[Westheim]

Raccoons (57-49) @ Falcons (48-53) – July 30-August 1, 2012

The Falcons weren’t scoring a lot of runs at all, just over 3.9 per game for 11th in the Continental League. Their pitching was sound, with the third-best rotation and a capable bullpen, but that couldn’t keep them afloat, as they still ran a -38 run differential. They were already buried by 27 games by the Thunder. Against the dear Coons, they were 3-3 on the season.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (9-6, 2.78 ERA) vs. Steve Kreider (9-8, 3.80 ERA)
Shunyo Yano (3-8, 5.15 ERA) vs. Donnie Fitzgerald (1-6, 7.30 ERA)
Rich Hood (5-4, 3.84 ERA) vs. Adrian Valencia (9-5, 3.23 ERA)

Southpaw on Wednesday, and we might get two more on the weekend in our 4-game set in Indy.

Sandy Sambrano had already started rehab in St. Pete on Saturday. Michael Palmer was scheduled to go there by Wednesday. Both could rejoin us on the weekend. Maybe. Tomas Castro was also expected back by the weekend. Getting this team healthy might do more good than randomly swapping prospects for more Richard Williams-types.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – LF Pruitt – 1B Quebell – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – RF Ayers – SS M. Gutierrez – P Brown
CHA: LF DeBoer – CF J. Jimenez – 3B Ladd – 1B J. Diaz – RF Nieves – 2B Da Silva – C T. Turner – SS Pollack – P Kreider

The Coons took a 1-0 lead when Yoshi opened the game with a double and scored on Carmona’s single – the first RBI in Carmona’s extremely underwhelming debut – but Brownie didn’t have anything in terms of stuff, and when that combined with nightmare defense in the second inning, the Falcons easily threw three runs onto the board, two of which were unearned after a Gutierrez error, and they scored on a Jimmy DeBoer bloop to shallow left in which Matt Pruitt and Gutierrez were too concerned not to break a claw rather than actually going after the ball, which fell in for the 2-out, 2-run single, on a 2-2 pitch. No strikeouts through two innings for Brownie, who would pick up a few against the bottom of the order later, but this start was to be filed away under the category “gruesome”.

He did lead off the fifth with a single, though, bringing the tying run to the plate. Nomura struck out, but Carmona found the gap for a double that put the tying runs in scoring position with one out. Matt Pruitt had singled in his last at-bat, extending a hitting streak to 11 games, so he had done his day’s work and grounded out to first, an example that Quebell followed instantly. The Coons had the exact same offensive opportunity again in the sixth inning: D-Alex singled, Ayers doubled, which brought up Gutierrez, unfortunately. John Alexander hit for him, which only led to an intentional walk, and now we only had right-handed chumps and the automatic strikeout Craig Bowen available to hit for Brownie. **** it, let Brownie do the magic. At least he bats left-handed. 2-1 pitch lined to right, OVER Maxime Da Silva, into right, Ayers turning third, he’s in to score, tied ballgame!

The top of the order excused themselves from participation then, leaving J-Alex and Brown on base. Brown responded to his own heroics by walking leadoff man Domingo Nieves on four pitches in the bottom 6th, and with Nieves at second nursed another 3-0 count to Tom Turner, who then grounded out to Yoshi, moving up Nieves. That brought up blink-and-you-miss-him ex-Coon Melvin Pollack, who had a grand total of 11 AB on the year, had struck out already in the game, and was probably an easy meal for Brown again, and indeed Brown retired him on a casual grounder to Dave Roudabush at short. Kreider departed after two leadoff walks in the top 7th, but Hoshi Watanabe found some tool to hit into a double play all too readily (Dylan Alexander), Brown was left with a no-decision eventually. Quebell had runners on the corners with one out in the top 9th and hit into a double play as well. The Coons found their way to the tenth inning, in which they left the go-ahead run on second base when Roudabush struck out, and in the bottom of the frame it Micah Steele to shovel the bases full with nobody out. Ron Thrasher replaced him to try and save the forsaken, but walked in the winning run against RELIEVER Matt Collins. 4-3 Falcons. Nomura 2-5, 2B; Carmona 2-5, 2B, RBI; Pruitt 2-4, BB; D. Alexander 2-4, 2B; Brown 7.0 IP, 8 H, 3 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 6 K and 2-3, 2 RBI;

THEY ARE SO GODDAMN AWFUL!!!

By the way, Nick Brown over his last seven games: 2-3 with a 1.48 ERA and 54 K in 48 2/3 innings. 2-3!!

Donnie Fitzgerald got shafted before the middle game and was replaced by Alfredo Collazo (9-10, 4.19 ERA), another righty.

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – LF Pruitt – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – 3B Merritt – C D. Alexander – SS Whitehouse – P Yano
CHA: LF DeBoer – 1B J. Diaz – C F. Chavez – 3B Ladd – CF J. Jimenez – RF Nieves – 2B C. Aguilar – SS Da Silva – P Collazo

Collazo was completely bonkers and issued walks, wild pitches, and also a few hits without any huge formalities. Ask and you receive. The Raccoons asked, got the bases loaded with nobody out in the top 2nd and scored two runs on a wild pitch and a groundout by Whitehouse, then got two more runs in the third despite leadoff man Ricardo Carmona getting caught trying to steal third base. More runs were always better with the horrible Shunyo Yano pitching, and the Coons saddled Collazo with six runs on seven hits and four walks in five innings. The last hit was a 2-run homer by D-Alex, tying him for the team lead in dingers with Quebell. Yano made it through six with a 3-hit shutout, and we were a bit worried that something might be wrong with him, but when the Falcons came back to waffle him for four hits and two runs and knocked him out in the bottom 7th, we were relieved to see that he was still in normal condition. Manobu Sugano inherited two on with one out, filled them up with a single by Maxime Da Silva, but then struck out PH David Rincón and got a soft line right to Yoshi from Jimmy DeBoer. The Coons regained their 6-run advantage with a Gutierrez sac fly in the eighth and a solo shot by Quebell (no tie no more) in the ninth, all off Juan Carlos Bojorquez, but Josh Gibson got stuck in the ninth after a scoreless eighth and left runners on the corners and no outs to Ron Thrasher, who of course conceded the runs. 8-4 Raccoons. Carmona 2-5; Quebell 2-3, 2 BB, HR, RBI; Merritt 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI; D. Alexander 1-2, 2 BB, HR, 2 RBI;

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – RF Ayers – 3B Merritt – 1B Pruitt – C D. Alexander – LF Fucito – CF J. Alexander – SS Whitehouse – P Hood
CHA: CF DeBoer – LF J. Jimenez – 3B Ladd – 1B J. Diaz – RF Nieves – 2B Da Silva – C T. Turner – SS Pollack – P Valencia

Both teams scored a run early on, with a John Alexander triple and Pat Whitehouse’s groundout doing it for the Coons in the second inning. Rich Hood’s mound presence was largely cosmetic, with the defense doing all the work, or sometimes not. Tied at one, both teams had the bases loaded with one out in the sixth inning, and for both teams an error was involved (Keith Ayers getting the blame for the Coons), but while J-Alex and Whitehouse made too entirely harmless outs, the Falcons at least got a sac fly from Nieves and took a 2-1 lead. The Raccoons had the tying run on in the eighth, borked it, the Falcons tacked on a run against Hood and Sugano in the bottom of the inning, and when Ricardo Carmona reached with an infield single in the ninth that was well short of sparking a rally. Nomura grounded out, Bowen hit for an 0-4 Ayers and whiffed, and that was it. 3-1 Falcons. Pruitt 2-3, BB, J. Alexander 2-4, 3B; Carmona (PH) 1-1;

Matt Pruitt had a 13-game hitting streak, but the Coons had their first series loss against the Falcons since 2010.

Raccoons (58-51) @ Indians (44-64) – August 2-5, 2012

Most of the decent players the Indians had had had ended up on the trade market or on the DL in recent weeks, so this team was merely a shell now. Well, the bullpen was still good, and they still had Jose Paraz, but he had a weak season as well, and he was 35 by now. Overall, they were eighth in runs scored and dead-last in runs allowed with a -119 run differential. Their rotation had been last in the CL even WITH Curtis Tobitt, and they probably wouldn’t get out of there without Curtis Tobitt. But here came the Coons, who were only 4-3 against Indy this season.

Projected matchups:
Richard Williams (1-1, 5.30 ERA) vs. Tom Weise (10-9, 4.20 ERA)
Hector Santos (8-8, 3.93 ERA) vs. Aaron Walsh (2-2, 5.69 ERA)
Nick Brown (9-6, 2.72 ERA) vs. Tristan Broun (4-8, 5.91 ERA)
Shunyo Yano (4-8, 5.03 ERA) vs. Sadakano Imamura (2-7, 5.56 ERA)

We only get one left-hander, Broun vs. Brown on Saturday, with Sam McMullen (2-11, 5.66 ERA) having pitched on Wednesday. Yoshi was thus penciled in for an off day on Saturday. Except for him and Merritt everybody had enjoyed a day off already since Sunday, and Merritt got his day off to open this set.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – LF Pruitt – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – C D. Alexander – SS Whitehouse – 3B M. Gutierrez – P Williams
IND: CF J. Wilson – LF Kui – C Paraz – RF J. Ortíz – 1B S. Guerra – 2B Mathews – SS R. Miller – 3B R. Garza – P Weise

Williams coughed up a run in the first, but had a 2-out single in the top of the second that also moved Whitehouse to third base and brought up Yoshi Nomura, who hit a ball right into the corner in rightfield, where the ball stopped dead for long enough that Yoshi ended up with a 2-run triple. Weise then balked him in, 3-1. The next two innings were killed with double plays by Quebell and Whitehouse, respectively, but Richard Williams, who was abusing the defense but was otherwise okay, hit a leadoff double in the top 5th, and Carmona and Quebell got well-placed hits to score two more in the inning and take a 5-1 lead. After another double play hit into by D-Alex in the top of the eighth, Williams was still on the mound, but a Ramón Garza single to start the bottom 8th chased him. Ron Thrasher came in and made a mess, plating the run before somehow getting out of it when Juan Ortíz bounced right into his glove to keep two men stranded in scoring position. Thankfully Angel Casas was well rested and made short work of the Indians in the ninth. 5-2 Coons. Pruitt 2-4; Williams 7.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K, W (2-1) and 2-3, 2B;

Sandy Sambrano was activated from his rehab assignment for game 2, and Jimmy Fucito was sent back to St. Pete after batting .167 in 18 AB.

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – LF Pruitt – 1B Quebell – 3B Merritt – RF J. Alexander – SS Whitehouse – C Bowen – P Santos
IND: CF J. Wilson – LF Kui – C Paraz – RF J. Ortíz – 1B S. Guerra – 2B Mathews – SS R. Miller – 3B R. Garza – P Walsh

Matt Pruitt and John Wilson robbed another of doubles in the first inning. Wilson left the game in the second inning with an injury, but the Indians, who hit the ball all over the place against Santos, scored a run to take a 1-0 lead. Craig Bowen opened the third and fifth innings by reaching base, once on an error, and was bunted to second base by Hector Santos both times. The first scoring opportunity just vaporized, and Whitehouse killed the fourth with an inning-ending double play, but Yoshi Nomura hit a game-tying RBI double in the fifth, and the Raccoons all of a sudden didn’t look quite so lost anymore. Or maybe they still were. Nomura was left on by Carmona and Pruitt, and when Quebell drew a leadoff walk in the top 6th, Merritt improved on an 0-2, 2 K day with a double play hit into. The bottom 6th saw the Indians’ pitcher Aaron Walsh hit a leadoff double just past the reach of Pruitt, but Santos finally got his **** together and struck out Robbie Luxton, Ming Kui, and Jose Paraz in order, got through the seventh with some poor contact, but there was no reward for him, not even a participatory ribbon. The Coons couldn’t get through Aaron Walsh at all, and when Sandy Sambrano hit a pinch-hit single off Helio Maggessi in the ninth that only led to ANOTHER ****ING DOUBLE PLAY hit into by Craig Bowen. Law Rockburn pitched the eighth and started the ninth but left before completion with some tweak he felt.

Extra innings, Yoshi and Carmona hit 1-out singles in the 10th, pulling up Pruitt, whose 14-game hitting streak was approaching extinction. He floated another pitch weakly to Jimmy Bayle, the Indians’ third leftfielder of the game, for the second out, and Quebell fouled out behind third. We had to go to the 11th to finally break through, then ironically against the first left-hander the Indians threw into the fray. Ryan O’Quinn served up a homer to John Alexander, his 10th on the year, to break the tie, and Sambrano and Bowen also had hits. Gutierrez whiffed for the second out, but Yoshi singled to center to score Sambrano. When Carmona walked, Pruitt did get another at-bat, but he grounded the first pitch back to O`Quinn and was laden with a 0-6 line. Pruitt was squawking when he was replaced in the field for defense, but I hushed him down. If they walk you three times it might not be your fault, but if you go 0-6 then you don’t deserve another chance if somehow this thing goes even longer. Funny thing is, the Indians came uncomfortably close to extending this game. Garza and Luxton both hit singles off Angel Casas and after an ill-advised throw to third by Keith Ayers (who had replaced Pruitt for defense…) were both in scoring position with two outs and rookie Shane Larsen batting, who was still searching for his first major league hit – better cue the dramatic music. Lesser fools have sunk the Coons on these occasions. Larsen grounded up the middle where we had Sambrano at short, he had to spin around to make a throw and – to first – bang-bang – OUT! 3-1 Blighters. Nomura 3-6, 2B, 2 RBI; Quebell 2-4, BB; J. Alexander 3-4, BB, HR, RBI; Sambrano (PH) 2-2; Bowen 2-5, 2B; Santos 7.0 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 8 K; Rockburn 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

Hector Santos faced Joey Mathews three times and struck him out three times. The middle K put Santos at 100 strikeouts more than walks for the season, which is a nice mark to reach in early August.

And so Pruitt’s run ended at 14, and the Coons also left 14 men on base, which if you add the three double plays over 11 innings leaves you with an unfathomable and horrendous performance whenever there is a Furball on base.

Tomas Castro was sent on rehab to the minors, just for two or three days to get warm. I think Carmona will be sent back to St. Pete then. He’s just not clicking.

Game 3
POR: 2B Sambrano – 3B Merritt – LF Pruitt – 1B Quebell – RF Ayers – CF J. Alexander – C D. Alexander – SS Roudabush – P Brown
IND: CF J. Wilson – 3B Mathews – RF J. Ortíz – 1B S. Guerra – C Padilla – LF Bayle – 2B Larsen – SS R. Miller – P Broun

Quebell was assessed an error on the first play behind Nick Brown, putting John Wilson and his sore shoulder on first base. Wilson stole second, but was eventually left on base when Ayers caught a deep drive by Santiago Guerra. The Coons hit into the first double play (…) in the second, leaving plenty room for another horrendous box score. The Indians made TWO errors in the third inning, which only led to Pruitt flying out to Wilson with the bases loaded to end that frame, and for a while Tristan Broun had more hits than the entire Furballs lineup after singling off Brown his first time up. Roudabush would single in the fifth, which didn’t lead anywhere, but the Raccoons had an actual chance to finally put something on the board in the sixth inning. Merritt had drawn a leadoff walk, Broun’s third given up, and Pruitt’s pathetic hobbler escaped Guerra and went into right. Quebell walked to fill them up before Ayers grounded to Joey Mathews, who fired home to get Merritt and Ayers was out at first as well!

FOR ****’S SAKE, GET YOUR ****ING ***ES MOVING, YOU ****ING ****HOLES!!!

The foundations of the park were shaking slightly. An earthquake? Nah. Probably some lunatic who couldn’t bear it anymore. There I was, banging against the shatterproof glass of my assigned suite, and yet they weren’t scoring. John Alexander grounded out to Larsen, Brown came out broken in the sixth, walked Ortíz, walked Guerra, drilled Dave Padilla, Bayle whiffed, but Larsen hit a ****ty infield single – first major league hit … - and Ryan Miller hit a hard 2-run single, and this one was going down the drain. Tristan Broun pitched a 3-hit shutout through eight, but the Arrowheads understandably panicked when he issued a leadoff walk to Quebell in the ninth. Helio Maggessi took over, and that run never moved off first. 3-0 Indians. Roudabush 2-3;

TRISTAN BROUN!! ****ING TRISTAN BROUN!! AAAAAARRRRRGGGHHH!!!

(is tasered again by some security goon)

Trsssstnnn … Brooouuu… (waves with all non-paralyzed arms)

Game 4
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Sambrano – RF J. Alexander – 1B Quebell – 3B Merritt – LF Carmona – SS M. Gutierrez – C Bowen – P Yano
IND: SS R. Miller – LF Kui – C Paraz – RF J. Ortíz – 1B S. Guerra – 3B Mathews – CF Luxton – 2B M. Clark – P Imamura

Yoshi and Sandy opened the game with singles, which was not necessarily putting the Indians in danger of trailing early, and indeed the Coons didn’t score in the first. They DID score in the second, in which they had a single, three walks, and three stolen bases, and somehow that worked out for one run. Bring up Yano, who allowed a single and two walks to load the bases in the bottom 2nd, but fear not: there’s two out and the pitcher up to – ****. Imamura singled to left, plating two, and Ryan Miller followed up with an RBI single, and as soon as that the Indians held an insurmountable 2-run lead.

If there was a positive to take away from a real trash can game that saw Yano knocked out after four and a third, down 5-4 and with a man on first, then it was Ricardo Carmona, who reached base each of his first three at-bats, ran actual circles around the Indians battery and stole four bases to score each time he was on. That was some fun. The rest of the team was anything but. They had the tying run on first twice before reaching the ninth, never moved him further. The top 9th saw Helio Maggessi unavailable and since the Indians had been mixing and matching for a while, they were now left with left-hander Juan Bernard, who had a 9.72 ERA and walked three for every two he struck out. He faced the middle of the order. Quebell walked. That was all. 5-4 Indians. Sambrano 2-3, 2 BB; Carmona 3-5, 4 SB; Whitehouse 2-2; Thrasher 2.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K;

Juan Ortíz (.286, 19 HR, 67 RBI) had two hits in this game, including the single that Ron Thrasher allowed, which was Ortíz’ 2,000th base hit. He will turn 34 on Monday. Happy birthday, now bugger off.

Ricardo Carmona tied the mark Sandy Sambrano had set earlier in the season with four stolen bases in a game. The Coons still lost.

In other news

July 31 – It cycles ‘round here! CIN LF R.J. DeWeese (.251, 16 HR, 47 RBI) connects for four hits in the Cyclones’ 8-7 loss to the Warriors, one of each kind, with a triple in the first, a single in the fifth, a double in the seventh, and a solo home run off Dan Nordahl in the ninth. The 50th cycle in ABL history is the fourth this season and the first for the Cincinnati franchise. Of the four cycles this year, three came in losing efforts, including that by SFW Gil Gross on May 16. Four cycles in a year had previously been achieved in 1989, 1997, and 2004, and there have never been five in a season.
August 3 – The Pacifics take a hit with the news that 3B/2B Jens Carroll (.308, 3 HR, 48 RBI) is out for the year with a torn posterior cruciate ligament.
August 4 – MIL OF Philip Locke (.303, 9 HR, 60 RBI) has a huge tear in his labrum and needs surgery to get it stapled back together. The Loggers estimate that with the severity of the injury he could well miss almost a full year.

Complaints and stuff

(lights a black candle and draws the blinds)

Law Rockburn is out for the season with a partial tear in his labrum, so that’s that. He’s a free agent after the season and I don’t know whether we will try to resign him. He’s 32 and ever since hitting the big three-oh he’s been a bit too average for my taste. He appeared in 528 games for the Coons, 39-19 with 18 SV and a 2.87 ERA. K/BB almost 3.9 …

Kevin Denton was called up and put in the pen. He made one of those forgettable starts when all hell broke lose after Colin Baldwin’s injury in May. He is the only righty reliever on the 40-man roster that’s not hurt and the 40-man roster is full right now. More moves might well come next week. I can’t do anything sophisticated right now … I can’t even pick up the phone after that taser incident.

Does all this make Josh Gibson our setup man? (shivers)

Hidden somewhere deep beneath the tears of agony are some nice facts. Like that we’re halfway through Craig Bowen’s immovable contract. So let’s cheer up.

There weren’t many things in the scouting report on August 1 that I didn’t know yet (most of our rotation stinks and will stink more in the future, except for Brownie and Santos), but there were a few takeaways. Outfielder Mike Cook got a ratings upgrade, and this year’s seventh-rounder Blake Kelly got a significant stuff upgrade. He has struck out ten in 8.1 innings so far in Aumsville, where there isn’t enough work with too many relievers and infielders around. Well, we won’t purge Kelly, that’s for sure.