[pauwoo]

Brooklyn Citizens (43-31, .581, 1st NL East) @ Los Angeles Kings (44-31, .587, 2nd NL West)
The flight home was less eventful than our trip into town, the team was tired and the realities of being without Otto for the remainder of the year has officially sunk in. For my part, I spent most of our day off in LA in a conference with Megan and Zahur going over trade possibilities but wasn’t really sold on any of their ideas. The reality as I see it is that we are still a really good baseball team without him, even if we’ll need to be on our very best behavior to achieve anything of note in 2078. All is not lost - we’ll need to adjust our strategy, use our speed a bit more, and tighten up our defense to make the playoffs - and we’ll need our staff to shore up its loose ends. And, in my mind, we have the personnel to do it. This next set against Brooklyn has taken on some additional importance for us - the Citizen are a top-flight club that boasts a great lineup (3rd NL) and staff (4th NL) but could use an upgrade or two in the bullpen to shore up what has been their only weakness. They also carry 4 former Los Angeles players on their roster in 1B Ruben Zarate (.249/6/37), LF Tony Voorhis (.313/10/57), SS Nehemiah Jenkins (.306/6/33), and SP Merl Crawford (10-6, 2.86) – two of whom we’d love to have back in Voorhis and Crawford. But, alas, what’s done is done as they say – so, we’ll head into this one with our eye on the prize, forward-facing, and avoid the pitfalls of dwelling on the mistakes of our past.

Side note: The team announced that we’ve signed C Dominic Cooke to a 2-year extension worth a total of $27.5M – this is Megan’s first real piece of work for the club as our GM (signing her beau, Kirk, doesn’t count).

76 of 162: Trevor Dotson (5-4, 4.71) @ Anthony Boswell (4-7, 4.97)
Win, 7-5. We’d need a late rally to overcome the Citizens in this one and OH HONG delivered it on a silver platter when he hit a 2-run double in the top of the 8th to put us up for good. Barbaccia picked up his 25th save, Julian Goodwin hit a double and registered 3 RBIs, and Zody stole his 12th bag of the season. It was a bit odd wearing our road kit at home – but that was the requirement for this makeup road game with Brooklyn…

77 of 162: Taylor Todd (2-1, 3.92) @ Newton Weiser (9-5, 3.55)
Win, 106. So, today went swimmingly – OH HONG took player of the game honors for the second game in a row and went 3 for 4 with 3 RBIs in this one, Dom drove three in, and Zody brought in two more. The Citizens got to Newton a little bit, but our young hurler was able to navigate some difficulties in 6.2 innings of work to earn the win and Barbaccia, in his second appearance of the night, completed his 26th save of the season. Mullens stole his 24th bag, and OH HONG, really feeling himself in this one, stole his 1st bag of the season.

Side note: 3B Dontrell Gay will be listed DtD for the next 4 days with groin tightness and SP Kordell Littles was called up to the big club and will join our bullpen while RP Toni Cartwright tries to work out some kinks in Compton. Also, our Manager, Ryan Rudnick, has, temporarily moved Brisky to the bullpen and is moving Jonny Garcia to the starting rotation for the time being.

78 of 162: Miguel Machado (6-4, 5.13) @ Jonny Garcia (2-4, 2.53)
Loss, 3-1. Jonny was serviceable and only gave up 3 runs over 7 innings of work – he acquits himself nicely here in his first start of the 2078 season – but, Miguel Machado was nearly unhittable over 8 innings and struck out 8 on his way to earning the victory for Brooklyn. OH HONG struck out 3 times, Rajkumar hit our only EBH, a double, and Ethan’s SAC FLY may have been the only real offensive play that qualified as a highlight. Tough day at the plate for the Kings of LA.

Elsewhere: The CITY OF COMPTON’s Rad Taylor went 8 strong innings against the Nashville Picks and earned his 6th International League win of 2078. Rad has been impressive over his last 4 starts since returning to Compton from the big club. He’s slowly developing into a guy that will, one day, stick on the big club in, if nothing else, a middle-relief role.

79 of 162: Merl Crawford (10-6, 2.85) @ Aiden Jensen (7-5, 3.97)
Loss, 3-2. Jensen gave up only two runs, but Merl gave up only one… and that is, really, all she wrote in this one. Leandro Mercedes is the man of the match for Brooklyn as it was his solo HR that put the Citizens up for good. Mullens drove both of our runs in, Jensen committed two errors, and the OF assist that Ethan completed – he caught Roan Munoz trying to make it home on a SAC FLY – comprised the entirety of our highlights. I’d also like to note that all of the former Kings currently on the Brooklyn roster, outside of Merl, had little to no impact during this 4-game series.