[Westheim]

Raccoons (28-17) @ Thunder (33-11) – May 22-24, 2012

We hadn’t played the Thunder yet, and I wasn’t looking forward to it. They had been good last year and we had taken the season series 5-4, but they were quite obscenely good right now, and the Raccoons not so much. Most runs scored, least runs allowed was only where it started for them. If there was a weakness about the roster it was that they were close to the bottom of the Continental League in extra-base hits, but they compensated for that by suffocating the opposition with singles.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (4-2, 3.81 ERA) vs. William Raven (3-2, 2.95 ERA)
Shunyo Yano (2-3, 4.18 ERA) vs. Edgar Amador (2-0, 4.50 ERA)
Hector Santos (4-2, 3.52 ERA) vs. Daniel Dickerson (5-1, 3.15 ERA)

Three right-handers. We might see a lefty in Dave Butler on Friday, but the week is long, and much can happen.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Castro – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – P Baldwin
OCT: SS Farias – C J. Martinez – 2B D. McCormick – RF M. Cruz – CF Kim – 3B Reese – 1B J. Roberts – LF Matthews – P Raven

Until Jimmy Roberts struck out and Jeffrey Matthews popped out foul, it looked well like the Thunder would eat up all of Baldwin in a single inning. They rocked him for five hits in the first inning, all but Jesus Martinez’ triple being singles. Only two runs scored before Roberts and Matthews left three men on. Baldwin was unable to reign himself in and was charged with another run before excusing himself with a barking something in his throwing apparatus. Bill Conway took over and the mess just got bigger with that. Offensively, the Raccoons had two on in the second, wasted that, then didn’t really hassle Raven much for the rest of his six innings. John Alexander singled on a 3-0 pitch at one point, then was caught stealing. Palmer hit a leadoff single against Dave Crawford in the eighth, but Quebell grounded right and fat into a double play. The Coons were held to five singles and were locked away safely and quickly in this one. 5-0 Thunder. D. Alexander 2-3;

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Sambrano – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Seeley – SS Palmer – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – P Yano
OCT: 2B Farias – 1B J. Roberts – 3B D. McCormick – RF Reese – C J. Martinez – CF Matthews – SS Janes – LF A. Rodriguez – P Amador

Bottom 1st, Yano allowed singles to Emilio Farias and Jimmy Roberts, then graciously walked Dave McCormick to fill them up. The Thunder scored two on Tom Reese’s groundout and a sac fly by Martinez before the Raccoons got their own chance with the bases loaded and nobody down in the top of the second inning. Seeley and Merritt had hit singles while Palmer had been plunked. Two pops surrounding Yano’s strikeout resolved this situation wholly in the favor of the home team.

At least the bleeding didn’t go on right away and Yano put up two scoreless before Jason Seeley drilled a leadoff jack in the fourth inning to get the Raccoons back to within a lone run. They put two more runners on base, Yano bunted them into scoring position, and then Yoshi Nomura struck out in flailing fashion to strand them, after which things went on by Yano issuing a leadoff walk in the bottom 4th before serving up a can of peas to Erik Janes, who splattered them all over the rightfield bleachers, putting the Thunder ahead 4-1. Yano wound up getting knocked out in the next inning, allowing three hard hits and a run before Manobu Sugano replaced him with two outs and would have escalated things further if Merritt hadn’t made a diving catch on Jesus Martinez’ low line to left. Even more impressive was the flying grab that Tom Reese made on Matt Pruitt’s drive into the gap in right center in the top of the next inning, ending it. Pruitt had batted for Sugano with runners on the corners, but somebody put in the 2011 tape and he never had a chance. Ron Thrasher was charged with a run in the seventh, while the Fat Cat hardly missed a beat and pitched into the eighth with ease, only being chased when Jason Seeley had his fourth hit of the day. Outside of Seeley, the lineup continued to be pretty much dead. 6-1 Thunder. Seeley 4-4, HR, 2B, RBI; Merritt 2-4;

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Sambrano – LF Pruitt – 1B Quebell – RF Seeley – SS Palmer – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – P Santos
OCT: 2B Farias – 1B J. Roberts – 3B D. McCormick – RF Reese – C J. Martinez – CF Matthews – SS Janes – LF V. Diaz – P Dickerson

Santos got through the first inning unharmed, which would have been reason for joy if he hadn’t been turned into hamburgers in the second inning. What started innocently enough with a Tom Reese single soon led to another single by Martinez, an RBI double by Matthews, and the pile got bigger at an alarming rate. Down three runs and with a man on second base with two outs, Santos allowed a single right over the second base bag to Farias, 4-0, and then finally Jimmy Roberts conquered him with a booming home run that wasn’t going to come down until crossing over into Texas.

Well. Hector. That’s a 6-0 hole. It’s all your fault. We killed the pen the last two days already. So see for yourself how you clean this **** up.

Yeah, I’m great. Always the motivator, especially with young players. They need guidance. Except for Santos, who needed a butcher. The third inning started with two more singles, but despite Seeley throwing out Jesus Martinez at third base for the first out of the inning, Santos just kept getting impaled. A wild pitch moved Jeffrey Matthews to third base before he walked Janes anyway. Vinny Diaz hit a 2-run triple… and everything was pointless. **** it. Conway was back in for the fourth inning, and neatly fit in with a leadoff homer allowed to Jimmy Roberts. By then the score was 9-1, by the way, but it was not necessary to count. Only one team was playing baseball anyway, give or take a Sambrano RBI double in the top 5th that closed the gap all the way to 9-2. This time Conway wasn’t even getting through two innings, let alone three, but managed to throw 12 straight balls to three Thunder in the bottom 5th. Martinez – always the killer – hit a 2-out, 2-run single then to knock him from the game. Ron Thrasher had already pitched in the sixth inning on Wednesday, now was called into the fifth in a blowout, and surrendered another run on a fat RBI single by Matthews. This game just kept on giving. Daniel Dickerson went eight and was charged with four runs, of which half were unearned. 14-4 Thunder. Nomura 2-5; Sambrano 2-5, 3B, 2B, 2 RBI; Pruitt 2-4, 2B, RBI;

Well. ****.

Raccoons (28-20) @ Knights (18-27) – May 25-27, 2012

The Thunder’s exploits meant that although not all was completely bad for the Knights, they were already a raging 17 games out in the South and it wasn’t even June yet. They sat ninth in both runs scored and runs allowed in the Continental League, and their starters’ 4.19 ERA was better than the Raccoons’ mark by now, which sat at 4.22 ERA, with these teams sitting squarely in the middle of the starters’ ERA table in sixth and seventh. We had so far taken two of three games from them.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (6-1, 2.82 ERA) vs. Art Cox (2-3, 5.25 ERA)
Rich Hood (0-1, 5.14 ERA) vs. Dave Butler (4-3, 4.14 ERA)
TBD vs. Shaun Yoder (4-3, 3.13 ERA)

Okay, we arrived in Atlanta with a completely toasted bullpen, but – bright sides – we had a bit of Rockburn and Steele, and a readily available Angel Casas, who pitched a quick inning in Wednesday’s rut. Most importantly, we had EASILY our best starting pitcher up to start this set. On the other hand, we had a gaping hole on Sunday, with no clear word on Colin Baldwin yet. If he couldn’t go, it would create another mild dilemma. We were short on pitching in AAA, and we wouldn’t be able to wring a spot start from the pen in all likelihood. There was an unappealing option on the 40-man roster: AA Kevin Denton, who had been shafted to the pen and had a 6+ ERA down there. If push came to shove, he would be called up to make a trash can start.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Seeley – 3B Merritt – C Bowen – P Brown
ATL: CF Arnette – SS Hibbard – LF M. Reyes – 3B C. Martinez – 2B Hilderbrand – RF McIntyre – 1B K. Rodgers – C C. Delgado – P Cox

23rd place on the career strikeout list was reached with whiffs filed for by Marty Reyes in the first and T.J. Hilderbrand in the second inning – at least a share of 23rd place. More importantly even: no runs scored in the first two innings, already a colossal improvement over the traumatic 3-night layover in Oklahoma. But the game had seven more innings to play, the Raccoons did NOTHING offensively, and while Brownie took sole possession of 23rd place with a strikeout to Pat Arnette in the third inning, that came with Carlos Delgado on second base. Devin Hibbard tripled, Marty Reyes singled, and the Knights were up 2-0. While the Raccoons tied the game right away in a 2-run fourth including an RBI triple by John Alexander with nobody out, the pain came right back when Hilderbrand tripled to start the bottom 4th and was scored by Will McIntyre’s single.

Down 3-2 in the top 5th, Craig Bowen hit a ball for a double to center when Arnette took a circuitous route to the ball that didn’t lead him anywhere in particular. Brownie singled to right, his second hit on the day, and Yoshi hit a double through Ken Rodgers to knot the score again with two men in scoring position and nobody out. After Brown scored on Quebell’s sac fly, which gave the Coons a 4-3 lead but was all they got in that promising situation, he walked Reyes in the bottom of the inning before his rapidly escalating pitch count was saved by Reyes being caught stealing by Craig Bowen, but Brown quite simply didn’t have it, and choked in the seventh when Carlos Delgado hit a leadoff double to represent the tying run. Bill Miller singled, and Pat Arnette struck out, meaning there were runners on the corners when Steele replaced Brown to pitch to the right-handed Devin Hibbard, who was promptly hit for with left-handed batter Gonzalo Munoz, who batted .160 over 50 AB. Steele had him at 0-2 before he allowed a long single to right to tie the score, and Miller made it all the way to third base, from which he scored on Reyes’ sac fly as the Knights took the lead.

Top 9th, Dave Shannon was pitching with the 5-4 lead. Sambrano hit for Merritt, drew a walk, and was caught stealing. Bowen was drilled by Shannon, and although the unhelpful Castro struck out, a single by Nomura and a walk by Palmer loaded the bases with two outs for Quebell, and it should be noted that if Sambrano hadn’t been caught stealing by a guy with an 11% CS rate, the game would be tied by now and ready for Quebell to hit into a double play. His favorite toy taken away, Quebell doubled to right instead, plating two runs before John Alexander flew out. Angel Casas inherited a lead after all, although in convoluted manner, and the bottom of the ninth started with Sambrano blowing a ball at third base that put the tying run on in Delgado. Well, Sandy had to play there after hitting for Merritt, and now everything was going down the chute yet again. Except that it didn’t. Miller struck out, and Arnette’s grounder to first was nicely played by Quebell to nip the lead run at second. Munoz then grounded out to Yoshi. 6-5 Blighters. Nomura 2-5, 2B, RBI; Quebell 3-4, 2B, 3 RBI; J. Alexander 2-5, 3B, RBI;

Still a fact: Nick Brown has yet to pitch a game and allow either one or two runs this year.

Also a fact: Colin Baldwin was diagnosed with a ruptured finger tendon and would vanish onto the DL for a significant amount of time. “Three months” were flung around on Saturday morning, but it could be even more than that.

Want another fact? Rich Hood awoke this Saturday with a head swollen to twice the size, the nose bright red and running, and no voice at all. Whatever poisonous peasant had sneezed the plague into him, he was completely flat and couldn’t reasonably be expected to pitch … or hold a spoon to eat some soup by himself.

Aaand now? Kevin Denton had thrown 40+ pitches on Wednesday and was not ready at all to make a start. Fortunately we were relatively close to St. Petersburg, where we called down to have a rocket shoved up Ian Cumins’ ass to fire him up to Atlanta in time for the start of the Saturday game. Cumins was not chosen for any merits. This 24-year old right-hander was pitching to a 4.79 ERA in AAA and was probably lucky that it was only this bad. It was merely his turn. The .500 Alley Cats had to see where to find another starter for themselves. This 2006 fifth-rounder, whom the Critters had picked up off the street in ’09, was entirely unremarkable.

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – LF Sambrano – 1B Quebell – 3B Merritt – CF Castro – RF Ayers – C D. Alexander – P Cumins
ATL: 1B Arnette – CF Kelsey – LF M. Reyes – 3B C. Martinez – SS Hibbard – C Ledesma – 2B Hilderbrand – RF McIntyre – P D. Butler

Cumins’ first major league strikeout was to Marty Reyes in the first, but that came with two already on and Carlos Martinez soon collected those runners with a huge, huge, way too huge 3-run homer to left. Because things weren’t bad enough yet, Cumins needed over 30 pitches for the first inning, didn’t pick up the pace after that, and there was also some rain setting in and we had a 23-minute delay after three depressing innings were in. While Cumins wasn’t overwhelming or even challenging anybody, at least the long balls turned into outs to centerfield after a while and the Knights didn’t score again through five innings, while the Critters did … zero. Top 6th then, Quebell led off with a grounder to Hilderbrand, who threw it away. Merritt walked, bringing up the tying run in Castro, but Castro fabulously ruined the inning in first hitting into a fielder’s choice that got Merritt out at second base, then got himself picked off first. Ayers then flew out way too easily to right and the Coons had squid again. Ian Cumins was knocked out by Hilderbrand with a homer in the bottom of the inning, and we ended up chopping together the last few innings with Mullins, Law, and Sugano. The Raccoons, after the Castro drama, never threatened again. Or reached base. Dave Butler pitched a 5-hit shutout. 4-0 Knights. Merritt 1-2, 2 BB;

With that, Ian Cumins was sent back to AAA. And since Rich Hood continued to be sick like a dog on Sunday, here came Kevin Denton, who had been an interesting prospect a few years back, but injuries had hacked him into pieces, and since being drafted eighth overall by the Coons in the 2007 draft, he had made 20 or more starts only once in the minor leagues. He was now a trash can reliever for Ham Lake, and we would indeed give him the Sunday start, since he was on the 40-man roster anyway. Denton, 24, was a southpaw with a 94mph heater, a semi-decent splitter and a no-good changeup, and all that coupled with messy command and control. And he had never pitched above double-A!

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Sambrano – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – SS Palmer – 3B Merritt – C Bowen – P Denton
ATL: RF Arnette – SS Hibbard – LF M. Reyes – 3B C. Martinez – 1B J. Garcia – 2B Hilderbrand – CF Kelsey – C C. Delgado – P Yoder

The Raccoons took the lead on back-to-back doubles by J-Alex and Pruitt to start the top of the second inning, but was anybody surprised when Matt Pruitt was never moved off second base after that? Carlos Martinez tied the score right away with a solo homer in the bottom of the inning, and things weren’t stopping there. Denton walked Jorge Garcia, drilled Hilderbrand, but John Kelsey hit into a double play. With the pitcher in the on-deck circle, and Denton sucking badly, Delgado was walked intentionally, and then Shaun Yoder hit a looping 2-run double to leftfield anyway. Denton would be knocked out in the third inning, in which the Knights hit four extra-base hits, pairs of doubles and triples, to crush him under a 7-1 score. Conway was in the game for the third time this week, which was bad enough already, but the Coons also lost Sandy Sambrano to an injury in the field in the fourth inning. Conway pitched as crappily as ever, but somehow only allowed one run before being lifted for a pinch-hitter, Keith Ayers, to make the last out in the seventh inning. That was right after Craig Bowen had somehow fallen into a 3-run homer, and yet the score barely visibly budged at 8-4 Knights.

Yet this game was still not at the finish line; enter Kyle Mullins in the bottom of the seventh, a Martinez single to right, and then a loud shot by Jorge Garcia that put the Knights into double digits, and also considerably livened up Garcia’s .192 clip. Mullins walked the next two batters before being thrown into a bottomless pit, and Thrasher conceded a run on a groundout to Bill Miller. Despite being down by seven runs with six outs left, the Raccoons brought the tying run to the plate in the ninth inning. John Alexander had hit a 3-run homer in the eighth off Lawrence Rivers, and was batting again with two outs and two on as the tying run against Patrick Mercier … and struck out. 11-8 Knights. J. Alexander 2-5, HR, 2B, 3 RBI; Pruitt 2-4, 2B, RBI; Bowen 2-4, HR, 3 RBI;

The Knights had 13 hits, of which nine were for extra bases. This includes two triples and two homers. Or in other words: their average base hit was worth about 2.15 bases.

In other news

May 23 – Cyclones outfielder Will Bailey (.393, 8 HR, 47 RBI), who has been on the most terrific tear so far, has a torn meniscus and will miss at least a month.
May 24 – Boston’s LF/RF Jesus Flores (.308, 6 HR, 15 RBI) hits for the CYCLE in 9-5 Titans win over the Bayhawks, in which he also walked and drives in three runs. After Christian Greenman’s cycle in 2004, this is the second cycle for the Titans, and it is also the fourth consecutive cycle hit for in the month of May, as well as six of the last nine.
May 24 – As far as knee injuries go, BOS RF/LF Ricardo Garcia (.265, 4 HR, 25 RBI) has Bailey beat, however. The 29-year old Titan has been diagnosed with a ruptured medial collateral ligament and is out for the season.
May 25 – CHA SP Alfredo Collazo (4-5, 3.28 ERA) 2-hits the Canadiens in a 1-0 shutout.
May 26 – In a week of knee injuries, SFW OF Jose Morales (.330, 16 HR, 47 RBI) goes down to a strained posterior cruciate ligament and could be out for two months.

Complaints and stuff

I tried hard to come up with another week in which the Raccoons were laid this hard, and I got nothin’. Nope, nothin’. This week was very special.

Denton is back to Ham Lake after this one, and Josh Gibson will be called up to help out the pen in the Bayhawks series that comes up, but we will need another starter by Saturday. Our AAA team has someone become shockingly thin in pitching. Where has all the depth gone!?

ABL CAREER STRIKEOUTS (excerpt)

13th – Leland Lewis – 2,664 (HOF)
14th – Manuel Movonda – 2,663
15th – Kiyohira Sasaki – 2,640
16th – Craig Hansen – 2,578 (HOF)
17th – Kelvin Yates – 2,571 (active)
t-18th – Dan George – 2,516
t-18th – Bill Smith – 2,516
20th – Angel Romero – 2,499
21st – Dennis Fried – 2,455
22nd – Juan Correa – 2,427 (HOF)
23rd – Nick Brown – 2,382