June begins poorly with the loss of Jay Bell for pretty much the rest of the season to a labrum tear. Bill Almon is once again called upon.
That doesn’t help our steadfastly streaky form as we follow 5 wins with 4 losses and, while we aren’t doing anything horribly what we are doing simply isn’t being converted into enough wins and soon enough we’re in mortal danger of falling out of contention as the Cubs stay hot.
As this continues, we lose Andy Van Slyke for 5 weeks to a broken finger and it is becoming painfully obvious this doesn’t look like it is going to be our year.
Rob Deer comes up to hopefully give us a bit of that X factor we are clearly lacking.
At the ASB, we sit at 51-36 and 9˝ games in back of the Cubs but come back and play horribly, with a 2-8 stretch quickly blowing the deficit out to a dozen.
Under most circumstances I’d still give us a chance with 70 games to be played, but I simply don’t feel this group has the extra gear or two required to come back from here.
Our only hope as I see it is if the Cubbies absolutely implode. They don’t look likely to do so.
So we start thinking about 1988 and go on the hunt for deals that will hopefully get us headed back in the right direction.
We cross paths with one fairly quickly, actually, and pull the following swap with the Astros:
Jose De Leon was the only other guy on our radar and he’s in his walk year with his current club asking way too much in return, so instead we swap one big-hitting ineligible 1B for a better one.
It was always our intention to move Buck on next year with him getting expensive and Bobby Bo our long-term 3B option, but our non-competitiveness means we can do so now.
Not sure why the ‘Stros had Big Daddy languishing down at AAA Tucson, although he didn’t languish as much as light up that level with 30 HR already this season.
We finish the stanza with five straight wins but they don’t make much of a dent in the Cubs’ lead, which stands at 11 as we enter August.
We extend Neal Heaton on a 3/1530 deal, along with Vance Law (1/465) and Gary Redus and Mitch Webster, to each of whom we give a single-season extension valued at roughly $1m that’ll probably be the final one with us for both or at least definitely one of them.
The A’s maintain their lead in the AL West with continued good form but get some surprise competition in the form of the Mariners, who put together a run of 12 straight wins to move into second spot but then lose Mike Krukow for the season to a UCL tear.
They, the Cubs and Reds all look fairly comfortable, leaving just the good old AL East as the focal point again.
Monthly Award Winners
June
American League
Batter – Kevin McReynolds (Mariners): 409 / 7 HR / 19 RBI
Pitcher – Bruce Hurst (Red Sox): 6-0 / 3.07 / 27 K / 44 IP
Rookie – Jeff Robinson (Mariners): 3-1 / 2.51 / 23 K / 32.1 IP
National League
Batter – Tim Raines (Expos): 391 / 5 HR / 15 RBI
Pitcher –Mike Scott (Pirates): 4-1 / 1.60 / 40 K / 45 IP
Rookie – Tom Glavine (Braves): 3-0 / 2.72 / 20 K / 36.1 IP
July
American League
Batter – Mark McGwire (A’s): 341 / 11 HR / 22 RBI
Pitcher – Jimmy Key (Blue Jays): 4-1 / 2.63 / 28 K / 51.1 IP
Rookie – Melido Perez (Twins): 4-2 / 2.36 / 21 K / 45.2 IP
National League
Batter – Eric Davis (Cubs): 380 / 8 HR / 15 RBI
Pitcher –Mike Scott (Pirates): 5-0 / 1.54 / 25 K / 35 IP
Rookie – Shawn Hillegas (Cardinals): 0-0 / 2.08 / 8 K / 13 IP
News, Leaders and Top 20s
Milestones and Observations of Note
2000 Hits: Robin Yount
Phillies veteran Mike Schmidt misses the better part of two months to a PCL strain
Deadline trades of note:
