[Westheim]

It could have been much worse. As we flew home, medical staff told me that Juan Martinez was not seriously injured. He had a sore back and was DTD for a few days. However, the pain he suffered in certain motions was about prohibiting him from a proper windup, so he would not see action in the home part of the series, unless our team was out of arms in a 22nd inning.

1993 WORLD SERIES
Portland Raccoons (91-71) vs. Washington Capitals (100-62)

Game 3 – Miguel Lopez (17-8, 2.81 ERA) vs. Parker Montgomery (12-13, 3.77 ERA)

I had Moreno play second base in this game. At least on defense he is an upgrade on Allen, who has nothing but disappointed for 11/12 of the year.

The Capitals knocked Lopez early, for two runs in the first inning. He looked about as bad as Beato in the series opener, and that was not a promising sign.

A hit batter and doubles by Cleveland, Freddy Gonzalez and Marc Shaw plated two more runs for the Capitals in the third inning. At this point, Montgomery was tossing a no-hitter.

While Montgomery’s bid ended on time, Lopez’ start did so, too. Jeffery Brown homered to make it 5-0 in the fourth, and that meant bed time for our youngster. Too bad that I was running out of starters to use. We had the bases loaded in the bottom 4th, with no outs, and PROMPTLY grounded into a double play. This time Hall was the culprit.

You can’t go anywhere like that. Tony Vela was not pitching any better than Lopez, aborting a long relief attempt when he put two in scoring position with nobody out in the sixth. Daniel Miller came in and was lucky enough to surrender three men without the runners scoring, but that would not earn him a place in history in a game his team was losing 6-2.

Hall and Vinson would hit into killing double plays in the sixth and seventh innings, respectively, as the Raccoons were losing this one by a mile. Again. They didn’t even get on base in the eighth, and were left to a Hall single in the ninth.

Capitals 7, Raccoons 2 (Capitals lead 2-1); Moreno 2-2, BB; Miller 3.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 3 K;

Again, not even close. We were out-hit 15-7, which will give you results like these. We were not stinking up to these Capitals, who were well on the road to become the first team with three titles (in four years to make it more impressive) after almost leaving town in the early and mid-80s.

Game 4 – Jason Turner (10-13, 3.16 ERA) vs. Ramón Ortíz

In a way, this was a must-win game. We were looking at either Beato or Wade to start game 5, and neither had been anything but horrible these playoffs. So, how did Turner plan to defeat Ortíz? Well, I don’t know.

Moreno remained in, Kinnear batted third and played instead of Hall, who was one-for-a-zillion in the World Series after striking the Condors with fear a week ago.

Ortíz struck out the first three Coons that dared to encroach the plate, and would be perfect the first time through the lineup. Turner didn’t exactly match him, but held the Capitals to two hits and no runs through the first three frames.

Salazar ended Ortíz’ blossoming bid with a hard liner into center for a leadoff single in the fourth. Quinn followed that with a single to right and Salazar went to third. Prime chance to score! Baldivía made a poor out, and O’Morrissey hit into a groundout, but Salazar scored for a 1-0 score. Lopez came up next and blasted a shot to dead center. HOME RUN!!

Up 3-0, it was Turner’s to lose.

Top 5th: Yoshihito Ito doubled to right and went to third base on a wild pitch. Fred Rodgers lined out to Kinnear, and Ito scored. Then, Turner walked Shaw. Ortíz bunted him over before Rodriguez flew out, but Turner was clearly showing chinks in the armor. Wait, it’s Turner – which armor??

No, Turner wouldn’t make it. The first two men in the sixth got on and the ship was clearly sinking. Jackie Lagarde came in with a bucket to get the water out. He struck out Cleveland and Rivera, but a 2-2 grounder by Ito got through Moreno and one run scored. We held a 3-2 lead.

I needed another inning from Lagarde, unfortunately, with one man missing from the bullpen. He mastered that task, too.

Some more offense would have been nice, so far we had been held to three hits. We got two men on in the bottom 7th with a Moreno single and Vinson getting brushed by Chris Nelson, but Hall, hitting for Lagarde, whiffed, and the inning was over.

Burnett was tasked with the top 8th – and failed. Brown got on, and Cleveland doubled. While Brown was thrown out at home, Cleveland moved to third, and then scored on a single by Ito. The game was tied, and the fans were falling silent, but when Grant West pitched a scoreless top 9th, there was still a chance to walk off.

But Rivera sat down the Coons in order, and we went to overtime again. West put two men on with singles in the top 10th, but nobody scored. Rivera also remained in the game. Kinnear walked, Vinson whiffed, before Allen singled in place of West. 180 feet to make up with one out.

Salazar struck out. Two out. Bobby Quinn came up, not matching up well with the righty Rivera, but here we go. Quinn looped into shallow right, and Kinnear kicked into highest gear from second base, turned third base like it’s in the book and sprinted home – and was safe. Walkoff!

Raccoons 4, Capitals 3 (10) (series tied 2-2); Quinn 2-5, RBI; Allen (PH) 1-1; Lagarde 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K; West 2.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K, W (1-0);

We were out-hit 13-6 in this one, so there was little doubt as to which team would have deserved to sweep their opponent at this point.

Game 5 – Scott Wade vs. Carlos Reyes (5-7, 3.59 ERA)

Wade got the start over Beato, as we faced ex-Coon Carlos Reyes, who had made only 20 starts this season due to being the #5 guy and a couple of minor ailments.

I slid Hall and Allen back into the lineup for this game. I had doubts on both moves, but… yeah. This would be Daniel Hall’s final home game. How about a walkoff grand slam with two outs in the ninth? That’d be swell.

The Capitals got going early with a run in the first inning against Wade. They did not stop there. The top 2nd marked the end for Scott Wade, as the Capitals reeled off a barrage that wanted to be matched by any team. Two doubles got past Lopez in center, but Wade was to blame for the most part. Now, in a 4-0 game, Beato came in.

Even against a middling pitcher like Reyes, that was hard to make up in the World Series. Down 4-0, you had to get going, really hard. The Raccoons were 1-hit through three innings.

Actually, they didn’t get anybody on again until Daniel Hall walked in the fifth. Nobody out, a home run or so would be nice. Baldivía singled, which was not bad for starters. Then they made three outs without even being close to scoring a run.

Four innings to go, four runs down. Something about that situation was bound to change, and it was not the innings remaining, as Beato surrendered two more runs in the top 6th. When Salazar got on to start the bottom of the inning, and Lopez doubled to put two runs in scoring position with one out.

That brought up O-Mo, who was batting .200 in the playoffs. He was not cleaning up too well. Here, he faced Reyes with two in scoring position and one out, and his team six runs down in game 5 of the World Series. Bloody hell, get them runners home!

He struck out. Daniel Hall grounded out, no happy end here, either. And when Baldivía got on in the seventh, Allen double played us out of there.

The Capitals didn’t stop. Proctor was blown up in the eighth, Cleveland homered off Miller in the ninth. Everything the Raccoons managed to do was another double play in the ninth.

Capitals 10, Raccoons 0 (Capitals lead 3-2); A. Lopez 2-4, 2 2B; Baldivía 2-4; Kinnear (PH) 1-1;

Oh well. That will probably not work out the way Coon City would have liked.