[Westheim]

Just two weeks into the season, I already had made major changes to the lineup: CF Clark – 2B Nixon – LF Hall – 1B Cook (Johnston) – RF Sánz – SS Simon – C Bocci – 3B Green.

Sánz, Simon, and Bocci were terribly cold at the moment, and Hall also did not hit a lot of balls, but he walked once per game on average. Of course, Sánz had back spasms, so he would miss the first two Knights games.

Raccoons (9-6) vs. Knights (5-10)

Both teams were on each other’s throats the whole game, never getting more than a 1-run lead. The Raccoons lost Daniel Hall to an oblique strain suffered hustling into first base on an infield single. Christopher Powell left after seven with a 3-2 lead, but the Raccoons blew it in the eighth. Paul Cooper loaded the bases in the top 9th, but Grant West got out of the jam. For the first time this season, the Raccoons went to a 10th inning. To celebrate, the pitchers of both teams really started to rock and held batters down into the 14th inning, where Ralph Nixon slammed a solo shot to left center to walk off the Raccoons, 4-3. My pitchers whiffed 13 (Powell and Moran both five, West three). Knights punched 11. Simon, Cox, Bocci all were 0-6. Johnston was 0-5 with 4 K’s.

Daniel Hall would be out for about a week and was not sent to the DL. With Sánz also still down, I only had three outfielders available, and two of them had trouble to even hit a monster truck with their bat.

Jack Pennington carried a no-hitter into the eighth inning, before 3B Marvin Martin broke it up with a double. Martin came around to score, and Pennington was successlessly pinch hit for in the bottom 8th. Gaston walked three in the top 9th, before ending the game with a 3-1 win for the Raccoons.

Ben Green blew the Indians’ effort against Oklahoma City and the Thunder won 5-3. The Raccoons thus were back in first place in the CL North.

The Raccoons then quickly took a 6-0 lead in game 3 of the series, expanding it to 7-0 in the fourth inning. All looked well and relaxed, but then the Knights put up a 4-run seventh inning that made things close again. Grant West worked a strong 1.2 innings after Coleman and Jenkins had been ineffective, and Gaston came on to retire the last batter, righty shortstop Claudio Moreno to complete the sweep with a 7-4 win.

The Indians were swept by the Thunder, which meant that we now were 1.5 games ahead again, just as we had been before the horrible series in Indianapolis. Bad news: Thunder was up next.

By the way, the four teams that have finished dead bottom each of the last three years, are not that bad to start the season:
Raccoons: 1st place, 12-6
Gold Sox: 2nd place, 12-7, 2 GB of Pacifics
Miners: 4th place, 9-9, 2 GB of Cyclones and Rebels
Condors: 4th place, 9-10, 5 GB of Falcons
At one point about ten days ago, we all had been tied for second place in our divisions, or better. Compare to the four division winners last year. The Scorpions are 8-11 after a major restructuring of their championship team, while the other three are all 11-8 at this point. First place teams: 41-35. Last place teams: 42-32.

Raccoons (12-6) vs. Thunder (11-8)

Here was one of those first place teams from last year. Their pen had an ERA of 5.27, so there was one thing to work on: get their starter out (although those also only had an ERA of 4.10) and hurt their relievers. By the way, the Raccoons starters had an ERA of 2.71, 2nd behind the Falcons.

First up was the duel of Gary Simmons (0-2, 3.79 ERA) and Ralph Hoyles (0-1, 6.38 ERA). One should not make wrong assumptions about Hoyles from that numbers. He was a 76-game winner with a 2.72 ERA lifetime, all with Oklahoma. Simmons seemed to pitch the game of his life. With a 1-0 lead thanks to a Hoyt Cook homer, he dueled with Hoyles through the eighth. Simmones whiffed ten on the way and stayed in. With one out, Felipe Hernandez singled, and Dylan Milley came up and sunk the ball into the left field stands. Raffaele Antuofermo kept the Raccoons at bay in the ninth and we lost 2-1. And it hurt.

Logan Evans surrendered a bases clearing double to opposing pitcher Morton Jennings in the second inning of game 2, shoveling his own grave. He took the 4-0 loss. Raccoons had four hits, up 33% from the day before.

Christopher Powell had his issues in the last game. The Raccoons brought their bats again and tied a 3-2 deficit in the fourth, then added two in the fifth. Thunder scored once off Powell in the sixth and we now held a tiny 5-4 lead. West pitched a flawless eighth, then even came to bat in the bottom 8th, since lefty SS Gary Reed was to lead off the top 9th. West singled, but the Raccoons did not score. Orlando Torres came to pinch hit for Reed and Wally Gaston was brought in. Torres singled and Edward Evans walked, but the Raccoons then got a double play and Felipe Hernandez popped out to Johnston to end it with a 5-4 win for the Raccoons.

The Raccoons finished April with a 13-8 record, first in the CL North, 1.5 ahead of the Indians, and 2.5 ahead of the Titans, our next opponents.

Nicolas Castillo won rookie of the month with a .390, 3 HR, 11 RBI month for the Canadiens. I had traded him for three players, foremost Jerry Ackerman, who had a 7.00 ERA at the AA level. Uh-oh, next awful trade here?

Raccoons (13-8) @ Titans (11-11)

Daniel Hall was not available for the first game of the series due to the oblique strain he had suffered a week ago. We were missing his output a bit, with only six runs in the Thunder series. That would not be enough against Boston either.

The Raccoons scored five early off Kevin Williams, and with Pennington on the mound looked pretty confident. Penninton had a small lapse in the fifth and was taken deep by Frank Whitfield to make it 5-2, but the Raccoons immediately restored the old gap in the top 6th, 7-2. The Titans got another run off Pennington, but the Raccoons bats had just gotten warm and did some more damage. We won 11-3 on 18 hits. Clark 4-5 with a double and a home run, 1 RBI. Green 4-5 with a home run, 3 RBI. Cook 3-6. Ben Simon was the only batter without a hit, never reached base, and scored one on a sac fly. Pennington even walked twice and scored a run (that was even on the Simon sac fly). Pitchers whiffed nine (6:3 between Pennington and Cooper).

Daniel Hall came back for game 2 and was inserted in the #3 spot. He went 0-3 with a walk and was nailed in the game. Logan Evans pitched well, working out of jams in the third and seventh innings, and he struck out the side in the fifth. With the Raccoons up 6-0, Carlos Moran came on to pitch the eighth and ninth. He covered one inning fine, but loaded the bags in the ninth with nobody out. Jenkins walked in a run. Grant “Demon” West came on and struck out the side to end the game, 6-1 Raccoons!

After these two games, Bruce Wright brought the Raccoons offense to a total, complete, screeching halt. They only had four hits again in the last game and lost 1-0, courtesy of a Brian Adams home run off an otherwise very good Gary Simmons, who was now 0-4 with a 2.94 ERA. There was some screaming in the locker room after the game, why didn’t give their teammate any run support.

Anyway, you win some, you lose some. We were 5-1 against the Titans this year, and 38-40 (.487) all time – the best ratio the Raccoons had against any Continental league team. There were four Federal League teams where we had a 3-3 record. Two of them (Cyclones and Blue Sox) were up for play this year, the other two (Miners and Pacifics) not. Well, not playing the red hot Pacifics (18-7) was probably a good idea.

We had gained a game in the CL North, 2.5 and 3.5 ahead of Indians and Titans, respectively, now. We were 93-77 in runs scored/against, which was 9th in offense, but 1st in defense. Our on field defense was also 1st in the league. The latter was one I was watching closely. I was putting great emphasis on the defensive abilities of players. Pitcher never win a game alone, their eight team mates have to catch some balls in any case. Errors can lose you games very quickly. The team had nine errors so far, best in the CL, and tied for best with the Warriors overall. By contrast: the Crusaders had 20 errors, plating 21 unearned runs. The Raccoons had only six of those.

Raccoons (15-9) @ Canadiens (11-13)

The Raccoons didn’t hit a lot in game 1, and they lost Daniel Hall, who broke his foot, only back in the lineup for three days. He’d miss at least three weeks into late May. Hall had slid into second trying to break up a double play – that he accomplished, but then he was carried off. Something sparked right there with the rest of the team, and they went on to score four in that inning to turn a 1-0 deficit around. Peterson slugged a 3-run double. With a fine outing by Ocasio, who had five hits and four walks against him in seven frames, the Raccoons won the game 5-1. But we lost Daniel Hall’s .246 / .436 / .316 line. Little power, but on base all the time, and Sherwood Henderson would not be able to cover that in the long run.

We sent Hall to the 15-day DL after the game, and I had a choice between Troy Scott and Fernando Gonzalez to replace him as fifth outfielder. I went with Scott, since Gonzalez’ only effective position was rightfield, which was also Pedro Sánz. Scott could play everywhere on the grass. This also was the first roster change of the season for the Raccoons.

I would try lefty Scott against righty pitchers, and righty Henderson against lefties. We’d see how far we’d come with this.

But wait. Did I say that Henderson was no run producer? He launched a grand slam in the sixth inning of game 2, part of a 6-run inning that got the Raccoons ahead 7-1. Hoyt Cook had hit a home run earlier in the game. Miguel Guzman hit a grand slam for the Canadiens in the bottom 8th. Coleman and Bojorquez had loaded the bases and Grant West had surrendered the homer, for his first earned run of the year. Troy Scott doubled in a run, he had entered the game earlier as pinch hitter, in the top 9th. Wally Gaston failed to save it and loaded the bags with one run already in and one out. Jenkins came out of the pen to get Guzman, who grounded to Nixon for a game-ending double play. Raccoons won 8-6, but Gaston’s troubles were a problem by now.

Gaston’s ERA had gone up to 7.56 and combined with Jenkins’ 10.80 and Bojorquez 9.64 ERA’s there were a few who had had their issues.

The Canadiens got just three hits against the Raccoons in the last game, but scored three runs with it. Pennington was charged with one small ball run, and Cooper later gave up 2-run shot to – whom? Right! – Nicolas Castillo. Raccoons lost 3-1, landing only four hits themselves.

Since the Indians won 3 of 4 against the Loggers in Milwaukee, our lead in the CL North shrunk to 2 games. Titans 4 behind. Interleague play was up next with the Wolves and Cyclones.

Raccoons (17-10) @ Wolves (11-17)

Bocci scored two runs early for the Raccoons in game 1, but Logan Evans had a horrible fifth inning and the Wolves scored all runs they needed in a 4-2 loss for us. We had out-hit the Wolves 9-8, but hadn’t gotten the job done.

Part of the problems we had offensively was Ben Simon. He was batting .192 and well into May now this was a problem that at some point needed to be addressed. He was a defensive cornerstone, but I could drop him further than eighth in the batting order…

Simmons didn’t pitch well in game 2. Every run the Raccoons gave him, he immediately surrendered again. He left after five, with the game 5-5, and it remained like that through nine. Jenkins got the bags full in the bottom 9th with one out, but Simon drilled a grounder to home to nail a runner and Jenkins punched out the next to send the game to extra innings. All for nothing: Angel Mejia led off the bottom 10th with a homer and the Wolves walked off, 6-5. It was Mejia’s first hit of the season. A 3-run bomb had been homer #7 for Nixon, giving him the CL lead.

The Roman Ocasio I knew and hated came back and allowed the Wolves to sweep the series. He walked seven and the Raccoons lost 8-1. The pen was awful as well and at the same time we only had four hits. The only Raccoons run was unearned.

Pedro Sánz, 30, signed a 2-yr, $760k extension with us, removing the first potential free agent from the list. His current contract came in at $375k a year, so this was not a big raise at all.

Raccoons (17-13) vs. Cyclones (17-13)

The Cyclones were up and I had a very bad feeling. Their starters were struggling a bit, but the Raccoons had had a very slow week overall. Well, we started them with our 1-2 punch of Powell and Pennington, neither of whom had been credited with an L so far this season. Both were 4-0 with ERA’s under 3. Of course they faced the #1 offense in the majors. The Cyclones scored a whopping 6.06 runs per game! The Raccoons? 3.83, 9th in the CL, better don’t ask. Our defense was still 1st, allowing 3.50 runs per game. The truth would most likely lie somewhere between 3.50 and 6.06 RA for the next three games.

The Raccoons out-hit the Cyclones 11-10 in game 1. Christopher Powell only allowed two runs, both on sac flies in six innings. The Raccoons lost 9-1. The pen collapsed in spectacular fashion and left Powell saddled with the loss. It had been a truly awful game, with the Cyclones landing every shot that offered itself (Pedro Hermundo contributed happily) and the Raccoons not getting anything done. Cameron Green was 4-4 with the sole RBI of the team.

In contrast, Bojorquez and Jenkins walked the bags full and actually walked one in on top of that in the eighth, which further escalated from there. Their ERA’s were 8.64 and 14.85, respectively, and it was enough. Bojorquez was sent to AAA, and Jenkins would have found the same fate, but he refused demotion, executing 10/5 rights. Rights! Who ever gave players rights??

We brought up Jason White to replace Bojorquez, which left us with only one lefty in the pen (West). In any case, Paul Cooper replaced Jenkins at setup. But first the Raccoons had to start scoring again.

Game 2. The Cyclones went up 1-0 in the first with a sac fly, then scored Juan Diaz later, who had reached on an uncaught third strike. Pennington had been strong, going 7.1 innings with 5 H, 4 BB, 6 K. The Raccoons never scored and went down silently, losing 2-0.

Last game. The Raccoons stumbled to a 3-1 lead with a long ball by Ben Simon, which Wally Gaston blew apart in the top 9th. He walked four and the tying runs scored. Jason White ended the inning. The Raccoons lost 5-4 in the 10th on Carlos Moran. Cameron Green hit a home run to lead off the bottom 10th, but that was it.

In other news:
April 24 – Miners LF Jose Pacheco has a 20-game hitting streak going. He went 1-4 with an RBI double, but the Miners lost to the Gold Sox, 7-4.
April 26 – Boston SS Dimian Barrios goes 5-6, 3B, 2 2B, 3 RBI against the Aces in a 9-7 win, lacking a home run for the cycle.
April 26 – The Gold Sox beat the Miners 6-1, and also chill Pacheco’s streak at 21 games.
May 3 – Falcons SP Joe Jones is out for a few months will elbow tendinitis. He was 3-1, 1.54 ERA on the season and had already shown the Raccoons the door once.
May 3 – As if the 10-14 Scorpions didn’t have enough problems, they also lose their LF Larry Marshall for a month to a sprained ankle.
May 6 – The Warriors lose slugger George Lynch for three months. He was hit in the hand by a pitch and suffered a badly broken finger.
May 6 – Blue Sox closer Danny Fairchild suffers a ruptured ulnar collateral ligament and will be out for at least a year. Fairchild has 80 career saves.
May 10 – Dave Perkins 3-hits the Warriors in a 10-0 Titans rout.
May 12 – Falcons slugger 1B Irwin Webster strains an abdominal muscle and is out for two weeks. He’s currently batting .383 with 3 HR and 24 RBI!
May 13 – The Falcons bounce back on a gem by Virgil Arnold, who pitches a 2-hitter in a 1-0 win over the Wolves.

Seven losses in a row, and next are the Indians, who have tied with the Raccoons, but played two more games. Loggers and Condors after that, all at home. After that we will have a 2-week road trip, leading to San Francisco, Charlotte, Atlanta, and Boston, which will carry well into June.

At 17-16, we’re still tied for the division lead, owing to the fact that the CL North seems to suck as a whole. After all, the Indians went 1-5 during this interleague week as well.

The Raccoons were 7-0, then 17-9. But that’s over. The free fall for the team has begun. They probably won’t stop before hitting .400 again, better accept that and move on. Maybe it will hurt less then.