[Westheim]

If I have anything to say, then Mark Dawson will be CLCS MVP. He hit .393 in the series, with 4 HR and 10 RBI. Without his resurgence we wouldn’t have gone anywhere, and certainly would not have won the series.

Most of the lineup was very sharp, the only problems came with Alex White, who hit .250 (which is not in the definition of adding 10%), and the second base pairing of Bowling (who hit .400) and Thompson (who hit zero). And off the bench. Cam Green had three at-bats and made three embarrassing outs in the series. The rest of the bench, except for Dicks, was not any better. Gonzalez and Borjón contributed zero.

The pen had it’s lapses, but was overall sharp. The ENTIRE staff was very sharp, to be honest. Powell lost his first game because of the offense being shut out, and in game 3 we went with Ackerman deep in extra innings, and there are reasons for why he’s not in the rotation in October. Kinji Kan had been in line for the win.

Who will be our opponent? That was undecided at the point of the crowd storming the field and tearing the ballpark apart, since the FLCS went the distance of seven games. The Stars had taken the first two at home, 5-3 and 7-3. Former Furball Paul Cooper was the losing pitcher in game 1.

The Blue Sox then crashed Sergio Esparraguerra in game 3 and won 7-2, then came from behind in a big rally in game 4 and took it late, 5-4. Cooper was the winning pitcher this time.

The Blue Sox came from behind AGAIN in the fifth game, and again won 5-4. The winning pitcher? Former Raccoon Gary Simmons. This had brought the series back to Dallas, where the Stars suddenly faced elimination, but swung big bats in the sixth game, romping over the Blue Sox to an 11-3 win, and this set the stage for game 7.

The home team had won every game so far, and the string held up. Esparraguerra again gave away two in the first, but the Stars jumped on Steve Thompson, putting up a 4-spot in the bottom 1st. That was it already – the Stars won 4-2 and advanced to their first World Series.

I don’t know whether I would have preferred the Blue Sox. They had a slower offense for sure. The Stars had some frightening sluggers, but you know, spilled milk and so on … I’ll cry after this is over, for one reason or another.

In any case, had the Blue Sox won, we would have had home field advantage, but the Stars had won 96 games to our 95 and so we started the World Series in Texas.

The Stars were not renowned for their pitching staff. While it had been 2nd in the Federal League, there were some gaping holes in there, and no starter had an ERA under 3, although they had the FL strikeout king Kiyohira Sasaki. He had 18 wins in the regular season and could mow down everything alive or dead. The other starters were respectable as well, but the true weakness I saw was the bullpen, especially the backend, where Juan Miranda had saved 45 games, but had been blown up almost as much and had an ERA over 4. Most of their pitchers racked up high numbers of strikeouts (they had led the FL in the category), but they were also very vulnerable to pitch to contact, and were not great fielders. In hits allowed and BABIP, they had been among the worst three teams in their league.

While their infield did not hit for much, except for 1B Jerome Ramsay, the outfield was dangerous. They all hit over .290, and four of the five outfielders hit for power, and a lot of that. Gabriel Cruz had finished 2nd in home runs in the Federal League, and his colleagues had been close.

They had a dangerous catcher, too, in Angel Potter, but he was in the middle of a terrible slump persisting since mid-September.

And there was Jerome Ramsay. He went .276, 19 HR, 104 RBI in 142 games this year. But he had gotten hurt in the FLCS! His wrist was battered and he was OUT for the World Series! They replaced him with an extra outfielder on the roster, who was not very scary.

All Raccoons are healthy. We played the Stars this year, but lost two of three.

The rotation has been reworked. We will start with Kinji Kan, THEN Powell, Evans, and Young. Going back to Powell would have started Evans on short rest, and I need their ALL for this!

120% that is.