[Westheim]

Raccoons (53-65) vs. Miners (63-55) – August 13-15, 2058

The string continued with three games against the Miners, who had faced the Raccoons in each of the last three seasons and each time had lost two games to one. Their team this year ranked fourth in runs scored in the FL, but ninth in runs allowed, with a +38 run differential (Coons: -32). They had a pile of injuries to contend with, including Salvatore Rodrigues, Tomokazu Kaneshiro, and Cruz Madrid.

Projected matchups:
Bobby Herrera (9-7, 3.23 ERA) vs. Chad Shultz (5-0, 3.05 ERA)
Zach Stewart (8-11, 3.09 ERA) vs. He Shui (7-9, 4.64 ERA)
Ramon Carreno (5-11, 4.13 ERA) vs. Sean Sweeton (11-7, 3.63 ERA)

Two ex-Critters and three right-handers were lined up by the Miners for this series, which started after a common off day on Monday.

Game 1
PIT: 2B A. Vasquez – SS Spehar – 1B K. Price – 3B Corrales – RF Angulo – C Monaghan – CF Lindauer – LF B. Rivera – P Shultz
POR: 2B Labonte – SS Lavorano – CF Caswell – C M. Chavez – LF Brassfield – 1B Starr – RF Puckeridge – 3B Brobeck – P B. Herrera

Kevin Price took Herrera deep to right in the top 1st, but Portland made up the run in the bottom 1st, with some kind support by the Miners. Lonzo walked (!), took an extra base on a bad pickoff throw by Shultz, and then made up the rest of the distance with a deep fly by Caswell and Chavez’ 2-out single to center. The tie would be broken by a home run in the second inning – by Paul Labonte! He had hit five in his rookie season, but none (in more at-bats) so far this year, but after Brobeck and Herrera took to the corners with 2-out singles in the bottom 2nd launched a drive over the fence in right to give Portland a 4-1 lead.

The Miners had only three hits off Herrera in five innings, but one was that Price homer and another was Angel Angulo’s double to left-center in the top 5th that opened the inning. Jeremy Lindauer walked after a groundout by Eric Monaghan, and Bobby Rivera’s fly to deep left was enough to get at least Angulo home, even while being caught on the track by Brassfield. Mark Haney batted for Shultz, but made a poor third out to strand the tying runs. A homer to left by Brassfield off Felix Castano re-established a 3-run lead in the same inning, and Herrera survived more instances of the leadoff batter reaching base in the sixth and seventh innings, Angulo drawing a leadoff walk in the latter to remain a threat. Bottom 7th, and Lonzo opened with a single to right against Pablo Paez. Several failed attempts to get a jump on the right-hander with Caswell batting and the accompanying attention then kept him too close to first base to score on the double that Caswell hit eventually, but there was a pair in scoring position with nobody out. Chavez’ liner to Ryan Spehar and the soggy infield pops by Brass and Starr meant that pair remained there throughout and beyond the inning…

Paez retired two more to begin the bottom 8th before Jesus Martinez batted for Herrera and singled. Labonte also reached base, and then Lonzo and Caswell cracked back-to-back triples to drive in three earned runs, while Caswell scored on an error by Victor Corrales for a fourth, unearned run. Leonardo Ramos popped up Brass to end the inning after all. Matt Walters was kept in storage after the save was no longer on and instead Neal Hamann was sent out against the all-lefty 3-4-5 batters in the ninth. Price singled, Corrales whiffed, and Angulo hit a ball off Starr’s chest on the bounce for an error on the rookie. Peter Bivens then appeared as a fourth lefty bat off the bench, hit an RBI single, and Hamann was purged. Siwik popped up Lindauer and got a K on Bobby Rivera to end the game before Matt Walters actually had to get back up. 9-3 Raccoons. Lavorano 2-4, BB, 3B, 2 RBI; Caswell 3-4, BB, 3B, 2B, RBI; Martinez (PH) 1-1; B. Herrera 8.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, W (10-7) and 1-3;

Game 2
PIT: 2B A. Vasquez – SS Spehar – 1B K. Price – 3B Corrales – C Monaghan – RF McIntyre – LF Angulo – CF Bivens – P Shui
POR: 2B Labonte – SS Lavorano – CF Caswell – C M. Chavez – LF Brassfield – 1B Starr – RF Martinez – 3B Brobeck – P Stewart

Lonzo scored in the bottom 1st again, as should be the law, hitting a single off his old teammate Shui and stealing a base, while Caswell reached on an error. Chavez’ groundout then brought in Lonzo with the game’s first and only early run. Offense was at a premium and people queued around the block for it, but the only other hit the Raccoons put together through five innings was Lonzo getting plonked by Shui in the fifth, stealing another base (his 40th of the season), and then being stranded out there in the wasteland. The Miners had two hits off Stewart in five innings, with 6 K for the Portland southpaw, and the most meaningful threat having been a Will McIntyre double off the wall in leftfield.

Stewart went 6.2 innings before walking McIntyre in a drawn-out plate appearance, which put him at 106 pitches, *and* the Miners sent Lindauer to bat for the left-handed Angulo. Reynaldo Bravo answered with a strikeout… but not without throwing a wild pitch at 1-2 first. Martinez’ leadoff single after the stretch off Paez then was only the second Critters base knock in the game, and we can’t have such a rush of offense, so Brobeck hit into a double play immediately. Bravo handled the eighth in the 1-0 game in 1-2-3 fashion and with two strikeouts, and the Raccoons did nothing with Labonte’s leadoff single in the eighth inning. Walters got into the game *this* time, but walked Ryan Spehar to begin the ninth inning. Price popped out to third base, however, and Lonzo received a grounder from Corrales that was easily spun around for two outs. 1-0 Blighters. M. Chavez 0-1, 2 BB; Stewart 6.2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 6 K, W (9-11);

The two stolen bases meant that Lonzo overtook Xavier Reyes of the Baybirds for first place in the CL with 40 stolen bases. This was also the ABL lead, with nobody in the FL having even reached 30 at this point.

Game 3
PIT: 2B A. Vasquez – SS Spehar – 1B K. Price – 3B Corrales – RF Angulo – C Monaghan – CF Lindauer – LF N. Daniels – P Sweeton
POR: 2B Labonte – SS Lavorano – CF Caswell – C M. Chavez – 1B Brassfield – LF Puckeridge – RF Martinez – 3B Anderson – P Carreno

Carreno met disaster as soon as he put his brown pants on as Vasquez bunted for a base hit on his very first pitch on Thursday, while his own error put Spehar on base, and singles by Price and Corrales first loaded the bases and then brought in two runs. Somehow the Miners went from that to making three straight poor outs against “Pinata” Carreno then, but they were back in the third inning with a Corrales single and Eric Monaghan’s 2-run homer to left, 4-0. While the Coons did diddly squat, Carreno wasted more oxygen going into the fifth inning, then was taken deep by Corrales himself in solo fashion, allowed a hit to Angulo, an RBI double to Monaghan, and then a 2-run homer to Lindauer to double the score to 8-0. Neal Hamann got a pop from Nathan Daniels to finally end the inning, then was hit for with Brobeck, who was then seamlessly inserted for garbage duty and proved that yes, miracles DO happen – not that the Raccoons would make up an 8-0 deficit, nah, Sweeton pitched a 7-hit shutout; but Brobeck pitched FOUR SCORELESS to get the game over with. 8-0 Miners. Labonte 2-3; Starr (PH) 1-1; Brobeck 4.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K;

Where did that come from??

No, Slappy, four scoreless from Brobeck; I’m entirely used to Carreno getting blown to Kingdom Come by now.

Raccoons (55-66) vs. Indians (54-68) – August 16-18, 2058

Fourth place in the South was still hotly contested between these two teams, who were the two worst in terms of scoring runs in the CL, with the Raccoons even 29 runs behind the Indians at this point, not that the numbers surprised me a lot. They were eighth in runs allowed, carrying a -73 run differential. They also led the season series, 7-5. The Indians were without four B’s, all on the DL: Barbieri, Brent (Andrews), and Bernie Bahena;

Projected matchups:
Cameron Argenziano (6-1, 2.69 ERA) vs. Roberto Oyola (6-4, 3.72 ERA)
Chance Fox (2-6, 5.04 ERA) vs. Bill Lawrence (8-10, 4.25 ERA)
Bobby Herrera (10-7, 3.18 ERA) vs. Chris Kaye (4-9, 5.07 ERA)

Oyola would be the third straight ex-Coon to face the team. All options were right-handed, but Ben Akman (4-4, 3.93 ERA) and Kaye had both pitched in a double header on Tuesday and both were regular-rest options for the Raccoons.

For the time being there was another double header entirely, as the Friday game was washed away by persistent rain that lasted into the night. Two games were thus on the plate for Saturday.

Game 1
IND: SS Kilday – 2B Ewers – CF O. Ramos – 1B B. Quinteros – 3B R. Vargas – RF Lovins – C Lefebvre – LF Oldfield – P Oyola
POR: 2B Labonte – SS Lavorano – CF Caswell – RF Martinez – 1B Starr – LF Puckeridge – C C. Chavez – 3B Bribiesca – P Argenziano

So what we needed more than anything else was Argenziano give up two hits, two walks, and two runs in the first inning, the runs coming on Chris Lovins’ 2-out, bases-loaded single. Michael Lefebvre grounded out to Labonte to strand a pair. Argenziano went on to give up a solo homer to Kevin Ewers in the top 3rd, but ultimately only surrendered one more hit and one other walk against seven strikeouts through six innings, which still took him 107 pitches and wasn’t making the pitching plans for the rest of the day any easier. The Raccoons were scattering four hits against Oyola through five innings, once having on Lonzo with a single, but he got caught stealing by Lefebvre before Martinez singled and Starr doubled with two outs and both were stranded in scoring position by a Pucks pop.

Neal Hamann held the Indians at bay in the seventh inning before Jesus Martinez opened the bottom 7th with home run #13 on the year (quite pathetic for a team leader), and the Raccoons also got Pucks and Cortez Chavez on with one out. Bribiesca whiffed against Oyola, but Steve Royer drilled a ball into the right-center gap in his first appearance of the entire week and then legged out a game-tying triple…! Labonte struck out to leave him in scoring position, though. Tanizaki walked a pair in the eighth and somehow wasn’t blown up, ending the inning with strikeouts against Lovins and Lefebvre. Ricardo Vargas’ error at the hot corner then put Lonzo on base to begin the bottom 8th and Oyola allowed a single to center to Caswell that sent Lonzo all the way to third base. Martinez’ sharp and clean single to left got Matt Walters warming up in earnest, but then Pucks tripled in two more runs and scored on an error by Quinteros when Brobeck pinch-hit with two outs. That took the save off again. 2-out singles by Richard Anderson and Paul Labonte filled the bases against righty Dave Corrao, and Lonzo dinked a ball into the right-center gap on a 1-1 pitch. Brobeck scored, Anderson scored, Labonte tried to score, but was thrown out at the plate to end the 6-run rush. Brobeck then completed the game on the hill, two days removed from four innings in garbage relief, getting three easy outs from the Arrowheads. 9-3 Coons. Labonte 2-5; Lavorano 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Martinez 3-4, HR, 2 RBI; Puckeridge 3-4, 3B, 2 RBI; Royer (PH) 1-1, 3B, 2 RBI; Anderson (PH) 1-1;

What a display of “we don’t care any more about this” on multiple levels by having Brobeck pitch the ninth…

Game 2
IND: SS Kilday – 2B Ewers – CF O. Ramos – 1B B. Quinteros – 3B R. Vargas – RF Lovins – C Villafan – LF McConnell – P B. Lawrence
POR: CF Royer – SS Lavorano – LF Brassfield – RF Martinez – 1B Starr – C M. Chavez – 3B Anderson – 2B Bribiesca – P Fox

Matt Kilday singled, Kevin Ewers walked, and Ramos’ fielder’s choice to short and Quinteros’ deep fly to Royer got home a quick run against Chance Fox in the first inning of the nightcap. A walk to Lovins and Blake McConnell’s 2-run homer in the second inning tripled the score already, and Cristiano, if you tell me ONE MORE TIME how good Fox’ so-and-so stats are, I will print out this box score and stuff your snout with it!

The Coons took until the fourth inning to get to the board, scoring a 2-out run on singles by Starr, who stole second in a confused hit-and-run botch call that left Willie Villafan even more befuddled than Anderson, and then Anderson, plating Starr from second base, 3-1. Same deal in the fifth; 2-out singles by Lonzo, who stole second base, and Brass, narrowing the score further to 3-2. Lawrence didn’t throw a strike to Martinez, but then Starr popped out to strand a pair.

The bottom of the sixth began with Lawrence walking Chavez and Anderson before getting replaced with Melvin Guerra, who popped out Bribiesca. Fox was retained to bunt, purely to confuse the Indians further, but Royer flew out to center to strand another pair. Fox got an out from McConnell in the seventh before singles by Steve Thompson and Kilday knocked him out. Siwik struck out Cory Oldfield and Orlando Ramos to kill the inning for Indy, though. Indy even loaded the bases against Eloy Sencion in the eighth inning before both McConnell and Thompson struck out to keep a soft single by Vargas and walks drawn by Hugo Munoz and Villafan on the bases. This was all screaming for a comeback by the home team, and Joel Starr singled off Randy Slocum to begin the bottom 8th, and Thompson overran the ball in rightfield to give him an extra base. Chavez’ and Anderson’s fly outs were both deep enough for Starr to advance, and Anderson’s sac fly tied the game at three. Bribiesca singled, but Caswell popped out against Dave Corrao to end the inning.

Walters was used to keep the Arrowheads in their place in the ninth, with the top of the order leading off the bottom of the hopefully-last inning, even though we still had a couple of relievers available, including Ivan Ornelas for multiple innings. Royer reached on a Vargas error to begin the inning, then was caught stealing. Lonzo singled and stole second base for real, but had to hold on Brass’ grounder to third base, and Martinez merely walked on an open base with two outs. Starr lined out against Matt Green, with a fine catch now by Vargas, to end the inning and send the game to extras. The Coons stuck to Walters for the tenth, which turned out to be the wrong move. Lefebvre drew a walk coming off the bench into the #6 hole, and singles by McConnell and Thompson brought him in to score with two outs before K-ilday ended the inning. That was the fifth strikeout for Walters in the outing, but he was still on the short end of the stick now. Portland didn’t go down all that easily in the bottom 10th, though. While Jameel Williams struck out Chavez and Bribiesca, pinch-hitters Labonte and Pucks reached with a 1-out single and a 2-out walk, bringing back a rather successless Steve Royer … who struck out as well. 4-3 Indians. Brassfield 2-4, BB, RBI; Starr 2-5; Anderson 1-2, BB, 2 RBI; Labonte (PH) 1-1;

Game 3
IND: SS Kilday – RF Lovins – LF O. Ramos – 1B B. Quinteros – 3B R. Vargas – CF Oldfield – C Lefebvre – 2B Ewers – P Kaye
POR: 2B Labonte – SS Lavorano – CF Caswell – RF Martinez – 1B Starr – C M. Chavez – LF Puckeridge – 3B Anderson – P B. Herrera

The real problems developed when Bobby Herrera appeared to have NOTHING to start the Sunday game. The Indians began the game with clipping three singles for a run, and Quinteros hit a sac fly, 2-0. Vargas walked, Oldfield hit another single, and Lefebvre thankfully found Lonzo for a 6-4-3 double play. Herrera didn’t get out of the *third* inning, which the Indians opened with four straight hits, and it was 5-0 with a pair in scoring position and one out in the inning when he was yanked after allowing nine hits and a walk. Ornelas took over, got a comebacker from Ewers, and a grounder to short from Kaye to at least limit the damage to what it already was.

Ornelas held out for the middle innings without allowing a run, and while the Coons had only a stray homer by Caswell in the first five innings, the bases were loaded with nobody out to begin the bottom 6th against Kaye as Labonte singled, Lonzo doubled, and Caswell walked. Martinez popped out next to first base in foul ground, and Starr’s fly to right that allowed Labonte to score was the only run in the inning as Chavez was robbed by Lovins charging into the gap and snatching his 2-out drive. Hamann had a smooth seventh in the 5-2 game, but Bravo walked three and plated a run with a wild pitch before needing to be rescued by Sencion in the eighth. Tanizaki got romped even worse, giving up a 2-run homer to Quinteros and a solo shot to Oldfield in the ninth as the rout concluded rather unmercifully. 9-2 Indians. Lavorano 2-4, 2B; Caswell 1-2, 2 BB, HR, RBI; Ornelas 3.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K;

In other news

August 12 – More long-term injuries every day: Rebels SP Antonio Alfaro (9-7, 3.81 ERA) will be out for a full year after suffering a tear in his UCL.
August 12 – Aces 1B/RF/LF Aubrey Austin (.332, 16 HR, 78 RBI) won’t be available until September with a torn hamstring.
August 13 – DEN SP Raul Ontiveros (9-10, 3.16 ERA) 2-hits the Condors in a 7-0 shutout.
August 13 – The Warriors lose 2B Mike DeFusco (.235, 5 HR, 39 RBI) until the middle of September after the 28-year-old has suffered a strained rib cage muscle.
August 15 – The Pacifics beat the Gold Sox, 10-6, thanks to a 10-run first inning, then spend the rest of the game kicking back and managing.
August 17 – Another catcher has put a 20-game hitting streak together after two singles and the only RBI of the game are entered into the box score of a 1-0 win against the Falcons by SFB 1B/C Jon Mittleider (.307, 1 HR, 43 RBI).
August 17 – The Condors out-slog the Aces, 14-11 in 11 innings, hitting six home runs, with 3B/RF Eric Frasher (.243, 13 HR, 51 RBI) chipping in a pair.
August 18 – San Francisco’s Jon Mittleider (.306, 1 HR, 43 RBI) goes hitless in a 4-3 loss to the Falcons and ends his hitting streak at 20 games.

FL Player of the Week: LAP 1B Chris Rice (.321, 8 HR, 58 RBI), batting .407 (11-27) with 2 HR, 10 RBI
CL Player of the Week: LVA 3B/1B/RF Alex Alfaro (.321, 15 HR, 67 RBI), smacking .424 (14-33) with 4 HR, 8 RBI

Complaints and stuff

Five scoreless innings from Brobeck this week – he’s totally gonna be in the rotation next year!

No, we have no clue how to form this hapless lump of broken pieces into an actual winning team right now.

Next week: three at Loggers, then three at home against the Aces. No starter lined up for Wednesday, either; the off day is on Thursday.

Fun Fact: Lonzo stole six bases this week, and seven in the last eight days.

He got ONE in the preceding 17 games. Baseball is a funny thing.