[Westheim]

Raccoons (61-55) vs. Blue Sox (52-66) – August 15-17, 2016

Last interleague series of the year, and one that had seen alternating winners in the last four editions, with the Blue Sox coming out on top most recently in 2015. All four of those series had been 2-1 affairs (one way or the other), following back-to-back Raccoons sweeps in 2007 and 2008. This was really not a good Blue Sox team, either, which their .441 record hinted at already. They were also 11th in runs scored in their league (although they had still plated 24 more runs than the Critters in the more offensively-minded Federal League), but only had average pitching. The rotation was even quite decent with an ERA on the good side of four, but the bullpen had holes, more and bigger than Swiss cheese.

Projected matchups:
Chris Munroe (5-8, 3.47 ERA) vs. Evan Greenfield (8-10, 4.31 ERA)
Tadasu Abe (9-7, 3.73 ERA) vs. Kevin Clayton (6-5, 3.13 ERA)
Nick Brown (13-6, 2.09 ERA) vs. Matt McCabe (8-8, 4.28 ERA)

Three righties for the Coons’ left-handed armada of non-hitters to fail against.

Game 1
NAS: LF R. Allen – RF Calderon – SS Showalter – 3B A. Esquivel – CF Macias – 1B M. Garza – C W. Jones – 2B Eason – P Greenfield
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Walter – 3B Nunley – LF DeWeese – 1B Young – SS McKnight – RF Richards – C Baca – P Munroe

From early on it looked like offense might have a chance in this game, despite two inept orders taking swings at another. Both pitchers walked a pair of batters in the first inning, and neither got much better than that. The Blue Sox were the first to break through against Munroe, and did so quite forcefully with a pair of 2-run homers in the third inning, hit by Chris Macias and William Jones. Ironically, none of the four runners that scored reached on a walk there. The Raccoons would not reach second base again until the bottom 4th, when DeWeese and McKnight hit singles, but Ron Richards found his way into a double play to end the inning. Bottom 5th, Cookie’s 2-out walk didn’t look like much, but soon enough Shane Walter singled and Nunley also walked, loading them up for DeWeese, who was the tying run. One run scored on a passed ball before DeWeese struck out. Munroe stuck around long enough to allow a 1-out double to rightfielder Nick Calderon in the seventh inning, which promptly turned into the Blue Sox’ fifth run on Seung-mo Chun’s watch as he allowed a single to Andrew Showalter, who then stole two bases on Baca to score on another single by Antonio Esquivel. The Raccoons would only go on to score a meaningless run in the bottom 8th on McKnight’s grounder to Bobby Eason that allowed DeWeese to come home from third base. The game ended on a recently frequent play: Cookie Carmona being thrown out at second base. This time he arrived in time, but overslid the bag. 6-2 Blue Sox. Jones (PH) 1-1, 2B;

The Raccoons had five hits, and only Howard Jones’ was for extra bases. They drew six walks, of which Cookie won half. They are also inept and make my eyes burn.

Game 2
NAS: LF R. Allen – RF Calderon – SS Showalter – 3B A. Esquivel – CF Macias – C Garner – 1B M. Garza – 2B Fuentes – P Clayton
POR: CF Carmona – SS Walter – 3B Nunley – LF DeWeese – RF Fucito – 1B Young – 2B H. Jones – C Margolis – P Abe

Both teams whiffed themselves out of fat chances early in the game. DeWeese and Fucito failed with Cookie and Nunley on base in the first inning, and the Blue Sox had two on with one out in the second when Abe ran consecutive full counts with Marcos Garza and Tony Fuentes. The former walked, the latter whiffed, and Kevin Clayton also went down swinging. The Sox continued to put their first two men on in the third as Roger Allen walked and Calderon singled to center, but then had Showalter strike out and Esquivel hit into a double play.

After four innings, both teams had hit into two double plays, but the fifth saw some scoring, finally. Matt Nunley got the Sox going with his second error of the game (the first had been double-played away), putting Allen on base to start the inning. Calderon bunted him over, Abe walked Showalter, and then fell to a 2-run double by Esquivel into the left center gap. Chris Macias flew out to center and Randy Garner grounded out to end the inning, with Abe’s day also over. Five hits, four walks, and six strikeouts had led to a whopping 105 pitches for him in just five frames. The Raccoons pulled one run back in the bottom 5th when DeWeese plated Cookie with a sac fly in foul ground; Cookie had stolen his 25th base after a leadoff single to left center in the inning. Still down 2-1, the Coons got seven outs from John Korb in long relief, with the seventh out only registered by Danny Margolis throwing out pinch-runner Mason Harp after Esquivel’s leadoff single in the eighth. After Will West finished that inning, and the Raccoons’ offense did literally nothing, Ron Thrasher completely failed in the ninth, walking two before allowing a single to Bobby Eason. While Ron Richards threw out pinch-runner Myles Beckwith at home plate on Eason’s single, Thrasher being yanked for Mathis only made things worth as Mathis threw a wild pitch and allowed another run on Showalter’s single. Clay Messer singled before Chris Macias struck out to finally end the inning.

With the team down 4-1 and Margolis leading off the bottom 9th against Logan Sloan and his meager 3.42 ERA, people started leaving. Maybe a little bit prematurely: Margolis walked, and Richards singled to right. Margolis misjudged that ball and made for third base, but arrived ahead of Eason’s throw. Worse for the Sox: Eason hurt himself and they were out of bench players, which ended with starting pitcher Jimmy Lee having to set up camp in rightfield. Cookie the tying run, no outs, a defense in trouble, now was the time to make a move! Cookie couldn’t come up with more than a run-scoring fielder’s choice that saw Richards out at second, but Walter singled to send him to third base, and that brought up the winning run in Matt Nunley, who popped out. DeWeese was walked in rather indifferent fashion, with Alonso Baca batting for Mathis in the #5 slot, running a full count for eight pitches until Sloan lost him, his third walk in the inning, and now Adam Young came up with the tying run just 90 feet away and the winning run on second base. Sloan had completely melted now, the Sox couldn’t get anybody up quick enough and Young hit a 2-0 pitch through the right side for a single. Walter scored, DeWeese scored, and the Coons had a walkoff! 5-4 Critters! Carmona 2-5, RBI; Baca (PH) 0-0, BB, RBI; Young 3-5, 2 RBI; Margolis 1-2, 2 BB; Richards 1-1, BB; Korb 2.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Game 3
NAS: LF R. Allen – 1B Messer – SS Showalter – 3B A. Esquivel – CF Macias – C Garner – 2B M. Garza – RF Beckwith – P McCabe
POR: CF Carmona – 3B Walter – SS McKnight – LF DeWeese – RF Richards – 1B Young – 2B Sambrano – C Baca – P Brown

While the Coons left Cookie on third base in the first inning when DeWeese flew out to Beckwith in right, the Blue Sox again got the first run onto the board, scoring on Randy Garner’s groundout in the second inning after Esquivel and Macias had opened the inning with a single to left and a double to center, respectively. Brown would then walk Marcos Garza, but struck out Beckwith and got McCabe to foul out to limit the damage to one run that didn’t stand up for long, due to Cookie launching his sixth homer of the season, a solo shot, in the bottom 3rd. Brownie however had the location not working in this game. His pitches were up, not down, and consequently the Sox hit fly balls to the deeper outfield regions repeatedly. The Sox would hit three fairly hard singles off him in the fifth, bitterly with McCabe getting one to hit to left to start the inning, to take a new 2-1 lead in the fifth inning. The Blue Sox again had runners on first and second with one out in the sixth inning following Myles Beckwith’s infield single. McCabe turned to bunt, albeit badly, and Shane Walter got a force out at third base. Roger Allen came up, batting merely .218 but with a keen eye, and even at 0-2 we were quite sure that Brown would not get a strikeout (though Munroe had whiffed Allen once on Monday) against the eagle in the box. He didn’t – but Allen also made the third out, grounding out to Young at first base.

Brown was taken off the hook in the bottom 6th. DeWeese had walked, but had gotten forced on Richards’ grounder, resulting in the second out. Young and Sambrano came up with a pair of singles to plate Richards, however, tying the score at two before Alonso Baca lined out to Garza to end the sixth. Brownie was sent back to the mound for the seventh, though, with only 86 pitches on the odometer, though most of them had been not too good. The Sox got to see 11 more, hit three of them, two of those hard, but all three right at a fielder to go down 1-2-3 in the seventh, the bottom half of which would see Cookie stranded on third base by DeWeese for the second time in the game, this time with a foul pop. The Coons only scored in the next inning, with Young and Sambrano hitting singles off McCabe, who then fell to a 2-run double by Alonso Baca that beat the reach of Chris Macias in centerfield by inches. This set up a save opportunity, which in lieu of any better ideas was to be handled by Ron Thrasher, with left-handed pinch-hitter Colin Kendall to lead off, the first plate appearance of the season for the 30-year old. He lined out to center, Allen whiffed, and Messer flew out to Richards to end the game. 4-2 Critters. Carmona 2-4, HR, RBI; Richards 2-4, 2B; Young 2-4, 2B; Sambrano 2-2, 2 BB, RBI; Nunley (PH) 1-2; Brown 7.0 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 4 K;

Chris Mathis won back-to-back games.

Jimmy Fucito, batting .231, was waived and designated for assignment. We’d give the world for an efficient right-handed outfield bat. And there might be something coming up… But for now, we recalled Matt Stubbs, because, hey, maybe second time’s the charm. First time he had hit .174…

Raccoons (63-56) @ Crusaders (75-45) – August 19-21, 2016

Do I need to go into detail about how awesome the Crusaders are? I hope not. Everybody knows them, everybody has it up to here (holds hand horizontally in front of his nose) with them. Third in runs scored, first in runs allowed, yada, yada, yada. The Coons still held on to a 6-4 record against them in 2016, and the Crusaders had some considerable injuries with Curtis Tobitt, Jorge Ortega, Eric Paull, and Winston Jones on the DL for them. Also, Francisco Caraballo was hampered by back spasms and day-to-day.

Projected matchups:
Hector Santos (10-5, 2.60 ERA) vs. Albert Lorusso (9-9, 4.01 ERA)
Jonathan Toner (6-6, 2.93 ERA) vs. Jaylen Martin (13-2, 2.27 ERA)
Chris Munroe (5-9, 3.65 ERA) vs. Fernando Cruz (12-9, 3.38 ERA)
Tadasu Abe (9-7, 3.66 ERA) vs. Hwa-pyung Choe (13-5, 3.07 ERA)

This is an odd series. It starts with a double-header, but it will not mess up the rotation or require a spot start due to being flanked by off days. We had one on Thursday, we will have another one on Monday. So everybody other than Brownie will have go in this set, and Brown will pitch Tuesday to start the series in Indy on five days’ rest.

The Crusaders have two southpaws lined up with Lorusso and Cruz, however, both Cruz and Choe would go on short rest for them. Knuckleballer Doug Thompson threw 149 pitches on Thursday, so he’s out of the equation, but they might get a spot start from Colin Sabatino (1-1, 4.12 ERA) if they so desired. Sabatino has thrown 43.2 innings over 22 games this year, all in relief. He started 60 games for the Crusaders between 2014 and 2015, with mixed results. While he went 25-20 combined, he owed all of that to the strong New York offense given his 4.92 ERA over the two seasons.

Game 1
POR: CF Carmona – 1B Sambrano – 3B Walter – LF DeWeese – SS H. Jones – C Margolis – 2B Bergquist – RF Stubbs – P Santos
NYC: RF Bailey – SS Salinas – LF M. Ortíz – 1B Manfull – 2B Caraballo – C Lowe – 3B Rivas – CF Brissett – P Lorusso

The walk-prone Lorusso issued two free passes in the first, but that didn’t help the Raccoons to score. I also made sure to give the Crusaders a really good look of Shane Walter, whom they had lost on waivers to the Raccoons earlier in the season and who had now (just a few days ago) gobbled up enough plate appearances to qualify for the batting race again, in which he came in ranking second. He quickly hurt them with a 2-run single in the third inning, scoring Cookie (fielder’s choice after Santos’ leadoff single) and Sandy (double). Santos managed to bunt into a double play his next time up, ending the top of the fourth, but at least he had allowed only a single hit to the Crusaders the first time through the order. While the numbers told a good story, the reality was that Santos gave the outfielders, and especially Cookie a workout. Carmona made three strong (and daring) plays in the first four innings…

When Cookie and Sandy opened the fifth by getting on base, Walter hit into a double play and DeWeese struck out, which for DeWeese meant that he had now left Cookie on third three times in the last two games. The oddity of baseball struck in the sixth inning, with the Raccoons still up 2-0 and Santos nursing a 2-hit shutout. The inning started with an error on B.J. Manfull that put Howard Jones on base, though Margolis quickly grounded to short to erase Jones in a double play. Bergquist singled and stole second base, prompting an intentional walk to Matt Stubbs. Lorusso then fell to a 3-1 count against Santos who got a pretty fat pitch to hit and looped it to left center, where it split Martin Ortíz and Amari Brissett and became a 2-run double! Santos’ shutout bid derailed on pitch count reasons in the bottom 7th after two walks to Miguel Salinas and Ortíz, though none of them scored. The top 8th then saw Santos even being hit for. With Margolis and Bergquist in scoring position and two outs, we longed for the death knell to the Crusaders’ comeback chances. Matt Nunley hit against right-hander Damon Barnett, but had his fly to left caught by Ortíz. Walter would hit a sac fly in the ninth to run the score to 5-0 before the bullpen collapsed once more in the bottom 9th. Sugano had already pitched the eighth, but continued here with lots of left-handed batting in the lineup. He got two outs, but allowed a double to Caraballo, who promptly left the game with an aggravated back. Frederic Roche pinch-ran, while the Raccoons sought to gain the final out from Will West, who failed in epic proportions, walking both Alex Rivas and Amari Brissett before allowing an RBI single to Masaya Arakaki. With the tying run appearing at the plate in left-hander Will Bailey, who had 13 homers on the year and 361 in his 18-year career, it was Thrasher time. Bailey struck out, and the first game went the Coons’ way, though not in desired fashion. 5-1 Raccoons. Sambrano 4-5, 2B; Walter 1-3, BB, 3 RBI; Margolis 2-4, 2B; Bergquist 2-3, BB; Santos 7.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 4 K, W (11-5) and 2-3, 2B, 2 RBI;

Game 2
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Walter – 3B Nunley – 1B Young – SS McKnight – RF Richards – LF Sambrano – C Baca – P Toner
NYC: RF Bailey – SS Salinas – LF M. Ortíz – 1B Manfull – 2B Brulhart – 3B Rivas – C Durango – CF Brissett – P J. Martin

The first inning sure didn’t look much like the anticipated pitchers’ duel with Adam Young doubling home Nunley for a quick 1-0 Coons lead in the top half, before Jonny struck out two to get started before walking Ortíz, drilling Manfull, and allowing a single to Brulhart. With the bags full, Alex Rivas grounded out to McKnight. The Raccoons had their own opportunity with the bases loaded in the top of the third. Toner had led off with a single before Walter also singled and Nunley got slapped in the thigh. Young batted with one out, sent the first pitch to deep left, but it was caught by Ortíz, holding Young to a sac fly. McKnight hit a single to reload the bases, but Richards struck out on three pitches to release Martin from impending doom. The Coons added another run in the fourth after a 2-out double by Toner and subsequent single by Cookie, and another one in the fifth; with two outs, McKnight legged out an infield single to allow Shane Walter to come home from third base after having started the inning with a double to right center. The 4-0 lead looked rock solid with Jonny pitching, who suffocated the Crusaders to the tune of two singles over seven innings, although he also walked Ortíz twice and “Midnight” Martin (…) once, the latter one at the start of the sixth inning. He arrived in the bottom 8th on 100 pitches to find Roche batting for Martin, and Kevin Beaver – our third lefty and the only one that hadn’t pitched in the first game – was getting ready. Roche struck out before Bailey and Salinas flew out to left in non-threatening fashion. Toner batted for himself in a scoreless top 9th, still holding a 4-0 lead and he would at least get a shot for a shutout here, although two left-handed bats with 42 homers between them opened the bottom 9th. Ortíz lined out softly to Walter, but Manfull singled, and now right-handers were coming up. Todd von Lindenthal took Toner’s pulse, found he still had one, and he retained the ball to face Jim Brulhart, who flew out to shallow center, but when Rivas singled to right, it was over. Beaver came out for Durango and nailed down the double-header with a K. 4-0 Furballs! Walter 3-5, 2B; McKnight 2-4, RBI; Toner 8.2 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 8 K, W (7-6) and 2-4, 2B;

Eduardo Durango threw out Cookie trying to take second base in the fourth inning. This was Cookie’s 100th time overall to get caught stealing.

With this Friday sweep, the Raccoons reduced their gap to the Crusaders to single-digits, 9 1/2 games precisely.

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – 1B Sambrano – 3B Walter – LF DeWeese – C Margolis – SS McKnight – 2B Bergquist – RF Stubbs – P Munroe
NYC: RF Bailey – SS Salinas – LF M. Ortíz – 1B Manfull – 2B Brulhart – C Lowe – 3B Rivas – CF Brissett – P F. Cruz

A DeWeese error in the second inning allowed the Crusaders to take the lead in frustrating circumstances, as the slugger had dropped a 2-out pop by Fernando Cruz, the opposing pitcher. That was all the offense through five innings. Munroe allowed four hits in five innings to a mostly left-handed lineup, so he was doing pretty well, but the Coons’ offense was completely stillborn against Cruz, mounting a Sandy single and two walks in the first five frames. When Cookie led off the sixth with a single to left, it was reason for excitement. Then Sambrano hit into a force at second, and Walter into a double play. Okay, DeWeese leads off the seventh with a double to right! Excitement! Between Margolis grounding out to short, McKnight flailing out, and Bergquist looping one to Brissett, the Coons stranded him at third base. Good, good! Now he sees how it feels!!

Stubbs opened the eighth with a single to become the tying run. Munroe bunted him over, and he advanced further on Cookie’s groundout. Sandy Sambrano sent a hopper up the first base line that almost hit him in fair territory, but Drew Lowe was thrown off by Sandy’s dance moves around the bouncing ball and misplayed it the first time, which gave the speedy Sambrano enough time to leg out an infield single while Stubbs slid home safe behind Lowe to tie the score at one. Walter’s single sent Sandy to third and eliminated Cruz from the contest, but Helio Maggessi struck out DeWeese, as usual, to deny the Coons. Munroe got two outs in the bottom 8th but arrived at Ortíz already over 100 pitches and this was too dicey. Sugano came out, walked Ortíz and allowed a deep drive to center to B.J. Manfull that sent Cookie sprawling onto the track, but the damn ball was in his glove and the inning was over. Top 9th, Salvadaro Soure appeared with his 7.9 K/BB ratio and 1.12 ERA. Nunley hit for Margolis and singled to right, and McKnight also singled there. Bailey botched the pickup, allowing the two former Rookies of the Year to set up shop in scoring position with nobody out. Adam Young batted for Jason Bergquist, and the Crusaders weren’t keen on that. He was walked intentionally. Alonso Baca batted for Stubbs with the bags full, grounded to Brulhart, who fired home to not only get Nunley forced out, but Lowe’s throw also beat Baca at first. Ron Richards hit for Sugano and struck out.

And that was not the wickedest thing to happen in this game. After Seung-mo Chun overcame Brulhart’s leadoff single to survive the bottom 9th and the game went to extras, Soure retired Cookie on a grounder to start the top 10th before Sandy Sambrano whacked a no-doubter to right center to break the tie, his first homer of the season. Walter singled, DeWeese struck out (…!!), but Soure suddenly hit consecutive batters, Howard Jones batting for Chun and McKnight. That filled the bags for Young, and no place to walk him intentionally. Young hit a ball hard to right, out of the reach of Will Bailey, for a 2-run single! Baca struck out, leaving a 4-1 lead to save for Chris Mathis, who ended the Crusaders in three batters. 4-1 Coons!! Sambrano 3-5, HR, 2 RBI; Nunley (PH) 1-1; Young (PH) 1-1, BB, 2 RBI; Munroe 7.2 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 5 K;

Wheee!

**** Ron Richards though. What ***hole gave a contract to that ****er???

Game 4
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Walter – 3B Nunley – LF DeWeese – 1B Young – SS McKnight – RF Sambrano – C Baca – P Abe
NYC: RF Bailey – SS Salinas – LF M. Ortíz – 1B Manfull – 2B Brulhart – C Lowe – 3B Rivas – CF Brissett – P Choe

In a battle of Asian imports, the Raccoons got going first. DeWeese opened the top 2nd with a double to right and scored on McKnight’s single, 1-0, and the Coons got another run entirely on throwing errors in the third inning. Cookie reached base with a walk, made it to third when Drew Lowe threw the ball past Salinas on a stolen base attempt, and scored when Brulhart made a gross throwing error on Nunley’s grounder, but that was before Abe actively sabotaged the 2-0 lead in the bottom of the inning, walking the bases full just in time to bring up Martin Ortíz with two outs. Ortíz, like most on the Crusaders without an RBI in the series, grounded out to the one that hurt the Crusaders the most because they could use him the most now, Shane Walter, stranding Brissett, Bailey, and Salinas.

Abe continued with a walk to Manfull in the bottom 4th before even the weather hit a rough patch and a brief shower interrupted play for about half an hour. When play resumed, Abe walked Brulhart, his fifth walk in seven batters. Something had to be amiss! Oberst von Lindenthal went out to yell at him, while the Druid also went out and asked him to hold and squeeze a rubber ducky. Finding everything in order, he allowed him to continue. The Coons got a breather when consecutive grounders to McKnight by Lowe and Rivas resulted in three outs and Ivan Mena could investigate Abe further in the dugout with some of his more scientific toys, including a hula hoop and a bright pink waffle iron. That the Coons tore Choe apart in the top 5th also helped greatly. Cookie hit a double, Salinas made an error on Walter, and then Nunley’s RBI single was followed by an RBI double for DeWeese, his first run-scoring hit of the week. Choe was gone, with righty Richard Vincent allowing another run to score against Adam Young, running the score to 5-0. While Abe was technically still pitching a no-hitter, he walked Vincent (!!) and Salinas in the bottom 5th and was yanked. Kevin Beaver took over two runners with two outs and Ortíz in the box, and was bailed out by Cookie selling his life out there again in defusing a vicious rocket to center. Another few weeks like that and the Carmona family would have two kids in a wheelchair…

Bottom 6th, the Crusaders got their first hit, a Drew Lowe single with one out. Beaver had walked Brulhart before that, and then Brissett reached on a 2-out error by Walter at short (McKnight had departed in a double switch when Abe was removed). Frederic Roche pinch-hit, and Chun replaced Beaver, getting a grounder to Howard Jones at second base to end the inning. That was the only batter Chun retired, as his spot came up in the top 7th. Walter and Young had hit singles off Colin Sabatino, while Brulhart’s second error on the day (and the fourth on New York in total) had also put DeWeese on. Ron Richards hit for Chun only because Sabatino was a right-handed pitcher, snuck a ball past Manfull for an RBI single, though DeWeese was thrown out at home by Bailey on the play. Two outs, Sambrano singled to center, scoring Young, 7-0. Still three innings to pitch, so the Coons turned to John Korb in the hope for two, but he was drowning in runners before he even got one. Bailey grounded out to start the bottom 7th, but Salinas and Ortíz singled before Korb hit Manfull. Brulhart hit a sac fly to left, DeWeese’s throw home arriving late, before Drew Lowe walked to restock the bags. Rivas struck out, stranding three yet again and keeping New York down by six, and soon seven when Nunley pulled back the run that Korb had allowed with a sac fly in the top 8th. Korb got only two more outs before Arakaki singled to center in the bottom 8th. Will West was once again tasked with a nominally won game. Bailey grounded out to Jones (now at first after another double switch had brought in Bergquist at second along with West) to end the inning, and West finished the four-game sweep in 15 pitches. 8-1 Raccoons!!! Walter 2-5; DeWeese 2-4, BB, 2 2B, RBI; Young 2-5, RBI; Richards (PH) 1-1, RBI; Jones 1-1, BB, RBI;

Alonso Baca flailed himself a golden sombrero in this game.

Jimmy Fucito arrived in St. Petersburg without getting claimed or retiring … or throwing himself into the Mississippi.

In other news

August 15 – The Gold Sox rout the Falcons, 17-1, including a 9-run eighth inning. Julio Candela (.294, 2 HR, 28 RBI) has four hits, including two doubles, and scores four times. Mun-wah Tsung (.285, 16 HR, 78 RBI) hits a grand slam off Art Cox while going 3-for-6.
August 16 – TIJ LF/RF Domingo Nieves (.265, 5 HR, 27 RBI) will miss the rest of the season with a torn anterior cruciate ligament. The 33-year old outfielder was acquired from the Falcons midseason by the Condors, but only had 3 RBI for them in 23 games.
August 18 – PIT SP Jeremiah Bowman (11-8, 4.23 ERA) 3-hits the Loggers in a 12-0 blowout.
August 21 – Cincy’s SP Ricky Mendoza (10-10, 4.58 ERA) spins a 3-hit shutout against the Buffaloes. The Cyclones win 3-0.
August 21 – The first career home run by IND SP Dan Lambert (7-10, 3.75 ERA; .135, 1 HR, 1 RBI) is the margin of victory in the Indians’ 1-0 win over the Canadiens.
August 21 – The Scorpions out-hit the Gold Sox, 13-10, but still get routed, 12-5. Scorpions pitching issues ten walks and a hit batter, and they also make two errors.

Complaints and stuff

First off: HOLY COON!! What the **** was that??

Not only are the Coons now 17-4 in August and third in the power rankings (without any power), no, Sandy Sambrano was also Player of the Week. Our glorified one-size-fits-all tool hit .579 (11-for-19) with a homer and 4 RBI. Oh yeah, and we’ve bagged the season series with the Crusaders at 10-4.

Sandy and Cookie also have been teammates for five years now, and this is only the second year that they have both homered in the same season, the previous being 2013. In just over 5,100 combined at-bats, they have 26 dingers (including Sandy’s time with the Aces).

Nick Brown is now just 14.2 innings away from triggering his 2017 option ($1.8M). As things stand right now, we would be slightly overbudget for 2017 with his option triggered, pending budget adjustments after the season.

The right-handed outfield bat that might come up soon is Alex Duarte, 23, who is hitting .251/.377/.328 in AAA. If he could translate this to the majors, he’d probably be a good #2 batter, and he’s also a good defensive centerfielder, though probably not a base stealer. The only issue with this 2011 eighth-rounder would be where the **** to play him, because we have three long-term commitments between R.J. DeWeese, Ricardo Carmona, and Ron Richards. Said commitments will total $34.5M after the end of this season, not counting Cookie’s 2023 team option. Ron Richards would be ****ing expensive to platoon a rookie with, but the way he is (not) producing we can’t even sell low enough to get rid of him.

Richards is also by far the guy with the strongest arm in the group. Between Cookie and Duarte there isn’t much to be gained from playing either in rightfield. R.J. DeWeese has *never* appeared in rightfield in a single inning, ever. He gives above-average defense in left, but only because he can hide his cotton candy arm.