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Westheim · 05-26-2016, 07:27 AM

Raccoons (29-22) vs. Bayhawks (24-26) – May 29-31, 2012

We had taken two of three from the Baybirds in San Francisco earlier this season, and right now a repeat of that would already be soothing the soul considerably, for if the Raccoons continued to play like last week they’d soon find themselves all the way down in fourth place. They were fourth in runs scored, but 10th in runs allowed, with a rotation even worse than ours at a 4.86 ERA (11th).

Projected matchups:
Shunyo Yano (2-4, 4.63 ERA) vs. Alex Maldonado (2-2, 5.35 ERA)
Nick Brown (6-1, 3.17 ERA) vs. Milt Beauchamp (2-4, 5.46 ERA)
Rich Hood (0-1, 5.14 ERA) vs. Felipe Ramirez (5-2, 3.79 ERA)

Their entire rotation is right-handed, and we miss their best guy, Reynaldo Rendon (5-4, 3.16 ERA).

Our own rotation was a mess even if you were disinclined to throw their 4.50 ERA (9th in CL) into the discussion right now. Six guys had started six games for the Coons last week, and three were not on the team anymore. Since Nick Brown was the only thing vaguely similar to a reliable guy right now, we would keep him on regular rest, which put him into the Wednesday middle game of the series. Shunyo Yano had pitched Wednesday last week – without success, but hey, who had? – and was assigned the opener on five days’ rest. Rich Hood was slotted in behind them although he hadn’t started a game at all, and then we’d have Santos on Friday on seven days’ rest. Like I said, it was a mess right now. We had no starter for Saturday so far, and the wildest possibility was to give Sergio Vega another start. Yeah that guy that can’t do anything and has been doing that for over a decade. And yet he keeps (creeps?) coming back!

The other option would be Bill Conway, but … ugh!

Meanwhile we learned of Sandy Sambrano’s injury by Tuesday morning, and he had a pretty bad hamstring strain and went to the DL. Walt Canning (.293, 3 HR, 32 RBI in AAA) was called up to replace him on the roster, since we were essentially missing an infielder with our superutility guy down. Canning was a career .258 batter with 2 HR in 190 AB in the Bigs. Team trainer Octávio Herrera reported that Sandy could miss two months, then ducked efficiently out of the Raccoons mug I hurled at him. While that one mug splintered against the wall, we still have enough for the first 15,000 games to come for Saturday’s home game against the Elks. Maud has more info on that; I only have a headache, and nothing to drink from anymore.

Game 1
SFB: CF Holt – 3B J. Rodriguez – RF Alston – LF J. Gomez – 1B Simmons – C J. Clark – SS Ingraham – 2B Brazeal – P Maldonado
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Seeley – CF Castro – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – P Yano

Yano certainly wasn’t overpowering anybody, and the Bayhawks took a 1-0 lead in the first inning on singles by Javier Rodriguez and Jose Gomez around a walk to “Monti” Alston. Zach Ingraham increased the lead to 2-0 with a 2-out RBI single in the fourth, at which point the Raccoons didn’t have a hit yet, but Palmer took care of that to start the bottom of the fourth, and scored on Jason Seeley’s double, cutting the 2-0 gap in half, and Dylan Alexander’s solo home run in the fifth made up the rest of it as both teams had five hits for two runs through five innings, although the Coons also had two men on in the bottom 5th until Quebell popped out foul to end the frame…

Why could Quebell not hit like Alex Maldonado!? The opposing pitcher’s turn came up with two outs in the sixth, and the bases were loaded. The Bayhawks didn’t hit for him, but why would they? Maldonado beat Seeley’s range for a double into the gap, two runs scored, the Birds went up 4-2, and Yano was heading for the showers. Law Rockburn struck out Jasper Holt to end the inning. Quebell in the bottom 7th got another chance at doing something good for the Coons, again with two outs and Nomura (who had singled home Jon Merritt to cut the score to 4-3) and Palmer on second and first, respectively. Facing righty reliever Javier Montés-Ortíz, Quebell lined a 1-2 pitch into right center to plate Yoshi from second and tie the score. J-Alex walked, but Seeley struck out to strand another three runners, and when Tomas Castro hit a leadoff double in the bottom 8th, nobody could be bothered to plate him. Both closers were on duty in the ninth inning: Angel Casas allowed a leadoff single to Sadaharu Ishikawa, but then retired Holt with a strikeout and had Javy Rodriguez hit into a double play. Valentim Innocentes faced the top of the order right away. Yoshi was retired on a soft fly to left, but Palmer hit a bloop single. Quebell worked a 3-1 count before taking a rip at a low pitch, which I normally didn’t like to see, especially not in this situation, but he actually hit that low pitch and drove it a ton to right, where Ron Alston ran after it to no avail, since this one was ticketed to Washington State altogether. 6-4 Raccoons! Nomura 2-5, RBI; Palmer 3-5; Quebell 2-5, HR, 3 RBI; Sugano 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Game 2
SFB: CF Holt – C J. Clark – RF Alston – LF J. Gomez – 1B Simmons – SS Ingraham – 3B J. Rodriguez – 2B Brazeal – P Beauchamp
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Seeley – C D. Alexander – 3B Canning – P Brown

In his head, Nick Brown was a mess in that second inning. Jose Gomez led off with a single, but got forced by Andrew Simmons, who remained at first base. Brown then slipped from this dimension, threw a WILD pitch, then balked Simmons to third altogether, from where Javy Rodriguez scored him with a slow single through Walt Canning and the Bayhawks were up 1-0. Well, technically, Brownie had his stuff, and the Birds whiffed in droves (9 K in the first five innings, and on under 70 pitches), but he certainly hadn’t all his mind together, and on top of that got no support whatsoever. D-Alex was charged a passed ball to move Rodriguez into scoring position in the fifth, where he remained, but our backstop was also charged guilty twice, along with Seeley, for nixing promising offensive efforts: Pruitt in the bottom 2nd and J-Alex in the bottom 4th opened frames with doubles, and neither moved further than third base, and the Coons kept trailing 1-0.

Bottom 5th, leadoff walk drawn by Canning. We called a hit-and-run, Brownie missed, but Canning was safe at second, then moved to third when Brown grounded out to Micah Brazeal. Yoshi walked, giving us runners on the corners, and Palmer found himself in a full count when he grounded to short, and here Ingraham’s throw to Brazeal was just that little tad off what Brazeal expected; while Yoshi was out, they couldn’t turn two, the score did become tied after all, but didn’t remain as such for long. Quebell singled, and then John Alexander beat Alston for a triple into the corner to send the Brownshirts flying 3-1. Depressingly, Brownie responded to this finally arriving cavalry support with a leadoff walk to Jason Clark in the top 6th, then allowed a first-pitch single to Alston to put the tying runs on, but the Bayhawks clunkered out of it on two strikeouts and a bouncer back to the mound, yet that didn’t mean that **** wasn’t coming down again in the seventh inning, starting with Brown’s inexplicable and inexcusable 2-out walk to Milt Beauchamp. Holt singled, and then Jason Clark hit that kind of drive to deep left that made you close your eyes, turn away, and wait for a crowd reaction as to what was going to happen. The home crowd was dead silent, but then you could hear the ball clanking off the wall, the noise rose a bit, another bit, and then they burst into cheers and some isolated “Pru-itt! Pru-itt!” chants. Matt Pruitt had played Clark’s drive off the wall pretty well, and had unleashed a deadly rocket back in. Beauchamp scored, and the Birds sent Holt to tie the game, but Palmer’s relay killed him off at the bag and the Coons maintained a 3-2 lead!

Brown came back out for the top 8th, getting Alston to ground out and whiffed Gomez to fill up a dozen, but then walked another lefty in Simmons. That was it, 117 pitches on the clock and a right-hander up, but once Steele was on the mound, the Baybirds sent in left-hander Omarion Thompson to pinch-hit for Ingraham, but Steele struck him out anyway. Tomas Castro hit for Canning in the bottom 8th and launched a homer for an insurance run, but to everybody’s mental trauma Angel Casas blew the lead anyway in the top of the ninth. Issuing a walk to Brazeal was bad enough, but getting taken deep by Jasper Holt to tie the score should merit two weeks in the oubliette. He didn’t get out of the inning either, as Clark singled and Alston walked with two outs. While there was no happy end for Nick Brown’s W-L record, at least Thrasher got out of the inning, also pitched a scoreless 10th, and when his turn (in the #5 hole) was up to start the bottom 10th, Craig Bowen hit for him and ended the game in just two more pitches – back-to-back walkoff homers! 5-4 Critters. Quebell 2-5, 2B; J. Alexander 2-4, BB, 3B, 2B, 2 RBI; Bowen (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; Castro (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; Brown 7.2 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 12 K; Thrasher 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, W (3-2);

That was a pretty curiously bad outing for Angel Casas, who threw 29 pitches and achieved nothing except to make Brownie mad. It’s okay, Brownie, you will win the next one. Maybe.

Another note, Nick Brown’s ERA is over 3, which is unusual, but his 2.2 BB/9 and 10.4 K/9 numbers are career bests or pretty close to it. His main issue is shoddy defense right now, with a .310 BABIP against him, which would be tied for a career-worst for a full season for him.

Game 3
SFB: CF Holt – C J. Clark – RF Alston – LF J. Gomez – 1B Simmons – SS Ingraham – 3B J. Rodriguez – 2B Brazeal – P F. Ramirez
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – CF Castro – C Bowen – P Hood

After not walking anybody in his first career start and coming down with the plague in between, Rich Hood opened his second career start with two walks to the first two batters he saw, then coughed up two hits to concede three runs right away. Not all was lost yet, since the Raccoons would throw up their own 3-spot to tie the game in the third inning, although the Bayhawks were kindly supporting them. Bowen led off the inning with a single, and was Rodriguez’ target when Hood bunted to third base. Bowen beat the throw to second, the fielder’s choice retired nobody, and the inning continued long enough for the Raccoons to score two runs on Michael Palmer’s double to right center, and the tying run when John Alexander singled with two down.

Ramirez had barely caught his breath when he was back to pitching again in the bottom 4th, and didn’t see the other end of the frame. The Coons wobbled him with two outs, starting with singles by Bowen to right, and by Hood up the middle. Yoshi found the gap in left center for a go-ahead 2-run double, then scored on Palmer’s roller into center, 6-3. Replacement Ron Carter got out of the inning when Simmons made a great grab on Quebell’s fast bounce to right, and whiffed Hood with the bases loaded to end the fifth inning, but Quebell got him for an RBI double in the bottom 6th after a leadoff walk to Yoshi. By then it was also raining on and off. Hood made it through seven on just one more hit after the first inning shackling he received, but was then knocked out by Ishikawa’s pinch-hit double without logging an out in the eighth inning. Kyle Mullins threw two pitches to Jasper Holt before a rain delay was called, which lasted almost for an hour. After that, Mullins surrendered the runner left on by Hood on two fly outs, and with Angel unavailable I tried my luck with Sugano for a 4-out save once Alston came up, and a strikeout to our former slugger certainly got Sugano on a good track, but the top 9th was opened with singles by Gomez and Simmons, bringing up the tying run. Ingraham was retired on a soft line to Nomura, and Rodriguez struck out. Brazeal had little to no power, and so the Coons stuck with Sugano, who whiffed the second baseman to get the sweep into the books! 7-4 Furballs! Nomura 3-4, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Palmer 2-5, 2B, 3 RBI; Bowen 2-3, BB; Sugano 1.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K, SV (1);

That’s obviously Sugano’s first career save in the ABL, and it established a virtual tie with the Elks for first place in the division just as said stinkers were coming into town. Brace yourselves, a vile smell is coming!

Raccoons (32-22) vs. Canadiens (31-21) – June 1-3, 2012

The Elks were seventh in runs scored, but second in runs allowed with the best rotation in the league. Their starters’ ERA was 2.94, something the Raccoons remembered vaguely but couldn’t quite make a claim to right now… We had beaten them for four out of six so far in 2012.

Projected matchups:
Hector Santos (4-3, 4.61 ERA) vs. Juichi Fujita (5-3, 4.04 ERA)
Marco Gomez (0-0) vs. Rod Taylor (7-2, 2.25 ERA)
Shunyo Yano (2-4, 4.79 ERA) vs. Brad Osborne (4-3, 3.06 ERA)

Two things. Looks like they will skip Bob King (3-4, 3.14 ERA), and we miss their only southpaw Johnny Krom (3-2, 2.31 ERA) as well. Which might not be a bad thing in general.

Third thing: Marco Gomez will make his major league debut on Saturday. He was our 2006 fourth rounder and has been in St. Pete since 2009 without ever achieving anything. He is right-handed, throws about 92, but while he has some natural sink to his fastball, his breaking stuff is all mediocre and hangs too often, resulting in grisly scores. Also an issue, like he doesn’t have enough of those: walks. For crying out loud, his AAA ERA is 4.97 over more than 500 innings…! Gomez might make two starts before we can get another off day and get some flexibility in the rotation.

Game 1
VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 3B Suzuki – C Baca – SS Rice – 2B M. Austin – P Fujita
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – CF Castro – C Bowen – P Santos

Both teams had only a single the first time through the order, but soon enough the Elks rallied against Hector Santos and took a 2-0 lead on a mammoth homer by Alonso Baca in the fourth inning. Castro hit a 1-out single in the bottom 5th, stole second base, but Bowen grounded out, which would have left Castro on third base if Hector Santos’ roller hadn’t eluded Ray Gilbert for reasons unknown and had made it into shallow right for an RBI single. Yoshi hit another one like that past Gary Rice, but Palmer flew out to left to end the inning. Top 6th, Don Cameron reached base with a single but was caught stealing by Bowen, who had now killed off seven of 15 runners this year. The Raccoons quickly had something going in the bottom of the sixth inning then. Quebell drew a leadoff walk, and John Alexander singled to right. Pruitt grounded out, moving the tying and go-ahead runs into scoring position for Jon Merritt, who made a pathetic rolling out on the first pitch and didn’t get the runners in, and Castro grounded out to Gilbert after that.

Santos was gone after seven good, but unsuccessful innings, but the Elks ran out Fujita for the bottom 8th. And why wouldn’t they? He was on 92 pitches, and despite only whiffing three in seven innings he looked like he was in good shape. Then Palmer assaulted him for a game-tying leadoff jack in the eighth. Oh well, we’ll take that. It did come surprising, though. The Coons were in business soon enough: Quebell reached on Mark Austin’s bobbling error, and J-Alex singled to right, but eventually left the bases loaded when Bowen struck out, and without taking the lead. Law Rockburn pitched the top 9th, with Gilbert hitting a leadoff single. He moved to third on two groundouts, which brought up Baca again: .395, 6 HR, 21 RBI. Nope! Four fingers outside and let’s go to Gary Rice (.210, 6 HR, 21 RBI), whom Law whiffed to escape the jam, and the Coons did little enough to send the game to extras.

Once there, Josh Gibson was broken out just before his removal from the roster to make room for Marco Gomez. He got through the 10th despite a leadoff single and hit batter, then walked Cameron at the start of the top 11th and THEN hit Suzuki! Alright, get that scum off the mound! Sugano came out, struck out Baca and Rice and got a grounder to short from PH Ramiro Cavazos to escape another jam. Then the Coons had their first two men on in the bottom of the inning. Castro had singled to left, and Bowen got plunked by Pedro Alvarado. Gutierrez was the last bat off the bench, hitting for Sugano, grounded to the pitcher, who got Bowen forced at second. But that didn’t matter! Castro was at third with one out, and Yoshi was at the plate, hit a 1-0 pitch up the middle, Jaylin Lawrence didn’t get to it, and the Coons had their third walkoff in the week! 3-2 Blighters! Nomura 3-5, BB, 2B, RBI; Palmer 2-5, HR, RBI; J. Alexander 3-5; Castro 2-4, BB; Santos 7.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 4 K and 1-2, RBI;

Game 2
VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 3B Suzuki – C Baca – SS Rice – 2B M. Austin – P R. Taylor
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Seeley – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – P M. Gomez

How often will a pitcher knock two base hits in the same inning? While the statisticians are still on that one, add Rod Taylor to the list prematurely. After home runs by Quebell and Baca had made this a 1-1 game early, Gomez became the next Raccoons fill-in starter to be torn to shreds inconveniently early. Taylor opened the top of the third inning with a single, the line kept moving, moving, moving, and after an intentional walk to Mark Austin that filled the bags with two outs, Taylor lined another hopeless Gomez offering into rightfield for a 2-run single, which ran the score to 7-1 and Gomez from the game. Bill Conway replaced him and had Seeley hustle after a Ross Holland drive to center, but eventually Gomez’ line closed after ten hits and seven runs allowed in 2 2/3 innings. Despite facing Taylor, who led the league in strikeouts (102 coming in), the Raccoons weren’t entirely dead yet, since Adrian Quebell managed to hit another homer his second time up. This one came with Yoshi on base and cut the gap to 7-3 in the third.

But, well, no, it was a lost game and I was fearing for people to throw their mugs at the players. Bill Conway actively petitioned for removal to St. Petersburg (or Chumpsville, NE), bunting into a double play in the bottom 4th, followed by walking two and plating a runner with a wild pitch in the top 5th. That was even AFTER he had already conceded an unearned run blamed on a throwing error by Dylan Alexander. Or was it really lost? Rod Taylor developed a curious case of The Walks in the middle innings, and loaded the bases on walks to Nomura and J-Alex around a Palmer single and a too-eager strikeout of Quebell in the bottom 5th. Pruitt came up and was also soon in a favorable count before peppering a 2-1 pitch to deep right, deep, deep – GRAAAAAAAND SLAAAAAAAMMM!!!!

This one knocked out Taylor, who thus did not manage to qualify for a win despite getting nine runs of support. The tying runs were on base in the bottom 6th, two outs and Quebell facing righty Peter Edwards, who lost the Coons’ first baseman to a walk, but Alexander flew out to left after that. And despite Conway being hit for in the inning, the pitching remained a mess. Mullins drilled Baca in the top 7th before Gary Rice legged out an infield single, but fell down immediately behind the bag, holding his leg and wincing in agony. Jaylin Lawrence replaced him in the game, while Mullins was shafted for Ron Thrasher, who reduced the Elks to two strikeouts on the way out of the mess. Merritt homered off John Bennett to get the Coons within a run, but they had to face Pedro Alvarado in the bottom of the ninth, with Quebell, Gutierrez (due to some double-switching), and Pruitt up in the inning. The Raccoons were reduced to frustration in ten pitches. 9-8 Canadiens. Nomura 1-2, 3 BB; Quebell 2-4, BB, 2 HR, 3 RBI; Pruitt 2-5, HR, 4 RBI; Thrasher 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

We don’t get any love with our replacement level pitching, huh??

Waiver claim

The pitching-desperate Raccoons added another lab rat on Sunday, claiming SP Scott Spears off waivers by the Wolves. Spears was employed as a swingman by Salem, pitching 32.1 innings with five starts and three relief appearances, and put up a 1-3 record with a 3.34 ERA. He walked 15 against 14 strikeouts. Spears, a 32-year old right-hander, was of course a long-time part of the Elks’ rotation, and NEVER managed to pitch to an ERA better than the 4.19 mark in his rookie campaign.

Like I said, we’re desperate.

Spears started on Wednesday, meaning that Monday would be a regular rest start for him, but we’re not moving Brownie for waiver claim scum and he will instead pitch Tuesday ahead of Rich Hood.

Well, at least he only makes $232k this year. Minor note: he has 993 K, so unless he turns out to be yet another one-nightmare-wonder like the last three guys we tried, he should make it to 1,000 as a Coon. Not that this matters in ANY way. Although his arrival means that Nick Brown no longer accounts for more than 50% of the assembled career strikeouts on the roster.

Raccoons (32-22) vs. Canadiens (31-21) – June 1-3, 2012

Game 3
VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 3B Suzuki – C Baca – SS Lawrence – 2B M. Austin – P Osborne
POR: 2B Nomura – 3B Merritt – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Castro – SS Canning – C D. Alexander – P Yano

Coon City went up 1-0 on Pruitt’s single in the bottom 1st after the team had loaded the bases on all possible means before that, including a Yoshi single, a Merritt walk, and poor J-Alex getting dished in the elbow. The Coons would throw up four in total, with Castro wringing a bases-loaded walk from Osborne, and Dylan Alexander hitting a 2-out, 2-run double, on which Castro was thrown out at home. The Coons had the bases loaded again with one out in the third inning after another single by Pruitt, another walk by Castro, and this time it was Canning who got smacked, but Osborne escaped with strikeouts to the #8 and #9 batters, then came pretty close to tying the game in the top 4th. The Elks had started the inning by battering three straight singles off Yano, who was pretty much hopeless out there, but a John Alexander throwing error certainly didn’t help his efforts. The Elks had plated three runs by the time Osborne hit a sharp bouncer to Merritt, who just barely got his paw on it to keep this one from going into the corner and scoring Mark Austin from second base.

Like all good things, this relief was temporary, and Yano was knocked out in the fifth. Garcia and Gilbert hit two more singles to get started, and he walked Mitsuhide Suzuki with one out. Manobu Sugano came in and threw one pitch to dissolve the situation, a perfect double play grounder by Alonso Baca to Yoshi, and the Coons maintained a 4-3 lead. Sugano logged another five fairly efficient outs on 20 pitches total, and Castro hit a solo homer to give at least one insurance run, and still, as soon as Sugano was gone, Law Rockburn was suddenly drowning in runners in the top 7th. Gilbert singled, Cameron walked, and then Canning started a double play with a nifty swipe on a sharp grounder by Suzuki to escape yet another mess.

Bottom 7th, Edwards pitching. Pruitt singled, Castro doubled, Canning walked. Nobody out, bases loaded. Come on now! Bowl them over! D-Alex beat a sliding Enrique Garcia for a 2-run double on a 3-1 pitch, before Seeley walked to reload the sacks, and another walk was issued to Nomura, shoving home a run. That was finally enough for Edwards, with another righty in Dave Weber replacing him. Weber struck out Merritt, Bowen – hitting for Law after an earlier double switch – lined out to Suzuki at third, and John Alexander hit a drive to right center that – is it? Will it? It would! GRAAAAAAAAAND SLAAAAAAAAMMMMM!!!!

That 7-run outburst gave the Critters a 12-3 lead, but they still had to pitch for six outs, so… And it was Mullins again at it in the eighth, although a walk to Mark Austin didn’t turn around to bite him. He remained in the blowout for the ninth, allowing singles to Holland and Garcia to get going before the defense bailed him out completely. 12-3 Raccoons! J. Alexander 1-4, HR, 4 RBI; Pruitt 4-5, RBI; Castro 2-3, 2 BB, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; D. Alexander 3-5, 2 2B, 4 RBI; Sugano 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K, W (3-0); Mullins 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K;

Well, the bats are working now, it seems.

In other news

May 28 – Indy’s SP Curtis Tobitt (5-3, 3.01 ERA) erases the league-stomping Thunder with ease in a 2-hit shutout, whiffing ten, as the Indians win 4-0. One of the hits is collected by the Thunder’s Emilio Farias (.341, 0 HR, 28 RBI), who runs a hitting streak to 20 games.
May 30 – At 40 years old, LVA CL Ryosei Kato (1-2, 1.80 ERA, 11 SV) still has it, and locks up his 400th career save by preserving a 3-1 win over the Titans. Kato, the 2005 Reliever of the Year, has appeared in 1,120 career games since debuting with the 1994 Bayhawks, and whiffed 1,322. He led the league in saves twice with the 2000 Bayhawks and the 2004 Buffaloes. His career ERA is 2.75.
June 1 – The Indians place 2B Jong-beom Kym (.278, 10 HR, 35 RBI) on the DL with a torn meniscus. He might not be back this month.
June 2 – Another CYCLE is hit for in the ABL! NYC LF Martin Ortíz (.293, 10 HR, 45 RBI) connects for four hits including all the required components in the Crusaders’ 6-5 loss to the Indians, driving in two. The third cycle in less than three weeks and the 49th overall, this one is the second for the Crusaders franchise after Stanton Martin’s from 2006. While only eight of the 49 ABL cycles have been hit by players on the losing team, two of the last three have been hit by defeated contestants (also: SFW Gil Gross on May 16).
June 2 – BOS 2B/3B Jesus Ramirez (.236, 6 HR, 26 RBI) should miss a week or so with a sprained elbow.
June 2 – DAL SP Victor Scott (5-3, 4.88 ERA) could be out for a full year with a torn flexor tendon in his elbow.
June 3 – The hitting streak of OCT INF Emilio Farias (.335, 0 HR, 31 RBI) ends after 24 games as he is held cold in four at-bats by the Aces, who take the series finale from the Thunder, 2-1.

Complaints and stuff

After Nick Brown’s game on Wednesday, his ERA was a full run better than that of any other starter, and 1 1/2 runs better than that of any other starter not broken and on the DL. Whoopsie. Looks like my quest for the “silently efficient” type of pitcher yielded a triple-whammy this year. Add to that Hood and Santos, who are both messes.

The pitching is … traumatic. Don’t know whether it will get better with Spears, either… Mullins and Conway are also pretty darn close to getting shafted.

The bimonthly scouting report was a bit unpleasant. Nick Brown was graded down in terms of movement (still a 13 though and he hasn’t allowed too many homers recently), and Angel Casas was also slashed of a point of movement (to 14). Juan Calderón also diminished Michael Palmer to two stars, but I think he’s doing good enough right now…

However, part of the prospect haul from last July was rated up, with Gary Dupes, who had recently been promoted to AAA, gaining a blip of stuff and control (10/10/9 current), and Ricardo Carmona’s contact was improved to 17. Too bad he’ll be on the DL still for most of the month.

Odd trivia: Who was the only pitcher in the ABL to allow a run while throwing a no-hitter? Portland’s Manuel Movonda.

Today is the first day of 11 straight off work for me. Updates might be frequent from now on.

05-26-2016, 07:27 AM	#1860
Westheim Hall Of Famer Join Date: Apr 2012 Location: Germany Posts: 13,859	Raccoons (29-22) vs. Bayhawks (24-26) – May 29-31, 2012 We had taken two of three from the Baybirds in San Francisco earlier this season, and right now a repeat of that would already be soothing the soul considerably, for if the Raccoons continued to play like last week they’d soon find themselves all the way down in fourth place. They were fourth in runs scored, but 10th in runs allowed, with a rotation even worse than ours at a 4.86 ERA (11th). Projected matchups: Shunyo Yano (2-4, 4.63 ERA) vs. Alex Maldonado (2-2, 5.35 ERA) Nick Brown (6-1, 3.17 ERA) vs. Milt Beauchamp (2-4, 5.46 ERA) Rich Hood (0-1, 5.14 ERA) vs. Felipe Ramirez (5-2, 3.79 ERA) Their entire rotation is right-handed, and we miss their best guy, Reynaldo Rendon (5-4, 3.16 ERA). Our own rotation was a mess even if you were disinclined to throw their 4.50 ERA (9th in CL) into the discussion right now. Six guys had started six games for the Coons last week, and three were not on the team anymore. Since Nick Brown was the only thing vaguely similar to a reliable guy right now, we would keep him on regular rest, which put him into the Wednesday middle game of the series. Shunyo Yano had pitched Wednesday last week – without success, but hey, who had? – and was assigned the opener on five days’ rest. Rich Hood was slotted in behind them although he hadn’t started a game at all, and then we’d have Santos on Friday on seven days’ rest. Like I said, it was a mess right now. We had no starter for Saturday so far, and the wildest possibility was to give Sergio Vega another start. Yeah that guy that can’t do anything and has been doing that for over a decade. And yet he keeps (creeps?) coming back! The other option would be Bill Conway, but … ugh! Meanwhile we learned of Sandy Sambrano’s injury by Tuesday morning, and he had a pretty bad hamstring strain and went to the DL. Walt Canning (.293, 3 HR, 32 RBI in AAA) was called up to replace him on the roster, since we were essentially missing an infielder with our superutility guy down. Canning was a career .258 batter with 2 HR in 190 AB in the Bigs. Team trainer Octávio Herrera reported that Sandy could miss two months, then ducked efficiently out of the Raccoons mug I hurled at him. While that one mug splintered against the wall, we still have enough for the first 15,000 games to come for Saturday’s home game against the Elks. Maud has more info on that; I only have a headache, and nothing to drink from anymore. Game 1 SFB: CF Holt – 3B J. Rodriguez – RF Alston – LF J. Gomez – 1B Simmons – C J. Clark – SS Ingraham – 2B Brazeal – P Maldonado POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Seeley – CF Castro – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – P Yano Yano certainly wasn’t overpowering anybody, and the Bayhawks took a 1-0 lead in the first inning on singles by Javier Rodriguez and Jose Gomez around a walk to “Monti” Alston. Zach Ingraham increased the lead to 2-0 with a 2-out RBI single in the fourth, at which point the Raccoons didn’t have a hit yet, but Palmer took care of that to start the bottom of the fourth, and scored on Jason Seeley’s double, cutting the 2-0 gap in half, and Dylan Alexander’s solo home run in the fifth made up the rest of it as both teams had five hits for two runs through five innings, although the Coons also had two men on in the bottom 5th until Quebell popped out foul to end the frame… Why could Quebell not hit like Alex Maldonado!? The opposing pitcher’s turn came up with two outs in the sixth, and the bases were loaded. The Bayhawks didn’t hit for him, but why would they? Maldonado beat Seeley’s range for a double into the gap, two runs scored, the Birds went up 4-2, and Yano was heading for the showers. Law Rockburn struck out Jasper Holt to end the inning. Quebell in the bottom 7th got another chance at doing something good for the Coons, again with two outs and Nomura (who had singled home Jon Merritt to cut the score to 4-3) and Palmer on second and first, respectively. Facing righty reliever Javier Montés-Ortíz, Quebell lined a 1-2 pitch into right center to plate Yoshi from second and tie the score. J-Alex walked, but Seeley struck out to strand another three runners, and when Tomas Castro hit a leadoff double in the bottom 8th, nobody could be bothered to plate him. Both closers were on duty in the ninth inning: Angel Casas allowed a leadoff single to Sadaharu Ishikawa, but then retired Holt with a strikeout and had Javy Rodriguez hit into a double play. Valentim Innocentes faced the top of the order right away. Yoshi was retired on a soft fly to left, but Palmer hit a bloop single. Quebell worked a 3-1 count before taking a rip at a low pitch, which I normally didn’t like to see, especially not in this situation, but he actually hit that low pitch and drove it a ton to right, where Ron Alston ran after it to no avail, since this one was ticketed to Washington State altogether. 6-4 Raccoons! Nomura 2-5, RBI; Palmer 3-5; Quebell 2-5, HR, 3 RBI; Sugano 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K; Game 2 SFB: CF Holt – C J. Clark – RF Alston – LF J. Gomez – 1B Simmons – SS Ingraham – 3B J. Rodriguez – 2B Brazeal – P Beauchamp POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Seeley – C D. Alexander – 3B Canning – P Brown In his head, Nick Brown was a mess in that second inning. Jose Gomez led off with a single, but got forced by Andrew Simmons, who remained at first base. Brown then slipped from this dimension, threw a WILD pitch, then balked Simmons to third altogether, from where Javy Rodriguez scored him with a slow single through Walt Canning and the Bayhawks were up 1-0. Well, technically, Brownie had his stuff, and the Birds whiffed in droves (9 K in the first five innings, and on under 70 pitches), but he certainly hadn’t all his mind together, and on top of that got no support whatsoever. D-Alex was charged a passed ball to move Rodriguez into scoring position in the fifth, where he remained, but our backstop was also charged guilty twice, along with Seeley, for nixing promising offensive efforts: Pruitt in the bottom 2nd and J-Alex in the bottom 4th opened frames with doubles, and neither moved further than third base, and the Coons kept trailing 1-0. Bottom 5th, leadoff walk drawn by Canning. We called a hit-and-run, Brownie missed, but Canning was safe at second, then moved to third when Brown grounded out to Micah Brazeal. Yoshi walked, giving us runners on the corners, and Palmer found himself in a full count when he grounded to short, and here Ingraham’s throw to Brazeal was just that little tad off what Brazeal expected; while Yoshi was out, they couldn’t turn two, the score did become tied after all, but didn’t remain as such for long. Quebell singled, and then John Alexander beat Alston for a triple into the corner to send the Brownshirts flying 3-1. Depressingly, Brownie responded to this finally arriving cavalry support with a leadoff walk to Jason Clark in the top 6th, then allowed a first-pitch single to Alston to put the tying runs on, but the Bayhawks clunkered out of it on two strikeouts and a bouncer back to the mound, yet that didn’t mean that ** wasn’t coming down again in the seventh inning, starting with Brown’s inexplicable and inexcusable 2-out walk to Milt Beauchamp. Holt singled, and then Jason Clark hit that kind of drive to deep left that made you close your eyes, turn away, and wait for a crowd reaction as to what was going to happen. The home crowd was dead silent, but then you could hear the ball clanking off the wall, the noise rose a bit, another bit, and then they burst into cheers and some isolated “Pru-itt! Pru-itt!” chants. Matt Pruitt had played Clark’s drive off the wall pretty well, and had unleashed a deadly rocket back in. Beauchamp scored, and the Birds sent Holt to tie the game, but Palmer’s relay killed him off at the bag and the Coons maintained a 3-2 lead! Brown came back out for the top 8th, getting Alston to ground out and whiffed Gomez to fill up a dozen, but then walked another lefty in Simmons. That was it, 117 pitches on the clock and a right-hander up, but once Steele was on the mound, the Baybirds sent in left-hander Omarion Thompson to pinch-hit for Ingraham, but Steele struck him out anyway. Tomas Castro hit for Canning in the bottom 8th and launched a homer for an insurance run, but to everybody’s mental trauma Angel Casas blew the lead anyway in the top of the ninth. Issuing a walk to Brazeal was bad enough, but getting taken deep by Jasper Holt to tie the score should merit two weeks in the oubliette. He didn’t get out of the inning either, as Clark singled and Alston walked with two outs. While there was no happy end for Nick Brown’s W-L record, at least Thrasher got out of the inning, also pitched a scoreless 10th, and when his turn (in the #5 hole) was up to start the bottom 10th, Craig Bowen hit for him and ended the game in just two more pitches – back-to-back walkoff homers! 5-4 Critters. Quebell 2-5, 2B; J. Alexander 2-4, BB, 3B, 2B, 2 RBI; Bowen (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; Castro (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; Brown 7.2 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 12 K; Thrasher 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, W (3-2); That was a pretty curiously bad outing for Angel Casas, who threw 29 pitches and achieved nothing except to make Brownie mad. It’s okay, Brownie, you will win the next one. Maybe. Another note, Nick Brown’s ERA is over 3, which is unusual, but his 2.2 BB/9 and 10.4 K/9 numbers are career bests or pretty close to it. His main issue is shoddy defense right now, with a .310 BABIP against him, which would be tied for a career-worst for a full season for him. Game 3 SFB: CF Holt – C J. Clark – RF Alston – LF J. Gomez – 1B Simmons – SS Ingraham – 3B J. Rodriguez – 2B Brazeal – P F. Ramirez POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – CF Castro – C Bowen – P Hood After not walking anybody in his first career start and coming down with the plague in between, Rich Hood opened his second career start with two walks to the first two batters he saw, then coughed up two hits to concede three runs right away. Not all was lost yet, since the Raccoons would throw up their own 3-spot to tie the game in the third inning, although the Bayhawks were kindly supporting them. Bowen led off the inning with a single, and was Rodriguez’ target when Hood bunted to third base. Bowen beat the throw to second, the fielder’s choice retired nobody, and the inning continued long enough for the Raccoons to score two runs on Michael Palmer’s double to right center, and the tying run when John Alexander singled with two down. Ramirez had barely caught his breath when he was back to pitching again in the bottom 4th, and didn’t see the other end of the frame. The Coons wobbled him with two outs, starting with singles by Bowen to right, and by Hood up the middle. Yoshi found the gap in left center for a go-ahead 2-run double, then scored on Palmer’s roller into center, 6-3. Replacement Ron Carter got out of the inning when Simmons made a great grab on Quebell’s fast bounce to right, and whiffed Hood with the bases loaded to end the fifth inning, but Quebell got him for an RBI double in the bottom 6th after a leadoff walk to Yoshi. By then it was also raining on and off. Hood made it through seven on just one more hit after the first inning shackling he received, but was then knocked out by Ishikawa’s pinch-hit double without logging an out in the eighth inning. Kyle Mullins threw two pitches to Jasper Holt before a rain delay was called, which lasted almost for an hour. After that, Mullins surrendered the runner left on by Hood on two fly outs, and with Angel unavailable I tried my luck with Sugano for a 4-out save once Alston came up, and a strikeout to our former slugger certainly got Sugano on a good track, but the top 9th was opened with singles by Gomez and Simmons, bringing up the tying run. Ingraham was retired on a soft line to Nomura, and Rodriguez struck out. Brazeal had little to no power, and so the Coons stuck with Sugano, who whiffed the second baseman to get the sweep into the books! 7-4 Furballs! Nomura 3-4, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Palmer 2-5, 2B, 3 RBI; Bowen 2-3, BB; Sugano 1.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K, SV (1); That’s obviously Sugano’s first career save in the ABL, and it established a virtual tie with the Elks for first place in the division just as said stinkers were coming into town. Brace yourselves, a vile smell is coming! Raccoons (32-22) vs. Canadiens (31-21) – June 1-3, 2012 The Elks were seventh in runs scored, but second in runs allowed with the best rotation in the league. Their starters’ ERA was 2.94, something the Raccoons remembered vaguely but couldn’t quite make a claim to right now… We had beaten them for four out of six so far in 2012. Projected matchups: Hector Santos (4-3, 4.61 ERA) vs. Juichi Fujita (5-3, 4.04 ERA) Marco Gomez (0-0) vs. Rod Taylor (7-2, 2.25 ERA) Shunyo Yano (2-4, 4.79 ERA) vs. Brad Osborne (4-3, 3.06 ERA) Two things. Looks like they will skip Bob King (3-4, 3.14 ERA), and we miss their only southpaw Johnny Krom (3-2, 2.31 ERA) as well. Which might not be a bad thing in general. Third thing: Marco Gomez will make his major league debut on Saturday. He was our 2006 fourth rounder and has been in St. Pete since 2009 without ever achieving anything. He is right-handed, throws about 92, but while he has some natural sink to his fastball, his breaking stuff is all mediocre and hangs too often, resulting in grisly scores. Also an issue, like he doesn’t have enough of those: walks. For crying out loud, his AAA ERA is 4.97 over more than 500 innings…! Gomez might make two starts before we can get another off day and get some flexibility in the rotation. Game 1 VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 3B Suzuki – C Baca – SS Rice – 2B M. Austin – P Fujita POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – CF Castro – C Bowen – P Santos Both teams had only a single the first time through the order, but soon enough the Elks rallied against Hector Santos and took a 2-0 lead on a mammoth homer by Alonso Baca in the fourth inning. Castro hit a 1-out single in the bottom 5th, stole second base, but Bowen grounded out, which would have left Castro on third base if Hector Santos’ roller hadn’t eluded Ray Gilbert for reasons unknown and had made it into shallow right for an RBI single. Yoshi hit another one like that past Gary Rice, but Palmer flew out to left to end the inning. Top 6th, Don Cameron reached base with a single but was caught stealing by Bowen, who had now killed off seven of 15 runners this year. The Raccoons quickly had something going in the bottom of the sixth inning then. Quebell drew a leadoff walk, and John Alexander singled to right. Pruitt grounded out, moving the tying and go-ahead runs into scoring position for Jon Merritt, who made a pathetic rolling out on the first pitch and didn’t get the runners in, and Castro grounded out to Gilbert after that. Santos was gone after seven good, but unsuccessful innings, but the Elks ran out Fujita for the bottom 8th. And why wouldn’t they? He was on 92 pitches, and despite only whiffing three in seven innings he looked like he was in good shape. Then Palmer assaulted him for a game-tying leadoff jack in the eighth. Oh well, we’ll take that. It did come surprising, though. The Coons were in business soon enough: Quebell reached on Mark Austin’s bobbling error, and J-Alex singled to right, but eventually left the bases loaded when Bowen struck out, and without taking the lead. Law Rockburn pitched the top 9th, with Gilbert hitting a leadoff single. He moved to third on two groundouts, which brought up Baca again: .395, 6 HR, 21 RBI. Nope! Four fingers outside and let’s go to Gary Rice (.210, 6 HR, 21 RBI), whom Law whiffed to escape the jam, and the Coons did little enough to send the game to extras. Once there, Josh Gibson was broken out just before his removal from the roster to make room for Marco Gomez. He got through the 10th despite a leadoff single and hit batter, then walked Cameron at the start of the top 11th and THEN hit Suzuki! Alright, get that scum off the mound! Sugano came out, struck out Baca and Rice and got a grounder to short from PH Ramiro Cavazos to escape another jam. Then the Coons had their first two men on in the bottom of the inning. Castro had singled to left, and Bowen got plunked by Pedro Alvarado. Gutierrez was the last bat off the bench, hitting for Sugano, grounded to the pitcher, who got Bowen forced at second. But that didn’t matter! Castro was at third with one out, and Yoshi was at the plate, hit a 1-0 pitch up the middle, Jaylin Lawrence didn’t get to it, and the Coons had their third walkoff in the week! 3-2 Blighters! Nomura 3-5, BB, 2B, RBI; Palmer 2-5, HR, RBI; J. Alexander 3-5; Castro 2-4, BB; Santos 7.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 4 K and 1-2, RBI; Game 2 VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 3B Suzuki – C Baca – SS Rice – 2B M. Austin – P R. Taylor POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Seeley – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – P M. Gomez How often will a pitcher knock two base hits in the same inning? While the statisticians are still on that one, add Rod Taylor to the list prematurely. After home runs by Quebell and Baca had made this a 1-1 game early, Gomez became the next Raccoons fill-in starter to be torn to shreds inconveniently early. Taylor opened the top of the third inning with a single, the line kept moving, moving, moving, and after an intentional walk to Mark Austin that filled the bags with two outs, Taylor lined another hopeless Gomez offering into rightfield for a 2-run single, which ran the score to 7-1 and Gomez from the game. Bill Conway replaced him and had Seeley hustle after a Ross Holland drive to center, but eventually Gomez’ line closed after ten hits and seven runs allowed in 2 2/3 innings. Despite facing Taylor, who led the league in strikeouts (102 coming in), the Raccoons weren’t entirely dead yet, since Adrian Quebell managed to hit another homer his second time up. This one came with Yoshi on base and cut the gap to 7-3 in the third. But, well, no, it was a lost game and I was fearing for people to throw their mugs at the players. Bill Conway actively petitioned for removal to St. Petersburg (or Chumpsville, NE), bunting into a double play in the bottom 4th, followed by walking two and plating a runner with a wild pitch in the top 5th. That was even AFTER he had already conceded an unearned run blamed on a throwing error by Dylan Alexander. Or was it really lost? Rod Taylor developed a curious case of The Walks in the middle innings, and loaded the bases on walks to Nomura and J-Alex around a Palmer single and a too-eager strikeout of Quebell in the bottom 5th. Pruitt came up and was also soon in a favorable count before peppering a 2-1 pitch to deep right, deep, deep – GRAAAAAAAND SLAAAAAAAMMM!!!! This one knocked out Taylor, who thus did not manage to qualify for a win despite getting nine runs of support. The tying runs were on base in the bottom 6th, two outs and Quebell facing righty Peter Edwards, who lost the Coons’ first baseman to a walk, but Alexander flew out to left after that. And despite Conway being hit for in the inning, the pitching remained a mess. Mullins drilled Baca in the top 7th before Gary Rice legged out an infield single, but fell down immediately behind the bag, holding his leg and wincing in agony. Jaylin Lawrence replaced him in the game, while Mullins was shafted for Ron Thrasher, who reduced the Elks to two strikeouts on the way out of the mess. Merritt homered off John Bennett to get the Coons within a run, but they had to face Pedro Alvarado in the bottom of the ninth, with Quebell, Gutierrez (due to some double-switching), and Pruitt up in the inning. The Raccoons were reduced to frustration in ten pitches. 9-8 Canadiens. Nomura 1-2, 3 BB; Quebell 2-4, BB, 2 HR, 3 RBI; Pruitt 2-5, HR, 4 RBI; Thrasher 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K; We don’t get any love with our replacement level pitching, huh?? Waiver claim The pitching-desperate Raccoons added another lab rat on Sunday, claiming SP Scott Spears off waivers by the Wolves. Spears was employed as a swingman by Salem, pitching 32.1 innings with five starts and three relief appearances, and put up a 1-3 record with a 3.34 ERA. He walked 15 against 14 strikeouts. Spears, a 32-year old right-hander, was of course a long-time part of the Elks’ rotation, and NEVER managed to pitch to an ERA better than the 4.19 mark in his rookie campaign. Like I said, we’re desperate. Spears started on Wednesday, meaning that Monday would be a regular rest start for him, but we’re not moving Brownie for waiver claim scum and he will instead pitch Tuesday ahead of Rich Hood. Well, at least he only makes $232k this year. Minor note: he has 993 K, so unless he turns out to be yet another one-nightmare-wonder like the last three guys we tried, he should make it to 1,000 as a Coon. Not that this matters in ANY way. Although his arrival means that Nick Brown no longer accounts for more than 50% of the assembled career strikeouts on the roster. Raccoons (32-22) vs. Canadiens (31-21) – June 1-3, 2012 Game 3 VAN: CF Holland – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 3B Suzuki – C Baca – SS Lawrence – 2B M. Austin – P Osborne POR: 2B Nomura – 3B Merritt – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – CF Castro – SS Canning – C D. Alexander – P Yano Coon City went up 1-0 on Pruitt’s single in the bottom 1st after the team had loaded the bases on all possible means before that, including a Yoshi single, a Merritt walk, and poor J-Alex getting dished in the elbow. The Coons would throw up four in total, with Castro wringing a bases-loaded walk from Osborne, and Dylan Alexander hitting a 2-out, 2-run double, on which Castro was thrown out at home. The Coons had the bases loaded again with one out in the third inning after another single by Pruitt, another walk by Castro, and this time it was Canning who got smacked, but Osborne escaped with strikeouts to the #8 and #9 batters, then came pretty close to tying the game in the top 4th. The Elks had started the inning by battering three straight singles off Yano, who was pretty much hopeless out there, but a John Alexander throwing error certainly didn’t help his efforts. The Elks had plated three runs by the time Osborne hit a sharp bouncer to Merritt, who just barely got his paw on it to keep this one from going into the corner and scoring Mark Austin from second base. Like all good things, this relief was temporary, and Yano was knocked out in the fifth. Garcia and Gilbert hit two more singles to get started, and he walked Mitsuhide Suzuki with one out. Manobu Sugano came in and threw one pitch to dissolve the situation, a perfect double play grounder by Alonso Baca to Yoshi, and the Coons maintained a 4-3 lead. Sugano logged another five fairly efficient outs on 20 pitches total, and Castro hit a solo homer to give at least one insurance run, and still, as soon as Sugano was gone, Law Rockburn was suddenly drowning in runners in the top 7th. Gilbert singled, Cameron walked, and then Canning started a double play with a nifty swipe on a sharp grounder by Suzuki to escape yet another mess. Bottom 7th, Edwards pitching. Pruitt singled, Castro doubled, Canning walked. Nobody out, bases loaded. Come on now! Bowl them over! D-Alex beat a sliding Enrique Garcia for a 2-run double on a 3-1 pitch, before Seeley walked to reload the sacks, and another walk was issued to Nomura, shoving home a run. That was finally enough for Edwards, with another righty in Dave Weber replacing him. Weber struck out Merritt, Bowen – hitting for Law after an earlier double switch – lined out to Suzuki at third, and John Alexander hit a drive to right center that – is it? Will it? It would! GRAAAAAAAAAND SLAAAAAAAAMMMMM!!!! That 7-run outburst gave the Critters a 12-3 lead, but they still had to pitch for six outs, so… And it was Mullins again at it in the eighth, although a walk to Mark Austin didn’t turn around to bite him. He remained in the blowout for the ninth, allowing singles to Holland and Garcia to get going before the defense bailed him out completely. 12-3 Raccoons! J. Alexander 1-4, HR, 4 RBI; Pruitt 4-5, RBI; Castro 2-3, 2 BB, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; D. Alexander 3-5, 2 2B, 4 RBI; Sugano 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K, W (3-0); Mullins 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K; Well, the bats are working now, it seems. In other news May 28 – Indy’s SP Curtis Tobitt (5-3, 3.01 ERA) erases the league-stomping Thunder with ease in a 2-hit shutout, whiffing ten, as the Indians win 4-0. One of the hits is collected by the Thunder’s Emilio Farias (.341, 0 HR, 28 RBI), who runs a hitting streak to 20 games. May 30 – At 40 years old, LVA CL Ryosei Kato (1-2, 1.80 ERA, 11 SV) still has it, and locks up his 400th career save by preserving a 3-1 win over the Titans. Kato, the 2005 Reliever of the Year, has appeared in 1,120 career games since debuting with the 1994 Bayhawks, and whiffed 1,322. He led the league in saves twice with the 2000 Bayhawks and the 2004 Buffaloes. His career ERA is 2.75. June 1 – The Indians place 2B Jong-beom Kym (.278, 10 HR, 35 RBI) on the DL with a torn meniscus. He might not be back this month. June 2 – Another CYCLE is hit for in the ABL! NYC LF Martin Ortíz (.293, 10 HR, 45 RBI) connects for four hits including all the required components in the Crusaders’ 6-5 loss to the Indians, driving in two. The third cycle in less than three weeks and the 49th overall, this one is the second for the Crusaders franchise after Stanton Martin’s from 2006. While only eight of the 49 ABL cycles have been hit by players on the losing team, two of the last three have been hit by defeated contestants (also: SFW Gil Gross on May 16). June 2 – BOS 2B/3B Jesus Ramirez (.236, 6 HR, 26 RBI) should miss a week or so with a sprained elbow. June 2 – DAL SP Victor Scott (5-3, 4.88 ERA) could be out for a full year with a torn flexor tendon in his elbow. June 3 – The hitting streak of OCT INF Emilio Farias (.335, 0 HR, 31 RBI) ends after 24 games as he is held cold in four at-bats by the Aces, who take the series finale from the Thunder, 2-1. Complaints and stuff** After Nick Brown’s game on Wednesday, his ERA was a full run better than that of any other starter, and 1 1/2 runs better than that of any other starter not broken and on the DL. Whoopsie. Looks like my quest for the “silently efficient” type of pitcher yielded a triple-whammy this year. Add to that Hood and Santos, who are both messes. The pitching is … traumatic. Don’t know whether it will get better with Spears, either… Mullins and Conway are also pretty darn close to getting shafted. The bimonthly scouting report was a bit unpleasant. Nick Brown was graded down in terms of movement (still a 13 though and he hasn’t allowed too many homers recently), and Angel Casas was also slashed of a point of movement (to 14). Juan Calderón also diminished Michael Palmer to two stars, but I think he’s doing good enough right now… However, part of the prospect haul from last July was rated up, with Gary Dupes, who had recently been promoted to AAA, gaining a blip of stuff and control (10/10/9 current), and Ricardo Carmona’s contact was improved to 17. Too bad he’ll be on the DL still for most of the month. Odd trivia: Who was the only pitcher in the ABL to allow a run while throwing a no-hitter? Portland’s Manuel Movonda. Today is the first day of 11 straight off work for me. Updates might be frequent from now on. Attached Images __________________ Portland Raccoons, 92 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 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. Last edited by Westheim; 05-26-2016 at 07:28 AM.