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Westheim · 10-27-2015, 09:16 PM

We go into the week facing the Thunder and Loggers. The Crusaders will have the Aces and Canadiens on their plate.

Raccoons (83-47) @ Thunder (67-62) – August 27-29, 2007

The Thunder were right about average in both offense and pitching, with a -3 run differential. The Raccoons came in with 555 runs scored (9th) and 444 runs allowed (1st), which was kinda wicked. We are 4-2 against them on the year.

Projected matchups:
Cássio Boda (5-3, 3.74 ERA) vs. Aaron Anderson (11-5, 3.99 ERA)
Raúl Fuentes (9-9, 4.25 ERA) vs. Manny Guzmán (9-9, 4.77 ERA)
Nick Brown (14-7, 2.47 ERA) vs. Luis Martinez (8-12, 3.62 ERA)

I said before that the open slot in the rotation would fall on Thursday. Well, I can’t even count to five correctly, which might be one reason the team has blown its huge late-June lead. Brownie will go on short rest regardless, despite throwing 110 pitches in his last start. I just don’t really feel like jumbling roster spots in the final days of August.

Game 1
POR: SS Flores – 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B Sharp – 2B Nomura – P Boda
OCT: LF V. Sanchez – 1B T. Cardenas – RF Takizawa – CF W. McCormick – SS M. Garza – 2B Michel – 3B S. Walker – C L. Paredes – P A. Anderson

The Coons got singles from their first three men up, loading the bases, before letting the old veteran Anderson, who had recently overtaken Woody Roberts for most wins in ABL history with 281, largely off the hook. One run scored on Pruitt grounding to second for a fielder’s choice before Hack blacked out. Craig Bowen sent a drive to deep left center that Victorino Sanchez - … well, I don’t know how he got it. Guy must have a jet pack hidden under the uniform. There was no such advantage for Luke Black, who could not get to Sanchez’s soft floater in the third inning, giving Sanchez an RBI double to tie the game and also an 18-game hitting streak.

Anderson then cracked in the top of the fourth. After Pruitt made the first out, Black walked, setting off a chain of lucky events. Bowen had a blooper drop between Michel and McCormick in shallow center for a single, and Sharp walked on a close ball four. Yoshi and Boda both sent soft singles into center to score single runs before Vic Flores’ 2-run double into right really broke the score open. After a while, Anderson logged another out on Quebell’s sac fly, but that was it for him, leaving down 6-1. The Coons made it 7-1 on Castro’s single and 11 Critters came to the plate in total. Boda coldn’t quite slam the door on the Thunder in that situation. They got him for a run in the bottom 4th, then left two on base when Pruitt shagged two hard drives in the fifth, and stranded another pair in the sixth when Steven Walker and Luis Paredes drew a pair of 2-out walks, but were left on by Alberto Rangel grounding out to Flores. Reliever Kevin Cummings allowed an add-on run in the seventh. After the Oklahoma bullpen had retired nine straight, the Duke rediscovered his stroke and bashed Cummings for his 26th home run of the year, a solo job that gave the Critters an 8-2 lead.

But even a 6-run lead could be an adventure. Sergio Vega was expected to give us the bottom 8th, but very didn’t. Marcos Garza and Samy Michel singled, and then he walked … well, Walker. No outs, three on. Marcos Bruno replaced him, struck out Paredes and PH Kurt Metting, before Victorino Sanchez, who might well be the best batter in the CL (.360/.466/.524) battled out a walk to shove home the Thunder’s third run. Sharp caught a foul pop by Cardenas to end the frame. The relief didn’t get better in the bottom 9th, though. Kaz Kichida was in, and allowed three singles for a run, logging only two outs. Enough with the fudging! Angel Casas whiffed Paredes to put this one in the books for good. 8-4 Coons. Flores 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Castro 2-5, RBI; Bowen 2-3, BB, 2B; Boda 6.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 4 K, W (6-3) and 1-3, RBI;

The shallow end of our bullpen is very shallow. Elsewhere it was NYC 10, LVA 5, so our lead remained at one game.

Santiago Trevino rejoined us off the DL, replacing Jose Cruz on the roster. Cruz got only into two games, with one at-bat (a single), and fielding one inning in this game here after a double switch that took out Matt Pruitt late.

Game 2
POR: SS Flores – 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B Sharp – 2B Nomura – P Fuentes
OCT: LF V. Sanchez – 2B Metting – CF J. Gonzales – 1B T. Cardenas – SS S. Walker – C L. Paredes – RF Rangel – 3B Arreola – P M. Guzmán

After stranding a pair in the first, the Raccoons took a 1-0 lead in a wicked third inning, which started with a Fuentes single escaping Walker before Vic Flores got pitched in a little bit too tight. Quebell erased him right away with a double play, but that left Fuentes had third, who scampered home on a wild pitch before Castro could single. Both teams killed a promising start to their halves of the fourth with a double play before a 2-out triple by Rangel in the bottom 5th got the tying run to within 90 feet. Since Ignacio Arreola batted left-handed, Fuentes went after him, got him to 1-2, then surrendered a fly to deep center, but Castro was on his horse in due time to catch it. We then added our second run in the sixth on singles by Quebell, Pruitt (which was actually touched by Cardenas, but was hit too hard to be contained), and Black (just past the reach of Arreola), only for a so far 0-for-2 Sanchez to extend his streak to 19 games in the bottom 6th with a hard line drive single to right, and Kurt Metting to tie the game with a home run to left center. The next inning, Fuentes was again pitching to Arreola with two outs and a man on third, got to 0-2, then allowed an RBI single. Garza and Sanchez also reached base safely to load them up, with Law Rockburn appearing to face Metting, but the Thunder countered with lefty Wes McCormick. It was the Thunder’s time to erupt. McCormick and Jorge Gonzales both drove in pairs with hard hits to sink the Raccoons and send their GM into another bout of depression, which could not be reversed even by a pinch-hit 2-run homer by J.C. Crespo in the ninth. 7-4 Thunder. Crespo (PH) 1-1, HR, 2 RBI; Black 2-3, BB, RBI; Trevino (PH) 1-1;

The infinitely less **** Crusaders romped the Aces 11-6, tying up the division.

Game 3
POR: 3B Flores – CF Castro – 1B Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – LF Crespo – 2B J. Gutierrez – SS Sato – P Brown
OCT: LF V. Sanchez – 2B Metting – CF J. Gonzales – 1B T. Cardenas – SS S. Walker – RF Takizawa – C L. Paredes – 3B Arreola – P L. Martinez

Brownie struck out the side (around a Metting single) in the first, reaching and passing 200 K for the season for the fifth consecutive year (excluding injury-shortened campaigns). While Brown was mostly successful in his battles with Thunder batters, they were excellent in running up his pitch count, and combined with him going on short rest had him out of the game after five innings without tagging him for an earned run. The rest of the team’s efforts were a parade of futility, starting with Sato hitting into the perfect double play to end the second inning with Bowen waiting on third base, through the team finally grinding out a run in the fourth, straight to giving it right back when Tomas Castro made a grave error in the bottom of the same inning.

Most notably, the ND’ed Brown held Sanchez dry in three at-bats, and the left-hander vying for a 20-game hitting streak faced Ed Bryan with nobody on and two outs in a 1-1 tie in the bottom 7th. At 2-0, Sanchez unleashed a tremendous line drive to left, where Crespo sold out quite a bit to make a successful catch. Haruyoshi Takizawa tried to imitate J.C. on Sato’s liner that started the top 8th, got it too, but hurt himself and had to be scraped off the field. Rangel took over. A slowish Raccoons offense got a chance donated in the ninth against closer Sancho Rivera when Tomas Cardenas bobbled Castro’s quick bouncer into an error. A hit-and-run was a risky play with Paredes’ arm being one of the strongest in the game, but we called one anyway with Pruitt batting. It worked, Pruitt singling to left, and the quick start allowed Castro to reach third base with no outs. Rivera now uncharacteristically lost control, walked Black, and allowed an RBI single to Bowen in a 2-0 count. Crespo struck out, and Nomura’s grounder to third allowed Arreola to strike down Pruitt at home. Kuni Sato made himself useful after all then, singling up the middle into center for two extra runs before Quebell ended the inning with a fly to Gonzales. Angel Casas reached both 40 saves and 70 strikeouts in a rather quick bottom of the inning to grab the series. 4-1 Critters! Pruitt 2-4; Bowen 2-3, BB, 2B, RBI; Sato 2-4, 2 RBI;

We had only one extra base hit in both of the last two games, contributing to those lots-of-guys-on, few-runs scenarios. We actually out-hit the Thunder soundly on Tuesday (12-9), but couldn’t get men in.

The Crusaders’ Greg Connor was shelled for four runs early in Vegas, and they never recovered, going down 5-4, giving the Coons’ their precious 1-game lead back.

Raccoons (85-48) vs. Loggers (63-70) – August 31-September 2, 2007

Having taken eight of eleven from the Loggers on the year, we were hoping on some add-on wins in this weekend three-set. Worst in offense in the CL, they were average in runs allowed, with a -44 differential in runs, with a team that was mostly unremarkable.

Projected matchups:
Kelvin Yates (17-2, 2.34 ERA) vs. William Lloyd (11-10, 3.66 ERA)
Cássio Boda (6-3, 3.68 ERA) vs. Fernando Cruz (10-5, 4.35 ERA)
Raúl Fuentes (9-10, 4.41 ERA) vs. Martin Garcia (15-4, 2.74 ERA)

Garcia is laboring on a sore shoulder. Should he not be able to start, Junior Diaz (6-13, 5.16 ERA) would move into the series, which would be very much welcome by us. If Garcia started, we’d face three southpaws for four straight in total after Luis Martinez on Wednesday.

Game 1
MIL: 2B B. Hernandez – 3B Tolwith – RF Hiwalani – CF T. Austin – C J. Reyes – 1B T. Powell – LF J. Garcia – SS M. Clark – P Lloyd
POR: 3B Flores – CF Castro – 1B Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – LF Crespo – 2B J. Gutierrez – SS Sato – P Yates

Batting just .205 with 12 homers we didn’t expect much hurt from Bakile Hiwalani, yet he hit a 2-bomb off Yates in the first inning. The Critters mounted a forceful comeback immediately, starting innocently enough with a Flores single, but then Pruitt and Black hit back-to-back RBI doubles before Craig Bowen came up with a 2-run home run that escaped over the leftfield fence on its last breath. Amazingly, Bowen hit another one like that the next inning, even shorter, but also further to the left. The pair of 2-run homers escaped the park by probably a combined 15 feet, but the Raccoons now held a 6-2 lead in the third. They would expand on that soon enough. The fourth started with a Sato single that got Lloyd out of the game, before Sato stole second and advanced to third on an error. Kel walked, Castro brought home a run, Black doubled in a run, and Bowen this time hit a shot to center, but fell short of the wall. It was still a 2-run double, giving him six ribbies in a 10-2 game. He scored on Crespo’s single, 11-2, four runs charged to unlucky Steve Galloway. Still 11-2 in the seventh, Bowen led off against lefty Leonardo Gonzalez in long relief. Bowen ripped at the 0-1, drove it to left, and – that – was – GONE!!! Three home runs for Craig Bowen!!! While the Loggers tried to ride Gonzalez to the end of the game, Castro led off the eighth with a single, got caught up in Pruitt’s double play, but then the Duke singled. That brought up Bowen once more. Was there more damage to be done? Gonzalez’ first pitch was wide. The second one was even wider, and escaped Reyes, allowing the Duke to take second base. Eventually, Bowen took a few hacks and the count ran full. In that full count, Bowen finally made contact. That ball is CRUSHED! It’s high! It’s going! IT IS GONE!!!!! 14-2 Furballs!!!! Flores 2-5; Castro 2-5, RBI; Black 3-5, 2 2B, 2 RBI; Bowen 5-5, 4 HR, 2B, 9 RBI; Crespo 3-5, RBI; Yates 9.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 8 K, W (18-2) and 1-3;

Kelvin Yates threw the most underappreciated 94-pitch, complete-game 3-hitter in history as Craig Bowen became the FIRST ABL PLAYER with four home runs in a game! Craig Bowen!!

CRAIG. ****ING. BOWEN!!

That is the same guy that didn’t manage more than 188 AB or an 88 OPS+ in four years as the neglected Indians’ backup backstop. The guy we traded him for, Roberto Pacheco, is doing quite well in AAA for the Indians, and might hit a few dingers of his own off Brownie maybe as early as September, but holy smokes, Craig Bowen!! 17th 3+ HR game in ABL history, second for the Coons (Ben Simon, 1977), and first ever with four dingers! And a double! And if he hadn’t slapped that to center, it might have gone out as well.

Oh, we beat the Loggers by a dozen? The Crusaders out-did us! They smothered the Elks, 15-1, to maintain a 1-game deficit.

Rosters expanded for Saturday. We added a few guys in SP Tim Webster (7-11, 4.40 ERA in AAA), who was called up very reluctantly, MR Ward Jackson and MR Matt Cash, C Bob Wood, SS Ryan Miller, and INF Yoshi Yamada.

And guess what, we got Martin Garcia on Saturday!

Game 2
MIL: 2B B. Hernandez – SS Tolwith – RF Hiwalani – CF T. Austin – LF C. Parker – C J. Reyes – 1B M. Clark – 3B Wright – P M. Garcia
POR: CF Castro – SS R. Miller – LF Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B Sharp – 1B Quebell – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Boda

The day after Craig Bowen and the supporting cast beat the living hell out of the Loggers, the game rushed through the innings without much offense to drool over. Boda was doing quite well and seemed to be cruising, converting a not too shabby bunt by Garcia in the fifth into a force on Ken Wright on second base for the second out of the inning. A Hernandez single and a Tolwith double later, he trailed 2-0. In the bottom 5th, Garcia, vying for career win #267, allowed singles to Quebell and Gutierrez before the Loggers hauled him in after noticing him grimacing after every pitch. He was in SOME kind of pain. Dave Walk relieved him and surrendered the runs on a Boda bunt, Castro single, and Miller sac fly, getting the game tied at two. Boda completed seven without getting a decision, before we used three relievers in a tight top 8th in which Chris Delaney doubled off Bryan. The Coons could have scored unearned runs in the bottom 8th after a Pruitt bloop fell in and Bowen reached on an error, but Sharp struck out to waste the chance. The game was still tied in the bottom 9th as we faced Gabriel Garcia with the bottom of the order up. When Quebell walked, Yamada ran for him, and in the #8 hole was Vic Flores, lying in ambush after pinch-hitting the previous go-through. When he grounded to short, Yoshi-Y’s speed was all that kept the Coons out of the two-for-one. Aaron Tolwith went for the out at first. Next was Yoshi-N, also pinch-hitting the last time through. And here was a slap single to left, Yoshi-Y turning third, a mad dash home, and – safe!! 3-2 Furballs! Pruitt 2-4; Nomura (PH) 2-2, RBI; Boda 7.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 9 K and 1-1; Bennett 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, W (4-1);

The Crusaders had their own walkoff win over the Elks, a Marc Williams sac fly that scored Roberto Pena and gave them a 5-4 win. Bowen posted an oh-fer in this game, with one strikeout, but he was also outright robbed by Hiwalani on a line drive in his final at-bat.

Matt Pruitt however has a 12-game hitting streak going, but will get Sunday off as we keep rotating our left-handed batters in this string of lefty starters. We might get as much as FIVE southpaws in a row, with Jason O’Halloran lining up for the start of our next series with the Titans.

Game 3
MIL: LF J.R. Richardson – SS Tolwith – RF Hiwalani – CF T. Austin – 2B B. Hernandez – C J. Reyes – 1B C. Parker – 3B Gallagher – P F. Cruz
POR: SS Flores – LF Castro – 1B Quebell – RF Black – CF Crespo – 3B Sharp – C Esquivel – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Fuentes

While Tim Austin drove in Tolwith in the top 1st, the Raccoons had Flores reach on a leadoff single in the bottom 1st. Castro reached on J.R. Richardson’s error in left, and Quebell singled to load them up with no outs, but they only got the tying run on a Crespo single, on which Castro was thrown out by Hiwalani when he tried to score as well. Jesus Reyes took Fuentes deep in the second, 2-1 Loggers. After that, Fuentes had hits in his next two at-bats, reached scoring position with two outs and Castro batting twice, was left on the first time, but the latter instance, in the fourth, with Flores trailing Fuentes, Castro doubled off the wall in right center to flip the score to 3-2 Coons. Fuentes however was fueling both offenses. Rookie Bill Gallagher homered to tie the score leading off the Loggers’ half of the fifth, then walked a pair to bring up Hiwalani, and walked him as well. Bases loaded, one out, he was yanked. Two runs scored off Rockburn on a Tim Austin single and a Bartolo Hernandez sac fly to set the Coons back 5-3.

On the east coast, the Crusaders had already lost by the same score, so our division lead was safe, but we’d love to kick it up to two games. When Ryan Miller hit a pinch-hit home run off Cruz in the bottom 6th, the score was cut to 5-4, and Flores doubling and Castro singling moved the tying run to third with one out. “Double Play” Quebell was batting, and I considered hitting for him, but then didn’t. Cruz struck him out, but walked Black, which ended his day. Dave Walk came in to face Crespo, drilled a 2-1 pitch to right that eluded Hiwalani (just like Flores’ double had eluded him) and fell in for a 2-run double with Black held on third since the score had already been re-flipped. Sharp grounded out to ex-Coon Chris Parker.

Ward Jackson was tasked with one left-handed batter to start the seventh, Richardson, who was batting .154, and walked him on four straight balls. Alright, bring Bruno. Tolwith bunted the runner over, Richardson stole third, but Bruno prevailed, striking out Hiwalani before Austin grounded out to Miller, who had taken over at short (Sharp was out of the game). Bruno was almost through the eighth when Parker singled and Jaime Garcia walked. With Alonso Baca coming out to bat, we desired our other left-hander, the home-run-prone one, but Bryan got Baca to ground out to Gutierrez. Angel struck out Delaney and Tolwith in the ninth before Hiwalani came up as the potential final out, but scuffling as he was, he still had oomph, and he was not a wild hacker. In fact, his .205 average was more bad luck than anything, and LOTS of that. Here, he went ahead on Angel, was up 3-1 before thinking he’d get one to hit (with Austin and his 104 RBI following), but didn’t get it squared and fouled out to Quebell. 6-5 Raccoons!! Flores 3-5, 2B; Castro 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Crespo 2-3, BB, 2B, 3 RBI; Miller (PH) 1-2, HR, RBI;

Bakile Hiwalani is getting older, too. I’m loving that.

Sergio Vega claimed victory in this one, pitching a scoreless sixth for the Coons to complete a sweep of the Loggers.

In other news

September 1 – SAL SP Raúl Chavez (11-11, 3.18 ERA) 3-hits the Scorpions in a 2-0 shutout.

Complaints and stuff

Let’s just throw this one in. I unlocked a metric crap ton of Steam achievements this week.

5-1 with a 2.21 ERA and 41 K, Kel Yates was named Pitcher of the Month for August, while Matt Pruitt cashed in the Rookie of the Month award, batting .342 with 4 HR and 27 RBI.

With sets against the Bayhawks and Falcons remaining, the Raccoons are one win over Charlotte away from claiming all interdivision series this season. That has happened only once previously, in 1996 of course, when the Coons went 6-3 or better against all six CL South teams on the way to a 108-54 regular season effort, the only triple-digit wins campaign in franchise history. Then and now, they went a best 8-1 against the Knights (and also 8-1 against the Aces this year).

The only year the Furballs won all interleague series? 1989. This year we dropped two to the Gold Sox, the only matchup we didn’t win.

1989, a.k.a. “Quick Turnaround”, kicking off eight golden seasons.

Next week: Titans and Elks. Crusaders will have Indians and Titans. In total these two teams have the following games remaining – strength of schedule:
POR: BOS 6, CHA 3, IND 3, MIL 4, NYC 4, SFB 3, VAN 3 - .527
NYC: ATL 3, BOS 3, IND 6, MIL 3, OCT 3, POR 4, VAN 4 - .530

10-27-2015, 09:16 PM	#1568
Westheim Hall Of Famer Join Date: Apr 2012 Location: Germany Posts: 14,004	We go into the week facing the Thunder and Loggers. The Crusaders will have the Aces and Canadiens on their plate. Raccoons (83-47) @ Thunder (67-62) – August 27-29, 2007 The Thunder were right about average in both offense and pitching, with a -3 run differential. The Raccoons came in with 555 runs scored (9th) and 444 runs allowed (1st), which was kinda wicked. We are 4-2 against them on the year. Projected matchups: Cássio Boda (5-3, 3.74 ERA) vs. Aaron Anderson (11-5, 3.99 ERA) Raúl Fuentes (9-9, 4.25 ERA) vs. Manny Guzmán (9-9, 4.77 ERA) Nick Brown (14-7, 2.47 ERA) vs. Luis Martinez (8-12, 3.62 ERA) I said before that the open slot in the rotation would fall on Thursday. Well, I can’t even count to five correctly, which might be one reason the team has blown its huge late-June lead. Brownie will go on short rest regardless, despite throwing 110 pitches in his last start. I just don’t really feel like jumbling roster spots in the final days of August. Game 1 POR: SS Flores – 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B Sharp – 2B Nomura – P Boda OCT: LF V. Sanchez – 1B T. Cardenas – RF Takizawa – CF W. McCormick – SS M. Garza – 2B Michel – 3B S. Walker – C L. Paredes – P A. Anderson The Coons got singles from their first three men up, loading the bases, before letting the old veteran Anderson, who had recently overtaken Woody Roberts for most wins in ABL history with 281, largely off the hook. One run scored on Pruitt grounding to second for a fielder’s choice before Hack blacked out. Craig Bowen sent a drive to deep left center that Victorino Sanchez - … well, I don’t know how he got it. Guy must have a jet pack hidden under the uniform. There was no such advantage for Luke Black, who could not get to Sanchez’s soft floater in the third inning, giving Sanchez an RBI double to tie the game and also an 18-game hitting streak. Anderson then cracked in the top of the fourth. After Pruitt made the first out, Black walked, setting off a chain of lucky events. Bowen had a blooper drop between Michel and McCormick in shallow center for a single, and Sharp walked on a close ball four. Yoshi and Boda both sent soft singles into center to score single runs before Vic Flores’ 2-run double into right really broke the score open. After a while, Anderson logged another out on Quebell’s sac fly, but that was it for him, leaving down 6-1. The Coons made it 7-1 on Castro’s single and 11 Critters came to the plate in total. Boda coldn’t quite slam the door on the Thunder in that situation. They got him for a run in the bottom 4th, then left two on base when Pruitt shagged two hard drives in the fifth, and stranded another pair in the sixth when Steven Walker and Luis Paredes drew a pair of 2-out walks, but were left on by Alberto Rangel grounding out to Flores. Reliever Kevin Cummings allowed an add-on run in the seventh. After the Oklahoma bullpen had retired nine straight, the Duke rediscovered his stroke and bashed Cummings for his 26th home run of the year, a solo job that gave the Critters an 8-2 lead. But even a 6-run lead could be an adventure. Sergio Vega was expected to give us the bottom 8th, but very didn’t. Marcos Garza and Samy Michel singled, and then he walked … well, Walker. No outs, three on. Marcos Bruno replaced him, struck out Paredes and PH Kurt Metting, before Victorino Sanchez, who might well be the best batter in the CL (.360/.466/.524) battled out a walk to shove home the Thunder’s third run. Sharp caught a foul pop by Cardenas to end the frame. The relief didn’t get better in the bottom 9th, though. Kaz Kichida was in, and allowed three singles for a run, logging only two outs. Enough with the fudging! Angel Casas whiffed Paredes to put this one in the books for good. 8-4 Coons. Flores 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Castro 2-5, RBI; Bowen 2-3, BB, 2B; Boda 6.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 4 K, W (6-3) and 1-3, RBI; The shallow end of our bullpen is very shallow. Elsewhere it was NYC 10, LVA 5, so our lead remained at one game. Santiago Trevino rejoined us off the DL, replacing Jose Cruz on the roster. Cruz got only into two games, with one at-bat (a single), and fielding one inning in this game here after a double switch that took out Matt Pruitt late. Game 2 POR: SS Flores – 1B Quebell – CF Castro – LF Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B Sharp – 2B Nomura – P Fuentes OCT: LF V. Sanchez – 2B Metting – CF J. Gonzales – 1B T. Cardenas – SS S. Walker – C L. Paredes – RF Rangel – 3B Arreola – P M. Guzmán After stranding a pair in the first, the Raccoons took a 1-0 lead in a wicked third inning, which started with a Fuentes single escaping Walker before Vic Flores got pitched in a little bit too tight. Quebell erased him right away with a double play, but that left Fuentes had third, who scampered home on a wild pitch before Castro could single. Both teams killed a promising start to their halves of the fourth with a double play before a 2-out triple by Rangel in the bottom 5th got the tying run to within 90 feet. Since Ignacio Arreola batted left-handed, Fuentes went after him, got him to 1-2, then surrendered a fly to deep center, but Castro was on his horse in due time to catch it. We then added our second run in the sixth on singles by Quebell, Pruitt (which was actually touched by Cardenas, but was hit too hard to be contained), and Black (just past the reach of Arreola), only for a so far 0-for-2 Sanchez to extend his streak to 19 games in the bottom 6th with a hard line drive single to right, and Kurt Metting to tie the game with a home run to left center. The next inning, Fuentes was again pitching to Arreola with two outs and a man on third, got to 0-2, then allowed an RBI single. Garza and Sanchez also reached base safely to load them up, with Law Rockburn appearing to face Metting, but the Thunder countered with lefty Wes McCormick. It was the Thunder’s time to erupt. McCormick and Jorge Gonzales both drove in pairs with hard hits to sink the Raccoons and send their GM into another bout of depression, which could not be reversed even by a pinch-hit 2-run homer by J.C. Crespo in the ninth. 7-4 Thunder. Crespo (PH) 1-1, HR, 2 RBI; Black 2-3, BB, RBI; Trevino (PH) 1-1; The infinitely less ** Crusaders romped the Aces 11-6, tying up the division. Game 3 POR: 3B Flores – CF Castro – 1B Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – LF Crespo – 2B J. Gutierrez – SS Sato – P Brown OCT: LF V. Sanchez – 2B Metting – CF J. Gonzales – 1B T. Cardenas – SS S. Walker – RF Takizawa – C L. Paredes – 3B Arreola – P L. Martinez Brownie struck out the side (around a Metting single) in the first, reaching and passing 200 K for the season for the fifth consecutive year (excluding injury-shortened campaigns). While Brown was mostly successful in his battles with Thunder batters, they were excellent in running up his pitch count, and combined with him going on short rest had him out of the game after five innings without tagging him for an earned run. The rest of the team’s efforts were a parade of futility, starting with Sato hitting into the perfect double play to end the second inning with Bowen waiting on third base, through the team finally grinding out a run in the fourth, straight to giving it right back when Tomas Castro made a grave error in the bottom of the same inning. Most notably, the ND’ed Brown held Sanchez dry in three at-bats, and the left-hander vying for a 20-game hitting streak faced Ed Bryan with nobody on and two outs in a 1-1 tie in the bottom 7th. At 2-0, Sanchez unleashed a tremendous line drive to left, where Crespo sold out quite a bit to make a successful catch. Haruyoshi Takizawa tried to imitate J.C. on Sato’s liner that started the top 8th, got it too, but hurt himself and had to be scraped off the field. Rangel took over. A slowish Raccoons offense got a chance donated in the ninth against closer Sancho Rivera when Tomas Cardenas bobbled Castro’s quick bouncer into an error. A hit-and-run was a risky play with Paredes’ arm being one of the strongest in the game, but we called one anyway with Pruitt batting. It worked, Pruitt singling to left, and the quick start allowed Castro to reach third base with no outs. Rivera now uncharacteristically lost control, walked Black, and allowed an RBI single to Bowen in a 2-0 count. Crespo struck out, and Nomura’s grounder to third allowed Arreola to strike down Pruitt at home. Kuni Sato made himself useful after all then, singling up the middle into center for two extra runs before Quebell ended the inning with a fly to Gonzales. Angel Casas reached both 40 saves and 70 strikeouts in a rather quick bottom of the inning to grab the series. 4-1 Critters! Pruitt 2-4; Bowen 2-3, BB, 2B, RBI; Sato 2-4, 2 RBI; We had only one extra base hit in both of the last two games, contributing to those lots-of-guys-on, few-runs scenarios. We actually out-hit the Thunder soundly on Tuesday (12-9), but couldn’t get men in. The Crusaders’ Greg Connor was shelled for four runs early in Vegas, and they never recovered, going down 5-4, giving the Coons’ their precious 1-game lead back. Raccoons (85-48) vs. Loggers (63-70) – August 31-September 2, 2007 Having taken eight of eleven from the Loggers on the year, we were hoping on some add-on wins in this weekend three-set. Worst in offense in the CL, they were average in runs allowed, with a -44 differential in runs, with a team that was mostly unremarkable. Projected matchups: Kelvin Yates (17-2, 2.34 ERA) vs. William Lloyd (11-10, 3.66 ERA) Cássio Boda (6-3, 3.68 ERA) vs. Fernando Cruz (10-5, 4.35 ERA) Raúl Fuentes (9-10, 4.41 ERA) vs. Martin Garcia (15-4, 2.74 ERA) Garcia is laboring on a sore shoulder. Should he not be able to start, Junior Diaz (6-13, 5.16 ERA) would move into the series, which would be very much welcome by us. If Garcia started, we’d face three southpaws for four straight in total after Luis Martinez on Wednesday. Game 1 MIL: 2B B. Hernandez – 3B Tolwith – RF Hiwalani – CF T. Austin – C J. Reyes – 1B T. Powell – LF J. Garcia – SS M. Clark – P Lloyd POR: 3B Flores – CF Castro – 1B Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – LF Crespo – 2B J. Gutierrez – SS Sato – P Yates Batting just .205 with 12 homers we didn’t expect much hurt from Bakile Hiwalani, yet he hit a 2-bomb off Yates in the first inning. The Critters mounted a forceful comeback immediately, starting innocently enough with a Flores single, but then Pruitt and Black hit back-to-back RBI doubles before Craig Bowen came up with a 2-run home run that escaped over the leftfield fence on its last breath. Amazingly, Bowen hit another one like that the next inning, even shorter, but also further to the left. The pair of 2-run homers escaped the park by probably a combined 15 feet, but the Raccoons now held a 6-2 lead in the third. They would expand on that soon enough. The fourth started with a Sato single that got Lloyd out of the game, before Sato stole second and advanced to third on an error. Kel walked, Castro brought home a run, Black doubled in a run, and Bowen this time hit a shot to center, but fell short of the wall. It was still a 2-run double, giving him six ribbies in a 10-2 game. He scored on Crespo’s single, 11-2, four runs charged to unlucky Steve Galloway. Still 11-2 in the seventh, Bowen led off against lefty Leonardo Gonzalez in long relief. Bowen ripped at the 0-1, drove it to left, and – that – was – GONE!!! Three home runs for Craig Bowen!!! While the Loggers tried to ride Gonzalez to the end of the game, Castro led off the eighth with a single, got caught up in Pruitt’s double play, but then the Duke singled. That brought up Bowen once more. Was there more damage to be done? Gonzalez’ first pitch was wide. The second one was even wider, and escaped Reyes, allowing the Duke to take second base. Eventually, Bowen took a few hacks and the count ran full. In that full count, Bowen finally made contact. That ball is CRUSHED! It’s high! It’s going! IT IS GONE!!!!! 14-2 Furballs!!!! Flores 2-5; Castro 2-5, RBI; Black 3-5, 2 2B, 2 RBI; Bowen 5-5, 4 HR, 2B, 9 RBI; Crespo 3-5, RBI; Yates 9.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 8 K, W (18-2) and 1-3; Kelvin Yates threw the most underappreciated 94-pitch, complete-game 3-hitter in history as Craig Bowen became the FIRST ABL PLAYER with four home runs in a game! Craig Bowen!! CRAIG. ING. BOWEN!! That is the same guy that didn’t manage more than 188 AB or an 88 OPS+ in four years as the neglected Indians’ backup backstop. The guy we traded him for, Roberto Pacheco, is doing quite well in AAA for the Indians, and might hit a few dingers of his own off Brownie maybe as early as September, but holy smokes, Craig Bowen!! 17th 3+ HR game in ABL history, second for the Coons (Ben Simon, 1977), and first ever with four dingers! And a double! And if he hadn’t slapped that to center, it might have gone out as well. Oh, we beat the Loggers by a dozen? The Crusaders out-did us! They smothered the Elks, 15-1, to maintain a 1-game deficit. Rosters expanded for Saturday. We added a few guys in SP Tim Webster (7-11, 4.40 ERA in AAA), who was called up very reluctantly, MR Ward Jackson and MR Matt Cash, C Bob Wood, SS Ryan Miller, and INF Yoshi Yamada. And guess what, we got Martin Garcia on Saturday! Game 2 MIL: 2B B. Hernandez – SS Tolwith – RF Hiwalani – CF T. Austin – LF C. Parker – C J. Reyes – 1B M. Clark – 3B Wright – P M. Garcia POR: CF Castro – SS R. Miller – LF Pruitt – RF Black – C Bowen – 3B Sharp – 1B Quebell – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Boda The day after Craig Bowen and the supporting cast beat the living hell out of the Loggers, the game rushed through the innings without much offense to drool over. Boda was doing quite well and seemed to be cruising, converting a not too shabby bunt by Garcia in the fifth into a force on Ken Wright on second base for the second out of the inning. A Hernandez single and a Tolwith double later, he trailed 2-0. In the bottom 5th, Garcia, vying for career win #267, allowed singles to Quebell and Gutierrez before the Loggers hauled him in after noticing him grimacing after every pitch. He was in SOME kind of pain. Dave Walk relieved him and surrendered the runs on a Boda bunt, Castro single, and Miller sac fly, getting the game tied at two. Boda completed seven without getting a decision, before we used three relievers in a tight top 8th in which Chris Delaney doubled off Bryan. The Coons could have scored unearned runs in the bottom 8th after a Pruitt bloop fell in and Bowen reached on an error, but Sharp struck out to waste the chance. The game was still tied in the bottom 9th as we faced Gabriel Garcia with the bottom of the order up. When Quebell walked, Yamada ran for him, and in the #8 hole was Vic Flores, lying in ambush after pinch-hitting the previous go-through. When he grounded to short, Yoshi-Y’s speed was all that kept the Coons out of the two-for-one. Aaron Tolwith went for the out at first. Next was Yoshi-N, also pinch-hitting the last time through. And here was a slap single to left, Yoshi-Y turning third, a mad dash home, and – safe!! 3-2 Furballs! Pruitt 2-4; Nomura (PH) 2-2, RBI; Boda 7.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 9 K and 1-1; Bennett 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, W (4-1); The Crusaders had their own walkoff win over the Elks, a Marc Williams sac fly that scored Roberto Pena and gave them a 5-4 win. Bowen posted an oh-fer in this game, with one strikeout, but he was also outright robbed by Hiwalani on a line drive in his final at-bat. Matt Pruitt however has a 12-game hitting streak going, but will get Sunday off as we keep rotating our left-handed batters in this string of lefty starters. We might get as much as FIVE southpaws in a row, with Jason O’Halloran lining up for the start of our next series with the Titans. Game 3 MIL: LF J.R. Richardson – SS Tolwith – RF Hiwalani – CF T. Austin – 2B B. Hernandez – C J. Reyes – 1B C. Parker – 3B Gallagher – P F. Cruz POR: SS Flores – LF Castro – 1B Quebell – RF Black – CF Crespo – 3B Sharp – C Esquivel – 2B J. Gutierrez – P Fuentes While Tim Austin drove in Tolwith in the top 1st, the Raccoons had Flores reach on a leadoff single in the bottom 1st. Castro reached on J.R. Richardson’s error in left, and Quebell singled to load them up with no outs, but they only got the tying run on a Crespo single, on which Castro was thrown out by Hiwalani when he tried to score as well. Jesus Reyes took Fuentes deep in the second, 2-1 Loggers. After that, Fuentes had hits in his next two at-bats, reached scoring position with two outs and Castro batting twice, was left on the first time, but the latter instance, in the fourth, with Flores trailing Fuentes, Castro doubled off the wall in right center to flip the score to 3-2 Coons. Fuentes however was fueling both offenses. Rookie Bill Gallagher homered to tie the score leading off the Loggers’ half of the fifth, then walked a pair to bring up Hiwalani, and walked him as well. Bases loaded, one out, he was yanked. Two runs scored off Rockburn on a Tim Austin single and a Bartolo Hernandez sac fly to set the Coons back 5-3. On the east coast, the Crusaders had already lost by the same score, so our division lead was safe, but we’d love to kick it up to two games. When Ryan Miller hit a pinch-hit home run off Cruz in the bottom 6th, the score was cut to 5-4, and Flores doubling and Castro singling moved the tying run to third with one out. “Double Play” Quebell was batting, and I considered hitting for him, but then didn’t. Cruz struck him out, but walked Black, which ended his day. Dave Walk came in to face Crespo, drilled a 2-1 pitch to right that eluded Hiwalani (just like Flores’ double had eluded him) and fell in for a 2-run double with Black held on third since the score had already been re-flipped. Sharp grounded out to ex-Coon Chris Parker. Ward Jackson was tasked with one left-handed batter to start the seventh, Richardson, who was batting .154, and walked him on four straight balls. Alright, bring Bruno. Tolwith bunted the runner over, Richardson stole third, but Bruno prevailed, striking out Hiwalani before Austin grounded out to Miller, who had taken over at short (Sharp was out of the game). Bruno was almost through the eighth when Parker singled and Jaime Garcia walked. With Alonso Baca coming out to bat, we desired our other left-hander, the home-run-prone one, but Bryan got Baca to ground out to Gutierrez. Angel struck out Delaney and Tolwith in the ninth before Hiwalani came up as the potential final out, but scuffling as he was, he still had oomph, and he was not a wild hacker. In fact, his .205 average was more bad luck than anything, and LOTS of that. Here, he went ahead on Angel, was up 3-1 before thinking he’d get one to hit (with Austin and his 104 RBI following), but didn’t get it squared and fouled out to Quebell. 6-5 Raccoons!! Flores 3-5, 2B; Castro 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Crespo 2-3, BB, 2B, 3 RBI; Miller (PH) 1-2, HR, RBI; Bakile Hiwalani is getting older, too. I’m loving that. Sergio Vega claimed victory in this one, pitching a scoreless sixth for the Coons to complete a sweep of the Loggers. In other news September 1 – SAL SP Raúl Chavez (11-11, 3.18 ERA) 3-hits the Scorpions in a 2-0 shutout. Complaints and stuff** Let’s just throw this one in. I unlocked a metric crap ton of Steam achievements this week. 5-1 with a 2.21 ERA and 41 K, Kel Yates was named Pitcher of the Month for August, while Matt Pruitt cashed in the Rookie of the Month award, batting .342 with 4 HR and 27 RBI. With sets against the Bayhawks and Falcons remaining, the Raccoons are one win over Charlotte away from claiming all interdivision series this season. That has happened only once previously, in 1996 of course, when the Coons went 6-3 or better against all six CL South teams on the way to a 108-54 regular season effort, the only triple-digit wins campaign in franchise history. Then and now, they went a best 8-1 against the Knights (and also 8-1 against the Aces this year). The only year the Furballs won all interleague series? 1989. This year we dropped two to the Gold Sox, the only matchup we didn’t win. 1989, a.k.a. “Quick Turnaround”, kicking off eight golden seasons. Next week: Titans and Elks. Crusaders will have Indians and Titans. In total these two teams have the following games remaining – strength of schedule: POR: BOS 6, CHA 3, IND 3, MIL 4, NYC 4, SFB 3, VAN 3 - .527 NYC: ATL 3, BOS 3, IND 6, MIL 3, OCT 3, POR 4, VAN 4 - .530 Attached Images __________________ Portland Raccoons, 94 years of excell-.... of baseball: Furballs here! 1983 * 1989 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1995 * 1996 * 2010 * 2017 * 2018 * 2019 * 2026 * 2028 * 2035 * 2037 * 2044 * 2045 * 2046 * 2047 * 2048 * 2051 * 2054 * 2055 * 2061 * 2071 1 OSANAI : 2 POWELL : 7 NOMURA \| RAMOS : 8 REECE : 10 BROWN : 15 HALL : 27 FERNANDEZ : 28 CASAS : 31 CARMONA : 32 WEST : 39 TONER : 46 SAITO Resident Mets Cynic - The Mets from 1962 onwards, here.