp’s roster spot.

So, Ramón, if you get Sharp and Miller, whom else outside of Santos, Brown, and Umberger (always popular choices with other teams…) would you like?

Ramón liked Quebell, or Yoshi, or Castro, or … really? Really.

Or Jimmy Oatmeal.

My whiskers twitched in excitement.

[Westheim]

(dramatically shoves all his chips into the middle of the table)

Short of the deadline, the Raccoons acquired 29-year old slugger LF/RF Ron Alston (.333, 19 HR, 58 RBI) from the Indians in exchange for 31-yr old 1B/3B Daniel Sharp (.270, 0 HR, 5 RBI), 24-yr old AAA SS/2B Ryan Miller (.191, 0 HR, 9 RBI) and 20-yr old AA LF Jimmy Eichelkraut (.214, 4 HR, 30 RBI between A and AA).

Everybody knows about Alston. A sweet dream of a batter.

Everybody knows about Sharp. Useful bat, not overwhelming, and little power, never hitting double digit home runs in nine seasons in the Bigs. Good player on a perennially losing team. Miller hasn’t even consistently shown his glove so far, and his bat has been atrocious. .215 with two homers in over 300 major league at-bats. 14 walks, 65 strikeouts. The living definition of an automatic out.

And then there’s Jimmy Oatmeal. Catastrophic bust if there ever was one. His power potential has been slashed by scouts. He has a big roundhouse swing with no self-control and terrible eyes. If he meets a ball, he can mash it a half mile. But he NEVER meets one, because he CAN’T. He has 25 walks and 108 strikeouts this season in the low minors. He is actually worse than last year.

The Indians think he can be fixed. I doubt it.

But that’s not our beer anymore. We’ve got Alston. Debuting at 19, full time player at 20. Okay, he wasn’t actually good until 22. But wow, has he been good! For his career, he’s .289/.376/.472 with 227 HR and 725 RBI. He missed 111 games with injuries last season, but that was the first time that happened to him. He was on the DL only once before that. Three DL trips in total, for a tight back, an intercostal strain, and a broken wrist. No known weaknesses.

So! Alston joins the big league roster, and Pruitt moves to the bench. Trevino gets sent to St. Petersburg. Jose Gutierrez gets added to the big league roster. He plays only second base and bats right-handed (Manuel Gutierrez is the one that plays all spots and bats left-handed). I see a platoon with Yoshi Nomura happening here. Gutierrez batted .200 in 30 AB earlier in the year, and .225 in 102 AB last year.

Man, we can’t wait for those sorry Bayhawks to come to town!

[Texasborn]

Hmm... On the surface this trade seems nice.... but we all know that sharp and Jimmy will end up as all-stars the next few seasons. We will see!!!

[Trebro]

That's a very NYY#23 kinda trade, and his track record is pretty good.

[Orcin]

**Orcin buys four more season ticket seats before this Alston kid drives the price up**

[Westheim]

I was itchy to get home and see Ron in alsto- … in action all day long. Productivity today: zero.

Raccoons (58-39) vs. Bayhawks (44-56) – July 29-31, 2008

The Bayhawks might have the puniest offense in the Continental League, but their pitching was actually above average and the rotation ranked in the top 3 in the CL. We had already taken one of those ugh 1-0 losses against them this year, and had lost two of three games the first time we met. That lone run had been a David Lopez homer. He led the league with 23 bombs.

Projected matchups:
Jong-hoo Umberger (11-4, 1.88 ERA) vs. Harry Wentz (3-11, 3.54 ERA)
Nick Brown (9-6, 3.09 ERA) vs. Shawn White (6-4, 3.47 ERA)
Kelvin Yates (8-5, 4.38 ERA) vs. Reynaldo Rendon (1-2, 2.92 ERA)

We think they’ll skip Derrick Turner (3-1, 3.00 ERA). If they don’t skip him, we’ll see him against Brownie, most likely. No matter how you comb that, we will get three right-handers. Rendon is a hot rookie that was on our draft list a few years back, but we took Jimmy Oatmeal instead. Spilled milk…

Game 1
SFB: LF Bayle – CF Ware – 3B D. Lopez – 1B T. Mullins – 2B Nakayama – C P. Fernandez – RF Walters – SS McCullough – P Wentz
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Umberger

Ron Alston’s first Coons at-bat came after Quebell and Castro doubling back-to-back and the Coons up 1-0 already. Alston hit a hard single to right, but Castro still scored from second base. One at-bat, one RBI, keep that pace, thanks. The Duke would also double, and the Coons scored three runs in total in the first inning. In the top 2nd, Jong-hoo struck out Pablo Fernandez for his 100th strikeout overall. The Critters kept raking Wentz, who threw a 3-0 pitch right into Alston in the bottom 2nd. Alston bent over, but was good. The sizeable crowd (for a Tuesday night) didn’t take this pitch too lightly, and the angry moods weren’t soothed by the Duke bringing in the fifth run of the game. We missed the chance to blow the game right open in the fourth inning, when Martinez grounded out to short with the bases loaded, but the Bayhawks also left a runner on third base twice in the first five innings, but they really didn’t generate much more traffic than that against Umberger, who struck them out in double digits through seven innings, but had an elevated pitch count. He did start the ninth inning, but a leadoff double by Haruki Nakayama ended his day. Fernandez’ fly to left advanced the runner with Rockburn pitching, and Law then allowed a soft line to center to Bill Walters. Castro made the catch and despite his weak arm managed to throw out Nakayama at home to end the game. 5-0 Critters! Quebell 2-5, 2 2B; Castro 3-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Alston 2-2, BB, RBI; Umberger 8.0 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 10 K, W (12-4) and 1-4;

We faced G.G. Williams in relief, where he pitched two hitless innings. Williams was our third-rounder in 2004, but had been included with Rémy Lucas in the deal for Raúl Fuentes before the 2007 season. This was his second major-league appearance, the first being a start. So far his ERA is zero, but in AAA he posted a 4-14, 4.87 ERA mark…

And somebody’s making a Pitcher of the Year case here.

Game 2
SFB: LF Bayle – CF Ware – 3B D. Lopez – 1B T. Mullins – C P. Fernandez – RF Walters – 2B P. Durán – SS McCullough – P White
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – SS Pollack – P Brown

Jimmy Bayle reached on an infield single to start the game, which already evoked the worst pictures in my head. Brownie struck out Ware and Lopez, however, and the Bayhawks didn’t score. The Raccoons did, though, with a Quebell homer to start their half of the first. When Bayle singled in the tying run with two out and runners on second and third in the top 2nd, Alston threw out McCullough with the go-ahead run to end the inning, and Quebell then hit a single to score Nomura and move Brown, who had also singled, to second base in the bottom of the inning, gaining the Coons the lead for the second time. While Brown scored on Alston’s single to get to 3-1, he was also very wild on the mound, racking up two walks and six strikeouts in the first three innings. While the Duke was denied with a rocket to center, Stephen Ware catching the ball on the warning track of the deepest part of the park, Melvin Pollack would hit a leadoff jack in the fourth inning, 4-1. After Brown made an out, Quebell homered again, and when Alston came up, he hit his first home run as a Critter, and his 20th of the year! Three homers in the inning, four in the game, and 6-1 in favor of our second-longest-tenured player!

Then things started to go very wrong – again. Nakayama hit for the scuffed White and hit a leadoff triple in the top 5th. Bayle struck out before ex-Knight Ware tripled in the other direction. Brown amped it up some more and struck out David Lopez before Mullins sneaked a single past Martinez to score Bayle and get back to 6-3. The heavy traffic and three walks and ten strikeouts held Brown to six innings in this game. The lead remained 6-3 through the bottom 6th, before John Richardson walked Bayle to start the top 7th. That remained his only assignment. Sims retired Ware, and Bruno got Lopez on a groundout and whiffed Mullins to end the frame. Nomura’s bloop fell in to start the bottom 8th. With him at first, Barrón hit for Pollack against a right-hander, Phil Cotton, lined to first, Mullins caught it and doubled off Yoshi. Never mind, though. Fletcher batted for Bruno, doubled, Quebell walked, and Castro hit a single to right to score Fletcher. Alston’s fly to left was caught by Bayle to end the inning. The extra run meant that we took Vega from the pen rather than Angel. Bayle reached with two outs, but Ware grounded out to short to end the inning. 7-3 Brownies!! Quebell 3-4, BB, 2 HR, 3 RBI; Castro 2-5, RBI; Alston 2-4, HR, 2 RBI; Fletcher (PH) 1-1, 2B; Bruno 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

Ron Alston reached more or less safely in his first six plate appearances as a Critter. This includes five hits and a hit-by-pitch. Brownie in turn now has 10+ wins in six straight seasons. Scott Wade and Kisho Saito both ran streaks for 11 years. Saito would have had 16 straight years of 10+ wins if not for that one dismal year he had in 1986, when he was off all year long and went 9-17 with a 4.12 ERA.

Game 3
SFB: LF Bayle – CF Ware – 3B D. Lopez – 1B T. Mullins – 2B Nakayama – C P. Fernandez – RF Walters – SS Irvin – P Rendon
POR: 1B Quebell – RF Fletcher – CF Castro – LF Alston – 3B Pollack – C Esquivel – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Yates

After a Bill Walters single in the second inning, Yates threw eight straight balls before the pitching coach realigned him with a jackhammer. He then promptly struck out Jeremiah Irvin and Reynaldo Rendon to escape the mess. Rendon retired the first seven Coons before a Barrón single in the bottom 3rd was an almost unnoticeable sign of impending doom. Yates bunted him over for the second out, but Barrón would bat again in the inning. Quebell and Fletcher reached before Castro singled into center to score two, Alston walked on four balls, and then Pollack singled into center to score another pair. Yoshi also plated a run before Barrón fouled out on a 1-0 pitch. 5-0 ahead, Kel cracked immediately and allowed a run on three hits in the top 4th. The lineup shrugged, then anal-probed Zack Yeadon by putting their first five batters on base in the bottom 4th, and scoring four runs in the inning, 9-1. For a while it seemed like a wild Yates wouldn’t even last as long as Brown the previous day, but he then had a very quick sixth inning and ultimately made it through seven on 113 pitches. Richardson completed the sweep over the Waterbirds with two perfect innings. 9-1 Raccoons! Fletcher 2-4, RBI; Castro 2-5, 3 RBI; Pollack 2-4, 2 RBI; Black (PH) 1-1, 2B; Yates 7.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 4 BB, 9 K, W (9-5) and 1-2;

We made up a game during the week in relation to the Crusaders. We get another badly struggling team now, while they get the slightly better Condors.

Raccoons (61-39) vs. Aces (39-62) – August 1-3, 2008

There was not a lot to like on this Aces team from a fan point of view. They were bleeding runs at a frantic pace, holding down 11th place in runs allowed, rotation ERA and bullpen ERA. An average offense was no cure for that kind of dynamite on the mound.

We were 2-4 on the year against the Aces, though, conceding seven runs or more in four of those games, and holding them to less than four only once, a Baldwin gem in early June. Luckily, Colin will pitch in this series. The losses include the Kichida and defensive meltdown that led to a 10th inning with six unearned runs and Kichida’s banishment, Nick Brown’s 22-out no-hitter that turned into a scalding loss, an 8-run inning solely on Cruz in April, and a 6-run inning on Yates and Rockburn the day before that. We didn’t just lose to the Aces. We LOST REALLY HARD … to those Aces.

Projected matchups:
Javier Cruz (7-6, 3.50 ERA) vs. Donnie Fitzgerald (4-5, 6.60 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (6-6, 3.26 ERA) vs. Jack Thomas (2-5, 3.89 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (12-4, 1.77 ERA) vs. Juan Valdevez (8-7, 4.58 ERA)

The fact that Fitzgerald has started 11 games at all speaks volumes about the Aces’ pitching depth. They admittedly do have two starters (Jim Pennington, Joe Hollow) on the DL, but … wow!

Game 1
LVA: 1B McDermott – SS F. Soto – CF Cameron – C Durango – RF R. Garcia – LF L. Taylor – 2B Dahlke – 3B H. Jones – P Fitzgerald
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Cruz

The Aces came mighty close to scoring first when Fitzgerald batted with two men in scoring position and two outs in the top 2nd. He sent a bouncer to Martinez that our third baseman had to play bare-handed – pretty much the worst case for him, but he made a perfect throw to Quebell to end the inning. In the bottom of the same inning then he led off proceedings with a double and scored on Bowen’s single. Nomura also singled and Barrón walked to pull up Cruz with three on and no outs. Cruz grounded to Tom Dahlke, who got Barrón at second, but Cruz legged out the relay to be safe by a whisker, which ultimately led to one additional run when Yoshi scored on Quebell’s groundout to make this a 3-0 game. Bowen doubled in Black from first base with two outs in the bottom 3rd, but Ricardo Garcia put the Aces aboard with a solo home run in the top 4th, 4-1. Sean McDermott reached with a leadoff walk in the fifth but was starved on third base after Yoshi made increasingly acrobatic plays for all three outs in the inning. In the bottom of that inning, the Duke was yet again denied on a drive to deep center (deepest part of the park…) before Martinez hit a jack right after him as if to show the old man how it’s done. Martinez homered to left center in this case, and Black’s had been out as well if it had gone there.

In the top 6th, Cruz had two on and two out when the Aces hit Forest Messinger in the #9 hole. He was a left-hander, but I had enough confidence in - … so of course Messinger whacked one outta here. That cut our lead to 5-4 and we KNOW how we tend to lose against these Aces, so Cruz was yanked instantly. Beltran walked Francisco Soto to start the seventh and when Durango singled, the Aces had them on the corners with one out. Bruno was called on to face Garcia, who lined out to Alston on the first pitch, but deep enough for Soto to score and tie the game. Marcos Bruno would pitch long enough to somehow wind up with the lead, despite the Raccoons making two quick outs against lefty Dane Sanders in the bottom 8th. Bowen then lined a single to shallow right. Gutierrez hit for Nomura against the southpaw and hit an infield single that Min-tae Yu couldn’t play in time. Barrón singled, and up came Pollack, who had entered much earlier with Beltran in a double switch, and now hit the fourth straight single off poor Dane Sanders. This won came in a full count and went into center, and Gutierrez scored quite easily from second base, right behind Bowen. Angel Casas hadn’t been used in a while, but struck out the side between McDermott, Soto, and Don Cameron. 7-5 Critters! Martinez 2-3, HR, 2B, RBI; Bowen 3-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Gutierrez (PH) 1-1; Pollack 1-2, 2 RBI;

Bruno and Rockburn now both have six wins, only one less than Cruz.

Game 2
LVA: 1B McDermott – 3B F. Soto – LF Cameron – C Durango – SS Dahlke – CF Messinger – RF L. Taylor – 2B H. Jones – P J. Thomas
POR: 3B R. Martinez – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – 1B Pruitt – SS Barrón – C Bowen – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Baldwin

We juggled the recently successful lineup a bit against the left-hander Thomas. For this Saturday, there was also rain in the forecast, so there was a certain sense of urgency involved, and it didn’t help at all that Jose Gutierrez threw away McDermott’s grounder for a 2-base error to start the contest. Despite Baldwin’s best efforts and intentions, the run scored in unearned fashion, and the Raccoons trailed 1-0. Rain came as early as the third inning and forced a 44-minute delay.

The Coons had only one hit the first time through the order. Fletcher singled to start the bottom 4th, bringing up Ron Alston, who catapulted a 2-2 pitch well beyond the rightfield wall to flip the score in the home team’s favor, 2-1. The next critical situation arose in the top 6th, where the Aces had Soto on second base with two outs, and the left-hander Durango batting. He was their best hitter, batting .319 with 11 homers and more RBI than Alston. With a righty, and after the rain, you’d probably go for a left-handed reliever. Intentionally walking him was not an option with the right-handed Dahlke coming after that. Baldwin assured the pitching coach that he was fine and got an easy grounder to Pruitt at first to end the inning. Logan Taylor then stole a home run from Alston, off the top of the fence in right, in the bottom of the inning and we remained at 2-1, at least until Tom Dahlke’s leadoff jack in the top 7th, which tied the game at two. Baldwin walked Messinger and was yanked, with Rockburn allowing a pinch-hit RBI single to Garcia.

Sims allowed a leadoff double to Don Cameron in the eighth and plated him with a wild pitch before Dahlke or Messinger could. Martinez’ solo homer got the Coons back to 4-3 in the bottom of the eighth, and with two out Alston walked (semi-intentionally) before the Duke’s hard grounder to Soto at third was intercepted, but not turned into an out. Two on for Pruitt, the Aces threw a replacement left-hander in there in Dane Sanders. There were only left-handed bats left on the bench, plus Esquivel, but Pruitt was 0-3 on the day and without much hard luck at that. Quebell batted for him, but grounded out to Sandy Sambrano at second base. Ray Hoskins sat down the Coons 1-2-3 in the ninth. 4-3 Aces. Barrón 2-4;

Oh, these Aces. They had luck and our shoddy fielding on their side. They might be in shambles, but they took the season series with this squeezer. Jose Gutierrez is actively campaigning to get switched with that other Gutierrez.

Game 3
LVA: 1B McDermott – SS F. Soto – CF Cameron – C Durango – RF R. Garcia – LF L. Taylor – 2B Dahlke – 3B Yu – P Valdevez
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Umberger

Neither team amounted to much offensively in a pitchers’ duel that saw both teams put only two men on base apiece in the first four innings, and this included a Nomura error. The Aces certainly had the first good scoring chance when Logan Taylor led off the fifth with an infield single and Dahlke hit a single past Barrón up the middle. Umberger managed to strike out Yu before Valdevez bunted the runners over. McDermott grounded to Barrón, whose throw to first was high, but Quebell hopped to grab it and came down in time to get the out on McDermott. After that scare, Craig Bowen rammed his 15th homer of the season to send the Raccoons soaring … slightly above ground level.

The Aces got more singles off Jong-hoo now. They had two in the sixth, which ended when Rich Garcia hit into a double play, and another one in the seventh, when Dahlke got on, but Yu and Valdevez both struck out. Umberger struck out McDermott and got Soto on a pop in the eighth before the left-handers came up and we made a move to Sims, who had his first pitch popped up to shallow center by Cameron, but that was a long way for Castro, coming, coming, coming – got it! No insurance run materialized as the Critters got 4-hit over eight innings by Valdevez, with Angel Casas taking over affairs in the top 9th. Durango grounded to the right side, where Quebell made a play deep behind first, but his throw to the hustling Casas went to Casas’ back side and while Angel certainly tried to catch that lousy throw and tag the bag while not getting broken in two, it didn’t work. Error Quebell, and the slick Sandy Sambrano ran for Durango. 1-0, no outs, Bowen better be ready. But it just seemed like Sambrano didn’t have a run sign for some strange reason. He hardly ever twitched and never went while Casas took 11 pitches to strike out first Garcia, then Taylor. That brought up Dahlke. Still no move from Sambrano, who seemed awake, but nevertheless wasn't going. Dahlke eventually struck out, as the Coons squeezed a series win out of this nail biter. 1-0 Furballs! Bowen 1-3, HR, RBI; Umberger 7.2 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 6 K, W (13-4);

In other news

July 28 – DAL CF/LF César Morán (.314, 13 HR, 68 RBI) has hit in 20 consecutive games with a double in the Stars’ 5-3 win over the Rebels.
July 28 – The Canadiens pick up right-hander Sancho Rivera (3-4, 4.20 ERA, 13 SV) from the Thunder in exchange for two prospects.
July 30 – The Knights go for it and pick up OF/1B Julio Garcia (.318, 8 HR, 48 RBI) and cash from the Rebels in exchange for two prospects.
August 2 – While DAL César Morán (.309, 13 HR, 68 RBI) has his hitting streak end after 23 games, being held dry by the Miners, Denver’s RF/LF Pedro Pujols (.353, 11 HR, 64 RBI) now has crafted a 20-game hitting streak himself with an RBI single in the Gold Sox’ 4-3 win over the Blue Sox.
August 3 – And this hitting streak ends, too: Pedro Pujols (.349, 11 HR, 64 RBI) is held dry by the Blue Sox in a 7-5 Gold Sox loss.
August 3 – MIL SP Roy Thomas (5-7, 4.39 ERA) hurls a 3-hit shutout in a 4-0 win over the Falcons.

Complaints and stuff

People stormed the gates this week. We gotta raise the prices for admission, beer, and bratwurst!

Ron Alston’s first week in the office: .368/.520/.684, 2 HR, 6 RBI – that tastes good!

We didn’t make another move. First the coffers are empty. Second, another move would probably mean upgrading at the catcher position, and that was difficult in the first place. Bowen wasn’t hitting for much average, but at least he controlled the running game well this year and hit for some power. No, this is the set that has to take us to the playoffs.

And, uh, speaking of Manuel Gutierrez, he sprained an ankle on Sunday, so we’re stuck with Jose for a while.

We have begun a string of 20 games without an off day. The rest of this tough stretch will be played on the road, including 4-game sets in both New York and Vancouver. In total, we have still 11 games left with the Crusaders.

We are 16-15 in 1-run games this season. You would expect us to fare batter with that tremendous pitching staff, and especially the bullpen. Well…

1-0 score: W-L 2-2
2-1 score: W-L 5-3
3-2 score: W-L 1-5
4-3 score: W-L 2-2
5-4 score: W-L 2-1
6-5 score: W-L 2-0
7-6 score: W-L 1-1
8-7 score: W-L 1-0
9-8 score: W-L 0-1

No, it’s been more of an offensive problem. The 9-8 loss the game where Cruz bled eight runs against the Aces, and he allowed six runs in the 7-6 loss to the Condors, both games in his horrendous April. Even in the 5-4 loss all damage was charged to the starter (Baldwin in this case). The 4-3 losses were combos of bad defense and a left-handed reliever blowing a fuse, Bryan earlier in the year, and Sims this week. And then we still have ten games lost where one run could have at least extended our chances. Once in extras, bullpen strength is everything, and we’re 8-3 in that regard.

Tim Webster cleared waivers and was assigned back to AAA early in the week.

Odd note: the total sum of positions, at which the four players in the Alston deal were picked in their respective drafts, was 39. Ron Alston was actually the lowest pick at #18. Eichelkraut was a #3 pick, Sharp a #5, and Miller a #13.

Totally odd note: the top 5 active leaders in career caught stealing all play for CL North teams right now: IND Cristo Ramirez 155, BOS Daniel Silva 133, NYC Martin Ortíz 112, POR Jerry Fletcher 111, MIL Bartolo Hernandez 109;

[Westheim]

Raccoons (63-40) @ Thunder (38-64) – August 4-6, 2008

Whatever had happened to the Thunder, be careful, boys, it might be contagious! 11th in runs scored, 5th in surrendering runs, they ran a -111 run differential in early August. They weren’t doing anything particularly well, but not doing anything particularly well had them .500 over six games with the Critters this season.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (10-6, 3.15 ERA) vs. Daniel Dickerson (5-11, 3.46 ERA)
Kelvin Yates (9-5, 4.21 ERA) vs. Shaun Yoder (2-0, 2.89 ERA)
Javier Cruz (7-6, 3.63 ERA) vs. Luis Martinez (4-11, 5.55 ERA)

Martinez is the only left-hander in this set. We will get to see the Crusaders over the weekend for four games and I want to keep everybody fresh and healthy, so everybody will get two or even three days off in this 20-game stretch, but I want the A team on the field against the Crusaders. That means that Alston and Barrón will get days off in this series. In Alston’s case, Wednesday is a good time, obviously, while Barrón gets a day off on Tuesday.

Game 1
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – C Esquivel – SS Barrón – P Brown
OCT: LF V. Sanchez – CF J. Gonzalez – C J. Martinez – 1B Clarke – 3B G. Turner – 2B M. Garza – RF Reese – SS McGreary – P Dickerson

The Raccoons scored two runs in the first inning after a Castro triple, Alston walking, an RBI single by Black and eventually Dickerson sending an errant pickoff throw to first to plate Alston. Then Nick Brown not only walked Victorino Sanchez on four straight balls, he also wouldn’t get a strike past any batter in the first inning. Ricardo Martinez induced a double play to keep the Thunder from scoring in the inning. Brown drilled Marcos Garza with an 0-2 pitch to start the bottom 2nd, and while Garza survived that, he got entangled with Barrón in a play at second base and had to leave with an injury after all. The Thunder stranded Tom Reese at third and remained down 2-0, but we felt uneasy. Bottom 3rd, now with a 3-0 lead: walk to Sanchez, Jose Gonzalez doubled, wild pitch, and Jesus Martinez finally walked. That was three walks, no strikeouts, and half my face was paralyzed. Either Brown clicked right there or the Thunder got overly greedy because they started hacking, and Clarke popped out before Gerald Turner and Keith Ayers struck out. Clumsy play wasn’t limited to the Coons, however, as Jesus Martinez allowed the Coons’ fourth run to score with a passed ball in the next inning.

While the Raccoons continued to put runners on base without benefitting from egregious fielding afterwards, and thus not scoring any more, Brown caught himself somewhere around the fourth or fifth inning and delivered a few more decent frames before walking Sanchez for the third time to start the bottom 8th, which finally ended his day. Rockburn took over, struck out Gonzalez and got a double play from Martinez. Casas saved the game without much trouble. 4-1 Brownies. Quebell 3-5; Castro 2-4, BB; Barrón 2-3; Brown 7.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 4 BB, 5 K, W (11-6);

Any team better than those Thunder would have stuck a rocket between Brownie’s hairy butt cheeks and would have fired him straight into the sun. Just how bad are they? Well, their 3-4 batters both are batting less than .200 … In fact, four of their seven times on base against Brownie resulted from Victorino Sanchez being an awesome player. Brownie didn’t retire him even once. The rest of the lineup fared substantially worse.

The Crusaders lost 7-6 to the Aces as we closed the gap to two games.

We gave the Duke another day off on Tuesday. He has not homered since the All Star Game. He has certainly hit the ball well, and most of it is being unlucky, since also so many long drives got caught. I still feel better giving him another day off (except for pinch-hitting of course) before we will get to New York.

Game 2
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – RF Alston – 3B R. Martinez – LF Pruitt – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – SS Pollack – P Yates
OCT: LF V. Sanchez – 1B T. Cardenas – C Ledesma – RF Reese – 2B Heathershaw – 3B A. De Jesus – CF Covington – SS McGreary – P Yoder

After Martinez singled in Quebell in the first inning, Victorino Sanchez continued to haunt the Coons’ staff with a leadoff triple in the bottom 1st. A single would have done as well, because Yates threw eight straight balls after that before surrendering RBI singles to Tom Reese and Bradley “Winner’s Name” Heathershaw. He finally logged an out after that, getting a sac fly from Alfredo De Jesus, who was so old that he had fought during the Mexican Revolution. It didn’t get any better for Yates after that, and he was yanked after Heathershaw’s 2-out single in the bottom 2nd scored a pair to run the score to 6-1. While John Richardson pitched 4 1/3 scoreless innings after Yates single-handedly blew the game, at no point did the Raccoons ever look like a comeback was going to happen sooner rather than later, or even at all. The rookie Yoder, in his fourth career start, drew them a nose again and again over seven innings. The Thunder added a run off Vega in the seventh, and two off a hapless Beltran in the eighth in a tremendous rout. 9-1 Thunder. Quebell 2-4; Martinez 2-4, RBI; Richardson 4.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 2 K and 1-2;

Time for changes! Yates might have had two or three good starts in the last six weeks, but for a team aspiring to win a division, he’s become unbearable. He was shifted to the pen after this horrendous miscarriage of a start. Unbelievable, a $1.8M long man. Sergio Vega was waived and designated for assignment, Luis Beltran was outrighted to St. Petersburg, and we called up an almost-perfect-in-AAA Ed Bryan and Cássio Boda, with the latter taking over Yates’ slot in the rotation and starting on Sunday in the closer in New York.

Game 3
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – LF Castro – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – SS Barrón – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Cruz
OCT: LF V. Sanchez – 1B T. Cardenas – C Ledesma – RF Reese – CF J. Gonzalez – 3B A. De Jesus – 2B G. Turner – SS McGreary – P L. Martinez

Martinez hit into a double play with the bases loaded in the top 1st to keep the Coons from scoring. When Sanchez walked on four pitches against Cruz in the bottom of the inning, he remained unretired in 10 trips to the plate in the series. The Duke would throw him out trying to reach third base on Tomas Cardenas’ single, and the Thunder didn’t score, either. The Critters stranded two more in the top 2nd, while Jose Gonzalez hit a leadoff triple and was still stranded in the bottom of the same inning. Fletcher was picked off by Luis Martinez in the third, to which Cruz responded by striking out the side, including the invincible Victorino Sanchez. Finally the Coons broke through in the top 4th! Bowen hit a scratch single before Barrón tripled him in and scored on Gutierrez’ groundout! Bottom 4th, Ledesma walked, Reese doubled, and Gonzalez singled right past Ricardo Martinez to tie the game. Argh!

More agony was on its way. While the Duke doubled home Quebell to restore a 3-2 lead in the top 5th, Cruz hung on for little longer than five minutes. De Jesus hit a leadoff single in the bottom 7th and was run for by Martin Covington. Bowen made no attempt to keep him from stealing second base, he advanced on a groundout by Turner, and when David Clarke (.193) hit for McGreary, Cruz fell behind 3-0 before throwing one right down the middle. Even Clarke could hit that one, snipping a single into center to tie the game again.

A Clarke error would put Castro on base to start the top 8th. The Duke took rips against Avtandil Tarakhanov, but struck out in a full count after Castro had stolen second base. Martinez however didn’t strike out. He mashed his 10th home run of the season, giving the Raccoons their third lead of the day. Ed Bryan held on to that for an inning before Yoshi Nomura hit for Gutierrez against righty Vaughn Higgins in the ninth, singled, but got forced out on Esquivel’s grounder. Quebell grounded out, bringing up a hitless Fletcher. Ah, no. Bring Alston! Ron Alston took a ball to measure Higgins’ arm, then catapulted the second pitch into the rightfield bleachers for a 2-run bomb! 7-3 Critters!! Alston (PH) 1-1, HR, 2 RBI; Black 2-4, 2B, RBI; Nomura (PH) 1-1; Bryan 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K, W (2-1);

Ka-BLAAMMM!!!

Alston shirts on sale now, Alston shirts on sale now! Get your #96 gear for just $96.99! It’s what I call competitive pricing. No, unfortunately we’re out of $10 Brownie gear.

Raccoons (65-41) @ Crusaders (69-39) – August 7-10, 2008

Okay, boys. Everything before this weekend set was just a game. These games here count! We will face the best offense in the league, and they are second to only us in runs allowed. Their +164 run differential dwarfs our +123 mark (but we have only the sixth-best offense after all). We had one thing going for us in that their centerfielder Roberto Pena (.367, 13 HR, 48 RBI) was on the DL, but that still left two ravaging outfielders, the Martin Brothers. We held a slight 4-3 edge over them this season.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (6-7, 3.25 ERA) vs. David Estrada (9-7, 3.77 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (13-4, 1.68 ERA) vs. Pancho Trevino (7-7, 3.67 ERA)
Nick Brown (11-6, 3.06 ERA) vs. Whit Reeves (11-4, 3.28 ERA)
Cássio Boda (0-0) vs. Greg Connor (16-3, 2.34 ERA)

Estrada is another left-hander, the other three will be right-handed pitchers. Tomas Castro was removed from the lineup for the opener in order to maximize right-handed bats.

Game 1
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – SS Pollack – C Esquivel – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Baldwin
NYC: 2B R. Garza – 1B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – SS Butler – CF Britton – C J. Flores – P D. Estrada

Our entire plans for the series went out of the window in the first inning, when Colin Baldwin faced two batters before leaving the game with a tweaked ankle. There was no way we would burn our bullpen right here. Instead Cássio Boda was warmed up. He was on regular rest for this game, but had not had his usual pregame routine of eating lots of ice cream while watching The Dumb and The Clueless the entire day. (Hey, it had won him 15 games in AAA!) We’d have to see what we’d get outta him. While Boda at least managed to get the first inning behind him after walking Martin Ortíz, the Duke ended his homerless streak in the top 2nd with a leadoff jack to deep left, his 18th long ball of the season. While backup catcher Jose Flores hit a 2-piece off Boda in the bottom 2nd, Alston brought home the tying run in the third. The Crusaders were undeterred, exploited another stupid error by Martinez in the bottom of the inning, and plated single runs on back-to-back RBI singles by Sonny Reece and Bob Butler to go ahead 4-2. Boda’s performance didn’t go past the fourth inning. Pruitt hit for him to start the top 5th, and grounded out on a 3-1 pitch. Quebell then doubled off the wall in right center, where even elite defender-and-everything-else Stanton Martin couldn’t make a play. Fletcher reached on an infield single before Alston plated one run with a groundout. The Duke batted with two outs and the tying run on second base, hit the most embarrassing lampoon ball to center, and Apasyu Britton still didn’t get it as it bounced in for a horrendous RBI single, and we were tied at four.

Bryan pitched in the bottom 5th and sucked the cover off the ball. First he walked the left-hander Ortíz, who had nothing but walked the entire game. Ortíz was caught stealing by Esquivel before both Martin and Reece hit screaming line drives to the deep outfield, where – somehow! – Fletcher and Alston made plays on them to end the inning. The relief remained spotty afterwards. Rockburn put two on in the bottom 6th and was replaced with Bruno with two outs and Ramón Garza batting. Garza drilled a 2-2 pitch to left for a double. Britton scored, while Flores was thrown out at the plate. The Crusaders grabbed back the lead anyway, 5-4, with Bruno in the seventh and Sims in the eighth not allowing any more damage. We faced Iemitsu Rin in the ninth, with Castro pinch-hitting for Sims to get started. He grounded out before Quebell singled and Fletcher hit into a double play. 5-4 Crusaders. Quebell 2-5, 2B; Fletcher 2-5; Black 3-4, HR, 2 RBI;

Game 2
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Umberger
NYC: 2B R. Garza – CF Britton – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – 1B Caraballo – SS Butler – C D. Anderson – P P. Trevino

We had the bases loaded early after Castro singled and stole second base, Alston singled, and Black walked. Major damage was dealt to Trevino in the inning. First, Martinez stayed out of the two-for-one and instead hit an RBI single. Bowen drew a walk to push in the second run before Yoshi went down swinging. But Barrón singled to left center, good enough to score a pair, 4-0, before Umberger struck out, who then had his 16-inning scoreless streak snapped instantly with a MONSTROUS home run by Martin Ortíz that also collected Britton after an ill-advised walk, and just like that half the lead was gone, and the other half looked like it was crumbling, too. While Trevino put up zeroes after the early clubbing, Umberger was horrible, because why not, and in the third allowed a leadoff single to Garza before walking Britton and Ortíz. The Crusaders let themselves be held to a sac fly by Martin before Reece hit into a double play, but somehow four runs wouldn’t suffice in this game. Trevino retired 11 straight before Castro singled in the fifth inning. Nothing came of that.

Bottom 5th, still up 4-3, another leadoff single by Garza. This time Britton made an out, but Umberger walked Ortíz anyway, then drilled Martin outright to load them up again. And Sonny Reece hit into another double play.

Better score some! Sonny won’t come up much more often! Trevino whiffed 11 in seven innings, while Umberger had walked four in a mess of an outing that lasted six and two thirds before Sims took over to face and retire Britton, but we were still ahead by a run. At least we were until the eighth inning came around. Ricardo Martinez ****ed up another play to put Stanton Martin on base, and then Sonny Reece was fed up of sucking and bombed a score-flipper off Sims to dead center. The game ended with Nomura left on second base when Iemitsu Rin handed Quebell a golden sombrero. 5-4 Crusaders. Castro 2-3, BB; Alston 2-4; Barrón 2-4, 2 RBI;

Okay. Can we reverse the Alston trade? It’s not Alston that’s the problem. More like everybody else. Another loss and it’s completely over.

Game 3
POR: CF Castro – 1B Pruitt – LF Alston – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B Pollack – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Brown
NYC: 2B R. Garza – 1B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – SS Butler – CF Britton – C D. Anderson – P Reeves

It took 14 pitches for the Raccoons’ season to end. That was enough for Brown to walk Garza, throw a wild pitch, walk Caraballo anyway, allow an RBI single to Ortíz and a truly impressive 3-piece to Martin. That was all it took. 14 pitches.

The faintest chance presented itself in the fourth inning. The Coons, 1-hit at that point by Whit Reeves, put Alston on with a leadoff walk. Black grounded to short, which was normally good for two, but Bob Butler bungled the ball and both runners were safe. But the Blighters wouldn’t get a hit into the field after that, either, and were limited to two groundouts that scored a charity run. The same two batters were on base again with no outs in the sixth, only for Bowen to roll into a double play and for Pollack to strike out. Brown pitched six scoreless innings and hit two singles after forfeiting our season, you know, just like aces do.

Ortíz homered as the only batter Ed Bryan faced in the eighth, before Richardson sat down the next three guys. Not that it mattered greatly. 5-1 Crusaders. Black 2-4;

Game 4
POR: CF Castro – 1B Pruitt – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Pollack – C Esquivel – SS Barrón – P Yates
NYC: 2B R. Garza – CF Britton – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – 1B Caraballo – SS Butler – C D. Anderson – P Connor

Boda was just not ready after throwing over 70 pitches on Thursday, so Yates got another start he didn’t deserve. Garza reached and scored on Britton’s double in the first, and Daryl Anderson hit a solo bomb in the second inning to give the Crusaders an early lead. The Crusaders weren’t looking likely to slow down soon, while the Raccoons were unable to get out of reverse. While the Coons DID manage to score a run on a sac fly in the third inning, the Crusaders fully took advantage of Yates being **** and all, and issuing leadoff walks to Martin and Reece in the fourth inning. Francisco Caraballo singled home a run, and after Butler struck out it was on Daryl Anderson to ground to short, and now Barrón made the critical error. Two runs scored in the inning. The awful Yates was yanked in the fifth inning after allowing five runs, four of those earned, all deserved. Somewhere in the middle of agony there would be a single twitch of the whiskers when Matt Pruitt hit a 2-run homer off Connor, but the Coons trailed and trailed. Down 5-3, it was Rin again in the ninth. Esquivel hit a leadoff single. The next three guys made outs. 5-3 Crusaders. Castro 2-5; Pruitt 3-4, HR, 2 RBI; Pollack 3-4, 2B;

In other news

August 6 – CHA C Fernando Chavez (.337, 15 HR, 53 RBI) has a 5-hit game with a homer, a double, and 4 RBI in an 8-3 win over the Titans.
August 7 – The Buffaloes get stomped 15-0 by the Cyclones, with CIN SP Luis Guerrero (6-2, 3.33 ERA) spinning a 2-hit shutout.
August 7 – SFB INF Jose Perez (.303, 4 HR, 27 RBI) is out for the balance of the month with a fractured rib.
August 9 – CIN 1B Ray Gilbert (.298, 15 HR, 82 RBI) is going to miss six weeks with a lat strain.

Complaints and stuff

That crushing noise you just heard was my will to live being frozen hard and then sledgehammered to dust. The icy winds from the north blew it out to the Pacific. It’s gone now.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (65-45) @ Canadiens (66-45) – August 11-14, 2008

Third in runs scored and runs allowed, and 6-5 against the Raccoons on the season, the Elks had jumped them on Sunday to take over second place, and were now looking forward to shave them, slice them, and put them in tin cans as special delicacy. Bread with coon spread, ummmm.

Projected matchups:
Javier Cruz (7-6, 3.66 ERA) vs. Juichi Fujita (15-5, 3.68 ERA)
Cássio Boda (0-0, 5.40 ERA) vs. Rod Taylor (12-8, 3.47 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (6-7, 3.23 ERA) vs. David Peterson (11-5, 3.63 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (13-4, 1.78 ERA) vs. Simon Pegler (8-11, 4.80 ERA)

Boda was inserted between Cruz and Baldwin to give the latter’s sore ankle an extra day to heal up.

I was in Portland. The TV with the game was on, and I was looking, but I wasn’t watching. Watching and being engaged requires heart and soul. I had neither. My heart and soul had died in New York.

Game 1
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – C Bowen – SS Barrón – P Cruz
VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B T. Ramos – LF D. Morris – 3B Suzuki – SS Rice – C G. Ortíz – 2B Palmer – P Fujita

A Suzuki error helped the Raccoons to a 1-0 lead in the first inning, and Castro singled in another run in the top 2nd, but that was with a brown-shirted guy on the mound that walked three in the first inning, and pitched behind in the count to almost every single batter. Mitsuhide Suzuki would make up for his earlier error with a 2-run double in the bottom 3rd, tying the score. At least Tomas Castro tried. The third time up, he hit his third single in the top 4th, scoring the go-ahead run, but Cruz was … FUBAR pretty much. Tumbling through five innings with five walks allowed, and bunting into a force at third base, and generally being useless all around, he issued a leadoff walk to Ortíz in the bottom 6th. Palmer singled, and even Fujita singled to give the ****ing Elks the bases loaded with no outs. Donald Sims appeared, his first pitch being wild to tie the score, and soon enough he got battered. Sims faced six batters, retired two, somehow, and left with the bases still loaded and in a 6-3 deficit. Marcos Bruno relieved him only to get bombed by Ortíz for a grand slam. The Raccoons began the series with their closer pitching mop-up. Fujita struck out ten in a complete game. 10-3 Canadiens. Castro 3-5, 2 RBI; Alston 2-5; Bowen 2-2, 2 BB; Gutierrez 1-1;

Sometimes it’s good to not have heart, nor soul. You can just shrug and get more cookies and Capt’n Coma.

The Elks had played this one without Jerry Dobson (.237, 1 HR, 18 RBI), who was ailing and finally placed on the DL on Tuesday with a strained oblique.

Game 2
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – C Bowen – SS Barrón – P Boda
VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B T. Ramos – LF D. Morris – 3B Suzuki – SS Rice – C G. Ortíz – 2B Palmer – P R. Taylor

Boda had spent too much time with the ****bag Cruz, going twice through the Elks’ lineup without striking out anybody, but walked three, and also threw a run-scoring wild pitch. Defense was all that kept him from being turned into cat food, with Black and Bowen throwing out aggressive runners, and Quebell made a few nice plays at first base, too, in addition to a solo homer in the third inning, which came one frame after Bowen had doubled in Nomura for the first run of the game. The Raccoons led 2-1 after five, but like the ****bag Cruz the day before, Boda wouldn’t retire any of the first three batters he faced in the sixth inning. Tony Ramos singled, Dan Morris singled as well, and Mitsuhide Suzuki hit a score-flipping 2-run double before being thrown out at third base by Castro. But who was giving a lick after all? The Elks would plate another run off Boda in the inning to chase him into his dark, wet corner where he belonged, while the rest of the team carefully avoided making the Elks’ precious bases dirty in the final three innings. 4-2 Canadiens. Bryan 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Sometimes I wonder … when I’m conversing with Honeypaws, and I’m complaining and moaning, whether he, inside his little stuffed head, actually screams in horror.

Well, you know, the thoughts you have when the task in which you’re caught up isn’t particularly prickling and the mind starts to wander…

Game 3
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Pruitt – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – RF Fletcher – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Baldwin
VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B T. Ramos – LF D. Morris – 3B Suzuki – SS Rice – C F. Diéguez – 2B Palmer – P D. Peterson

Baldwin delivered the least **** starter’s performance we had seen in a while, conceding a run in the first, before settling into a steady pace of retiring batters through five. Unfortunately (or: of course) this didn’t mean that the offense was inspired to hit anything. Well, they did merrily hit singles, but singles weren’t enough on their own normally, and they stranded six men in the first four innings, until Pruitt finally hit a double to plate Quebell in the fifth and tie up the score. Then came the bottom 6th, a.k.a. the moment of truth for Raccoons pitching these days. Baldwin issued a leadoff walk, his first of the game, to Ramos before Morris singled hard up the middle. Ramos was thrown out by Castro at third base, but following Suzuki’s groundout, Gary Rice rammed a single to left that easily scored the slow Morris even from second base and gave the Elks the lead back. Baldwin lived through seven before Pruitt’s leadoff single in the eighth was made that much more worth when Peterson balked. Martinez’ single gave the Raccoons runners on the corners, before Bowen doubled to tie the game at two, with two men in scoring position, no outs, and a pitching change coming. Jose Escobar replaced Peterson, with an intentional walk coming to Fletcher to bring up the left-hander Nomura. Alas, there was a certain formerly slugging rightfielder sitting on the bench, who batted right-handed, but I’m sure Nomura could have hit a grounder to short for a force play at home just as well. Barely and with a bad coughing sound the Raccoons would take a 3-2 lead on Barrón’s sac fly before handing the ball to Marcos Bruno, who retired Garcia and Ramos before inexplicably snapping and loading the bases with two outs, including two walks to Morris and Rice. Angel Casas came in right here, allowed a grounder to third base to Fernando Diéguez, and with Martinez playing there I screamed in horror. Martinez made the play, however, the lead persisted, and once the Raccoons left two more on base to run their LOB to 11 in the top 9th, Casas retired the side in order in the bottom of the inning. And just like that a mildly maddening 6-game losing streak to the other playoff contenders was over. 3-2 Raccoons. Quebell 3-5; Pruitt 4-5, 2B, RBI; Martinez 2-5; Barrón 2-3, RBI; Baldwin 7.0 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, W (7-7); Casas 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, SV (30);

This was Angel Casas’ 150th career save, but overall not enough to get me out of my “seven more weeks to play for nothing” depression.

Game 4
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – SS Pollack – C Esquivel – P Umberger
VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B T. Ramos – LF D. Morris – 3B Suzuki – SS Rice – C G. Ortíz – 2B Palmer – P Pegler

The pitching matchup wasn’t necessarily in the Elks’ favor, something that was underlined by Quebell’s leadoff jack in the first, to which he added a leadoff double in the third in which the Raccoons scored two more runs to take a 3-0 lead in support of Umberger, who was holding his ground fairly well. Pegler was beaten into the ground for good in the fifth inning. Castro hit a leadoff homer, Alston singled, and Black homered to run the score to 6-0 and get Pegler removed from the game. The home run show continued. Quebell hit another one off John Hatt, before Umberger was charged in the seventh inning. Mitsuhide Suzuki got him for a solo shot to left. Umberger didn’t reappear for the eighth inning. His pitch count was up already, and there were the same four left-handers due up that the Elks had sent into every game in the set atop their order. Donald Sims was charged with that. Ross Holland hit an infield single before Martinez busted an Enrique Garcia grounder for an error. While our lead was sizeable, bad things were known to happen to these Raccoons. Ramos and Morris popped out, however, before Richardson replaced Sims against Suzuki, but conceded an unearned run anyway when Suzuki singled. Gary Rice grounded out, but Richardson would be taken deep by Ortíz in the ninth. A serious charge didn’t come forward anymore from the Elks, though, also courtesy of two more insurance runs the Raccoons had plated late. 9-3 Raccoons. Quebell 3-5, BB, 2 HR, 2B, 2 RBI; Castro 2-4, BB, HR, 2 RBI; Martinez 2-5, 2B; Nomura 3-4, BB, RBI; Esquivel 2-5; Umberger 7.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, W (14-4);

Raccoons (67-47) @ Scorpions (59-57) – August 15-17, 2008

Here were two third-place teams that for all intents and purposes could book holidays for October. Like the Raccoons, the Scorpions were struggling to score, ranking ninth in runs scored in the Federal League. The interesting thing was that they were also ninth in runs allowed, posting a -60 run differential while still playing above .500 ball. Their bullpen posted a worse ERA than the good rotation, which led to games like the 10-0 defeat by the Stars they had suffered on Thursday. We had played the Scorpions both of the last two years, sweeping them both times. Only once have the Raccoons swept three straight series from the same interleague opponents, shutting out the Buffaloes from 1985 through 1989.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (11-7, 3.16 ERA) vs. Chester Graham (7-10, 4.39 ERA)
Javier Cruz (7-7, 3.86 ERA) vs. Calvin Morris (6-5, 5.79 ERA)
Cássio Boda (0-1, 5.79 ERA) vs. Ed Winn (0-0, 6.00 ERA)

This is the bad section of their rotation. Unless they skip Winn, we will not get to see Jorge Gine (13-4, 2.55 ERA). Their second best pitcher Carlos Castro (5-1, 2.39 ERA) was on the DL since May. Overall, they had a flurry of injuries, with seven big leaguers either on the DL or ailing. Either way, Graham will be our only left-handed opponent this week.

Game 1
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – SS Pollack – C Bowen – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Brown
SAC: SS Sato – RF Jo. Rivera – LF Je. Rivera – 3B Whitley – 1B Morton – CF Cutler – 2B R. Jackson – C Mata – P Graham

Ron Alston’s RBI triple was the keystone in a 2-run first inning for the Raccoons, Black scoring him with a sac fly to deep left. Nick Brown initially looked good before drilling Rickey Jackson in the bottom 2nd with a pitch that was closer to Nebraska than the strike zone. That pulled up ex-Raccoon Julio Mata with two out and two on, and while batting .344 in 32 AB, Mata still sucked, jabbed at a 3-0 pitch and grounded out. While the Quebell Power Show continued with a home run in the third, 3-0 Raccoons, the Martinez Horror Show did so as well, as he made an error to Brown’s highest annoyance in the bottom of the same inning. Brown pitched around that and was checking Martinez’ glove for rusty nails while the rookie third baseman was on the base paths in the top of the fourth. Melvin Pollack soon increased the offensive output to five runs with a home run, but soon enough Brown started to hate himself just as much as Martinez’. While the run the Scorpions carved out in the bottom 4th with a Xavier Cutler triple and subsequent wild pitch was chalked up in the category of “poo happens”, Brown was livid with himself once Kunimatsu Sato took him deep with a 2-shot in the fifth.

At least Brown was still pitching. The Scorpions had already arrived at their squishy pen, where Jesus Quinones immediately allowed a run in the top 6th, then loaded the bases with two more walks and single to Alston in the seventh, with Martinez coming to the plate with one out. Martinez rammed a rocket to left that escaped Jesus Rivera’s limited range and fell in just in front of the wall, scoring two runners and led to a pitching change. Pollack didn’t bother, smacking a liner to center to score two more off Kevin Poisson and get the Raccoons into double digits. Unfortunately Brown didn’t get through the seventh after walking a pair, but Rockburn entered with two outs and got Stan Whitley to fly out softly to right. Kelvin Yates was then assigned the 10-3 lead for the last two innings as rehab from intense sucking, but insisted on putting the leadoff man on base in both innings, and on surrendering a 2-run homer to Jose Rivera in the ninth. Raccoons pulled through, though. 10-5 Raccoons. Quebell 2-4, BB, HR, RBI; Alston 2-5, 3B, RBI; Martinez 3-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Pollack 2-5, HR, 4 RBI;

Martinez has 23 errors now. 23! Holy cow! Not even Cam Green was this atrocious in the field in the 80s!

Game 2
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B Pollack – 2B Nomura – C Esquivel – SS Barrón – P Cruz
SAC: SS Sato – C Eaton – RF Je. Rivera – 3B Whitley – CF Cutler – 2B D. Mendez – 1B Battle – LF A. Rodriguez – P C. Morris

****bag Cruz got himself yanked in the third inning of the middle game. The score might have been 1-1, but he had the bases loaded with one out after walking SIX, including all base runners in that inning. Rockburn allowed a sac fly to David Mendez, but no actual hard damage in that third inning, but was already hit for in the top 4th with Bowen and Barrón on base. Bowen was pinch-running for Esquivel, whom Morris had smacked in the shoulder with a pitch and who had had to leave the game. Pruitt batted for Rockburn and was the first of two Raccoons to grind out back-to-back full-count walks, with Quebell’s tying the game. Castro grounded out, but scored the go-ahead run and brought up Alston, who catapulted a pitch all the way to San Francisco for a 3-run home run!

While that gave us a 6-2 lead, we had to somehow cover six innings between the remainder of our bullpen. Richardson was the prime candidate to cover at least half that distance, but allowed a leadoff double to Alejandro Rodriguez in the bottom 4th. PH Ron Anderson grounded out before Richardson struck out Sato and Pat Eaton to escape the inning. Richardson would go two and two thirds. With two out in the sixth the Scorpions had Mendez on third base and sent lefty Joe Morton to bat, so we moved on to Ed Bryan, who conceded the run on a single to right. Alston would put the run back onto the board with a 2-out single in the eighth that scored Quebell after Bryan had tossed a scoreless seventh. Sims struck out the side in the eighth, continued in the ninth, but then sputtered and walked Rickey Jackson. Bruno came on, whiffed Sato, but then was singled against by Pat Eaton. Two outs, the heck, Casas was called into the game, and, the heck, was 3-bombed by Jesus Rivera. Stan Whitley would fly out to left to end this one. 7-6 Raccoons. Alston 2-5, HR, 4 RBI; Bowen 2-3, 2B; Barrón 3-5, RBI; Martinez (PH) 1-1;

That shouldn’t count as a save. I dropped my cookie when that Rivera ball left the yard. Now there’s crumbs all over Honeypaws.

Javier Cruz has 2,492 career strikeouts. Dunno whether he will live to rack up eight more … But when Alston hit that homer in the fourth, my whiskers twitched again. Was life finally returning into this battered corporeal container?

Esquivel had a bum shoulder, but it wasn’t too bad. He was listed as DTD, and the off day on Monday should help greatly to not having to bring up another catcher *just in case*.

Game 3
POR: CF Castro – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – 1B Pruitt – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – P Boda
SAC: 2B D. Mendez – RF A. Rodriguez – C Gibson – 3B Whitley – 1B Morton – CF Cutler – SS R. Jackson – LF R. Anderson – P Winn

The 25-year old Winn, a 2005 fourth-rounder, made his second career start. After Alston had already homered off him in the first inning, a solo shot, he came up again in a 3-0 game with the bases loaded and two outs in the top 2nd, but really didn’t get much on a 2-2 pitch and flew out to shallow right. Pruitt drove in our fourth run in the top 3rd, but Boda soon began to botch things up. The Scorpions got their first run in the bottom of the same inning, a combo of two singles, a wild pitch, and unfortunately an Alston error, but the run was earned. By the fifth inning, the hapless Boda surrendered rockets in all directions. Rodney Gibson had come off the DL just in time to hit an RBI double in the bottom 5th, then waited with Mendez in scoring position to be driven in by Whitley to tie the game. Alston all but sold out on Whitley’s drive to left here, caught it, and as a bonus avoided breaking his neck to end the inning. Both pitchers were done after six, and with a 4-2 lead that meant that the better bullpen held the lead. Before our bullpen had to be bothered, however, the Raccoons made this game a living hell for left-hander Kevin Beaver. Barrón singled, Alston singled, the Duke doubled! No outs, 5-2, two in scoring position, it helped that Beaver missed the strike zone clearly whenever he missed. Martinez walked, Pruitt singled in a run, and Bowen walked to force in another run. Nomura would then hit into a double play that still scored Martinez as the Critters doubled their output to eight runs. The Scorpions’ pen however was a gift that kept on giving, and Alston and Martinez drove in more runs in the eighth off righty Don Davis, whose ERA in 40+ innings reached over eight. Yates managed two scoreless innings this time. 10-2 Furballs! Castro 2-6; Barrón 2-4, BB, RBI; Alston 3-5, HR, 2 RBI; Black 2-5, 2 2B, RBI; Martinez 2-4, BB, RBI; Pruitt 3-5, 2 RBI; Bowen 2-3, 2 BB, 2 RBI; Yates 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K;

… and if the team hadn’t ****ed up so capitally the six games before the current 5-game winning streak, said streak might still have constituted meaningful baseball.

In other news

August 11 – The Indians have put SP Curtis Tobitt (4-1, 3.35 ERA) on the DL with back tightness. Tobitt had already missed more than three months with shoulder inflammation.
August 12 – SFW INF Oliver Torres (.315, 2 HR, 46 RBI) is going to miss a month with an intercostal strain.
August 15 – CIN SP Nathan O’Herlihy (10-6, 4.20 ERA) strikes out 16 Condors in a 6-2 win for the Cyclones.
August 17 – Denver’s 1B/3B Yuji Hashimoto (.330, 12 HR, 55 RBI) hits the DL with a rotator cuff strain and won’t be back until mid-September.

Complaints and stuff

Meaningful baseball aside, the Critters reached 70 wins on Sunday, with 45 games left to play. 70 wins was our total just three years ago.

You’d think that Adrian Quebell’s torrid week (.370, 4 HR, 5 RBI) would win him Player of the Week honors. Uh, no. New York’s Stanton “Clockwork” Martin won it with a .414, 3 HR, 11 RBI week. Well. I can see how it works for the Secret Ninja Committee making the decision. That doesn’t mean I gotta embrace it. (embraces Honeypaws instead)

There are several players on our .647 AAA team, the Alley Cats, that are applying for promotion. There’s just no room. For example, relievers Matt Cash, Kaz Kichida, and Claudio Salazar are all pitching wonderfully right now, and there’s power coming from two first baseman that are sharing duties there, Gilbert Eldridge (left-handed) and Leonard Wyatt (right-handed), as well as from outfielder Jerry Saenz. The first basemen are almost as old as Quebell, who’s 26, but Saenz needs to be watched. He’s a 23-year old left-hander with a weak arm, whom we acquired from the Warriors in ’06 for Steve Searcy. He was a supplemental round pick in 2004. However, it’s such a thing with weak-armed left-handed leftfielders. We already have a couple o’ those.

On my offseason list is updating the Coons’ draft history, but how are our top 2 picks from the last five years faring?

2004: We’ve pretty much given up on catcher Erik Ruff, who’s a backup in AA by now, and we already traded A.J. Altheide to the Rebels in the Chavez/Richardson deal.
2005: SP Brandon Teasdale had Tommy John surgery early in his professional career, and is now toiling away in AAA with a 4.71 ERA and unsatisfying K/BB ratio. Pat Composto was converted to a reliever and is spending his time in the AA pen.
2006: LF Jimmy Eichelkraut was disposed of in the Ron Alston trade after batting .178 in AA this year. The Indians moved him back to single-A, where he’s batting .161 in 56 AB. SP Dave Self was sent to L.A. in the Baldwin trade and is pitching in relief for their AA team, walking almost as many as he strikes out.
2007: SP Kevin Denton is putting up a 3.36 ERA in A, and should make the jump to AA before the year is out. 1B C.J. Vanderwall is in AA already, posting a good OBP (.384) but scarcely any power (1 HR in 190 AB).
2008: OF Jason Seeley started in AA but hit a rough stretch and was sent to Aumsville, where he OPS’ed 1.016 over three weeks and has just returned to Ham Lake. 3B Mark Abraham is hitting for power, but strikeouts are a grave issue so far, whiffing at a 30%+ rate in AA.

[Trebro]

Maybe you should apply for a transfer to the CL South?

[Westheim]

Raccoons (70-47) vs. Cyclones (68-48) – August 19-21, 2008

The Cyclones were leading their division with a complete package, scoring the second-most runs and conceding the second-fewest runs in the Federal League. Their +135 run differential was pretty to look at. We swept the Cyclones last year, but actually got swept in three of the five previous series. But well, those were the Uttercoons. Now we had a 5-game winning streak and considered ourselves invincible.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (7-7, 3.18 ERA) vs. Jack Berry (10-10, 4.00 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (14-4, 1.76 ERA) vs. Nathan O’Herlihy (10-6, 4.20 ERA)
Nick Brown (12-7, 3.20 ERA) vs. Juan Garcia (14-6, 3.35 ERA)

That’s three right-handers, starting with the guy we sold for scraps because he wouldn’t survive big league pitching. Now I’d be glad if Berry were still ours.

Game 1
CIN: CF E. Clark – LF R. Lopez – RF Bailey – 1B J. Silva – SS Hall – 3B Bond – 2B H. Cardenas – C F. Hernandez – P Berry
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Baldwin

The Raccoons’ winning streak was out of the window in a matter of minutes, as Baldwin was completely shredded in a 4-run first inning. The Cyclones just kept raking away at him for three hits (including two doubles) and two walks, and a Castro throwing error didn’t help either. In the second it was a leadoff double by Jack Berry eating up Black in right center followed by two walks that stocked the bases pretty good with one out. The idiots have all the luck, they say, and it was true as Jose Silva had a poor floater pop off his bat to be caught by Alston in shallow center for the second out. Bob Hall grounded out to short. After a quick third inning against the 6-7-8 guys, Baldwin issued a leadoff walk on four pitches to Berry in the fourth. In our pen, John Richardson didn’t wait for the phone to ring. He started stretching himself. But it wasn’t Richardson’s time yet. Baldwin might have been pitching indefensibly, but had some defense behind him, which only sounds like it doesn’t make sense. Barrón SOMEHOW turned a hard grounder from Earl Clark up the middle into a 6-4-3, and Baldwin got through the inning.

Now, the fear with Jack Berry when he had been a prospect on our farm in the early 2000s had always been that he would break our budget by allowing so many homers in cozy Raccoons Ballpark that we’d have to order an extra truck load full for every homestand. He had never pitched here in his major league career, but we got a glimpse and idea that those fears hadn’t been completely unjustified. While Baldwin somehow didn’t allow a dozen runs after the four early clunkers, the Duke and Alston both fired home runs off Berry in the first five innings, cutting the gap back to 4-3. Martinez led off the bottom 6th with a triple, representing the tying run then. Baldwin’s turn came up with the bases loaded and one out after a walk to Bowen and a free pass to Barrón. Pruitt hit for Baldwin to counter Berry, struck out, and Quebell popped out over third base. Nobody scored.

Ah, ah, agony. After the Cyclones left runners on the corners against Richardson, who finally got into the contest, in the seventh inning, Tomas Castro hit a leadoff single in the bottom of the inning. Normally not shy about sending him, this was Berry pitching and we had the Sisters of Pain coming up next. Alston already hit a fly to deep center that Earl Clark somehow managed to keep from tearing down the fence. Alright, bring the Duke! The count ran full, but we had a hunch that he was seeing Berry well. The first 3-2 pitch was cut into fiercely by the Duke. To center, high and deep, high and deep, HIGH AND DEEP AND GONE!!!

Too bad the lead didn’t stand up. Marcos Bruno had Bob Hall at 0-2 to start the eighth before Hall hit one into the gap in right center that appeared like it would bounce away forever from Black. Hall had a triple, Bruno struck out Kevin Bond, but pinch-hitter B.J. Manfull beat him with a groundout to second base that scored the runner. The Coons’ ship was sinking in the ninth then. With Sims pitching, Martinez made his 850th error of the season on leadoff man Clark’s grounder. Rodrigo Lopez singled and while Will Bailey lined out to Quebell, that was enough from Sims. Angel Casas appeared to somehow avoid defeat, and in spectacular fashion walked Silva and Hall to push in the winning run. Bailey threw out Alston on the bases after a leadoff single in the bottom 9th on which nobody could quite figure out what Alston was doing, and this loss went into the books. 6-5 Cyclones. Alston 3-5, HR, RBI; Black 3-5, 2 HR, 4 RBI;

This one goes into our Betamax set, the “Raccoons Shameful Classics”. – What? – What is it, Maud? – They don’t make Betamax anymore?

Ah well, VHS was always going to be the future. – What? – Maud? – They don’t make VHS anymore, either?

Game 2
CIN: CF E. Clark – 3B Bond – 1B J. Silva – RF Bailey – LF R. Lopez – SS Hall – 2B H. Cardenas – C F. Hernandez – P O’Herlihy
POR: 3B R. Martinez – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – 1B Pruitt – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Umberger

The horrendous run for our rotation continued uninterrupted even with our Pitcher of the Year AND Rookie of the Year candidate on the hill. Kevin Bond homered in the first, and the Cyclones left two on in both of the first two innings, including three walks! Jong-hoo pitched in almost as many full counts as Ricardo Martinez had incredibly stupid errors on the season, but cut down on the walks after the first two innings of horror. Meanwhile the Critters didn’t get a runner on base until Alston’s double in the fourth, but he was left on. Pruitt’s leadoff single in the bottom 5th was perhaps a good point to get going. Yoshi singled with one out and Barrón’s liner narrowly defeated Earl Clark’s glove to become a double, tying the game and leaving two men in scoring position for … Jong-hoops. The most embarrassingly batting pitcher in recent memory in a key situation, this was a tough decision. Castro (who was sitting along with Quebell after horrendous set openers), came out to bat for Umberger, then wasn’t even pitched to. Instead they pulled up Martinez with the bases loaded, but somebody should have told O'Herlihy he needed to throw the ball over the plate again now. He didn’t, Martinez walked, and the Raccoons were ahead. Fletcher also walked before Alston pushed a ball past Bond at third base for the end point in a 5-run uprising. We removed the Duke and left Castro in the game after that, assuming that we’d get along with a 5-1 lead and the old bones could use a bit of rest.

After Bryan pitched a clean sixth inning, Richardson created a mess with singles to Cardenas and Hernandez in the seventh. Nobody out, Sims came on, Al Graves grounded out, Clark whiffed, and Bond popped out to Pruitt at first base. That didn’t mean the Coons were out of the woods, though. After a scoring opportunity went away in the bottom 7th when Quebell hit in the spot where normally the Duke would have hit and failed again, Yates appeared for the final two innings, at least that was the plan. He actually faced only two batters, Silva and Bailey, enough for the Cyclones to close from 5-1 to 5-3 on a ringing line drive home run by the latter. Bruno did get the eighth dealt with before Casas quickly retired a pair in the ninth before Bond hit a looper into right that bounced off Fletcher’s glove for an extra base. Silva singled him in from second base, bringing up Bailey again. Ahead 2-0, he shoved the ball into the ground, a bouncer to Yoshi that was turned to Pruitt for the final out. 5-4 Coons. Alston 2-3, BB, 2B, 2 RBI;

That was no parade, either, but at least they somehow made five runs out of their six hits. Two games, and the pen was almost burnt out completely. Let’s just say that nothing would make me happier than a Brownie shutout in the rubber game.

Game 3
CIN: CF E. Clark – LF R. Lopez – RF Bailey – 1B J. Silva – SS Hall – 3B Bond – 2B H. Cardenas – C F. Hernandez – P R. Williams
POR: CF Castro – 1B Quebell – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B Pollack – C Esquivel – SS Barrón – 2B Nomura – P Brown

We got Richard Williams (9-8, 4.17 ERA) instead of the Juan Garcia, which could not be all bad for us, and in fact got some instant results when Tomas Castro walloped his 10th homer of the year well over the rightfield wall to open the first inning for the home team. Then there was the problem with Brown’s control however. It was not there, at all. He faced seven batters in the first two innings, and needed 46 pitches. Four full counts did the trick, while striking out three. A complete game was out of the question, and the shutout went bust in the fourth inning, in which the Cyclones loaded the bases with one out, then had to be content with Bond’s run-scoring groundout. The Critters reclaimed the lead in the bottom of the same inning. Two on, two out, Yoshi singled up the middle to plate Esquivel, and then Brown hit a single to right that scored Barrón! In a perfect world this would have created a snowball effect, but Castro grounded out rather gingerly to keep it at 3-1.

There was not much more Brown to watch in this game. He walked two en route to loading the bases after getting two quick outs in the fifth inning. Jose Silva grounded out to Barrón to starve all three runners, but the pitch count crept over 100 in this at-bat. Now, he was probably good for another out or two (or three), but there were interesting developments in the bottom 5th. First, the Duke jacked his third Big One of the series, collecting Alston to run the score to 5-1. Second, the thick clouds leaked water all of a sudden. No rain had been in the forecast, but maybe this would save our pen?

But first, what was with Brownie? He walked Hall to start the sixth, his fifth walk in the game, then allowed a ringing double to Bond. Rockburn replaced him and allowed the runners to score on Felix Hernandez’ single. Al Graves hit for Williams, popped out, and then Clark grounded out to finally end the inning. The rain got worse, too, and the umpires called a delay. Indeed, the rain saved our pen (aside from giving Rockburn a dubious save): with the Cyclones having to travel cross country rather urgently, the game was called after an hour of steady rain, and Brownie got away with a win he didn’t deserve. 5-3 Brownies.

A win he doesn’t deserve probably compensates a little bit, though, for the 30 wins the piss-poor mid-decade Raccoons cheated him out of. Every batter in the lineup had a hit in this game, and we had nine in total.

35-year old Bob Hall (.256, 6 HR, 66 RBI) hit a single the only time Brown didn’t walk him, which was good enough for his 2,000th career hit. The 13th overall pick in 1991 by the Miners and a 16-year veteran in the majors, Hall’s career was steady, but unremarkable. Just twice was he on a playoff team, and he made one All Star appearance in 2003.

Raccoons (72-48) @ Indians (62-59) – August 22-24, 2008

We were 5-6 against the Indians this year, but since falling behind we had acquired their most dangerous weapon, Ron Alston. They were over .500, yet they were hopelessly out, trailing the Crusaders by 18 games, probably the reason they parted with Alston in the first place. Even with him, their offense had been spotty at best, and now it was quite bad. The fourth best pitching in the league didn’t get it done on its own.

Projected matchups:
Javier Cruz (7-7, 3.92 ERA) vs. Román Escobedo (5-11, 4.81 ERA)
Cássio Boda (1-1, 4.70 ERA) vs. Bob King (11-7, 3.64 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (7-7, 3.33 ERA) vs. Ramiro Gonzalez (12-7, 3.58 ERA)

This could potentially end very badly for the Raccoons. Currently, neither pitcher in the rotation is locked in. All are scuffling. I’m close to promoting Brandon Teasdale just for the heck of it. Meanwhile, left-handers are bracketing our opposition for this series, and we will have another day off the following Monday.

Daniel Sharp had batted .225 in Pittsburgh, .300 in Portland, and was now at .290 in Indy and .278 overall. But Ryan Miller… .191 in Portland, THREE-SIXTY-SEVEN in Indy!! .367!!!! Tsung was a Coons draft pick. And watch that Roberto Pacheco kid, who’s out of our system, too.

Game 1
POR: 3B R. Martinez – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – 1B Pollack – CF Fletcher – C Bowen – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Cruz
IND: LF A. Solís – 3B Sharp – C Paraz – 1B Tsung – RF Pacheco – SS R. Miller – 2B Kilters – CF Martines – P Escobedo

Cruz’ last four starts totaled less than 20 innings, but 14 earned runs, and let’s just say he was aware of his reputation and defended it at all costs. After the Coons spotted him an early 2-run lead in the top 1st, Cruz coughed up a Solís double and was taken well outta here by Paraz to tie it up again. To his credit, Cruz had a few less stressful innings after that and overall sucked much less than Escobedo, whose life line was supported by a few strong plays by Felix Martines and Roberto Pacheco, but who still allowed two more runs in the third, key piece being a Pollack RBI triple, and only survived five innings because the Raccoons were horrendous in RISP situations, with ten hits and three walks for only four runs in five innings. The Indians threatened to break through Cruz again in the bottom 5th with two on and two out, when Sharp hit a sharp grounder to the left side. Barrón launched, intercepted it, scrambled up and lasered out Sharp at first base to end the inning.

Cruz’ turn to bat came up in the top 7th with the bases loaded and one out. That was another tough call. The Indians had lefty Juan Jimenez pitching, though, and our bench was steaming with left-handed batters. Sometimes a wing and a prayer and a pitcher that already had two hits in the game had to be enough! Cruz struck out, Martinez flew out, but at least we gained more length from Cruz, who was suddenly retiring Indians in order. In the top 8th, the Coons amounted to three walks and three strikeouts, but Cruz got two more outs in the bottom of the inning before Paraz came up and we really wanted a left-hander for that now. Bryan got him to ground out to end the inning. We threw three left-handed pinch-hitters (Pruitt, Nomura, Quebell) at right-hander Helio Maggessi in the ninth inning without success before Angel dealt with the save situation in sufficient manner. 4-2 Critters. Martinez 2-5; Barrón 2-4, BB, RBI; Fletcher 2-3, 2 BB, 2 RBI; Bowen 2-4, BB, 2B; Cruz 7.2 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 6 K, W (8-7) and 2-4;

We left 16 men on base. Ungh!! A miracle this game didn’t blow up somehow…

Game 2
POR: CF Castro – 1B Quebell – LF Alston – RF Black – SS Barrón – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – P Boda
IND: LF A. Solís – 3B Sharp – C Paraz – 1B Tsung – RF Pacheco – SS R. Miller – 2B Kilters – CF Martines – P King

The Raccoons stranded seven runners in three innings on Saturday, two in the first, three in the second, and two more in the third. They actually scored a run in that stretch, a 2-out RBI single by Bowen looped over Kilters’ head to plate Alston in the third inning. The Indians were sat down in order by Cássio Boda until Jose Paraz hit a home run in the fourth inning. 7-1 hits, 1-1 runs. Sounds fair. The Blighters had no hits through the middle innings (sounds fair, too) until Boda hit a single to start the top 7th. Castro singled before Quebell hit into a double play. An unretired Alston batted with two outs and Boda at third, but flew out to Pacheco. Like that wasn’t bad enough, **** came crashing down in the bottom of the inning. Boda walked Cristo Ramirez and Felix Martines before trying to be sneaky with King’s bunt with one out and tried to nip Ramirez at third. He didn’t nip anybody, then got yanked with the bases loaded. Sims struck out Solís, Bruno struck out Sharp to get out of this sticky situation. But for crying out loud, the Raccoons couldn’t get going. They popped out three times in the ninth, Bowen, Nomura, and Pruitt in order. A tiring contest was in its tenth inning when Ron Alston hit a 1-out double to move Quebell to third. The Duke was 0-4 on the day, with one strikeout, and didn’t match up well to Leonardo Sosa, but the bench options weren’t either. So the Duke remained in the game, jabbed at a 1-0 pitch, a low, soft line to right that fell in just fair and carried Pacheco into foul ground when he cut it off, allowing Black to make it to second base for a 2-run double. While Barrón would single, Esquivel hit for Martinez and right into a double play. No extra runs for Angel, who looked wobbly and allowed a leadoff single to Sharp in the bottom 10th. Paraz struck out hacking before Tsung fired a high drive to right. It lacked the length, though, and Black caught it on the edge of the track. Pacheco popped out on the first pitch. 3-1 Raccoons. Castro 2-5; Alston 3-4, BB, 2B; Barrón 2-5; Boda 6.1 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 5 K and 2-3; Bruno 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K;

Yoshi Nomura made two errors in this game, which was very Martinez-esque.

Game 3
POR: 3B R. Martinez – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – CF Fletcher – 1B Quebell – C Esquivel – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Baldwin
IND: LF A. Solís – 2B Brantley – C Paraz – 1B Tsung – RF Pacheco – 3B Sharp – SS R. Miller – CF Martines – P R. Gonzalez

Alston singled home Martinez in the first inning, which not only gave the Coons the lead, but also gave Alston a 12-game hitting streak. Baldwin would blow the tiny lead in the second, when he walked Sharp and had Miller double off him to score Sharp all the way from first base. Walks continued to be a thing for Baldwin, and he had four of those in the first three innings. The Raccoons had a hard time with Gonzalez, and Baldwin was struggling enough on his own so that when Barrón made a bobbling error in the fifth inning, Baldwin allowed a double to Solís that drove in the go-ahead run for the Indians. It didn’t get better in the sixth. Miller drove in another run with a bouncer through the middle of knot that Martinez formed with his limbs in mid-tumble, but before that we had already thrown out Pacheco at the plate. Yet, Jerry Fletcher hurt himself on that throw and had to leave the game. Baldwin went into the seventh and left in a 3-1 deficit. The offense just wasn’t picking up Gonzalez at all, he went eight innings of 3-hit ball. We still trailed 3-1 when Tommy Wooldridge entered in the ninth, with Alston up first. He was down 0-2 when he singled to center to bring up Black, who had spent the entire game as a quick out, and struck out. Wooldridge threw a wild pitch before Castro grounded out to short. That wild pitch was still keeping the Coons in the game, but they were down to their final out with Quebell up, also successless on the day, and another quick strikeout. 3-1 Indians. Alston 3-4, RBI;

Ron Alston was three quarters of our offense.

In other news

August 19 – Close, but no cigar: SAL Raúl Chavez (11-10, 3.39 ERA) 1-hits the Aces in a 3-0 win. Don Cameron has the lone hit for the Aces.
August 20 – LAP CL Johnny Smith (7-5, 2.26 ERA, 24 SV) reaches the 300 SV mark with a successful outing against the Bayhawks, protecting a 3-1 win for the Pacifics.
August 23 – New York’s star outfielder Roberto Pena (.367, 14 HR, 49 RBI) has a 20-game hitting streak going after a 2-4 day with a home run in the Crusaders’ 11-3 creaming of the Canadiens.
August 24 – Season over: ATL LF/RF Jose “Dingus” Morales (.343, 19 HR, 72 RBI) has ruptured tendons in a finger and won’t be back in 2008. This probably buries the Knights (8 1/2 GB) for good.

Complaints and stuff

As far as our outfield is concerned, Ron Alston hit .565 (13-23) with 1 HR and 4 RBI to nab Player of the Week honors, there is no word on Fletcher, but he’s in pain, and the Duke’s $1M vesting option for 2009 triggered when he tied his shoes on Saturday.

Who holds the lead in franchise hits among our current players? Adrian Quebell (443), just ahead of Yoshi (438) and Castro (403). That doesn’t sound like a lot, and it isn’t. Quebell ranks 29th on the all time franchise hits list, after obscurities like Matt Workman, Ed Sullivan, and Armando Sanchez. Looking at homers, the Duke ranks highest, 16th, with 53 shots, having passed Cam Green and Marvin Ingall this week. Nah, I don’t remember Marv as a power hitter, either. He was here for 11 seasons, and the term Ingall Single didn’t come from nothing.

Poor Marv. He will always be part of the Gang of Losers. You know, genuinely good (but far from great) players that didn’t mingle well and contributed towards a 10-year run of losing seasons. The Coons went into the bin as soon as Ingall grabbed a starting spot in ’97. Al Martin, Clyde Brady, Concie Guerin, Randy Farley, Ralph Ford, Dan Nordahl, Antonio Donis, Daniel Sharp and more are in the same group.

But well, it was a mixed week. We had a **** ton of hits against the Indians twice, and hardly got away with wins, then were almost choked on Sunday. The pitching is very mixed, the batting is very mixed.

And very mixed teams go golfing or fishing in October.

[Westheim]

So, I’ve been felled by the plague for three days, and haven’t been playing, because it’s hard to think straight when you’re convulsing in agony. So that’s why it’s been all silent in Portland for the last five days (which is a lot for this old babbler). Still don’t know whether I can actually think straight now.

I’ll be starting with something I’ve been meaning to do for a few (in game) weeks and didn’t get to do. Below is a list of all players on the 40-man roster (and some select players that were designated off the 40-man roster this season) and where they first signed, and most importantly, how the Raccoons acquired them. Where does (second place) success come from? It’s obviously not that we’re spoiled with riches. So I have to have been doing something right. Right?

Origin of current Raccoons 40-man (plus some odd creatures) roster (a * with a player included in the respective trades indicates the player was a minor leaguer / prospect at the time)

Ron Alston – 1997 first round pick (IND, #15) – acquired in 2008 from IND for Daniel Sharp, Ryan Miller, Jimmy Eichelkraut*
Colin Baldwin – 2004 first round pick (LAP, #4) – acquired in 2007 from LAP for Bob Wood, Dave Self*
Juan Barrón – 1990 first round pick (CHA, #6) – acquired in 2007 from WAS for Adam Riddle, Danny Zigay*
Luis Beltran – 2001 seventh round pick (POR, #186)
Luke Black – 1995 first round pick (SFB, #23) – signed in 2007 for 4-yr, $4M
Cássio Boda – 2001 eleventh round pick (TOP, #296) – acquired in 2006 from BOS with J.C. Crespo, Ricardo Martinez* for Albert Martin, Glen Barnes*
Craig Bowen – 1998 first round pick (IND, #6) – acquired in 2006 from IND for Roberto Pacheco*
Nick Brown – 1995 eleventh round pick (POR, #293)
Marcos Bruno – 1999 first round pick (POR, #16)
Ed Bryan – 1999 fourth round pick (POR, #114)
Angel Casas – 2003 first round pick (POR, #7)
Matt Cash – 2000 second round pick (POR, #70)
Tomas Castro – 2001 second round pick (NYC, #74) – acquired in 2006 from DAL with Angel Romero for Edgar Amador, Christian Greenman
Javier Cruz – 1990 fifth round pick (NYC, #154) – signed in 2008 for 2-yr, $1.6M
Jose Cruz – 2001 sixth round pick (POR, #162)
Pedro Delgado – 2002 third round pick (BOS, #96) – acquired in 2004 from RIC with Bill Corkum, Rémy Lucas* for Dale Moore, Manny Gabriel
Sergio Esquivel – 2002 international discovery (POR)
Jerry Fletcher – 1989 first round pick (MIL, #4) – acquired in 2008 from VAN for Bob Mays, Tom Watkins, D.J. Fulgieri*
Jose Gutierrez – 2002 international discovery (TIJ) – acquired in 2006 from LAP for Curt Cooks
Manuel Gutierrez – 1999 seventh round pick (DEN, #179) – claimed off waivers by SFW in 2007
Kazuhiko Kichida – 1998 third round pick (PIT, #104) – acquired in 2002 from SAC for Julio Mata
Cesar Lopez – 1999 international discovery (ATL) – acquired in 2001 from ATL with Jesus Palacios, Butch Kaustrop*, Manny Gabriel* for Marvin Ingall, Manuel Reyes
Ricardo Martinez – 2002 international discovery (LAP) – acquired in 2006 from BOS with J.C. Crespo, Cássio Boda* for Albert Martin, Glen Barnes*
Ieyoshi Nomura – 2002 first round pick (POR, #7)
Dan Parker – 2000 seventh round pick (ATL, #193) – acquired in 2007 from LAP with Carlos Vazquez for Raúl Fuentes
Melvin Pollack – 1996 second round pick (CHA, #78) – claimed off waivers by LVA in 2008
Matt Pruitt – 2001 supplemental round pick (CIN, #37) – acquired in 2005 from CIN for Pedro Salas*
Adrian Quebell – 2000 supplemental round pick (SFW, #46) – acquired in 2005 from SFW for Randy Farley, Dan Nordahl
Ted Reese – 2004 supplemental round pick (MIL, #46) – acquired in 2005 from MIL for Dave Wheaton and cash
John Richardson – 2000 supplemental round pick (NYC, #49) – acquired in 2008 from RIC for Nelson Chavez, A.J. Altheide*
Juan Rios – 2003 ninth round pick (POR, #241)
Lawrence Rockburn – 1999 international discovery (OCT) – acquired in 2001 from OCT for Butch Kaustrop*
Jerry Saenz – 2004 supplemental round pick (SFW, #47) – acquired in 2006 from SFW for Steve Searcy
Claudio Salazar – 2000 ninth round pick (POR, #238)
Donald Sims – 1996 second round pick (ATL, #69) – signed in 2007 for 1-yr, $300k
Santiago Trevino – 2003 second round pick (POR, #73)
Jong-hoo Umberger – 2007 international free agent – signed in 2008 for 3-yr, $3M
Sergio Vega – 1998 supplemental round pick (POR, #69)
Kenichi Watanabe – 2003 international free agent – signed in 2003 for 1-yr, $200k
Tim Webster – 2001 fifth round pick (POR, #138)
Yoshi Yamada – 2000 international discovery (SAL) – taken in 2004 in rule 5 draft from SAL
Kelvin Yates – 1996 international discovery (TIJ) – acquired in 2006 from TIJ with Ward Jackson for Antonio Ramirez, Edgardo Fernandez

I saw that coming. We forked over actual, hard money … *five* times, excluding the cash in the Wheaton/Reese trade which was to help the other team, for all players on the 40-man roster and some extras.

Yes, Yoshi Yamada is still hanging out here. He’s 30. He’s so inept. I’ve tried everything. I put him outside, with his sad face, and hung a sign around his neck that read “FREE”, and nobody took him.

+++

Related, this:

The following bits were originally written in the offseason 2007-08, when I wanted to make a push for Sonny Reece. I never made the push, settling on the combo of Martinez/Chavez that didn’t last long, didn’t use it then, but had combed hard for the data and kept it. Then I wanted to use it when negotiating the extension with Nick Brown, and that won’t happen until next year, so what the heck, I cut it some and updated it and here it is.

Why did the Raccoons not pursue Sonny Reece? He’d have been offense and defense rolled into one at third base. True, but while we had some money, spending $4.88M of it on a 35-year old free agent would have precluded us from signing most other people we took on, and then most 35-year olds play like they’re 35 years old. I also thought that Sonny would have commanded a longer contract. Instantly I see $12M flash before my eyes. Will he be worth that? Dunno. He failed to produce .798 or more (usually much more) OPS just once in the last nine seasons, in all of which he played more than 140 games.

$12M is a chunk of money the Raccoons have never spent on a free agent, or even in a contract extension. In fact, David Brewer’s $9M contract from 1995 is still the largest single chunk of money we ever agreed to spending, and we didn’t even spend half of that, trading him halfway through.

All our $5M+ contracts signed with the season for which they took effect:

$9,000,000 – David Brewer (1995)
$7,000,000 – Nick Brown (2006)
$6,400,000 – Tetsu Osanai (1991)
$5,800,000 – Neil Reece (1995)
$5,500,000 – Kisho Saito (1993)
$5,200,000 – Neil Reece (2000)

That’s ALL. Neil Reece signed two of only six deals amounting to more than $5M, and was paid in full both times. Master Kisho was paid in full as well (he voided a year of the contract after that, which was for markedly less). We paid less than half of both the Brewer ($4.3M) and Osanai (less than $3M) contracts before trading them for different reasons (1997 collapse, Osanai collapsing without a chair at first base, respectively). Brownie so far has received $5.1M of his escalating 5-year deal. So after all those years, the most money we ever agreed on with a player and actually paid for it, remains $5.8M on Neil Reece, 13 years ago. Yet I have every intention to pay out every single penny of that $7M agreement.

If we want to keep Brownie past 2009, $12M might be cheap.

[Westheim]

Jerry Fletcher had left the game last Sunday with an apparent injury on a throw, and there was no structural damage. He in fact had only a quite sore thumb. Officially listed as DTD for the first game against Boston, he should be good in full by Wednesday.

Raccoons (74-49) vs. Titans (66-59) – August 26-28, 2008

The Titans had lost five in a row, and despite a decent record had little hope of finishing in the first division in the North. They were a bit better than average in both runs scored and runs allowed. They had the best bullpen in the CL, albeit their relievers were outpitching ours by merely .01 points of ERA. Guys, that’s a challenge.

There’s more at stake. We are 9-3 against the Titans this season. We haven’t had a winning season against them since 1996.

Projected matchups:
Jong-hoo Umberger (15-4, 1.76 ERA) vs. Mauro Castro (8-7, 3.94 ERA)
Nick Brown (13-7, 3.26 ERA) vs. Jesus Elmore (9-8, 5.09 ERA)
Javier Cruz (8-7, 3.84 ERA) vs. Brian Patrick (10-4, 5.01 ERA)

Nick Brown probably asks why Brian Patrick is as far above .500 as he is, but … nngh.

Game 1
BOS: SS D. Silva – LF Garrison – C Suda – CF J. Gusmán – 1B R. Vargas – 2B M. Austin – RF P. Flores – 3B J. Amador – P M. Castro
POR: CF T. Castro – 1B Quebell – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – SS Barrón – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – P Umberger

The Martinez giveth, the Martinez taketh away, as it is written. After Quebell tried to kill an early tally by hitting into a double play in the first, Alston walked and scored after subsequent singles by Black and Martinez, but Martinez’ 25th error of the season cost an unearned run in the very next inning. Martinez’ turn came up with the bases loaded and one out in the bottom 3rd when he popped up the first pitch and the Coons didn’t score once Barrón was done grounding out to Roberto Vargas. Nobody really hurt a ball in the game until Quebell drilled one to deep left in the fifth inning, but it was caught out there by Rudy Garrison. And while Mauro Castro had walked four so far, we hadn’t cashed in, largely.

The game was still tied at one in the seventh inning when the Titans appeared to make a mistake. They had Mark Austin on second base with two outs and the pitcher batting – and didn’t send a pinch-hitter. They had the best pen around (by 0.01 …)! Castro struck out (only Jong-hoo’s second strikeout in the game), and the chance was gone. But to be entirely fair… with Yoshi on first, one out, and Umberger batting, our Koreaustrian master of subtlety chopped a bunt that got Yoshi forced at second, so perhaps it was all a wash. Perhaps we were even all equally stupid. Castro was still pitching in the bottom 8th and issued his sixth walk to get started, to Quebell. Alston singled, but the Duke popped out to shallow right. Pruitt hit for Martinez with Castro still in the game, but after Castro uncorked a wild one, Pruitt was walked intentionally. That filled them up for Barrón, and still no sign of the pen. At last, success, kind of, when Barrón lobbed a fly to deep enough in right center that it allowed Quebell to tag and score, and Angel Casas was being paid to extinguish hopes, and did so quickly with the Titans in the ninth. 2-1 Furballs. Alston 2-3, BB; Umberger 8.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 2 K, W (16-4);

Gotta award that Martinez kid a silver medal. Nobody’s made 25 errors in a season and lived to tell it here.

Ron Alston extended his hitting streak to 13 games, while we had only five hits, all singles, to our seven walks drawn off Castro.

Game 2
BOS: 2B D. Silva – LF Garrison – RF Brulhart – C Suda – CF J. Gusmán – 1B R. Vargas – SS J. Amador – 3B M. Austin – P Elmore
POR: CF T. Castro – 1B Quebell – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – SS Barrón – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – P Umberger

Javier Gusmán shaved Brownie’s whiskers early with a booming 2-out, 2-run double in the first inning, that just so narrowly missed being a 3-piece. The Raccoons preferred to go down in order against a former farmhand of theirs – for four innings. But there was hope. Elmore hit a leadoff double off Brown in the fifth, and maybe running the bases (and scoring on a Garrison single to make it 3-0) would tire him! Before we could check on that, “Quasimodo” Suda scored Garrison with a single up the middle, 4-0, and then, yes, actually, a Raccoon reached base! Ricardo Martinez singled in the fifth, then was swept away in Barrón’s double play. Brown left after six so-so innings (one walk, eight strikeouts, still lots of damage), and after that we handed the game over to our chief escalators. Bryan put Silva (grrr!) on base, and then Kelvin Yates allowed a single to Brulhart and plainly plunked Suda. Gusmán striking out (voluntarily, I presume) kept the Titans from extending their lead, which remained 4-0 into the eighth inning, where Elmore scored the Coons a charity run with a throwing error putting leadoff man Barrón on, and a wild pitch scoring him eventually. Suddenly the door opened. Yoshi got on, Castro got on, and they were on the corners, Quebell the tying run at bat with two outs, and of course he rolled one right to Vargas. Ex-Coon Manuel Martinez not only snuffed out Ron Alston’s hitting streak, but also the Raccoons playoff hopes in the bottom 9th. 4-1 Titans. Black 2-4, 2B;

We fell to nine games back, and Jesus Elmore is the new Charles Young.

Don’t know what happened to the offense the last week or so, but it … died. We can experiment in September.

Game 3
BOS: SS D. Silva – LF Garrison – C Suda – RF Brulhart – CF J. Gusmán – 1B R. Vargas – 2B M. Austin – 3B J. Amador – P Patrick
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B Pollack – CF T. Castro – RF Black – LF Pruitt – C Esquivel – SS Barrón – 2B Nomura – P Cruz

Matt Pruitt instantly provided a spark back in the lineup with a triple in the second inning … that still didn’t lead to a run, as no other Raccoon could be arsed to produce anything. After Javier Cruz had held the Titans to one hit and four strikeouts the first time through the order, he got double-bombed by Silva (grrrr!!!) and Garrison in the third inning, and the middle innings were soundly depressing, too. The Duke was left on third base in the bottom 4th, we starved a pair in the fifth, and I wondered where those bats had gone. Our bullpen crumbled late in the game, with Marcos Bruno walking in a run in the eighth, but it didn’t batter. These Raccoons had completely stopped playing and were shut out by Brian Patrick. 4-0 Titans. Fletcher (PH) 1-1; Martinez (PH) 1-2;

Brian huh?

Yap, season over.

Raccoons (75-51) vs. Knights (60-66) – August 29-31, 2008

We both trailed by 9 1/2 games and we both knew it was over. They were fifth in runs scored, but ninth in runs allowed in the league, with a -39 run differential. Their bullpen was horrendous and the worst in the league, but would the Raccoons ever see it? We were 4-2 against them on the season.

Projected matchups:
Cássio Boda (1-1, 3.74 ERA) vs. Chris Lamb (6-4, 4.24 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (7-8, 3.31 ERA) vs. Kurt Doyle (7-10, 4.65 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (16-4, 1.68 ERA) vs. Eduardo Hernandez (9-6, 4.30 ERA)

Lamb will be our only left-hander this week. Also, they were missing one of their big outfield bats in Jose Morales, but how would that help OUR run production?

Game 1
ATL: SS Kester – CF J. Garcia – RF G. Munoz – 2B C. Martinez – LF L. Jenkins – C De La Parra – 3B T. Pena – 1B Urban – P Lamb
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B R. Martinez – LF Alston – RF Black – CF Fletcher – C Bowen – SS Barrón – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Boda

Boda got a new piercing by some corpse that looked a lot like ancient Lou Jenkins escaped from the crypt and that hit a 2-run homer off him in the second inning. But there was at least *movement* visible on the base paths in the home innings. Like in the bottom of the second. Lamb walked Fletcher and Bowen, and when Barrón sneaked a single to left, we had three on and nobody out at all. The score flipped in a hurry when Gutierrez singled up the middle to score one run, and then Boda made a ball vanish in the gap in right center for two more! Quebell and Martinez would bring in single runs to put a 5-spot on Lamb, and maybe that was enough to nurse Boda through five, and – maybe not. Maybe Boda in the top 3rd would walk Jaime Kester, and Julio Garcia, and Gonzalo Munoz would give him a branding on the other cheek with a 3-run homer.

Neither starter was around for the fourth inning. Richardson replaced Boda in the third with two men on and got an inning-ending double play, then was in line for the W once Pruitt doubled home Gutierrez in the bottom 3rd. Yates was tasked with long relief, and while he was wild, he held up for three innings, but not for four, and the Knights tied it in the seventh. Journeyman Dave Jackson (6.08 ERA) was about to pitch two perfect innings in the seventh and eighth before Castro squeezed out a walk in the #9 spot. Castro then set out to steal, and De La Parra’s throw was high and into center, moving Castro to third with two outs for Quebell, who countered Jackson, but flew out to right. Meanwhile Law Rockburn pitched five outs to at least hold us to a tie in regulation, but we came up once more against Enrique Meneces. To bat in the ninth: Martinez, Alston, and … Rockburn. Yeah, talk about double switches going bad. Martinez grounded out, Alston whiffed, before Pollack walked in Rockburn’s place. Fletcher walked. Bowen walked! And Barrón was ahead in the count, 2-1, and then actually swung, and - … and it’s … to left, and … … and it’s in! And the Raccoons walk off! 7-6 Critters! Martinez 2-5, RBI; Barrón 2-5, RBI; Gutierrez 1-2, 2 BB, RBI; Pruitt (PH) 1-1, 2B, RBI; Yates 3.2 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 5 K; Rockburn 1.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 4 K, W (8-3);

If Rockburn wins another one, he ties for third on the team. Wicked bunch.

Game 2
ATL: SS Kester – CF J. Garcia – RF G. Munoz – 3B C. Martinez – LF J. Garcia – C De La Parra – 2B T. Pena – 1B Urban – P Doyle
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – SS Barrón – 2B Nomura – C Esquivel – P Baldwin

The home team continued to be trying the fans’ patience. Aside from stranding Castro at third, they did precious little, and little precious, in the first four innings, while De La Parra put the Knights up 1-0 with a fourth inning 2-out RBI single. Barrón then hit a leadoff double in the bottom 5th and maybe we could get going now, please. After Nomura’s groundout and Esquivel going down flailing and wailing, Baldwin found himself with Barrón on third base and a bit of pressure, and chipped a floater into shallow center that Julio Garcia couldn’t dig out. Tied game, 1-1. Then Quebell forgot how many outs there were and hit one of those masterful double play grounders when a simple foul pop had sufficed. Baldwin started the sixth with a walk to Munoz before Carlos Martinez doubled through Ricardo Martinez to put two men in scoring position with no outs. Garcia’s pop up was followed by Baldwin’s first K of the day to De La Parra, and yes, everything would be alright, except of course that Tony Pena lobbed a cheap single into far left that plated both runners with two outs, his first two RBI of the season. Sigh.

We could really use some inspiration! How about the Duke hitting one out! But first the baseball gods demanded that Castro grounded out to start the bottom 6th, upon which Alston singled. That brought up the Duke, a meatball, and a laser beam to left center, that was no doubt outta here and tying the score! The Raccoons even took the lead when Martinez and Barrón hit back-to-back singles and the former scored on Yoshi’s fly out to left. Up 4-3, Rockburn allowed a double to Garcia in the top 7th, but Sims managed to hold the runner on base. The Duke added a 2-out run in the bottom of the inning before we appeared set with Bruno and Casas ready and willing, except that a left-hander was up first for the Knights in the eighth, and Sims got that one. Bad idea. Jorge Garcia singled to right. Okay, now Bruno, and then Casas!

Both would have their hiccups. While Bruno started out with a 3-1 count before De La Parra popped out, and put the tying run on with a single, he preserved the lead, yet then Angel had Jaime Kester hit a leadoff single off him. That didn’t bode well for the rest of the Knights lineup, though. Angel axed them down, one-two-three. 5-3 Coons. Black 2-4, HR, 3 RBI; Martinez 2-4; Barrón 2-3, BB, 2B;

Game 3
ATL: SS Kester – CF J. Garcia – RF G. Munoz – 3B J. Garcia – 2B C. Martinez – C De La Parra – LF Torrez – 1B T. Pena – P E. Hernandez
POR: CF Castro – 2B Nomura – LF Alston – RF Black – 1B Pruitt – 3B R. Martinez – SS Barrón – C Bowen – P Umberger

The good thing about playing Martinez with our Pitcher of the Year applicant on the mound was that no runs on Jong-hoo would ever be earned. Martinez made an error as early as the second inning, but Umberger even pitched around that.

And while the Raccoons had run into rotten luck in the first with two on and Alston lining into a double play that erased Castro, in the second inning they came through. Pruitt singled, Martinez doubled, and then Barrón put the first counter on the scoreboard with a trickler to center. Bowen would bring in another run for an early 2-0 lead, and Pruitt would put up two more with a home run in the third. Should be ample for Jong-hoo, right?

Eeh. The Knights had their own 2-spot quicker than I could paint another “Jong-hoo for Continental League Pitcher of the Year” sign. A soft single here, a ringing double off the wall, then a balk, and a sac fly, and it was 4-2 in the top 4th. Ricardo Martinez, for once, was innocent. But support for Jong-hoo was on its way. The Portland Bombardiers had awoken again! After Yoshi got dinked by Hernandez in the fifth, Alston turned a 3-1 pitch into a fantastic projectile to right center and all the way to the back of the seats there, and the Duke, not wishing to stand back too far, went back-to-back with him, now off reliever Miguel Lopez (way not our Miguel Lopez of old) enlarging the lead to 7-2. Umberger still managed to maneuver himself into a tight corner in the seventh, when he had two on, two out, and faced righty Julio Garcia. He had to get him, or left-handers would appear. Garcia was probably his last man anyway. One hard grounder to short later, the danger had dissipated, Barrón had made the play. The Raccoons stranded pairs of runners in the fifth, sixth, seventh, and eighth innings in an attempt to invoke the wrath of the baseball god Crooked-Number, a particularly nasty one, but Bryan held up in the eighth, and Richardson got the ninth. Promptly, the first Knight, De La Parra, singled up the middle, inches past Gutierrez, who had hit for Nomura in the bottom 8th. Eddie Torrez doubled after that, and Angel Casas casually got ready. After two groundouts to short, Jaime Kester singled to right, the Knights were back to 7-4, and Richardson didn’t look that good right now. Neither did Angel, when he allowed a hard line drive single to Julio Garcia, and then a deep drive to left to Munoz. That won’t possibly go out, will it? Is Alston gonna - … is it - … !!?? Nah, it was too short, Alston made the catch on the track, and the Raccoons completed the sweep. 7-4 Raccoons. Castro 2-4; Quebell (PH) 1-1, 2B; Black 2-4, HR, RBI; Pruitt 4-4, HR, 2 RBI; Martinez 2-4, 2B; Umberger 7.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 5 K, W (17-4);

This team. Never shy to scare the skipper…

In other news

August 25 – DAL Jesus Bautista (12-12, 3.45 ERA) still has it at 36 years of age, pitching a 3-hit shutout against the Wolves. The Stars win 4-0.
August 26 – New York’s Roberto Pena (.364, 14 HR, 49 RBI) has his 22-game hitting streak snapped by the Loggers, going 0-3 in the 3-2 Loggers win.
August 26 – SFB 1B/3B/LF David Lopez (.310, 26 HR, 85 RBI) could be out for a month with a fractured rib.

Complaints and stuff

Awards time: Jong-hoo Umberger won Rookie of the Month AND Pitcher of the Month in the CL, going 5-0 with a 1.52 ERA and 31 K in 41 1/3 innings. 23 teams are kicking themselves right now! Coons have now netted three Rookie awards, and two Pitcher awards this season.

This week we signed a 4-yr, $1.4M extension with Law Rockburn. The annual value increases evenly from $275k in 2009 to $425k in 2012. This is a fundamentally sound deal, especially considering that Marcos Bruno might pass on his player option for 2009, the Raw Lockburn might be our 8th inning righty for some time, and we took an expensive contract or two that didn’t break our 2008 books, but I don’t dare to open the one for 2009. Hey, is that Ron Alston walking by outside? Hi, Ron!

Javier Cruz struck out his 2,500th batter on that sad Thursday against the Titans, Jim Brulhart in the first inning.

Before anyone asks, the single season ERA mark is an unbreakable 1.27 posted by Juan “Mauler” Correa in the league’s inaugural season. Actually, Correa holds the top 3 spots, with a 1.64 campaign in ’82 and a 1.68 run in ’86 (long before we used up his remains in ’90).

We’ll bring up 2005 first rounder Brendan (I always write Brandon, sorry, Brandon, I mean, Brandon, ack) Teasdale next week. His AAA season was mixed at best, but we’re out of it and he’s 24, it’s about manning up now. He will somehow slide into Boda’s spot (I don’t think that actually will work out…). And we ARE out of it. Below are the Raccoons ranks in the CL, and we lead the CL in five categories (all pitching) of 22 total. Of the 17 we do not lead, the Crusaders lead seven, and they do not rank worse than fourth in ANY of them. They even hit more home runs than us, and allow much less. We’re between 2nd and 5th in the power rankings constantly. Who’s in first? Crusaders, almost the entire season. It’s just not meant to be.

[Westheim]

Ready to visit both CL division leaders this week?

September Additions

With rosters expanding on Monday, the Raccoons called up six players to complement their personnel, three pitchers and three batters. The batters weren’t very exciting, and frankly, most of the pitchers weren’t either. We added Santiago Trevino again for outfield defense. It hadn’t been his fault that he had been demoted (other than not having Ron Alston’s swing), and we would try to sneak him into a few more situations. We also added Manuel Gutierrez, the versatile Salvadoran infielder. Looking for another batter, we wanted a right-hander, and had to reach down to AA to pick Jose Cruz, who was just coming out of a slump. We might add a third catcher soon-ish.

In hurlers, we added Dan Parker, the 21.60 ERA lefty, who will be assigned the most menial tasks only (so he won’t be on GM’s Sandwich Duty), also added Kaz Kichida for long relief (trying to give Yates a few more starts, too), and former first round pick Brendan Teasdale. His ERA was in the high 4’s in AAA, but I already explained that at some point it’s time to throw them into the water and see whether they sink or not.

I also remember the way his name is written now. It’s like Brenda, and not like Marlon Brando. A girl after all, it seems.

Raccoons (78-51) @ Falcons (71-57) – September 1-3, 2008

Strengths were roughly opposite between these teams. While the Raccoons enjoyed a top 2 pitching staff and had (still…) a middling offense, the Falcons were scoring the second-most runs and had a middling pitching staff, ranking only seventh in runs allowed. The pathetic nature of the CL South however had them virtually assured of the playoffs already with five weeks to play, with everybody else at least double digits behind and with a soundly losing record, the 62-69 Condors leading the pack.

With the season series at 3-3 so far, no team can win more than six from their opponents this year. In this particular matchup, neither team has won more than six from their opponents since 1998, when the Raccoons took seven games. The year before, horrid 1997, we were bloodied 1-8 by the Falcons. Since ’99, the series is almost even, 43-44 from our view.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (13-8, 3.36 ERA) vs. Pedro Vargas (8-6, 4.23 ERA)
Javier Cruz (8-8, 3.84 ERA) vs. Alfredo Collazo (6-10, 4.83 ERA)
Kelvin Yates (9-7, 4.69 ERA) vs. Tommy Wilson (8-11, 5.87 ERA)

Could be three right-handers, but they could still make a move, too. Now the sticky news. It’s unlikely that Teasdale will even debut this week. He has pitched on Saturday, but only threw 82 pitches. He could possibly go on short rest in the season finale. I quite surely won’t have him toss to the Crusaders on the weekend. We have lined up Baldwin (so, meh), Jong-hoo, and Brownie for that, and we just can’t do much better that that. So, game 3 is a maybe right now. Could be Yates, could be Boda, could be Teasdale, could be some walk-on we pick up from now until Wednesday.

Game 1
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – C Bowen – P Brown
CHA: SS J. Rodriguez – RF Theobald – C F. Chavez – 3B J. Lopez – LF J. Flores – CF P. Estrada – 1B Reya – 2B H. Green – P P. Vargas

In a strange game for Brownie even by this year’s standards, he neither walked nor struck out any of the first 15 batters in the game. At that point he trailed 2-1, including a chain of three 2-out base hits in the second and home run leader Jose Lopez’ 28th shot in the damage column. With a runner on third, he struck out Reya for the second out, walked Hubert Green, then got a favorable grounder from Vargas for the second time in four innings to strand two. Brown was knocked out in the sixth, when Vargas was up with two on and two out for the third time in the game, but this time lined a single to left. Another run scored when Javier Rodriguez singled against Donald Sims. The Raccoons had scored a lightning quick run after a Quebell triple in the first and since then had been almost entirely absent, a condition that never changed. Dan Parker was assigned a most menial 6-7-8 portion of the Falcons’ order in the bottom 8th and coughed up another run and then even needed rescue, and yet that still lowered his ERA by a few full points. 5-1 Falcons. Quebell 1-2, 2 BB, 3B; Alston 2-4;

We managed four hits, Brown managed four walks, and Luke Black managed four strikeouts (more than Brown). So this was quite the dumpster fire and it can hardly get worse from here.

Game 2
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Pruitt – RF Alston – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – C Bowen – SS M. Gutierrez – P Cruz
CHA: 3B J. Rodriguez – LF J. Flores – 1B J. Lopez – RF Reya – CF P. Estrada – SS S. Moore – C Ishikawa – 2B H. Green – P Collazo

Martinez was the only right-hander in this lineup and Collazo was mediocre at best. We better make some sparks now!

Quebell’s leadoff jack (#16 on the year) was certainly a spark. Two walks and an infield single by Martinez loaded the bases with one out before Collazo started emptying them with a wild pitch, which cost the Falcons another run when Nomura bounced to Steve Moore, but the double play had been taken away. Actually it cost them three more runs: Bowen homered (also #16!) to extreme right, almost foul, and the Coons held a 5-0 lead. Then came little Javier, seven years old, and lit some matches. Cruz walked the first two batters, then also allowed some hard contact. An Estrada fly beat Pruitt’s limited range for a double and the Falcons took two runs right back. The fire spread rapidly. Tomas Castro hurt himself racing after a drive in the second inning, and the next batter, Falcons original Hubert Green, jacked a solo home run to cut the gap to two runs. For a while it was doubtful whether Cruz would pitch longer than Collazo in this game, but when the first four Coons all landed base hits in the fourth inning, Alston’s 2-run single ran the score to 7-3 and got Collazo removed.

Cruz didn’t last that much longer. He allowed three hits, three walks, and drilled a man (aside from some really hard contact) in four innings, then walked two more to start the fifth inning and was yanked. We brought in Rockburn, who disintegrated in a hurry, allowing a single to Lopez, walked Reya, and Estrada, too, and when Steve Moore hit a sac fly to Pruitt, we finally made an out, the score being 7-6. Here came Kelvin Yates, for desperate reasons. His first pitch to Ishikawa was a bouncer to Nomura, who turned it into a two-for-one quickly to end that horrendous inning. Yates pitched two more innings, striking out four. Bruno replaced him for the eighth (the Coons offense being asnooze) and his first pitch was flicked into leftfield by Pedro Estrada. When Moore bunted, Bruno wanted the leadoff man, but bounced the throw and Gutierrez couldn’t come up with it. Two on, no outs, Ishikawa bunted the runners over before Green popped out and Paul Theobald grounded out to Yoshi.

The bats finally awoke in curios circumstances in the top of the ninth against closer Javier “Baby Bull” Navarro. Barrón hit for Martinez and rolled a single to right, then scored on Bowen’s double that was misplayed into one by Jesus Flores. Black hit for Gutierrez in the #8 hole and hurled a horrendous freak double that bounced on the right field line before bouncing to the bag with the tarp, where the ball decided to stay put. Luis Reya had expected some sort of carom, generating the extra base and run, but the inning would end with the next batter, Trevino. Panic wasn’t over yet. Angel insisted on allowing singles to the first two batters in the bottom 9th, then struck out Jose Lopez on 1-2, struck out Reya on 1-2, and on 1-2 to Estrada he tried to throw the ball right through Estrada’s butt. Sure enough Steve Moore hit one just like the Duke had done minutes before, just to the other side, and that emptied the bases, tied the game, and sent it to extra innings ultimately. Neither team reached further than first base for three innings after that. Antonio Ramirez would hit a leadoff single off Kichida in the bottom 13th, was bunted over and moved further on Flores’ groundout. With plenty of space, Lopez was walked intentionally even if Kichida had to face the left-hander Reya then. Picking poisons here. But Reya popped out, and so we played another inning, the deciding 14th. The Raccoons struck out three times, Jose Gutierrez, Trevino, and Pollack, while Kichida allowed a single to PH Dave Hamilton, then a triple to Ishikawa. 10-9 Falcons. Quebell 3-7, BB, HR, RBI; Martinez 2-4, 2B; Black (PH) 1-1, 2B, RBI; Esquivel (PH) 1-1; Yates 2.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 4 K; Bryan 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K;

Without a doubt, the Crusaders will kill us on the weekend. Also, happy birthday Brenda, you’re making the start on Wednesday. And you’ll have our worst possible outfield combo behind you, so be careful, nobody’s gonna save you. You’re piggy-backed with Boda, by the way, because the pen drowned last night. Like I said, nobody’s gonna save you.

Game 3
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B R. Martinez – RF Alston – CF Black – LF Pruitt – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – C Esquivel – P Teasdale
CHA: 3B J. Rodriguez – LF J. Flores – C F. Chavez – 1B J. Lopez – RF Reya – CF P. Estrada – SS S. Moore – 2B H. Green – P T. Wilson

Teasdale’s first inning was rather quiet, and he nabbed his first victim, striking out Jesus Flores as #1 of how-many-who-knows. The Raccoons scored an unearned run after a Rodriguez error in the second inning, but the Falcons soon enough started poking Brenda to see whether he would bleed. Lopez led off with a single, and Estrada would hit a hard double off the wall. Lopez was on his way home, Pruitt threw to the wrong base, the runner advanced to third, and subsequently scored. Alston tied the score at two with an RBI double in the third, but the same part of the order that had harmed Teasdale the first time, did it again the second time. Lopez walked, and two pitchers later Estrada hit a towering homer to left center, putting the Falcons ahead 4-2. Alston then homered in the top 5th, but had nobody on, but Black, Pruitt, and Nomura all reached to load the bases with one out. The Blighters wouldn’t manage to break through, though. Barrón lined out to second, and Esquivel hit a liner to shallow right that scored only the tying run before Teasdale flew out.

Teasdale’s debut ended with Jose Lopez’s RBI double after five and a third, that put him down yet again. We looked for one out from Sims, who allowed a deep fly to right to Luis Reya that Alston almost didn’t get. Then we brought Richardson, with two out and Lopez at third, to do something about the scorching Estrada, who grounded hard to Martinez for the third out. The Critters tied it again the following inning when Esquivel blooped a ball into shallow center for a single that allowed even Pruitt to score from second base, knotting the score at five (while the Furballs had twice as many hits as their opponents…). After that we sent Cássio Boda, because we didn’t have much else available anymore in terms of gaining length. After two good innings and striking out Lopez, Boda walked Steve Moore with one out in the ninth. Moore went with Green batting, but was thrown out by Esquivel, and although Hubert Green eventually singled, the Falcons didn’t score and this game went to extras as well (a.k.a. second-worst-case-scenario).

Esquivel bunted over Barrón after his leadoff single in the 10th inning before Jerry Fletcher hit for Boda against the left-hander Ryan O’Quinn. The Falcons didn’t bite and walked Fletcher intentionally to get to Quebell, whose line looked like had gotten into a wood chipper: 0-5, 3 K. For a moment we twitched to bat a right-hander (Jose Cruz, really??) or Bowen, but then led Quebell go, he always has a single in him. Or maybe O’Quinn would throw a meatball that Quebell romped to deep right and well outta here! That put the Coons 8-5 on top. A few quick outs later, Angel came out, trying to shake off the ravaging of the previous night. Yet, here, the Falcons had Rodriguez lead off with a single, and then he walked Chavez, and here came that home run leader. In a hard battle, Angel prevailed and struck out the slugging Lopez, then also got Reya to fly out to center. 8-5 Raccoons. Alston 3-6, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; Pruitt 2-5; Barrón 3-5; Esquivel 3-4, 3 RBI; Boda 3.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K, W (2-1);

Five runs in 5 1/3 look pretty bad, but that’s not the whole story. Teasdale only allowed six base runners. It’s just that almost all of them scored… Meanwhile the Coons left them left, right, and center…

Sour news: we found out on Thursday that Tomas Castro (.303, 10 HR, 65 RBI) had a fracture in his elbow after leaving Tuesday’s game hurt, and that he needed surgery and was out for the year. He will be ready for Opening Day, though, at least he should.

We lost another game to the Crusaders in the standings and now are 8 1/2 back. Yet, with seven to play, the way the last series went, and how we’re playing right now, we might as well round up to 15 1/2.

Raccoons (79-53) @ Crusaders (88-45) – September 5-7, 2008

The Crusaders’ greatness has been elaborated in tedious detail already. Most runs scored, least runs allowed, and the Raccoons come in scuffling. We are 4-7 against them on the season after that rough ploughing in August when we were swept in four games.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (8-8, 3.37 ERA) vs. Whit Reeves (14-4, 2.84 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (17-4, 1.72 ERA) vs. Angel Javier (10-11, 3.42 ERA)
Nick Brown (13-9, 3.46 ERA) vs. David Estrada (12-8, 3.77 ERA)

Estrada figures to be our only left-hander this week, but maybe the Crusaders will go and squeeze Greg Connor into this series, which would give us three right-handers. Both teams had one regular on the DL. It was Castro for the Raccoons, and Francisco Caraballo for the Crusaders.

Game 1
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B R. Martinez – RF Alston – CF Black – LF Pruitt – 2B Nomura – C Bowen – SS Barrón – P Baldwin
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B R. Garza – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – SS Butler – 1B A. Munoz – C D. Anderson – P Reeves

Quebell narrowly missed a homer on Whit Reeves’ fifth pitch, hitting one foot beneath the top end of the wall in right center, was held to a double, and starved. We started giving out intentional walks in the very first inning with Roberto Pena on third, two outs, and Stanton Martin (.303, 22 HR, 120 RBI) looking hungry. Nah, let’s try Sonny Reece, a left-hander, instead. Reece hit one good up the middle, but Yoshi made a scrambling play to end the inning. After the Coons left Quebell in scoring position again in the third inning, the Martin Brothers got hard hits off Baldwin in the bottom half to score the game’s first run, and with two outs in the fifth they were at it again. Ortíz hit a single, but this time Baldwin struck out Martin. Two singles and an aggressively moving Sonny Reece were enough for the Crusaders to produce a second run in the bottom 6th, and the Raccoons? What were the Raccoons doing? They got four measly hits off Reeves in seven innings, didn’t get anybody in, and when it started to rain in the top 8th and the umpires called the game due to bad weather after less than an hour of rain delay, we didn’t make much of a fuss even. We knew we had lost. 2-0 Crusaders. Baldwin 7.0 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 6 K, L (8-9);

The Crusaders did make a change after that and moved David Estrada into the middle game. Whatever works for them is fine for us…

Game 2
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B R. Martinez – LF Alston – RF Black – CF Fletcher – C Bowen – SS Barrón – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Umberger
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B R. Garza – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – 1B Butler – SS J. Hernandez – C D. Anderson – P D. Estrada

The Crusaders put Umberger down on his knees and begging for mercy way too easily and way too quickly. The first two men reached, and after Umberger squeezed through the Martin Brothers, Reece hit a single to right to score the first run. Another leadoff walk then in the bottom 2nd, but Hernandez was thrown out stealing. David Estrada however hit a home run to get to 2-0. And he kept walking people, after excelling with control all summer long, and while Estrada was no-hitting the Raccoons, Umberger stood there in the bottom of the fourth with the bases loaded, nobody out, and a power-packing catcher tucked away in the #8 slot at the plate. Anderson worked a full count before flying out to Black in a sac fly situation, 3-0 Crusaders, and they didn’t add on after a bunt and a groundout by Pena. The Crusaders got another run eventually as they chewed up our best man in six innings, while a Quebell single in the top 6th had at least staved off total humiliation. For the longest time this game was decided before a Ramón Garza error created the tiniest of openings in the top of the eighth. It put Quebell on with one out. Martinez flew out to the warning track in left before Alston singled. Black was doing hardly anything besides striking out this week, but finally connected with something and hit an RBI double to left, which put two runs in scoring position and they tying run in the 4-1 game at the plate in Jerry Fletcher. Estrada seemed like he was losing it, but had Fletcher at 1-2 before allowing an RBI single to right. Black was not sent against Martin’s murder arm. Strangely, the Crusaders still didn’t bring a reliever, even when Bowen was brushed by a pitch on the chest. When Barrón singled to center, Black scored, and Fletcher scored, the game was tied, and almost a panic broke out in the park. Pruitt grounded out batting for Jose Gutierrez, but it got worse for the home crowd. Closer Iemitsu Rin was finally in the game in the top 9th, 90 strikeouts in 63 innings, and Quebell shoved an apple in his mouth with a crushing homer to right. When needed most, Angel had a 1-2-3 inning to shut down the Crusaders. 5-4 Critters. Quebell 2-5, RBI; Fletcher 2-3, BB, RBI;

All our runs on Fletcher were unearned, but that didn’t excuse the dazzling managing in the home dugout. What were they doing …?

Game 3
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B Pollack – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Brown
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B R. Garza – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – SS Butler – 1B M. Williams – C D. Anderson – P A. Javier

I had a really bad feeling for Brownie in this game… Before the Crusaders could knock his teeth out, the Raccoons spotted him a run in the second inning when Barrón doubled home Yoshi. Brown then also had a 2-out single, but Quebell flew out to Martin. Brown was behind in the count to about everybody from the start, and it didn’t work for very long. After the gravest of sins, walking the opposing pitcher, he would allow a couple of sharp 2-out hits that allowed the Crusaders to score three runs in the third inning. Daryl Anderson hit a solo shot the next inning. They were up 4-1 when being done with him after six after logging eight hits and four walks.

The Crusaders had even learned something on Saturday. When Angel Javier issued walks to Fletcher and Alston to start the eighth inning, Scott Hood raced out of their bullpen. The Duke was the tying run at the plate, no outs, and Hood’s first pitch of the game got the fireworks started when the Duke slammed it well into the leftfield stands for a game-tying 3-run homer. The next three batters were chopped into really fine slices by Hood before Rockburn took over, but opened the bottom 8th by drilling Apasyu Britton. He got two outs after that, with Britton on second, when Ed Bryan came on in a double switch to face PH Ming Kui, one of those nasty jokers always with a tie-breaking single up the sleeve. He grounded rather hard up the middle, Manuel Gutierrez, also entering in the switch, got to it, and managed to nip Kui at first base to end the inning. Barrón then hit a leadoff single off Rin in the top 9th. Gutierrez bunted him over, but Quebell struck out and the Raccoons ran out of steam in that inning. Anastasio Munoz also hit a leadoff single in the bottom of the inning. Bryan was still in and remained in (Sims had been used in the seventh and we needed Bryan for Ortíz, who was coming up one way or another). Ramón Garza’s grounder got Munoz forced out at second, and Bryan struck out Ortíz before yielding for Bruno, whose first pitch was wild and who had Stanton Martin eventually grind out a walk. Left-hander Sonny Reece up, no qualified left-handed relief remaining, this was Bruno’s for better or worse now. It was for worse. Reece, just a really strong hitter after all, looped a single to left near the foul line, and there was no play on Garza to be made. 5-4 Crusaders. Fletcher 2-4, BB, 2B; Black 2-4, HR, 3 RBI; Barrón 2-4, 2B, RBI;

Uch. Mellow.

In other news

September 5 – CHA 3B Javier Rodriguez (.269, 2 HR, 34 RBI) is out for the season with an oblique strain.

Complaints and stuff

Officially no longer looking forward to Nick Brown starts. And when your best start in any week comes from Colin Baldwin and was average at best (7 IP, 2 R, 6 K), and was also worth a loss to the guy, that says a lot about the current strength of the team.

Also applying for the title of “Burning Wreck of the Week” was Luke Black, who even with Sunday’s heroics (that were ultimately futile anyway) went .200/.273/.450 with 7 K (felt like 13 K) this week in an attempt to display what some evil doubters had expected from him all season long.

;-)

We also plunged from second to sixth in the power rankings.

I was meaning to include the franchise leaders for the Crusaders really hard in this one, but I’ve run out of time for today. It’s not like I didn’t have plenty of chances before during the season (y’know, always include it for each CL North team when you play them, it’s not magic, y’know?) Elks are still missing, too. Well, you’ve been following for some time, you know how badly I suck at stuff.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (80-55) vs. Loggers (52-84) – September 8-11, 2008

Penultimate series with the dead Loggers this season, whom we had drummed 9-2 so far, and despite four more weeks to the season, their magic number to even fifth place in the division was down to eight. They weren’t doing anything particularly well. Aside from squishing out the last drops of blood from Martin Garcia’s arm, the roster was quite hopeless and they faced a few more hard years. Right now, they ranked in the bottom 3 in runs scored and runs allowed in the league.

Projected matchups:
Javier Cruz (8-8, 4.03 ERA) vs. A.J. Bartels (1-4, 5.26 ERA)
Brendan Teasdale (0-0, 8.44 ERA) vs. Roy Thomas (6-11, 4.53 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (8-9, 3.32 ERA) vs. Martin Garcia (9-10, 2.97 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (17-4, 1.85 ERA) vs. Fernando Cruz (7-14, 5.11 ERA)

That’s two right-handed starters, then two left-handed ones. This series opens an 11-game homestand on which we also see the Elks and Crusaders. At some point I want to slide Kelvin Yates into the rotation for another start or two before the year is out, too…

Game 1
MIL: CF J.R. Richardson – SS T. Johnson – RF Hiwalani – LF T. Austin – C Baca – 1B K. Scott – 3B S. Johnson – 2B M. Clark – P Bartels
POR: 1B Quebell – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – CF Trevino – P Ja. Cruz

Occasionally, old and almost blind Bakile Hiwalani could still smash one, giving the Loggers a 1-0 lead in the first with a solo jack, his 15th of the season while batting .245, after Cruz had struck out the first two batters of the game. The Duke’s 26th smack would tie the score to start the bottom 2nd and the Raccoons loaded the bases with 2-out singles by Nomura, Trevino, and even Cruz, before Quebell’s liner to right was sucked up Hiwalani. Extra bases continued to do damage in the third, however, when Black hit a double, and Martinez and Bowen both improved on that with a base each, establishing a 4-1 lead. Cruz, who had been infuriating for five months now, saw no need to stop and found a way to allow a 2-out RBI single to Bartels in the fifth and another jack to Hiwalani in the sixth that got the Loggers back within one. Both pitchers were done after six. Dave Walk took over for the Loggers, and the righty found himself in trouble after a leadoff walk to Barrón in the bottom 7th. The Duke singled to left before Martinez’ grounder to short was misplaced by Tom Johnson to load the bases with one out. Bowen needed no written invitation and hit a hard grounder up the middle with no chance for the middle infielders, plating two runs, 6-3. Looking for a right-handed pitcher (with Richardson used already) to deal with the 2-3-4 batters in the Loggers order I ill-advisedly grabbed Kichida, who promptly allowed a walk to Hiwalani and an RBI double to Tim Austin. Until Donald Sims had finally restored order, the Loggers had made up the two runs and reduced the Coons’ lead to one. Angel Casas sat down the first two without much effort in the ninth and had J.R. Richardson a strike away from a golden sombrero when the centerfielder hit a ball to left center, but that was no issue with Alston out there, either. 6-5 Raccoons. Black 3-4, HR, 2B, RBI; Bowen 2-4, HR, 4 RBI; Nomura 1-2, 2 BB;

Talking about bombs, the race is led by Charlotte’s Jose Lopez with 29. Ron Alston has 27, the Duke has 26 now (tying with SFB David Lopez), which completes the top 3.

Angel saved his 40th game this season, and the 160th of his career. Only 362 more to go to tie Grant West!

Game 2
MIL: CF J.R. Richardson – SS T. Johnson – RF Hiwalani – LF T. Austin – C Baca – 3B Tolwith – 1B Lewis – 2B M. Clark – P R. Thomas
POR: 1B Quebell – SS Barrón – LF Pruitt – RF Alston – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – CF Trevino – C Esquivel – P Teasdale

While Ricardo Martinez let a 2-run homer fly in the second inning, Teasdale was perfect the first time through the order until Richardson reached on an infield single to just that same Martinez in a case of “too clumsy” and not in the sense of one of those kitten videos Chad kept sending me. After a walk to Johnson, Hiwalani’s grounder couldn’t be turned for two, and a run scored on the following groundout before Martinez was also defeated by Baca’s grounder that whizzed through his zip code for an RBI single to left that also tied the game. Despite this, Teasdale appeared to be moving right along until the Loggers out of the blue double-bombed him in the seventh inning. Austin’s and Baca’s shots put them 4-2 ahead, since the home teams’ efforts had not amounted to more than two hits since the second inning, and they would not make any significant gains in their last three innings, either. 4-2 Loggers. Quebell 2-3, BB; Kichida 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K;

Yeah, Quebell’s single in the fifth inning was the final twich of the tail in this one…

Also, I have made up my mind regarding Yates, who gets a start on Thursday. Jong-hoo gets shoved into the weekend series with the Elks. We could then arrange for Brenda to not face the Crusaders by skipping him. I mean, not that it matters ANY at this point, at nine games back. Even if we’d sweep them (ha-ha) we would still be five games out with 17 or 18 to play. But we could then field Baldwin, Yates, Umberger, and Brown in the Crusaders series.

Game 3
MIL: CF J.R. Richardson – 3B Tolwith – RF Hiwalani – LF T. Austin – 2B M. Clark – SS T. Johnson – 1B S. Johnson – C J. Reyes – P M. Garcia
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – 3B R. Martinez – RF Black – C Bowen – SS Barrón – LF Jo. Cruz – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Baldwin

Loading up on right-handed Jose’s for this game had no immediate positive effect on production, but looking for an off day for Ron Alston in this long stretch of games this game was the most obvious date. Neither team did much for three innings, but Craig Bowen would liven up a pitchers’ duel with a home run in the fourth that gave the Raccoons a 1-0 edge. Especially Baldwin, who pitched like he was on Speed, and through five inning was no-hitting the Loggers with nine strikeouts. That wasn’t sounding much like our Colin Baldwin, and things turned sour in a hurry in the sixth. Martin Garcia broke up the no-hitter himself with a clean single to right before Baldwin nicked Richardson. Cruz couldn’t play Tolwith’s bloop to shallow left in time to prevent Garcia from scoring from second base to tie the score. Both pitchers left after seven innings with a no-decision. Rockburn took over for the Critters, creating the nifty chance for his ninth win, but this team just would not get going with the bats …! It was in the bottom 9th that they even reached as far as second base when Melvin Pollack hit a 1-out double. That brought up Manuel Gutierrez, who could hardly be hit for after a double switch since he now held down shortstop for the departed Barrón. He grounded out, moving Pollack to third base, but ultimately he would have gotten there anyway on Quebell getting smacked and Fletcher working a full count walk off Enrique Fernandez. Ricardo Martinez was up with two outs and three on, fell to two strikes and I saw that hungry expression in his eyes. Fernandez saw it, too. Whether or not Fernandez actually intended to throw a ball right into those lusting eyes will remain unknown, but in any case he ended the game when he struck down Martinez with his fourth pitch of the at-bat. 2-1 Raccoons. Bowen 2-3, BB, HR, RBI; Barrón 2-3, BB; Pollack 1-2, 2B; Baldwin 7.0 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 10 K;

Rather than Rockburn getting his ninth win, Marcos Bruno got his eighth, which is something, too. Moreover, Bruno, who struck out the side in the top 9th, is eight-and-SQUID.

Next, Kel Yates will get his first start again, exactly one month after his last, one of the losses in the infamous 4-game sweep to the Crusaders we suffered in August. His last few relief outings had not been all bad.

“Not all bad” – pretty good standard for a wannabe playoff team.

Game 4
MIL: CF J.R. Richardson – SS T. Johnson – RF Hiwalani – LF T. Austin – C Baca – 3B Tolwith – 1B K. Scott – 2B M. Clark – P F. Cruz
POR: CF Fletcher – 3B R. Martinez – LF Alston – RF Black – C Bowen – 1B Pruitt – SS Barrón – 2B Pollack – P Yates

A rare Barrón error gave the Loggers an extra out in the first inning and Yates kept toiling around with them long enough for them to turn the advantage into the first run of the game. The puzzled Coons hit into double plays twice in the first four innings while Yates struck out eight, but also allowed a home run to Tim Austin to fall 2-0 behind, and he struck out a dozen over six innings, and still could not get any support! Fernando Cruz was certainly not the cream of the pitching crop in this league, but in the bottom 6th he sat down Martinez, Alston, and Black in order so effortlessly that it didn’t forecast a happy ending. The Loggers wound another run from Yates’ hands with a pair of singles in the seventh inning and the Raccoons looked dead before they suddenly had the tying run at the plate. Cruz had walked Bowen, and Barrón had singled to right to bring up Pollack, with nine homers in 251 AB, up with one out. But Pollack struck out, leading to Quebell hitting for Yates and working a walk. Jerry Fletcher batted with the bases loaded, and hit the perfect ball, a ****ty blooper that appeared to hang before suddenly dumping in and bouncing away from Hiwalani and Richardson in ultimate screwing fashion. Fletcher’s double cleared the bases, tied the game, and next he scored the go-ahead run on Martinez’ single to left. Alston made the third out, finally for the Loggers, but that allowed the Duke to hit another leadoff homer in the next inning. Angel Casas in the ninth pitched with two men on and two outs to Hiwalani and stripped the old man down in three pitches. 5-3 Raccoons. Fletcher 2-4, 2B, 3 RBI; Yates 7.0 IP, 7 H, 3 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 13 K, W (10-7);

Our deficit to the Crusaders is now eight games after they lost two of three to the Indians.

Raccoons (83-56) vs. Canadiens (80-59) – September 12-14, 2008

Close the door, it smells outside!! This was the last series of the year with the Elks, with the Raccoons trailing 7-8 in the season series, still an improvement from last year’s 4-14 killer. Overall, we are nine under .500 against them. They come in with the third-best run production and also third-best run prevention, with rotation and bullpen both ranking fourth in ERA.

Projected matchups:
Jong-hoo Umberger (17-4, 1.85 ERA) vs. Rod Taylor (16-9, 3.24 ERA)
Nick Brown (13-9, 3.54 ERA) vs. David Peterson (13-6, 3.45 ERA)
Javier Cruz (9-8, 4.05 ERA) vs. Scott Spears (11-12, 4.28 ERA)

We will get three right-handers from the Elks here.

Game 1
VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B T. Ramos – 3B Suzuki – SS Rice – C G. Ortíz – LF F. Jones – 2B Rodgers – P R. Taylor
POR: 1B Quebell – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – CF Trevino – P Umberger

This was a stare-down between the league’s ERA leader and strikeout leader. Jong-hoo got three grounders to right in the top 1st, and after Quebell made another quick out, Barrón hit a single. Alston grounded to right, where Tony Ramos got charged with a tough error when he couldn’t corral the ball that took an evil bounce on the dirt. It was all good for the Raccoons, though. The Duke now took care of a quick lead, ripping a 3-run home run! No team wanted to give Umberger a 3-run lead, but Ross Holland managed to beat the Duke’s range for a 2-out RBI double in the top 3rd to get at least one run back for a short time. Ron Alston homered in the bottom of the inning to get back to the 3-run gap.

But well, sometimes things just should not be. Umberger walked Ramos at the start of the fourth inning, then had Suzuki reach on an infield single to third base. Gary Rice emptied his bowels over Jong-hoo’s ERA with a crushing 2-run triple, and there was still no out in the inning. When Rice scored on Freddie Jones’ fly out to right, Umberger’s ERA crossed the “2” mark and left the home crowd blinking in disbelief (me included). Jong-hoo was staked another lead by Bowen’s homer off Taylor (who whiffed six but was otherwise porous) in the bottom 4th, somehow stalked through the fifth inning unharmed, and somewhere in between there was also a 60-minute rain delay because it was Friday in Portland.

The Raccoons added on in the sixth inning against their former den mate Bill Corkum, although death crept up slowly to Corkum. Two outs, nobody on, Trevino doubled into right. Fletcher hit for Rockburn and walked, and then Corkum would allow three straight RBI singles to Quebell, Barrón (both to center), and Alston (to right). Tommy Briggs finally replaced Corkum and sniffed out the Duke to end the inning at 8-4 Blighters.

But what would baseball be without swift comebacks and Ed Bryan getting his snout pierced? He faced five batters in the seventh inning, four of them left-handers, and four of them landed base hits, which had two runs in and the tying runs on the corners with one out and Suzuki batting. With Bruno unavailable, Richardson was picked form the pen, got Suzuki to foul out, but the constant crotch pain Rice ripped a single to right to plate another run, and Gabriel Ortíz’ drive to center ALMOST went out, but was caught by Trevino at the wall. Never mind the breath of relief, Donald Sims managed to allow a leadoff jack to Freddie Jones in the eighth to bust the lead for good. Tied at eight, we were down to the least credentialed guy in the pen in the ninth inning, hapless Dan Parker, with the Elks sending as first man a pinch-hitter, Bob Mays (.192, 1 HR, 1 RBI in 26 AB). Bobo grounded out hard to Barrón, and somehow Parker registered three quick outs without killing anybody. Too bad three outs weren’t enough, since the Raccoons’ best efforts in the bottom 9th were the Duke getting hit by a Jose Escobar pitch. Parker blew out in the top 10th and loaded the bases before getting yanked for Kichida, which came close to forfeiting the game right away. The Elks scored the go-ahead run on a sac fly before Kaz struck out Holland to end the inning. The Coons got Trevino on with a 1-out single in the bottom 10th, only for Esquivel to roll into two. 9-8 Canadiens. Barrón 2-5, RBI; Alston 2-5, HR, 2 RBI; Black 2-4, HR, 3 RBI; Trevino 2-5, 2B;

Left-handed relievers are a fickle thing, and ours need some fine-tuning, I think. I need to have Slappy find the big meat cleaver.

The big shot put the Duke at 100 RBI for the season.

Game 2
VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – C G. Ortíz – 1B T. Ramos – 3B Suzuki – SS Rice – 2B Palmer – LF F. Jones – P D. Peterson
POR: 1B Quebell – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – CF Trevino – P Brown

Brown struck out the first four batters he faced, creating some sort of false security. After the first seven went down harmlessly, Freddie Jones yanked a ball out of center to get the Elks 1-0 on top, and things escalated from there. A single by the pitcher, a walk, and a Quebell error loaded the bases for Tony Ramos with two outs, but Ramos struck out. Martinez was also never shy about making an error, misfielding Rice’s grounder in the next inning. Michael Palmer singled right away, but Jones popped out to shallow left and Brown struck out the opposing pitcher, who of course gave the Raccoons fits, to end that inning. Ortíz hit a solo home run in the fifth, while all the Raccoons managed was a 2-out triple by Martinez that didn’t lead anywhere nice. Bottom 6th, finally a chance: Barrón and Alston got going by singling into almost the same spot in shallow left center, unreachable by anybody. That gave the Duke the tying runs to play with, but all he put together was the first of three consecutive strikeouts. Brown was hit for in the bottom 7th after a good outing, yet unrewarded, sitting in a 2-0 hole with Trevino on first base and one out. Pruitt pinch-hit and looped a ball into the right corner for an RBI double. Suddenly, an opening. Suddenly, it was gone. Quebell popped out to nowhere in particular, and Barrón grounded out to Palmer. The home team’s futility found it’s crowning top in the ninth inning, when between Rockburn, Bryan, Richardson, and Martinez’ holey glove the team cocked up four runs for the Elks. 6-1 Canadiens. Pruitt (PH) 1-1, 2B, RBI; Brown 7.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 8 K, L (13-10) and 2-2;

(calmly breaks between seven and nineteen sleeping pills out of a blister)

No, no, it’s okay. It’s just that I’m going to see pictures all night if I don’t up significantly on my normal dose of five. The demons won’t shut up otherwise.

Game 3
VAN: CF Holland – LF F. Jones – 1B T. Ramos – 3B Suzuki – SS Rice – C G. Ortíz – RF Mays – 2B Palmer – P Pegler
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B R. Martinez – LF Alston – RF Black – 2B Nomura – CF Trevino – C Esquivel – SS M. Gutierrez – P Ja. Cruz

We faced Simon Pegler (8-14, 4.49 ERA) in this game. Cruz botched up two runs in the first inning that the Duke swipingly pulled right back with his 29th homer of the year. Tony Ramos went deep off Cruz to give the Elks a 3-2 lead in the third, but the Duke would tie that one up as well, plating Martinez with a 1-out single to center. Nomura doubled after that, providing a sterling chance to take a lead for ourselves. But first, some rain. And some more. And some tarp. And we’re gonna wait for an hour. Maybe two.

When play resumed, the Elks would make two errors to give the Coons two runs and a 5-3 lead, with Cássio Boda taking over for Cruz after the lengthy rain delay, but only made it into the sixth before getting stuck hopelessly. Three straight hits routed him from the game with the score down to 5-4, and two runners in scoring position with one out. Sims came on and got a strikeout and a groundout to maintain the lead. But you just know that you have to accept all the losses and all the defeats and all the shame, when you bring on Marcos Bruno in the seventh, Jones and Ramos are down two strikes and somehow snip singles, and then he walks Suzuki. And with no outs. The Elks didn’t get more than the tying run out of this unfortunate scenario, but the tying run is always the worst run. Clueless Kichida allowed the next-worst run, the go-ahead run, in the eighth inning, two hits, two walks, and not a glimpse of spine. Manuel Gutierrez singled off Ralph Davis in the bottom 8th and was on third base with one out after Quebell’s single. Pruitt hit for Martinez with new pitcher Bill Corkum appearing. While he almost rolled into two, he just barely arrived at first base to allow Gutierrez to score the tying run. Alston walked, Corkum threw a wild pitch, then walked the Duke. Bases loaded for Yoshi, he grounded out harmlessly to Palmer. A Jeff MacGruder error unexpectedly gave the Coons a chance to walk off in the ninth when it put the winning run in Fletcher on third base with two outs and Quebell batting. Corkum was still in the game (and on his own had finished the inning alright), but now was beaten by Quebell for a bouncer up the middle that escaped into center, Fletcher crossing home. 7-6 Coons. Quebell 2-5, BB, RBI; Alston 2-4, BB; Black 2-4, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Trevino 2-5, RBI; Gutierrez 2-5, RBI;

At least the nasty smell should vanish now. Ugh!

In other news

September 10 – The Stars lose OF Cesar Morán (.303, 15 HR, 77 RBI) down the stretch to a strained rib cage muscle, but the 28-year old should be ready in time for the playoffs.
September 11 – TOP SP Paul Kirkland (8-10, 4.49 ERA) 3-hits the Rebels in a 6-0 shutout.
September 13 – NAS 1B/2B Georg Spinu (.318, 9 HR, 52 RBI) will have to watch for two weeks after sustaining a mild shoulder strain.

Complaints and stuff

We have another interesting leftfielder in AAA in Jerry Saenz, who might have been another callup option, maybe … but he has fractured his thumb and that’s done.

The Alley Cats went 89-55 this year to win their division and will play the Elks’ affiliate Drummondville Beatles in the first round of the playoffs. Our other teams got certificates of participation, Ham Lake even finished rock bottom.

FRANCHISE LEADERS: VANCOUVER CANADIENS

WINS
1st – Robbie Campbell – 172
2nd – Juichi Fujita – 100
3rd – Vernon Robertson – 93
4th – Jose Salgado – 86
5th – Jose Dominguez – 84

STRIKEOUTS
1st – Robbie Campbell – 1,895
2nd – Jose Dominguez – 1,047
3rd – Juichi Fujita – 1,039
4th – John Collins – 979
5th – Rod Taylor – 953

HITS
1st – Salvador Mendez – 1,358
2nd – Raúl Solís – 1,140
3rd – David Brewer – 1,086
4th – Miguel Guzmán – 1,050
5th – Eddy Bailey – 1,047

HOME RUNS
1st – Miguel Guzmán – 154
2nd – Luis Arroyo – 95
3rd – Iván Gutierrez – 93
4th – Raúl Solís – 90
5th – Tony Velasquez – 89

STOLEN BASES
1st – Raúl Solís – 237
2nd – Melvin Greene – 172
3rd – Ramón Gonzalez – 146
4th – Arthur Simon – 118
5th – Eddy Bailey – 104

Miguel Guzmán (1977-90) is the only batter in their history to spend more than nine years in Elk City, except for Roland Moore, who racked up ten seasons with them, but not consecutively. Everybody is leaving town at the first opportunity. See David Brewer, for example. Their batting leaders mostly had their time in the 80s and 90s. The Elks haven’t been renowned for hitting in a while. They had a bit more consistency with their pitching in recent years, with Taylor and Fujita having been there for a numbers of years, but before that Daniel Dickerson also jumped the ship. Robbie Campbell (1980-91) is the longest-tenured Elk other than Guzmán.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (84-58) vs. Crusaders (93-49) – September 15-18, 2008

Unless the Raccoons could sweep the Crusaders in this 4-game set, the remaining three weeks of the year were already meaningless, and recent track record showed that they probably wouldn’t. We had no means to compete with a team that led the Continental League in both offense and pitching. Over the season, the Crusaders had won nine of the 14 previous contests.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (8-9, 3.22 ERA) vs. Whit Reeves (15-4, 2.71 ERA)
Kelvin Yates (10-7, 4.51 ERA) vs. Greg Connor (21-4, 2.38 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (17-4, 1.99 ERA) vs. David Estrada (13-8, 3.54 ERA)
Nick Brown (13-10, 3.51 ERA) vs. Angel Javier (10-12, 3.39 ERA)

Game 1
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B R. Garza – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – SS Butler – 1B A. Munoz – C D. Anderson – P Reeves
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B R. Martinez – LF Alston – RF Black – SS Barrón – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – CF S. Trevino – P Baldwin

The Crusaders were dealt an early blow when Whit Reeves had to leave the game with an injury after facing only three batters, but it didn’t deter them for long. Stanton Martin opened the second inning with his 24th shot of the year to put them ahead 1-0, and while Baldwin struck out five the first time through the order, that run also included another leadoff jack in the third inning by Daryl Anderson. From there, the Crusaders quickly stacked the bases for Martin to bat with three men on, but Baldwin, who had walked the previous two batters, continued to be wild and hit one right into Stanton Martin, pushing in the third run before Sonny Reece and Bob Butler both struck out. Baldwin somehow struck out ten batters in five innings while also allowing four runs. The Raccoons had stranded runners on second and third in the first inning, and runners on first and second in the second inning. They didn’t get another runner until a Tim Poe error put Juan Barrón on base to start the seventh inning. Such are the terms of the Crusaders being a better team: no runners for the brown team for four innings. 2-out singles by Trevino and Pruitt loaded the bases for Quebell, who popped out to “Clockwork” Martin in rightfield. Richardson allowed a homer to Sonny Reece and two runs total in the eighth, and while Angel Casas was an awesome pitcher, he was not an awesome defender, and a throwing error of his led to two more runs, unearned, in the ninth inning. When Craig Bowen hit his 20th home run off Scott Hood in the bottom 9th, there was nobody left to cheer. 8-2 Crusaders. Pruitt (PH) 1-1; Parker 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 0 K;

Dan Parker has achieved an ERA under nine now. Good, good.

Game 2
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B R. Garza – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – SS Butler – 1B A. Munoz – C D. Anderson – P Connor
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B R. Martinez – SS Barrón – 2B Nomura – P Yates

Neil Reece had been a fan favorite for more than a decade, but every day we developed a softer spot for Sonny Reece (not related, by the way, as you might already have guessed from their diametrically opposite skin colors). After Connor sat down the first two batters in the first inning, Ron Alston drew a walk. Two soft singles loaded the bases for Martinez, who grounded to his fellow third baseman Sonny, whose throw to first was in the dirt and offline and forced Anastasio Munoz to scamper after it. All hands safe, the Raccoons led 1-0, but weren’t done, instead plating pairs of runs each on a Barrón single and a Yoshi double to go up 5-0. All runs were unearned, of course. Connor made an error himself the next inning to put Alston on base with two outs again, and the Duke happily doubled him in to get to 6-0, while Yates faced the minimum (including a Munoz single and double play) through three innings. The Crusaders put their first two men on in the fourth, but never managed to reach third base. Through seven, Yates appeared to be cruising on a 3-hitter with eight strikeouts, but after two walks and an almost-homer by Munoz he got removed from the game. Ed Bryan pitched to Roberto Pena with two on and two out and allowed a rocket to right that the Duke made a mighty fine play on to end the inning. Off the bat, that one had cried out “TWO RUNS! TWO RUNS!” for everybody to hear. After that, I wanted to get the ninth inning for cheap from Kaz Kichida, which predictably resulted in two on and nobody out before Marcos Bruno arrived just in time to allow a 3-run homer to Stanton Martin, and then a solo home run to Sonny Reece. So we DID have to break out Angel after all, and the game was over in five pitches, including a strikeout. 6-4 Raccoons. Black 2-4, 2B, RBI; Yates 7.2 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 8 K, W (11-7);

Okay, let’s add Bruno to the list of guys who are on mental holidays already. And who can blame them? I can’t wait for these meaningless games to run out, either. And it is true, none of our runs in this game were earned, and we never were particularly close to scoring after the second inning, or in other words: from the third through the eighth, the Raccoons managed one (1) more hit.

I don’t know what happened. They might have found the Capt’n Coma stash…

Game 3
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B R. Garza – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – SS Butler – 1B M. Williams – C D. Anderson – P D. Estrada
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B R. Martinez – SS Barrón – 2B Pollack – P Umberger

By now the sparkle had also completely come off of Umberger, who allowed a run in the first, singled in by “Clockwork” with two outs, and three in the second inning, with the first three batters, all right-handers, effortlessly lining hits off him. The Raccoons’ offensive efforts remained extremely pathetic. Through six innings, they hit all of two singles off David Estrada, a left-hander whose stats wouldn’t suggest he was a dominator otherwise. Ron Alston hit a double in the seventh inning to at least have a Critter appear in scoring position for the first time in the game, but he was left there. It was the last time those whiskers twitched in a horrendously pathetic effort, as the Raccoons let David Estrada get away with a 3-hit shutout, striking out seven. 5-0 Crusaders.

We’re now also tying the Canadiens for second place. Not that it means anything, but … it’s the ****ing Canadiens. And I don’t know what happened to the team, but they have just … stopped. They just stopped. That’s it.

Game 4
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B R. Garza – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 3B Reece – SS Butler – 1B A. Munoz – C D. Anderson – P P. Trevino
POR: 1B Quebell – 2B Nomura – LF Pruitt – RF Black – C Esquivel – CF S. Trevino – 3B Pollack – SS M. Gutierrez – P Brown

The Raccoons’ lineup had something of desperation while the Crusaders were urging to bleach our souls one final time this fruitless season. They sent Pancho Trevino (11-8, 3.68 ERA), a right-hander, into the duel.

After three scoreless innings, Brown started to throw some balls, enough for a leadoff walk to Garza in the top 4th, and enough to immediately open a door for the Crusaders to storm through. Ortíz singled, moving Garza to third, and the “Clockwork” gobbled up an RBI in every game in the set with a sac fly. The Crusaders loaded the bases before Munoz hit into a double play, and another double play saved Brown’s furry behinds the next inning. Meanwhile the Raccoons’ offensive efforts were … hard to describe in civil words, but in the bottom 5th Brown hit a 2-out single to get the stone rolling, perhaps. Quebell walked, bringing up Yoshi, but Nomura’s hard grounder to the right side was intercepted by Munoz and the inning ended. Bottom 6th, Pruitt and Esquivel singled, two on with one out. Then that one Trevino struck out that other Trevino (relational status unknown, the actual family ties of this particular Puerto Rican clan are complicated and they don’t talk a lot…), bringing up Melvin Pollack, who FINALLY provided some offense and rocketed a 3-run homer to left.

Nick Brown managed to get that 3-1 lead blown in a hurry, with a leadoff single to center by Munoz and then right away a triple by Daryl Anderson. Sure enough that tying run scored as well, and we were knotted at three. Roberto Pena got on with a single off Brown, but was wound up in yet another double play that ended Brown’s service, but not without getting in line for the W again. Quebell hit a solo jack with one out in the bottom 7th, and Yoshi and Pruitt both reached base, but Black struck out and Esquivel rolled out after the Crusaders had moved on to reliever Robbie Wills. This turn around, Bruno struck out both Martin and Reece in the eighth inning in preserving the 4-3 advantage. Angel put the incredibly annoying pinch-hit wonder Ming Kui on in the ninth inning, but struck out the final two batters to hold on. 4-3 Brownies. Pruitt 3-4; Pollack 1-3, BB, HR, 3 RBI;

So let’s see. That’s a 4-game set in which the Raccoons scored 12 runs, which is already bad enough, but of those 12 runs half were unearned, and the other half scored exclusively on home runs. You probably shouldn’t rely too much on those Melvin Pollack bombs. Boy, oh boy, do we have some hitty ****ting going on!

Raccoons (86-60) @ Bayhawks (62-84) – September 19-21, 2008

We started our final 9-game road trip of the season that would loop us around the country in counterclockwise direction. The Bayhawks had the worst offense in the Continental League with 535 runs scored (but the Raccoons might still give them a run for their money), with a mediocre pitching staff standings sadly in the middle of all that non-hitting they had going on themselves. We were 4-2 against them on the season, and we have lost the season series only once in the last five years.

Projected matchups:
Brendan Teasdale (0-1, 7.15 ERA) vs. Shawn White (6-9, 4.30 ERA)
Javier Cruz (9-8, 4.14 ERA) vs. Reynaldo Rendon (1-6, 3.07 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (8-10, 3.36 ERA) vs. Harry Wentz (6-17, 3.75 ERA)

That’s three right-handers for us to try our blunt teeth on. Maybe we can tickle them with our tails until they fall over…

Game 1
POR: SS Barrón – 1B Pruitt – LF Alston – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B Pollack – 2B Nomura – CF Trevino – P Teasdale
SFB: LF Bayle – CF Hudson – 3B D. Lopez – 1B I. Gutierrez – C P. Fernandez – 2B J. Perez – RF G. Morán – SS McCullough – P S. White

Ron Alston put two on the board with his 29th home run of the season in the first inning to put the Bayhawks under some early pressure which they relieved in the – for Brendan Teasdale starts – usual comic fashion. They weren’t content with ONE leadoff triple, no they hit TWO leadoff triples, Gonzalo Morán in the third inning, and John Hudson in the fourth, to bring in two runs to tie the score, then continued to make a mockery of the game by committing two clumsy errors in the top 5th to give the Raccoons their two runs right back.

Who laughs last, laughs best, they say, and while the game was developing it became increasingly clear that that person wouldn’t be Teasdale. Brenda was walloped for four hits, including three doubles, including one by the pitcher (…!), by the first four batters in the bottom 5th and subsequently removed from the game. Sending Kaz Kichida into a steaming 5-4 deficit of a mess was probably not the most optimal strategy of de-escalation, but the Bayhawks were happy anyway and scored another three innings to take an 8-4 lead. The Duke’s 30th homer of the season, a solo shot, was duly noted in the sixth inning, but couldn’t stop this game from becoming another reason for remorse I didn’t study harder and didn’t grow up to get a nice job. The Critters stranded a pair in the sixth, a pair in the seventh, a pair in the eighth. 8-5 Bayhawks. Pruitt 2-5, RBI; Alston 2-5, HR, 2 RBI; Richardson 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K;

We continue to not score runs outside the long ball and other people’s Martinezes.

By the way it’s true. Mom always wanted me to take the job at Uncle Walt’s garage, but I took a D in Social Studies in my senior year of high school and Uncle Walt was not going to work with some barbarian that didn’t even manage a decent grade in Social Studies…

But that was me back then, pretending to go to my room to study, then sneaking through the window to go see a baseball game. Ah, the old Grand Island Wagonmakers of the Northern Dust League…!

I hope this is a lesson to all those young folks out there. (calmly breaks pills out of a blister again)

Game 2
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Cruz
SFB: LF Bayle – CF Hudson – 3B D. Lopez – 1B I. Gutierrez – C P. Fernandez – 2B J. Perez – RF Walters – SS McCullough – P Rendon

The Raccoons, in the first inning, scored their first run of the week without the help of a long ball or error. With Alston on first, the Duke hit a pop to shallow right, just next to the line. Barely fair, the ball bounced off the low wall in front of the stands and got away a bit more from rightfielder Bill Walters to give the Duke a fluke double and an RBI, his 106th of the year. In the third, a walk to Quebell started the inning. Fletcher and Alston hit singles to load the bases for the Duke, who was only one homer and one RBI behind his marks from last year, but chose to strike out in this spot. It wasn’t all bad, though. Bowen and Martinez both singled in a run, and after Nomura hit into a force at home, Barrón singled in two, upon which Reynaldo Rendon walked Cruz in an obvious alarm sign that he was toast. They didn’t get a man up quick enough and so Rendon walked runs in with freebies to Quebell and Fletcher before former Coons farmhand G.G. Williams replaced him and got Alston to ground out, but by then the Raccoons were already up by seven. High time probably for Cruz to fold and implode, but so far that wasn’t happening, although Ricardo Martinez signaled that he was ready for any shenanigans by committing his 4,918th error in the fourth inning. The Baybirds still didn’t score.

Yoshi, after three disastrous at-bats, which included him being up in the fourth with the bases loaded and no outs, and him lining into a double play, singled in a run with two outs in the sixth to run the score to 8-0. The Duke batted again with the bases loaded in the seventh, now with one out, facing left-hander Rocky Keller, and ripped all-out at the first pitch. The contact sound could be heard all the way to Sacramento, and this one was not coming back. GRAAAAAAAND SLAAAAAAAAAMMMMM!!!!

We removed a few of the regulars after that slam blew the doors off a 12-0 game. The Birds continued to splinter anyway, allowing another three runs in the eighth inning, while Cruz was nursing a 3-hitter. In the ninth we faced 2005 first-rounder Zack Yeadon, who had already been shelled for 12 earned runs in 6 2/3 innings, and in a hurry had the bases loaded with no outs before being bailed out by the defense, and after stalling the Raccoons there, the Birds used a 1-out pinch-walk by Urbano Cicalina and two 2-out singles to overcome Cruz’ shutout bid in the bottom of the ninth. 15-1 Raccoons. Quebell 2-4, 3 BB, 2B, 3 RBI; Fletcher 3-5, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Alston 2-4; Black 3-5, HR, 2B, 5 RBI; Bowen 3-5, BB, 2B, RBI; Martinez 2-5, BB, RBI; Nomura 3-6, RBI; Barrón 2-6, 2 RBI; Cruz 8.2 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 7 K, W (10-8);

What a laugher! Now watch them not score again until next Friday.

Game 3
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – P Baldwin
SFB: LF Bayle – 2B J. Perez – 3B D. Lopez – 1B Cicalina – C P. Fernandez – CF Hudson – RF M. Rodriguez – SS McCullough – P Wentz

Two things hit 30 in the first inning on Sunday. Ron Alston launched a space probe for his 30th homer of the season, of the 3-run variety, and with Baldwin scuffling, one run already doubled in by David Lopez and two men on base with two outs, Ricardo Martinez made his 30th error of the season to load the bases. His bacon was saved by Fletcher making a grab on Manuel Rodriguez’ fly to center. Baldwin was really not good at all in this start. Quebell added a run in the second inning, but Baldwin served up a 2-run homer to Pablo Fernandez to get the Bayhawks back to 4-3 in the third, and continued to pitch ineffectively after that. He allowed a leadoff double to Brandon McCullough in the bottom 6th and was removed soon after. Law Rockburn inherited the tying run at third base with one out, struck out Jimmy Bayle and got away with a fat pitch to Jose Perez that got sucked up in Quebell’s glove.

Quebell’s defense held the game in one piece so far. This had been his third awesome play on the day, and two of them had ended innings with runners in scoring position. Top 7th, Barrón pitched with the bases loaded and one out. After the Duke’s hard drive to right had been caught to start the inning, Bowen had reached on a bloop, Martinez had been hit by Damon Barnett, and Yoshi had also singled. Both Barrón and Pruitt flew out gingerly and kept all three runners stranded. Of course so much slackery was swiftly punished. Richardson allowed a Pablo Fernandez double (more or less right through Martinez’ fat butt, though) with two outs in the bottom 7th, Sims replaced him to face left-handed PH Omarion Thompson, and gave up the game-tying single anyway.

Marcos Bruno pitched the final five outs in regulation for the Raccoons, allowing no runners while burning four batters before extra innings started with a Yoshi double to deep left of Salvadaro Soure. Barrón’s groundout moved Yoshi to third, from where he scored on Trevino’s sac fly. Then Quebell singled. With Fletcher being replaced defensively by Trevino anyway, Esquivel hit for him and hit a double off the wall in right center, which was good enough to score Quebell from first base for another run. Angel ended the game in three batters. 6-4 Coons. Quebell 3-5, BB, RBI; Esquivel (PH) 1-1, 2B, RBI; Alston 2-5, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Bowen 2-5; Nomura 3-5, 2B; Bruno 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 4 K, W (9-0);

That might be a good goal for the last two weeks of the season. Get Bruno to double digit wins. Ha-ha. Ha-ha. Ha.

In other news

September 15 – NAS LF/RF Jose Gomez (.294, 6 HR, 34 RBI) extends his hitting streak to 20 games with one hit in the Blue Sox’ 10-9 win over the Pittsburgh Miners.
September 17 – The Charlotte Falcons lock up the CL South with an 8-0 shutout of the Bayhawks. This will be the Falcons’ seventh postseason appearance, the fifth in six years, and the fourth consecutive.
September 17 – NYC SP Whit Reeves (15-4, 2.71 ERA) needs to have bone chips removed from his elbow and should be out until next May.
September 18 – Hitting streak over for NAS Jose Gomez. The 28-year old switch-hitter goes 0-3 in the Blue Sox’ 7-5 loss to the Miners, ending his hitting streak at 23 games. In the same game, PIT CL Paco Barrera (2-9, 3.00 ERA, 36 SV) closes his 400th career game. Barrera, 36, spent his entire career with the Miners, and was the 2006 FL Reliever of the Year.

Complaints and stuff

Our AAA team took a quick exit from the playoffs, losing the best of five series against Drummondville in four games. With that, a third catcher was added on Sunday, as well as right-hander Matt Cash.

Jose Lopez of the Falcons continues to lead our two power boys, now with 33 HR to the Duke’s 31 and Alston’s 30. In Alston’s case, he would need 39 to even have most of them as a Raccoon.

FRANCHISE LEADERS – NEW YORK CRUSADERS

WINS
1st – Anibal Sandoval – 119
2nd – Greg Connor – 110
3rd – Gary Nixon – 101
4th – Hector Lara – 97
5th – Kyle Owens – 91

STRIKEOUTS
1st – Gary Nixon – 1,321
2nd – Greg Connor – 1,103
3rd – Anibal Sandoval – 1,101
4th – Francisco Garza – 1,094
5th – Hector Lara – 937

HITS
1st – Martin Ortíz – 1,314
2nd – Avery Johnson – 1,111
3rd – Pedro Villa – 1,101
4th – Ed Rigg – 922
5th – Miguel Fuentes – 892

HOME RUNS
1st – Avery Johnson – 160
2nd – Martin Ortíz – 135
3rd – Ruben Melendez – 111
4th – Stanton Martin – 107
5th – Pat Jenkins – 102

STOLEN BASES
1st – Martin Ortíz – 252
2nd – Gary Rice – 99
3rd – Roberto Pena – 94
4th – Pedro Villa – 86
5th – Ed Rigg – 81

Very few of these (Fuentes, Villa, Owens) go back to the 70s and 80s. Most of the pitching leaders were active between the 90s and 2000s for them, while a number of the batting leaders (and of course Connor) is on the team right now and going good things (for them). Decades of futility in the 80s and 90s didn’t create too many pleasant records for the team, however…

[Westheim]

Raccoons (88-61) @ Condors (66-83) – September 22-24, 2008

The Raccoons could be mathematically eliminated as early as this series, depending on how much they would display themselves as fools against a team that had started playing out the string in June. The Condors had allowed a rousing 778 runs (11th in the CL), which was the main key to their failure to procure a decent W-L record. Their rotation was the outright worst with a 5.40 ERA, and the offense had sputtered as well, producing merely the eighth-most runs. The Coons had won four of six from the Condors this year.

Projected matchups:
Kelvin Yates (11-7, 4.30 ERA) vs. Santiago Chavez (9-12, 4.17 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (17-5, 2.10 ERA) vs. Jimmy Sjogren (8-9, 3.74 ERA)
Nick Brown (14-10, 3.52 ERA) vs. Doug Thompson (4-8, 5.56 ERA)

We would get their two best starters (but “best” is sometimes relative), and Sjogren will be the only southpaw we face in this series.

Game 1
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – C Esquivel – P Yates
TIJ: 3B Harris – C Leach – 1B Valenzuela – 2B J. Diaz – CF W. McCormick – RF Barnes – LF B. Román – SS S. Walker – P S. Chavez

Whenever some Condor managed to make contact with Yates’ offerings, you usually heard it well. They drove the ball like crazy off him, which had to lead to runs sooner or later, and it happened sooner. In fact, both teams had 2-out RBI triples hit by their leadoff men in the third inning. While Fletcher flew out to leave Quebell on base, Foster Leach singled to right to score Robbie Harris and give the Condors a 2-1 lead. Through five innings, Yates struck out eight (Chavez struck out none), all other outs being fly outs, and yet the Raccoons kept trailing after having Barrón thrown out at home with the tying run in the fifth inning. Alston was denied extra bases by McCormick in the sixth inning, preventing potential runs there with Fletcher on first base. In the seventh, Martinez led off with a double to left center, but never got further than second base. Foster Leach’s ****ty single remained the difference in the game into the ninth inning, where the good news was that we faced Charlie Deacon and had some drivers up to bat with Alston the first. While Alston hit a leadoff single, Black and Martinez struck out. Yoshi hit a single that moved Alston to third base, bringing up Barrón, who struck out in a hurry. 2-1 Condors. Martinez 2-4, 2B; Esquivel 2-3, 2B; Yates 7.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 12 K, L (11-8);

Well, that was a **** game. We out-hit them 9-4, and the bloody heck didn’t anything ever work out in this game.

Game 2
POR: CF Fletcher – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B R. Martinez – 1B Pruitt – 2B Pollack – P Umberger
TIJ: LF Crum – C Leach – 2B J. Diaz – CF W. McCormick – RF Barnes – 3B Harris – 1B R. Morris – SS S. Walker – P Sjogren

Umberger got unraveled early after Leach lined a ball past his ear in the first inning. He walked Diaz on four pitches to add to Leach on the bases, who had ended up with a single to center. Wes McCormick’s grounder to right defeated Pruitt for an RBI single and the first tally of the game. A Steven Walker triple to lead of an inning would lead to a second run somewhere later, but where was the Raccoons offense? What were they doing? Well, they weren’t scoring any for sure. In a wholly pathetic display of hitting, the team didn’t reach second base at all for five innings, and when they finally managed to move Craig Bowen there with a leadoff double in the sixth, they simply left him there to figure out how to score himself. This was no way to go about baseball in a winning fashion, and the Condors didn’t see a need to remove Jimmy Sjogren in the ninth inning in a 2-0 game. Alston and Black struck out, and Bowen flew out to Johnny Crum as the Raccoons were chocked up in a 5-hitter. 2-0 Condors. Umberger 8.0 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 7 K, L (17-6);

Just like I imagined this season to end. Defeated, and stomped, and suffocated.

Game 3
POR: 1B Quebell – C Esquivel – LF Alston – RF Black – 2B Nomura – 3B Pollack – CF Trevino – SS M. Gutierrez – P Brown
TIJ: CF Ward – C Leach – 1B Valenzuela – 2B J. Diaz – LF Crum – 3B Harris – RF Barnes – SS S. Walker – P D. Thompson

Spotted with a sliver of a 1-0 lead, Nick Brown retired the first 13 Condors he faced, including six strikeouts, before Johnny Crum hit a clean single to right in the bottom 5th. Of course that was soon enough followed by a Robbie Harris single, and in his year of the pest, Brown sure enough walked the bases full in due time before striking out Thompson to finally end the inning. Some air in the score was created in the following top of the sixth. The Duke led off with a single, his first productive AB of the series, before Harris misfielded Yoshi’s grounder into an error. After Pollack struck out, Trevino doubled to right to score the Duke. Gutierrez got walked intentionally, bringing up Nick Brown, who was still batting .294, and with one out. Brown would chop the ball back to the mound, where Thompson fired home for an easy force on Nomura. While Brown stayed out of the double play, Quebell also stayed out of an RBI by flying out to center.

Up 2-0 after six, Esquivel hit a leadoff single before Alston worked a full count walk in the seventh. The Duke gave a ball a ride to right, but not deep enough. Artie Barnes caught it on the track. In the end, it was just enough to create a sac fly by moving Esquivel to third, from where he scored on Nomura’s sac fly to left, 3-0. The next inning we had Gutierrez on first and called a hit-and-run with Brownie batting. Juan Diaz was so confused at second base that he completely botched the easy play on Brown’s soft pop. Quebell would plate Gutierrez with a single, before both Brown and Quebell were driven in by Esquivel with a double. With the lead thoroughly expanded to 6-0, Nick Brown was left out to see whether he could shut out the Condors. A walk in the bottom 8th certainly constituted unnecessary pitches, and he entered the ninth with 102 tosses, facing leadoff batter Tommy Ward, who grounded out to Pollack on the second pitch, and Foster Leach took only one more before flying out to Trevino. Jose Valenzuela would drill the 111th pitch of the game pretty well to center then, but Trevino got that as well. 6-0 Brownies!! Quebell 2-4, BB, RBI; Esquivel 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Alston 2-4, BB, RBI; Trevino 2-5, 2 2B, RBI; Brown 9.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 7 K, W (15-10);

Nick Brown’s sixth career shutout was the first this season, and even the first since 2006. He also spun his first complete game of the year, and has a dozen in total for his career.

We staved off mathematical elimination for another day, but the Crusaders just don’t ever lose …

Raccoons (89-63) @ Titans (86-67) – September 26-28, 2008

The Titans were unhappy with their fourth place and would like to hang it on the Coons. The two teams were almost equal in scoring (which means average), but the Titans were fourth in runs allowed rather than second (Coons). We had beaten them 10-5 so far this year.

Projected matchups:
Brendan Teasdale (0-2, 8.80 ERA) vs. Jorge Chapa (6-2, 2.49 ERA)
Javier Cruz (10-8, 3.98 ERA) vs. Mauro Castro (10-9, 3.51 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (8-10, 3.42 ERA) vs. Jesus Elmore (12-9, 4.51 ERA)

Jorge Chapa was back after missing about four months of the season on the DL. He is the only left-hander we face this weekend, unless the Titans shift something around. This is our final road series of the year. Brownie’s shutout on Wednesday already clinched a winning road record (41-37), but overall we didn’t get nearly enough wins on the road this season.

Game 1
POR: 1B Quebell – CF Fletcher – 3B R. Martinez – RF Black – C Bowen – LF Pruitt – SS Barrón – 2B Pollack – P Teasdale
BOS: 2B D. Silva – LF Garrison – C Suda – RF Brulhart – CF Ja. Gusmán – 1B R. Vargas – 3B M. Austin – SS Nelson – P Chapa

While Chapa appeared to not have missed a beat while being in rehab all summer, the Titans romped over Teasdale quite well. After a perfect first, he was tagged with a run on four singles in the second inning, another run in the third, and more runners, and more singles, and more runners, and even more runners, until they choked him out of the game in the fifth inning. Down 3-0, two on, one out, eight hits and a walk in 4 1/3 innings. Ed Bryan came and ****ed up the game for good with a single to Gusmán and then a bases-loaded walk to Vargas. All runs on Teasdale scored, leaving him with five for this particularly sad start. All his starts had been particularly sad.

Chapa went six and two thirds without showing much weakness or rust at all, and was removed when the Coons had two on in the seventh. Ron Alston hit for Law Rockburn against the Titans’ Law Rivers, but flew out to center. No run came forward in the top half of the line score, while in the bottom 7th Kaz Kichida added to the Titans’ output by allowing a single and three walks before getting peppered the heck outta there. John Richardson actually managed to do worse in the eighth, allowing a single and FOUR walks. The Titans were held to one run only for a double play started by Martinez, so THAT kid does something right ONCE and the whole thing still stinks. The Raccoons were swiftly routed. 7-0 Titans. J. Gutierrez (PH) 1-1;

We were mathematically eliminated with this loss.

Strangely, the longer I think about it, the more it seems like the offense started dying in August. Just after Ron Alston came along. That is strange.

Game 2
POR: 1B Quebell – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – 2B Nomura – 3B R. Martinez – CF Trevino – C Rios – P Cruz
BOS: 2B D. Silva – LF Garrison – C Suda – RF Brulhart – CF Ja. Gusmán – 1B R. Vargas – 3B M. Austin – SS J. Amador – P M. Castro

In a rotten week, the Duke of Smack came up with Barrón on second base and Alston on first base, and less than two outs, not in one, not in two, but in his first THREE plate appearances in the game. He almost hit into an inning-ending double play the first time, but narrowly beat the relay to allow Yoshi to plate the first run of the game with a single in the first inning. In the third inning, he grounded out to third base, moving up the runners, but the Coons only scored on a wild pitch by Castro, 2-0. While Cruz was holding his own so far, we had been around him for long enough to know he needed support eventually. So when the Duke was up with the same two guys on for the third time in the fifth inning, we definitely hoped for some smack. He didn’t disappoint three times. A hard drive to right narrowly missed the fence and instead hit off the wall for a 2-run double! Yoshi would hit another RBI single to bring the Duke home, and the Critters were up by five runs.

And the Duke’s next plate appearance? That came in the sixth, with one out, Barrón on second, and Alston on first, for the FOURTH time in the game. Alston had just singled to score Quebell to run the score to 6-0, but the Duke struck out in a full count and the Coons didn’t score any more in the inning. Sooner or later Cruz had to give up a run, too: Jim Brulhart hit a solo home run in the bottom of the seventh. Another Brulhart homer in the eighth cost Cruz another run, although by then the home run was off Rockburn, the second reliever in the game after Cruz had walked the leadoff man Daniel “Disgust” Silva. The Titans were back within three.

Before that, in the top half of the eighth, Barrón flew out and thus ended the streak of Luke Black coming up with in the ever same base state, but Alston was on with two outs, yet Black grounded out. Manuel Martinez choked his old team in the top 9th, before a Leon Ramirez triple cost Angel Casas a run in the bottom of the inning. He still saved his 45th of the year. 6-4 Critters. Barrón 4-5; Alston 3-3, 2 BB, RBI; Nomura 2-5, 2 RBI; Cruz 7.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 7 K, W (11-8);

Game 3
POR: 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – RF Alston – CF Black – SS Barrón – 3B R. Martinez – 2B Nomura – C Bowen – P Baldwin
BOS: SS J. Amador – LF Garrison – C Suda – RF Brulhart – CF Ja. Gusmán – 1B R. Vargas – 2B Heffer – 3B Ju. Gusmán – P Elmore

“Quasimodo” Suda drove in the first run of the game with a single scoring Jesus Amador, who had doubled to right to start the first inning, but the Raccoons weren’t idle for long. Black walked, Barrón singled, and then Martinez hit a ball over the third base bag that was just fair and amounted to an RBI double and leaving the go-ahead runs in scoring position with no outs for Nomura, who popped out, and Bowen and Baldwin both whiffed. Soon after that raging disappointment it started to rain and a delay occurred in the middle of the third inning. When play resumed over half an hour later, Baldwin was stomped by the Titans for three runs in the third, and left the game with two runners on base in the fourth inning. Matt Cash entered and allowed one run on a Suda single before Brulhart hit into an inning-ending double play. The Raccoons now trailed 5-1 against their former farmhand Elmore, and didn’t really know why.

So it was a good thing they came back for a 3-run fifth of their own, key piece in that a 2-run homer by Alston. The joy was short-lived when the Titans came right back with two runs off Cash in the bottom of the inning, one unearned after an error by a certain third baseman. The Raccoons got the tying run to the plate again in the seventh. Elmore was still pitching after allowing singles to Jose Gutierrez and Pruitt and was now facing Alston. The Titans probably knew this was not the best way to go about things, did so anyway, but didn’t incur the maximum damage. Alston hit a sac fly to center, and while the Duke singled in Pruitt, the Coons remained short at 7-6. Against Manuel Martinez the tying run didn’t get on base until Pruitt’s 2-out single, but at least that brought up Alston and another favorable match, but Alston grounded out to short. 7-6 Titans. Pruitt 2-4, RBI; Barrón 2-4; J. Gutierrez (PH) 1-2; Kichida 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

In other news

September 24 – Other then Portland’s Nick Brown, Nashville’s Stanton Taylor (9-10, 4.69 ERA) also spins a Wednesday 3-hitter in a 7-0 win over the Stars.
September 26 – Both Federal League divisions are clinched on the same Friday. The Stars beat the Wolves on the road, 3-1, to lock up the West regardless of the Warriors’ 1-0 loss to the Pacifics. The Cyclones smash through the Capitals, 13-5, then get the news that the Miners blew their lead late and lost 6-5 to the Buffaloes, with both events in combination locking up the East. The Cyclones will make their sixth playoff appearance and third consecutive, while the Stars will play October baseball for the 10th time, and fourth year in a row. They will tie the Blue Sox for most playoff appearances.
September 26 – Career win #200 has been counted for TOP SP Dan George (10-16, 3.27 ERA), who beats the Miners 6-5 in eight innings of work. 200-176 with a 3.71 ERA for his career, George was a 3-time All Star after initially being taken by the Miners in the supplemental round of the 1991 draft. He wound up with the Indians, for whom he debuted in 1993 and pitched until 1999 before signing with the Buffaloes.
September 28 – The Crusaders lose 8-2 to the Loggers, but get to celebrate their division title anyway after the Canadiens’ 8-3 loss to the Indians becomes final. For the defending champions, this will be their fifth playoff appearance and also the second consecutive one.
September 28 – The Cyclones lose C Felix Hernandez (.256, 4 HR, 57 RBI) for the rest of the year after the 32-year old has suffered a knee sprain.

Complaints and stuff

Jorge Chapa’s choker on Friday was the 2,600th regular season loss for the franchise. We aren’t even close in franchise wins. Some months ago I said that we’d reach 2,600 wins sooner by playing .667 from then. Yeah, me and my big, fat, ugly mouth of lies.

Let’s just say I’ll be glad when this season is over.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (90-65) vs. Indians (79-76) – September 29-October 2, 2008

Final week. We’d play the bottom two in the division once more, starting with the Indians, against whom we had evenly split 14 games so far this year and the Raccoons hadn’t won the season series since 1999. If the Raccoons wouldn’t stop losing (they were soundly under .500 in September), they could well drop to fourth place in the division. The Indians played low-scoring games, with sub-average runs scored and runs allowed.

Projected matchups:
Kelvin Yates (11-8, 4.22 ERA) vs. Bob King (15-9, 3.40 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (17-6, 2.11 ERA) vs. Tom Weise (11-8, 2.35 ERA)
Nick Brown (15-10, 3.36 ERA) vs. Curtis Tobitt (5-2, 2.32 ERA)
Javier Cruz (11-8, 3.93 ERA) vs. Ramón Jimenez (9-13, 4.83 ERA)

We could face four right-handers in this set. No more starts for Brenda. Ain’t much fun watching her fling balls around. In terms of future draft picks, we currently hold the #20 pick for next season. We can’t get better than #17 or worse than #23 anymore. The team we can’t catch anymore, obviously, are the Crusaders… Three Coons are still after invididual silverware. Alston and Black have 31 homers apiece, and trail Charlotte’s Jose Lopez by three. Also, Jong-hoo still leads the ERA race by a few points, but he should stop bleeding runs.

Game 1
IND: LF A. Solís – RF Pacheco – 1B Tsung – C Paraz – CF Luxton – 3B Sharp – 2B Mathews – SS R. Miller – P King
POR: 1B Quebell – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – CF Trevino – P Yates

The Coons scored first when Ricardo Martinez hit his 12th home run, a solo piece, in the second inning. A Trevino leadoff single and some small ball led to a second run in the third inning. Meanwhile Yates was struggling with ill control, walking two in the first inning, and stranded pairs of runners three times in the first four innings. In the bottom 4th the Duke missed his 32nd homer by not much at all, settled for a leadoff double, but scored after a Bowen single and Nomura double. Trevino was walked intentionally, pulling up Yates with the bases loaded and one out. Yates hit into a force at home to get Bowen erased, but Quebell would ticket a hopper up the middle into center to bring in two more runs for a 5-0 lead. Yates solved his issues in the middle innings, and ran up the strikeout count, whiffing eleven batters in total over seven and a third, after which he crossed 110 pitches and was removed. Parker and Richardson completed a 4-hit shutout over the Indians. 5-0 Furballs. Quebell 2-4, 3 RBI; Martinez 2-4, HR, 2B, RBI; Trevino 1-1, BB; Yates 7.1 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 11 K, W (12-8);

Looks like Yates is over his mid-season malaise. Too bad it doesn’t count for anything anymore. Although, despite the fact that he didn’t start any games for a month, he is now back up to third place in strikeouts in the Continental League.

Game 2
IND: LF A. Solís – RF Pacheco – 1B Tsung – C Paraz – CF Luxton – 3B Sharp – 2B Mathews – SS R. Miller – P Weise
POR: 1B Quebell – SS Barrón – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – 2B Nomura – CF Trevino – P Umberger

Weise was a 24-year old rookie who had a splendid ERA, but a wonky 1.48 WHIP and a K/BB rate that barely outpaced 1.3. The ERA was probably fake. Again the Raccoons scored first with a home run in the second inning, and this time it was the Duke’s 32nd piece, almost dead to center. Luke Black also opened an assault in the fourth inning with a double to left. Weise continued to surrender hard hits, a single to Martinez and a double to Bowen that plated both runners, all to the left side. Umberger was nursing a no-hitter through four innings in unspectacular manner, but had it in time broken up by Robbie Luxton’s leadoff single in the fifth. Ryan Miller (of course) would double him in to get the Indians back to 3-1. Solís and Pacheco drew 4-pitch walks from Jong-hoo to start the sixth, but Tsung, Paraz, and Luxton struck out in order. Umberger held out for 6 2/3 innings before walking Miller and getting removed. The lead, now 4-1 after another Martinez homer, was carefully tended to by Donald Sims and Angel Casas. The latter allowed a leadoff single to Jose Paraz in the ninth, but Sharpie hit into a double play to end the game. 4-1 Coons. Black 2-4, HR, 2B, RBI; Martinez 2-3, HR, RBI; Umberger 6.2 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 4 BB, 7 K, W (18-6) and 2-2; Sims 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

Umberger, a legendarily pathetic hitter so far, raised his batting average all the way to .110 with this offensive outburst. His lead in the ERA race is now 18 points over NYC Greg Connor. In the home run race, Jose Lopez also hit a home run on Tuesday to get to 35, so the Duke didn’t gain anything and time is almost out.

Game 3
IND: 2B Mathews – 3B Sharp – C Paraz – 1B Tsung – RF Pacheco – SS R. Miller – LF Luxton – CF Harrigan – P Tobitt
POR: CF Fletcher – 1B Pruitt – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – SS Barrón – 2B Nomura – C Esquivel – P Brown

Nick Brown easily had the most unenviable matchup in this series, a Curtis Tobitt nursed back to health and angry about a missed season. Brownie had an outside chance at reaching 1,600 career strikeouts in this game if he whiffed 11, and while he exterminated four batters the first time through the order, every single one of them struck out in a full count and his pitch count accordingly was on the rise quickly. Sharp drew a leadoff walk in the fourth inning and the Indians would rap out three singles in the inning to spot two runs on Brown, who did not pitch with second inning power support, but still struck out eight through four innings. Sharp would also hit his first home run of the season off Brown in the fifth inning, giving the Indians a 3-0 lead, while Tobitt was still facing the minimum. At least that was bound to chance. The Duke led off the bottom 5th with a single to left, and Martinez would double into the left corner. That gave us two men in scoring position and the tying run at the plate with no outs, and while neither of the next two batters exactly kept the line moving, Black scored on Barrón’s groundout, and Nomura’s floater to left center was juggled by Luxton and finally dropped for an error. In a dumb move, Nomura then strolled off first base and got picked off, just before Esquivel and Brown hit singles. When Fletcher also singled, the tying run could have long been in, but now it was Pruitt with the bases loaded, and he looked at strike three. Brown was done after six innings, whiffing nine, and left trailing 3-2. The Coons had Quebell on after a pinch-hit leadoff single in the bottom 8th, only for Fletcher to bunt into a double play. That was the killing blow for this game. 3-2 Indians. Black 2-4; Quebell (PH) 1-1;

Greg Connor took the loss in the Crusaders’ 7-2 defeat to the Elks, allowing three earned runs in 8.1 innings and raising his ERA by three points, which now makes Jong-hoo’s lead more or less secure despite him pitching the season finale.

Ron Alston is oh-fer in this series and stuck at 199 hits for the year…

Game 4
IND: LF A. Solís – RF Pacheco – 1B Tsung – C Paraz – CF Luxton – 2B Mathews – 3B Kilters – SS R. Miller – P Jimenez
POR: 1B Quebell – 2B Nomura – LF Alston – RF Black – 3B R. Martinez – C Bowen – SS Barrón – CF Trevino – P Ja. Cruz

Alston’s knot got resolved in the first inning with the third straight single for the Raccoons, loading the bases. Black flew out to shallow right, keeping everybody pinned, but Martinez’ bases-loaded walk pushed in the first run of the game. After Bowen’s sac fly Jimenez was almost out of the woods, but wound up surrendering 2-out RBI singles to both Barrón and Trevino as the Critters put up an early 4-spot. The Critters also had Jimenez out of the game after three innings, with Alston and Barrón chucking solo home runs off him to put the brown team up 6-0 after three. We faced reliever Kevin Edwards in the fourth inning. Yoshi led off with a single before Alston cracked another bomb to move the score to 8-0, pass the Duke in home runs on the team, and move up to within two of Jose Lopez’ mark. The game soon degraded from contest to free-for-all. Barrón hit a single to start the bottom 5th before Trevino rammed a homer off Edwards (who was then removed to be euthanized) and give the Coons a 10-0 lead. This was the end point for the Critters in this game. Little was to be said about Cruz, normally not a man to voluntarily pitch with a big lead, but in this game he was quietly efficient, removing batters at a steady pace and although he was already at 107 pitches he went into the ninth inning still aiming for that shutout, but he would have to contend with Tsung, Paraz, and Luxton and their 60 combined home runs. Tsung made it 61, and Cruz went to bed. Ed Bryan finished the game. 10-1 Critters. Quebell 2-5; Nomura 2-4, BB; Alston 4-5, 2 HR, 3 RBI; Martinez 2-4, BB, RBI; Barrón 3-4, HR, 2 RBI; Trevino 2-3, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Cruz 8.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 6 K, W (12-8) and 1-4;

Raccoons (93-66) vs. Loggers (61-98) – October 3-5, 2008

The Loggers hadn’t had much fun this year, with their third-worst offense and fourth-worst pitching, and stuck at the bottom of the best division in baseball. The Raccoons had stripped them to a 12-3 tune so far, and they had probably less than great chances to stay out of 100 losses.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (8-11, 3.64 ERA) vs. Fernando Cruz (8-15, 5.05 ERA)
Kelvin Yates (12-8, 4.05 ERA) vs. William Lloyd (9-13, 4.89 ERA)
Jong-hoo Umberger (18-6, 2.08 ERA) vs. A.J. Bartels (1-7, 5.24 ERA)

Cruz and Lloyd should be the only left-handers we get this week, unless the Loggers pull Martin Garcia (10-12, 2.82 ERA) into this series.

Game 1
MIL: 1B K. Scott – 3B Tolwith – RF Hiwalani – LF T. Austin – 2B M. Clark – SS T. Johnson – CF J. Garcia – C J. Reyes – P F. Cruz
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B R. Martinez – LF Alston – RF Black – CF Fletcher – SS Barrón – 2B Pollack – C Rios – P Baldwin

The Duke of Smack wasn’t giving up on that Home Run Hammer just yet. With the team already ahead 1-0 after a Martinez double, the runner moving up on Alston’s fly out and a passed ball blamed on Jesus Reyes, Black homered to left quite decisively to create a 2-0 lead and tie Alston again for 33 homers, two behind Jose Lopez. Too bad that Colin Baldwin imploded the lead in record time. He allowed a 2-run homer to Jesus Reyes in the second inning, then a solo piece to Aaron Tolwith in the third, sending the Coons trailing 3-2, and departed after five innings with a strained oblique suffered while running the bases. The Loggers scored another run off Rockburn and Bryan in the seventh inning, but Cruz’ shop had closed to the Critters after that first inning, they just couldn’t get to him. Sometimes facing the closer in the ninth renews hope, like when he has a 4.05 ERA like the Loggers’ Micah Steele. Martinez grounded out before Alston hit a single to left to bring up the tying run in the Duke, but Steele hung K’s on both Black and Pruitt. 4-2 Loggers. Quebell 2-4;

With this loss we can still tie the Elks for second place, tie the Titans for fourth place, and can wind up between #19 and #22 in next year’s draft.

Jose Lopez didn’t hit one out, leaving both Alston and Black two swaths out.

Game 2
MIL: CF J.R. Richardson – SS T. Johnson – RF Hiwalani – C Baca – 3B Tolwith – 2B K. Scott – LF J. Garcia – 1B S. Johnson – P Lloyd
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B R. Martinez – LF Alston – RF Black – CF Fletcher – C Bowen – SS Barrón – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Yates

The Loggers’ defense didn’t get a good start. Quebell reached only on a funny bounce of his hard grounder off Spencer Johnson’s glove that was not ruled an error, but Tolwith was charged an error for mishandling Martinez’ grounder. Alston singled up the middle to load the bases for the Duke, who didn’t get all of a 2-2 pitch and had his fly to left caught just short of the warning track by Jaime Garcia. That sac fly was all the Raccoons got with Fletcher and Bowen flying out softly to right. Soon our own defense let up. Quebell dropped a foul 0-2 pop off J.R. Richardson’s bat in the third inning, leaving the batter alive long enough to hit a single. Tom Johnson then promptly homered off Yates to give the Loggers a 2-1 lead. Over five innings, Yates struck out ten batters, but also managed to give up another 3-run homer to Alonso Baca. He pitched two more innings and finished with 13 K eventually, but the offense was just lame. Alston drove in a run in the bottom 5th with a 2-out single, but nothing grand was happening, and Lloyd was stumping the Furballs all the way through seven innings. The Loggers added a run charged to Matt Cash in the top 8th, moving away to 6-2, before Dave Walk appeared in relief in the bottom 8th. Martinez singled, Alston doubled, and suddenly the Raccoons appeared back in business. They were out of it about as sudden. Black only managed a run-scoring groundout, and Fletcher struck out. Scott Boone then struck out Bowen. 6-3 Loggers. Quebell 2-4; Alston 3-4, 2B, RBI;

Blech. Yates tied Brownie for second place in CL strikeouts with this outing. How can you allow five runs and simultaneously strike out 13!?

The Elks beat the Titans fiercely, 11-1, this Saturday to lock up third place for the Raccoons. Home run race unchanged, and Jong-hoo will go into the final game with 21 points of ERA of cushion over Greg Connor.

Oh, and here comes Martin Garcia. Old man doesn’t need rest.

Game 3
MIL: 2B K. Scott – SS T. Johnson – RF Hiwalani – LF T. Austin – C Baca – 3B Tolwith – CF J. Garcia – 1B Lewis – P M. Garcia
POR: 1B Quebell – 3B R. Martinez – LF Alston – RF Black – CF Fletcher – 2B Nomura – SS Barrón – C Esquivel – P Umberger

Ever seen a fireball in a ballpark? That was Jong-hoo Umberger, wannabe Pitcher of the Year, in the first inning. The Loggers whacked him every which way, hard line drives to all spaces imaginable and unimaginable, and the Raccoons defense did its worst to allow four runs (three earned) to score in the first inning. That casually shot his ERA from 2.08 to 2.20 and quite close to Connor’s 2.29 mark. The Raccoons had runners on the corners for the Duke, who cued the ball right into a double play, and didn’t score. Black plated a run with a single in the third inning, but Nomura would finally strike out with the bases loaded. A Caleb Lewis error opened a door in the fifth, putting Martinez on base in addition to Quebell with no outs. Alston grounded out, but Black lined a single to right that Hiwalani took a long time to cut off and play, and both runners scored, getting back to 4-3. Umberger had nursed himself through to here allowing only one more run after that disastrous first, but a Tolwith homer ended his season with one out in the sixth. The Coons got their own chance in the bottom 6th with 2-out singles by Esquivel and Jose Cruz pulling up Quebell with an RBI opportunity. Quebell singled to right center to score Esquivel, but Martinez struck out with the game still not tied, the Raccoons down 5-4. A Martinez error put the leadoff man for the Loggers aboard with Bruno pitching in the eighth, but Bruno would eventually wiggle out of two on, no outs, to keep the Loggers where they were, and struck out the side in the ninth. Leonard Williamson pitched the bottom 9th, a left-hander, and we started with Trevino in the #9 hole, whose groundout was about the furthest the Raccoons came to a rally. 5-4 Loggers. Quebell 3-5, RBI; Black 2-4, 3 RBI; Jo. Cruz (PH) 1-1; Bruno 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 4 K;

In other news

September 29 – NYC LF/RF Martin Ortíz (.302, 25 HR, 106 RBI) has five hits, including two home runs, and drives in six runs in the Crusaders’ 11-2 smashing of the Canadiens.
September 30 – WAS SP Chris York (21-9, 3.16 ERA) will miss his last start of the 2008 season with a mild shoulder strain.
October 2 – It’s late in the season but not too late for greatness: SAL OF Pat Buckholtz (.294, 5 HR, 35 RBI) hits for the cycle in a 13-5 trouncing of the Wolves over the Scorpions, going 4-for-4 with 3 RBI. It is the first cycle this year, and the 42nd in league history. The Wolves have not had a cycle since 1982, when Carlos León hit for not one, but two of them. Once before had a cycle been hit for on October 2, five years ago, when Dallas’ Vitantonio Cavalleri achieved the feat.
October 4 – VAN 1B Tony Ramos (.303, 17 HR, 98 RBI) has a 20-game hitting streak going with two hits in the Canadiens’ 11-1 rout of the Titans.

Complaints and stuff

Okay, first season series taken off the Indians in this millennium, we will chalk that up to the plus side.

That is everything we will chalk up on the plus side.

Finally the season is over. Can’t wait to get home. There’s a stash of boxed chocolate and Capt’n Coma that needs falling into.

[phillyboy19]

It's a step in the right direction I would look for better OBP guys because as a team you weren't the best in that and could improve apon it.

[Westheim]

2008 ABL PLAYOFFS

For the first time in league history, the playoff field for the 2008 season was identical to that of the previous season, with all four teams from last year qualifying again this year. Even the top two seeds were identical, and only the #3 and #4 seed were switched.

In the Federal League, the 101-61 Stars had posted the best record with a fundamentally, all-around sound team. They had conceded the least runs in the FL, with the top ERA marks for both starters and the bullpen, and had scored the second-most runs, with a +209 run differential. They had no significant injuries, although outfielder César Morán was listed as day-to-day for the first two games, and SP Elwood Spurrell had only just returned from the DL after missing more than half of the season. His 2.20 ERA mark was the best on the staff, which was otherwise led by Paul Miller (19-8, 3.62 ERA). While all their starters were right-handed, they had four left-handed pitchers in the bullpen ready to extinguish any significant threat. Their lineup featured five batters over .300, and four of those (Morán, John Alexander, Hector Garcia, Daniel Richardson) had also hit 12 or more home runs. Alexander had led the team with a .303 clip, 26 HR and 142 RBI. Nobody in the FL had hit more home runs than him.

The Cyclones hadn’t looked good against the Stars last year. They had won a weak FL East with a 92-70 record, and mirrored the Stars in that they were first in runs scored and second in runs allowed. Their run differential was however markedly less stellar, at +174. The Cyclones certainly weren’t stacking up too well against the Stars, and had lost six of the nine games played during the regular season, usually on excessive violence dealt to the Cyclones pitching staff. The Stars lineup was loaded with left-handed bats, and the Cyclones had an all-right-handed rotation, and their only reliable left-handed reliever was also their closer, Ian Johnson (1.43, ERA, 38 SV). If things were going wrong, they had a hard time reacting. Their lineup was also stacked with six .300+ batters, although one of those was backup catcher Robert Rucker, who had to sub for the injured primary catcher Felix Hernandez and hadn’t gotten much exposure during the year. The Cyclones weren’t hitting for power though, but were playing a constricting type of ball on loading the bases and waiting for that 3-run double. It had certainly worked for most of the regular season, but they didn’t have anybody on the club with more than 12 home runs.

The offensive lines all had their advantages, but the Stars had the left-handed relief strength the Cyclones lacked bitterly, and that alone should be enough to tilt the series in the favor of the Stars. The Cyclones had nobody to shut down f.e. John Alexander, a left-hander in the heart of a dangerous lineup. Stars in six!

In the Federal League, the defending champions 105-57 Crusaders had posted the best record in baseball in the best division in baseball. They ranked first in most important categories, like runs scored and runs allowed, with a +244 differential, and held the almost unique distinction of leading the league in home runs and being just narrowly beaten out for the most stolen bases, ranking second in that regard. Their offensive threat knew multiple angles of attack against opposing pitchers, with a terrorizing leadoff man in Roberto Pena (.344, 17 HR, 63 RBI) and two killers in the middle in the Martin Brothers, Martin Ortíz (.303, 26 HR, 109 RBI) and Stanton Martin (.282, 26 HR, 141 RBI), who themselves were defended by two more .300 batters, like veteran Sonny Reece in the #5 hole, batting .306 with 15 HR and 90 RBI. It WAS a fearsome lineup! Of course they had allowed the least runs, so the pitching couldn’t be all that bad, either. They were led by Greg Connor (22-7, 2.29 ERA), with three strong supporters in the mid-3 ERA range, and had a fantastic back end to their pen, with three capable closers ready to kill any offense in the late innings, with Robbie Wills (1.89 ERA) and Scott Hood (2.38 ERA) taking a step back to Iemitsu Rin (1.68 ERA, 41 SV). If anything their middle relief was *a little* weak, but when where they ever gonna need it?

The 91-71 Falcons had run away with a CL South that finished a collective 92 games under .500, with no team within even 18 games of the Falcons in the final tally. This Falcons team wasn’t all that good, to be honest. They had the insane luck of playing with a good set of players (not a great one, though) in a horrendous division. They had the ABL home run king on the roster in 2B/3B Jose Lopez (.286, 36 HR, 129 RBI), but aside from that had to patch their lineup to cover for the injury cases of Javy Rodriguez and Fernando Chavez. Their rotation hung on Larry Cutts (15-11, 3.25 ERA) and a 36-year old Steve Rogers, who had missed almost the entire season to injury and had not won a regular season major league game in 2008, and the bullpen was not *bad*, but not good either. Overall the team had scored the third-most runs, but had been merely average in runs allowed, with a +99 potential.

Forecast? Crusaders, Crusaders, Crusaders! Crusaders all day long.

***

2008 LEAGUE CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES

Falcons @ Crusaders … 5-3 … (Falcons lead 1-0) … CHA Jose Lopez 2-4, HR, 3 RBI; CHA Steve Rogers picks up his first W of the season

Falcons @ Crusaders … 2-12 … (series tied 1-1) … NYC Ramón Garza 3-4, BB, RBI; NYC Martin Ortíz 3-4, BB, 3 RBI; NYC Daryl Anderson 3-4, BB, 2 HR, 2B, 4 RBI;
Cyclones @ Stars … 3-6 … (Stars lead 1-0) … DAL Hector Garcia 2-4, 4 RBI; both teams have 10 hits apiece, but the Cyclones don’t score until the ninth

Cyclones @ Stars … 0-7 … (Stars lead 2-0) … DAL Zak Davidson 3-5, RBI; DAL Hector Garcia 2-4, BB, 2 HR, 4 RBI; DAL Elwood Spurrell 7.0 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 6 K, W;

Crusaders @ Falcons … 6-3 … (Crusaders lead 2-1) … NYC Bob Butler 2-4, HR, RBI; CHA Sadaharu Ishikawa 2-3, BB, HR, RBI;

Crusaders @ Falcons … 10-11 (10) … (series tied 2-2) … NYC Ramón Garza 3-6, 2B, RBI; NYC Francisco Caraballo 2-4, 2 BB, 2B, 3 RBI; CHA Jesus Flores 3-5; CHA Jose Lopez 3-5, HR, 4 RBI; CHA Steve Moore 2-4, BB, HR, 2 RBI; both starters allow six runs in less than five innings in a massacre that never stops
Stars @ Cyclones … 7-6 … (Stars lead 3-0) … DAL Hector Garcia 3-3, 2 BB, RBI; DAL Armando Rodriguez 2-4, BB, 2 RBI; CHA Will Bailey 3-5, 3B, 3 RBI; six of the Stars’ seven runs are unearned

Crusaders @ Falcons … 9-2 … (Crusaders lead 3-2) … NYC Martin Ortíz 3-5; NYC Francisco Caraballo 3-4, BB, 2B, 3 RBI; NYC Bob Butler 2-5, HR, 3 RBI;
Stars @ Cyclones … 4-2 … (Stars win 4-0) … DAL Paul Miller 7.2 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, W;

Falcons @ Crusaders … 8-5 … (series tied 3-3) … CHA Jose Lopez 3-4, HR, 4 RBI; CHA Antonio Ramirez (PH) 2-2, 3B; NYC Francisco Caraballo 2-4, HR, 4 RBI (grand slam in the first inning);

Falcons @ Crusaders … 2-7 … (Crusaders win 4-3) … CHA Jose Lopez 3-4, 2B; NYC Martin Ortíz 1-4, HR, 3 RBI (game-winning 3-run homer in the seventh); NYC Francisco Caraballo 3-4, HR, 2B, RBI;

Well, I never claimed to know an ounce about this game.

***

The Crusaders had considerable more problems in their league championship series than the Stars, but ultimately the two favored teams pulled through to give baseball fans a rematch of the 2007 World Series, which the Crusaders had taken in five games. This is the first time that two consecutive World Series feature the same two teams since the Capitals and Raccoons matched up three years in a row from 1991 through 1993. It has not happened before that.

The Crusaders won the crown in 1979 and 2007. The Stars were victorious in 1983, 1988, and 2006.

The Crusaders did not accumulate injuries, while the Stars got healthier with a fully healed César Morán.

While it is hard to compare two teams that played only three games against another in the regular season (the Crusaders came out on top 2-1), the Crusaders seem to have the slightly better pitching staff, including a healthier rotation over the course of the season, and the stronger back end to the bullpen, but they also have only one left-hander outside of Iemitsu Rin to carefully place amongst the left-handed leaning lineup the Stars will put up, perhaps even against left-handed starter David Estrada (14-11, 3.55 ERA). The Crusaders’ left-handed batters (Pena, Ortíz, Reece) are spaced out, but the Stars have enough relievers to slap all of them. Offensively, the Stars might hold a slight edge.

This is almost too close to call. The Crusaders won more games in a tougher division, so perhaps that can be an indicator that they are the better team overall. Whichever way the baseball gods’ pendulum may swing, it should be a long series.

***

2008 WORLD SERIES

Stars @ Crusaders … 5-4 … (Stars lead 1-0) … DAL John Alexander 1-3, BB, 3B, 2 RBI; NYC Stanton Martin 2-4, 3B;

Stars @ Crusaders … 3-4 (13) … (series tied 1-1) … NYC Melvin Dunn 2-3, 2 BB, RBI; Martin Ortíz walks off the Crusaders with an RBI double off Kevin Wanless

Crusaders @ Stars … 9-2 … (Crusaders lead 2-1) … NYC Roberto Pena 3-5; NYC Ramón Garza 3-4, BB, 2 2B; NYC Stanton Martin 3-5, 2B, 3 RBI; NYC Sonny Reece 4-5, HR, 5 RBI; NYC Greg Connor 7.2 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, W;

Crusaders @ Stars … 1-4 … (series tied 2-2) … DAL Armando Rodriguez 2-4, HR, RBI; DAL Paul Miller 8.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 1 K, W; Miller moves to 4-0 in the postseason

Crusaders @ Stars … 9-7 (10) … (Crusaders lead 3-2) … NYC Ramón Garza 4-6, HR, 2 RBI; NYC Apasyu Britton (PH) 1-1, 2 RBI; DAL Dennis Berman 3-5, HR, 2B, 3 RBI;

Stars @ Crusaders … 6-2 … (series tied 3-3) … DAL Joe Cowan 2-4, HR, 3 RBI; NYC Bob Evans 2.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 5 K;

Stars @ Crusaders … 3-11 … (Crusaders win 4-3) … NYC Roberto Pena 3-4, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; NYC Ramón Garza 3-5, HR, 2 RBI; NYC Sonny Reece 3-5, RBI; game is blown open in a 7-run third inning

Yuck, the Crusaders.

2008 WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONS
NEW YORK CRUSADERS
(3rd title)