[Westheim]

Raccoons (24-14) vs. Indians (16-22) – May 14-17, 2012

Scoring was not the Indians’ problem. They ranked fifth in runs scored, with a pretty good .277 team batting average. But when you turned to have a look at their pitching, it was quite the frightening sight. Completely uncharacteristically for an Indians team, their pitching was abysmally bad. The rotation ran up a 5.41 ERA, and despite the bullpen being somewhere between half-decent and mediocre they ranked dead-last in runs allowed in the Continental League. We hadn’t played them yet in 2012, and we had gotten drummed by them 6-12 last season. Time for revenge!

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (4-1, 3.51 ERA) vs. Tom Weise (3-4, 5.43 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (4-1, 3.50 ERA) vs. Juan Bernard (1-5, 11.48 ERA)
Shunyo Yano (1-3, 4.84 ERA) vs. Tristan Broun (0-3, 10.07 ERA)
Bill Conway (2-3, 5.67 ERA) vs. Samuel McMullen (0-3, 4.13 ERA)

Good news first: looks like we’ll miss Curtis Tobitt (4-1, 2.97 ERA), who pitched on Sunday. Bad news: except for Tom Weise, all their guys that are lined up for this set are left-handed.

Game 1
IND: CF Tanner – C Padilla – RF J. Ortíz – 2B Kym – 1B Tsung – LF Bayle – SS R. Miller – 3B Reece – P Weise
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Sambrano – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – SS Palmer – 3B Merritt – C Bowen – P Brown

After Rowan Tanner singled on the first pitch and drilling Korean import Jong-beom Kym, whom the Indians had picked up as international free agent last winter, Brownie was mostly fine, with the Indians not getting another hit off him until Sonny Reece singled with two outs in the fifth inning. The Raccoons’ output however was nothing to write home about. Twice through the order, they had three hits, two of those by Pruitt, including a triple in the fourth inning after which he scored on Palmer’s sac fly to Juan Ortíz in right.

With Brown on 11 strikeouts but also 90 pitches through six inning, Palmer found himself with the bases loaded and one out in the bottom 6th. Weise showed the first signs of crumbling, walking Quebell and allowing singles to J-Alex and Pruitt. Palmer was no help, grounding to the third baseman Reece who killed off Quebell at home, but Jon Merritt worked a bases-loaded walk with two outs to put a second run on the board. Brown struck out Ortíz and Kym in the seventh inning but crossed over 110 pitches, and we would need some qualified relief to get this one home for him. Brown was hit for in the bottom of the seventh to no great effect before the bullpen set out to set fire to his 2-0 lead. Steele allowed a single to Ryan Miller before fanning Reece, but when lefty Yohan Bonneau hit for Weise, Thrasher was brought in. That was not a good move in any way, shape or form. Formless Thrasher walked Bonneau, then also walked PH Jose Paraz to fill the sacks. Angel Casas was brought in to pitch a 5-out save in a most dire emergency. Dave Padilla hit a 1-1 pitch real hard, but right to Palmer for the second out before Ortíz fouled out to end the inning. The madness wasn’t over yet, however. Casas began the ninth by drilling Kym (who now had three welts for the season, and two of those from this game) before striking out Mun-wah Tsung. Ming Kui hit for Jimmy Bayle, and Kui had a history of killing Coons, but now grounded to Nomura – and Yoshi’s throw went over Palmer’s glove! No!! Error! Tying runs on base! Ryan Miller grounded to Merritt, who got the force on the lead runner, bringing up the grizzled veteran Sonny Reece, the versatile slayer of many a team. Angel mowed him down in three pitches to end this nerve-twister. 2-0 Brownies! Pruitt 3-4, 3B; Brown 7.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 13 K, W (5-1);

BROWNIE!!! After this torrid performance, that saw him claim the top spot in strikeouts in 2012 ahead of VAN Rod Taylor (71 to 68), he can even achieve a tie for 23rd place on the all time strikeout table in his next start. He would only need to whiff a lowly ten Aces for that.

Game 2
IND: CF Tanner – C Padilla – RF J. Ortíz – 2B Kym – 1B Tsung – SS R. Miller – LF Bonneau – 3B Reece – P Bernard
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Pruitt – CF J. Alexander – LF Gentry – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – RF Ayers – P Baldwin

After Brownie extinguished the Indians for seven innings on Monday, Baldwin was close to imploding in a 34-pitch first inning, allowing two singles, two walks, one run, and two really hard deep flies that Keith Ayers caught close to the wall. But sucking was one thing, yet out-sucking Bernard was another entirely. And initially the Raccoons whacked Bernard well, three extra-base hits in the first inning including a Nomura triple and doubles by Pruitt and Gentry plating two runs, and in addition to that Ayers had Baldwin’s back and got an outfield assist to throw out Ryan Miller at third base in the top of the fourth. But… there was only so many things that the defense could defend. After scoring three runs in the first two innings, the Coons stopped just like that, while Juan Ortíz hit a 2-run homer to tie the game in the fifth, and in the sixth Miller had another leadoff single, then scored on a blooper hit with two outs by… Bernard. Humiliation got more humiliating when Merritt’s throwing error also plated Bernard on Rowan Tanner’s grounder. Despite a Reece home run in the eighth running the score to 6-3 for the Indians, the Coons had the tying run at the plate in the bottom 8th, with nobody out. Palmer and Pruitt had reached base ahead of John Alexander, who faced lefty Ryan O’Quinn and singled to right on the first pitch. Bases loaded, Brock Bose, a right-hander, appeared to face Brett Gentry, but we moved to Adrian Quebell to pinch-hit. Quebell walked on four pitches before Seeley hit for Manobu Sugano, who had been bombed in the top of the inning. He struck out before Dylan Alexander hit a 3-0 pitch into a double play. Nomura and Palmer would even manufacture a run in the bottom 9th, but Dylan Alexander had completely blown it. 6-5 Indians. Nomura 2-5, 3B, 2B, RBI; Palmer 2-5, 2 RBI; Pruitt 2-5, 2B; Gentry 1-2, BB, 2B, RBI; Ayers 2-4;

The brainless dumb**** Dylan Alexander will be benched until I can find a place that takes brainless dumb****s. The dog food factory might be a spot to ask.

Game 3
IND: CF Tanner – LF Kui – 2B Kym – RF J. Ortíz – C Paraz – 1B Tsung – SS R. Miller – 3B Reece – P Broun
POR: SS Palmer – LF Gentry – 2B Sambrano – 1B Quebell – CF Seeley – 3B Merritt – RF Ayers – C Bowen – P Yano

I was on the window of the office with my trusted shotgun, which was loaded with rusty metal shards, ready to unload it into any brown-clad slacker I could spot. The first inning was certainly to my liking. The Raccoons batted through the order, plating three runs with a 2-run double by Seeley and a bases-loaded walk drawn by Bowen responsible for the runs. They got only one more run on Tristan Broun, with Seeley singling, stealing, scoring in the third, but it wasn’t their fault. Broun left with an injury three innings into the game, handing the ball to Sadakuno Imamura. Both pitchers however shared the K/BB stat being quiet definitely under 1, however. Aside from the early onslaught, however, double plays were the call of the day for the Raccoons. Gentry hit into one, Merritt – of course – hit into one through five. Shunyo Yano held up nicely through five, maintaining a 2-hitter, but started to swim in the sixth. The Indians’ Kui and Ortíz had singles and with two outs and in a full count Jose Paraz lined a pitch to the right side – SAMBRANO WITH A LEAPING CATCH! That was AMAZING!!

The rest of the mess didn’t untangle into a deciding blow at all. Gentry hit into another double play to kill the bottom 7th. Long man Aaron Walsh then drilled Sambrano to give the Coons another base runner, and Sambrano took second base easily from Paraz, then scored on Quebel’s single after all to make it 5-0. Indians righty Wade Davis issued three walks in the eighth without allowing a run, but Sugano and Slayton maintained the shutout. 5-0 Coons. Palmer 2-3, 2 BB; Quebell 2-3, BB, RBI; Seeley 3-3, BB, 2 2B, 2 RBI; Yano 7.0 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 7 K, W (2-3) and 1-3; Slayton 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Okay, Baldwin is trending south, Yano might be trending north. Now let’s see what Conway can give us.

Game 4
IND: CF Tanner – LF Kui – 2B Kym – RF J. Ortíz – C Paraz – 1B Tsung – SS R. Miller – 3B Reece – P McMullen
POR: SS Palmer – 2B Nomura – LF Sambrano – 1B Quebell – CF Seeley – 3B Merritt – RF Ayers – C Bowen – P Conway

Tanner humped a pathetic Conway pitch for a moonshot to start the game, and the ball kept flying off the bats in the tops of innings. There was a double in the second, but otherwise the outfielders made a few nice plays, which of course didn’t mean that Conway’s pitching was any good. The Raccoons would flip the score in the bottom 4th after Sambrano reached on a throwing error and Merritt and Ayers came up with back-to-back 2-out RBI doubles, but that didn’t last, and Jong-beom Kym hit a 2-run bomb in the sixth to put Conway back into a 3-2 hole. The Raccoons had had the odd base runner here and there against Sam McMullen, but once the bullpen took over after the sixth, they were reduced to nothing. The Coons’ own pen almost gave out in the eighth, neither Mullins nor Thrasher being a great help. Mullins issued a leadoff walk to Kui, and Thrasher drilled Ortíz. Rockburn restored order, but that didn’t help the team to score anything. 3-2 Indians. Merritt 2-4, 2B, RBI; Rockburn 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

I would like to know this really hard. Why are the Raccoons so goddamn awful against the Indians …?

Nevertheless, I was unhappy with … everything. Thus I declared the time of Rich Hood to have arrived. Slayton was sent to AAA because he had options and Mullins did not, and Conway was moved to long relief. Hood was penciled in for Sunday, the last game of the homestand. We also sent Brett Gentry to AAA as Tomas Castro came off the DL. Gentry had batted .278 in his short time up.

Raccoons (26-16) vs. Aces (18-22) – May 18-20, 2012

The Aces were in the bottom 3 in both runs scored and runs allowed, with the worst bullpen in the league, just short of a 5 ERA. We have won the season series three straight years, with back-to-back 5-4 outcomes.

Projected matchups:
Hector Santos (4-2, 3.55 ERA) vs. Jaquan Wagoner (2-5, 3.04 ERA)
Nick Brown (5-1, 3.13 ERA) vs. Juan Valdevez (4-1, 1.88 ERA)
Rich Hood (0-0) vs. Anthony Bryant (3-4, 6.15 ERA)

With Rich Hood called up for his major league debut, we now have three left-handed pitchers in the rotation. Hood was our first-rounder, #14 overall, in the 2009 draft. He was the #90 prospect before the 2010 season, but has not been ranked since. He has a 92mph heater accompanied by a very good curve, a pretty good slider, and a crummy changeup that he throws maybe once or twice a game just to throw guys off.

We will see a fourth left-hander this week, with Bryant on Sunday also coming from the south side. This is not good at all for the Raccoons, who can’t hit left-handers at all…

Game 1
LVA: SS Avila – 2B Downing – CF Shearing – RF Bednarski – C Durango – LF Richards – 1B McDermott – 3B F. Soto – P Wagoner
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Seeley – 3B Merritt – C Bowen – P Santos

Santos didn’t have much in terms of stuff and the Aces merrily singled away, with Wagoner driving in the first run on a 2-out RBI single in the top 2nd. That was already bad enough but they added another run on Ricky Avila’s single, and the Raccoons were in a 2-0 hole once more. Francisco Soto hit a leadoff double in the fifth but was thrown out at third base by Bowen on Wagoner’s bunt. Through four, the Furballs hadn’t put up as much as a mean face, but Bowen opened the bottom 5th with a double to left, and they had the bases loaded after a pitch grazed Nomura and Palmer singled to left. Quebell grounded a first pitch very slowly up the first base line, McDermott hustled in and tried to get Bowen at home, but missed the pickup and overran the ball, getting nobody at all as the Coons got an unearned run, but it was earned as well on Wagoner once J-Alex singled to right and scored two, flipping the score to 3-2 Coons. Although they turned double plays for Santos in both the sixth and seventh, the Aces still grinded out the tying run in the latter inning after Ron Richards had a leadoff double.

Bottom 7th, Chris Spindler started his inning with walks to Nomura and Palmer, which should be ample opportunity to take the lead again, especially with Spindler throwing right-handed and nothing but lefties coming up, but Quebell hit into a double play and Alexander hit one of those ****ty pops. Pruitt hit a leadoff single in the eighth, and nothing happened after that. Ron Thrasher struck out the side in the top 9th to give the team a chance to walk off against Ryosei Kato. Sambrano hit for Thrasher and singled to right, and Yoshi laid down his annual bunt to get him to second base. Palmer singled to right, but the ball just barely whizzed past Josh Downing and Mike Bednarski was all over it, and so Sambrano was held at third base. That opened us up to another double play by Quebell and indeed he grounded to Downing, but Palmer had been running with Kato going to the plate and so Downing decided to fire home where Sambrano slid past Eduardo Durango at high speed – SAFE!! 4-3 Raccoons! Palmer 3-4, BB; Sambrano (PH) 1-1; Santos 8.0 IP, 9 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 1 BB, 6 K;

Game 2
LVA: SS Avila – LF Melendez – C Durango – RF Bednarski – CF Shearing – 2B Downing – 1B McDermott – 3B F. Soto – P Valdevez
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Castro – C Bowen – 3B M. Gutierrez – P Brown

The Raccoons put three of their first four batters on in the bottom 1st before both Pruitt and Bowen came up with 2-run doubles to show Valdevez what a 2+ ERA looked like. Brown was perfect the first time through the order, but unfortunately that took him 49 pitches, so this would probably not be a shutout, and he was just shy of 80 pitches after five, striking out seven, but … 80 pitches! *Thankfully*, Francisco Soto hit a 1-out single in the top 6th, nixing any bid there might have been, because I know myself quite well and I would have ridden Brownie for 148 pitches with a perfect game on the table…

Brown ultimately went seven innings, whiffing eight, and was hit for at the start of the Coons’ half of the seventh inning. At that point it was still a 4-0 game and Valdevez had allowed only two runners since the second inning. Seeley hit for Brownie, wrestled a walk from Valdevez, and once Yoshi singled, the Aces’ pitcher was gone as well. Dave Hughes came in and allowed an RBI double to Palmer on the first pitch, then walked Quebell to load them up. Alexander whiffed, Pruitt popped, but Castro lined a pitch over the head of Sean McDermott to drive in two on the double. Up 7-0, we went to the pen. Kyle Mullins got his filthy paws onto a ball and got clobbered for three hard hits and two runs before Manobu Sugano rescued him, and also finished the game. 7-2 Brownies! Nomura 3-5, 2B; Palmer 2-5, 2B, RBI; Quebell 1-2, 2 BB, 2B; J. Alexander 2-4; Brown 7.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 8 K, W (6-1); Sugano 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

So, no movement on the strikeout table today, but hey, he whiffed 21 this week in 14 innings, allowed only four hits and no runs. Nice bounceback from the creaming he received from the Rebels!

Game 3
LVA: SS Avila – LF Melendez – C Durango – RF Bednarski – CF Shearing – 2B Downing – 1B McDermott – 3B F. Soto – P Bryant
POR: 2B Sambrano – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – CF Seeley – RF Ayers – C D. Alexander – P Hood

Welcome to da Hood! – I wanted to say that ever since drafting him.

Jon Merritt immediately introduced the recently-minted 25-year old debutee to his defense, making an error in the first that created a two on, one out pinch that Hood just barely wiggled out of. Sandy then drew a walk to get the Coons going, stole second off Durango’s murder arm, and scored on Palmer’s single. Once Quebell hit into a double play, the Raccoons’ offensive ambitions seemingly ended, while Hood scraped past for a while on feeding grounders to the infielders, but was not very convincing overall, didn’t get into good counts, and with two outs in the fourth was torn to shreds in a 3-run outburst fueled by Josh Downing’s triple, a single by Sean McDermott, and finally a Soto homer. Francisco Soto would hit another one, a solo job, in the seventh inning, and a Jon Merritt home run aside the Raccoons weren’t even in the ballpark in the bottoms of innings. They trailed 4-2 in the middle of the seventh with Hood thoroughly done. J-Alex had a 2-out single in his place in the bottom 7th that wasn’t going to lead to anything, and in the bottom 8th Palmer was on before Quebell hit into another double play. 4-2 Aces. Palmer 2-3, BB, 2B, RBI; Pruitt 2-4; J. Alexander (PH) 1-1;

Double play, double play, double play. Hey, whenever Quebell is up next, why not save everyone the hassle and take off the runner on first right away?

In other news

May 14 – Torn ankle ligaments force CIN C Jayden Jolley (.238, 1 HR, 11 RBI) out of action. He might miss most of the remainder of the season.
May 15 – Atlanta’s Dave Butler (4-2, 3.90 ERA) 2-hits the Aces in a 6-0 shutout.
May 16 – SFW LF/1B Gil Gross (.307, 10 HR, 38 RBI) not only has five hits in the Warriors’ 8-6 loss to the Scorpions, but also hits for the CYCLE once he hits a grand slam off Shi-young Oe in the eighth inning. The 47th cycle in ABL history is the Warriors’ first in almost 20 years (Chris Lynch, 1979; Claude Martin, 1993). For the last two years there has been only one cycle per year, and both came in May.
May 16 – LVA INF Howard Jones (.286, 0 HR, 9 RBI) might be out for the next month with a sprained ankle.
May 17 – More injury news, as PIT C Bartholomeu Pino (.260, 2 HR, 21 RBI) ends up on the DL with a broken rib and might not be back until July.
May 19 – NYC CL Scott Hood (1-1, 3.95 ERA, 6 SV) locks up his 400th save by protecting the Crusaders’ 5-3 lead over the Falcons. The 36-year old second-rounder, taken in ’98 by the Gold Sox, has appeared in 842 games in his career and has maintained a 1.96 ERA, while striking out 1,154 batters. He was also the Federal League’s first Reliever of the Year in 2004, and won three rings with the Crusaders in his career.
May 20 – More injury woes for the Cyclones, who lose RF/LF Jose Silva (.323, 1 HR, 18 RBI) after the 29-year old broke his elbow. He is assumed out for the season.
May 20 – SFB C Antonio Ramirez (.258, 0 HR, 15 RBI) tore a ligament in his thumb and might miss three to four weeks.

Complaints and stuff

Interesting tidbit: Nick Brown has yet to pitch a game this year in which he allows one or two runs. In ten starts, he’s been unharmed four times, but he allowed three runs three times, four runs twice, and six runs once. Bit of feast and famine here, but the end result is good enough, I guess. I’m not spitting someone on pace for 269 strikeouts in the face!

Next up are the Thunder for the Coons, who started the season 13-0, and also started May 16-2 before getting routed by the Loggers on Saturday and Sunday. Of their 11 losses, five were by one run, but three were by six runs or more.

Hey, here’s something wonky and funny. Let’s have a look at every pitcher on the roster and where they rank in terms of franchise strikeouts!

1st – Nick Brown – 2,376
2nd – Kisho Saito – 2,322
…
12th – Marcos Bruno – 629
13th – Angel Casas – 561
14th – Jong-hoo Umberger – 542
15th – Colin Baldwin – 529
t-16th – Daniel Miller – 511
t-16th – Juan Martinez – 511
…
26th – Felipe Garcia – 365
27th – Lawrence Rockburn – 357
28th – Raimundo Beato – 353
…
t-54th – Ed Bryan – 170
t-54th – Bill Conway – 170
56th – Gil McDonald – 169
…
61st – Charles Young – 144
62nd – Ron Thrasher – 139
t-63rd – Jerry Ackerman – 132
t-63rd – David Jones – 132
…
68th – Pat Slayton – 116
t-69th – Hector Santos – 111
t-69th – Tony Vela – 111
…
t-138th – Yasushi Suto – 32
t-138th – Justin Neubauer – 32
t-138th – Kyle Mullins – 32
t-141st – Shunyo Yano – 31
t-141st – Benton Wilson – 31
…
t-156th – Rich Hughes – 17
t-156th – Carlos Sackett – 17
t-156th – Manobu Sugano – 17
t-159th – Micah Steele – 15
t-159th – Iván Diaz – 15
…
t-194th – Dean Hood – 4
t-194th – Hisanobui Higuchi – 4
t-194th – Cody Bryant – 4
t-194th – Carlos De Los Angeles – 4
t-194th – Rich Hood – 4
t-199th – Jake Pitts – 3
t-199th – Dave Beck – 3
t-199th – Robbie McNeill – 3
…

Pretty wonky!

Who’s ranked exactly 100th with 66 K? Esteban Flores, who was a starter for the 1997-1999 Coons, at times. Flores holds the distinction of the worst winning percentage (.125) of any Raccoons pitcher with at least ten decisions at 2-14. Only two others are worse than .250: Matt Huber (2-8) and Gary Simmons (12-37), both of whom saw action in the 70s, so you know what to expect from them.