Team Record: 17-23
Sim Record: 3-6
Games
5/11 - 9-2 loss vs Nevada - Francisco Diaz had two hits. That's it. That is all the good that came from this game. 5 straight losses now.
5/12 - 5-1 loss vs Nevada - James Walsh has hit safely in 11 straight games and Billy-Bob Suggs pretty much doubles his innings total for the season (4 IP, 2 H, 0 R), but McKie gets shelled in 2 2/3 innings. Also, McLaughlin (who isn't my starting first baseman anymore) got 3 hits.
5/13 - 5-2 loss vs Utah - John O'Parra actually pitched pretty well (7 IP, 8 H, 3 R), but was outdone by Cory Bayne of Utah (8 IP, 8 H, 2 R).
5/14 - 6-4 loss vs Utah - Our
8th straight loss, Paul Long gets beat up in 4.1 innings (8 H, 5 ER) to raise his ERA to 5.93. Oscar Oakley hit his 3rd homerun of the year.
5/15 - 5-3 WIN vs Utah - Hooray! A Win! Chris Steelman, of all people, pitches well (6.1 IP, 9 H, 3 ER) and the bullpen locked it down. But the star was Oscar Oakley who hit 2 solo homeruns in the 4th (to give us the lead) and 6th (to give us some insurance) innings
5/16 - 4-1 loss vs Utah - Crosswell (7 IP, 9 H, 4 ER) pitched as well as we could hope for, but our offense didn't do jack squat. The sad part is, we only left 2 guys on base the entire game (we had 7 hits).
5/17 - Off Day
5/18 - 2-1 loss @ New Mexico - Chet McKie pitches well enough to win (7 IP, 5 H, 2 ER), but our offense doesn't help him out. Vin Koenig's 1st inning homerun was all the scoring that we did.
5/19 - 5-4 WIN @ New Mexico - We scored 4 runs in the top of the 9th inning with Francisco Diaz going 3 for 3 with a key 2-run single in the top of the 9th that tied the game. Oscar Oakley also stole a base, which put him at 799 for his career.
5/20 - 3-1 WIN @ New Mexico - Chris Steelman wins his second straight game (and also wins PoG honors) and James Walsh picks up 3 more hits to take the team lead in that category.
Standings
Code:
Great Explorers League
West
Team W L PCT GB Stk L10
Washington 27 14 .659 - L1 8-2
Idaho 23 17 .575 3.5 W6 7-3
Nevada 20 20 .500 6.5 W2 5-5
Utah 18 23 .439 9.0 L3 5-5
California 18 24 .429 9.5 W1 2-8
Colorado 17 23 .425 9.5 W2 3-7
East
Team W L PCT GB Stk L10
Wisconsin 26 14 .650 - W1 7-3
Texas 25 17 .595 2.0 W3 6-4
Kansas 22 18 .550 4.0 L1 7-3
Minnesota 20 20 .500 6.0 L2 4-6
Illinois 16 25 .390 10.5 L6 3-7
New Mexico 12 29 .293 14.5 L2 3-7
8 straight losses. Yikes!
We ended the sim on a high note, winning two of three (of course, those 3 games were against the worst team in the league).
Also, just a note for you all. The top two teams in each division make the playoffs. So if the season ended today, Washington (the 1 seed) would play Idaho (4 seed) and Wisconsin (2) would play Texas (3).
Pitching
Code:
Name G GS W L SV ERA IP HA R ER BB K
s1 C. McKie 10 10 3 4 0 4.11 61.1 67 29 28 11 30
s2 P. Long 6 6 2 3 0 5.40 33.1 45 21 20 7 5
s3 C. Steelman 9 9 3 5 0 5.06 42.2 49 25 24 14 24
s4 J. Crosswell 9 9 1 6 0 6.70 47.0 58 36 35 27 20
s5 J. O'Parra 6 6 1 4 0 6.83 27.2 34 21 21 7 10
mr D. MacKenzie 16 0 2 0 0 5.26 25.2 27 18 15 12 6
mr L. Briscoe 19 0 0 0 2 2.63 24.0 20 7 7 6 18
mr B. Suggs 5 0 0 0 0 5.79 9.1 9 6 6 8 2
mr J. Langlois 17 0 0 0 0 4.09 22.0 19 10 10 7 16
su R. Souza 22 0 2 1 0 3.45 28.2 22 11 11 6 21
su A. Stier 16 0 1 0 1 2.00 18.0 17 4 4 5 7
cl W. Chee 15 0 2 0 6 3.93 18.1 16 8 8 8 9
I moved Long down in the starting rotation. It seems like he is feeling too much pressure up there. I have a feeling this is going to be a
long year for this pitching staff. Check out their ERAs. Aside from Herold (who I don't want to bring up
just yet, there is no immediate help in the minors.
Lineup
Code:
Name G AB H 2B 3B HR RBI R BB K AVG OBP SLG
1 LF L. Mingo 35 136 31 8 1 0 6 21 15 25 .228 .314 .301
2 CF F. Diaz 38 138 41 4 2 4 16 14 5 28 .297 .322 .442
3 2B V. Koenig 39 136 41 3 0 2 17 17 7 18 .301 .340 .368
4 SS J. Kinchen 40 152 39 10 2 4 19 18 4 27 .257 .294 .428
5 C J. Walsh 36 141 43 9 1 1 21 15 8 18 .305 .342 .404
6 RF O. Oakley 38 144 31 4 1 5 19 11 13 31 .215 .278 .361
7 3B R. Jerkins 40 150 25 6 1 0 7 14 10 19 .167 .224 .220
8 1B A. Oberlin 28 47 14 3 1 1 8 5 3 2 .298 .346 .468
J. Carmona 18 17 7 0 0 0 1 0 0 2 .412 .412 .412
S. McLaughlin 33 109 28 2 0 1 10 13 6 22 .257 .302 .303
K. Biel 22 31 7 2 0 0 4 2 1 6 .226 .242 .290
N. Mutsuhito 15 38 4 0 0 0 1 1 2 9 .105 .150 .105
C. Baker 23 35 2 0 0 1 2 3 5 9 .057 .175 .143
Moved Oberlin into the lineup because I wanted to see what he could do. Turns out, not much.
I'm so very close to benching Jerkins and throwing Nightmare to the wolves in a trial by fire situation. The Jerk is getting on base less than 25% of the time. Blah!
Milestone Watch
Oscar Oakley needs but 1 stolen base to reach 800 in his career.
Team Rankings
Batting AVG: .239 (20th)
Homeruns: 20 (22nd)
Walks: 80 (24th)
Stolen Bases: 28 (T-11th)
Runs Scored: 138 (22nd)
Pitching ERA: 4.76 (21st)
Opponents AVG: .275 (20th)
HRs Allowed: 42 (23rd)
Walks Allowed: 118 (12th)
Runs Allowed: 196 (21st)
This is all out of 24 teams. Ouch!
Top Prospects Report
Feast your eyes on the top 10 of the
#1 rated minor league system in the NPBL!
Code:
Batters
# Name Age Pos Lvl AVG HR RBI
2 Ross Lange 18 C A .240 3 10
4 Bates Schatz 21 2B AA .301 1 10
5 James Hennen 24 LF AAA .316 4 29
6 Earl Schuh 24 RF AA .255 2 16
9 Nightmare Massengill 21 3B AAA .302 3 26
10 Eugene Grimes 24 LF AA .300 10 42
Pitchers
# Name Age Pos Level Rec ERA IP HA BB K
1 Paydirt James 18 SP A 1-2 2.74 62.1 58 17 32
3 Paul Long 22 SP Majors 2-3 5.40 33.1 45 7 5
7 Chip Herold 24 SP AA 5-0 3.00 60.0 45 26 37
8 Armando Renez 18 SP A 2-4 4.77 54.2 44 31 29
Lange and Renez need to pick it up a bit. Grimes continues to impress. I think it might be time to bring Herold up a level. He's almost fully developed, but needs to improve his control.
I'm excited that we are now the #1 minor league system. But we don't have any HUGE minor leaguers coming up through the system. Here's the top 5 guys and where they rank overall as a prospect:
Paydirt James - 16th
Ross Lange - 28th
James Hennen - 29th
Bates Shatz - 33rd
Chip Herold - 36th
So overall, we've got some good kids, but not great kids coming up. Our big boys (James, Lange, and Long) are still young though.