[Bub13]

JULY 2050

A new month! New possibilities! Okay, probably more of the same possibilities really. Can we keep winning? Can we stay (at least relatively) healthy? Will we make a trade? Maybe yes on all three fronts... Anyway, with the All-Star break and two other off days, we'll have just 25 games this month. Only six at home, which will make for some long-ass travel days. (We'll finish the month on a 13-game road swing, to Baltimore, Miami, Houston, and Oakland.)

July 1 also means International Amateurs are here! And holy cow have prices jumped. Only one player has a lisetd demand under $1M, and his want is still $900k. The highest ask is Panamanian 1B Willie Maya, who wants $11M to be a likely bust down the line. Although...he does look REALLY good. Still, as we went over budget last year we can't spend more than $500k on anyone, so we are out of the running. On everyone. For some reason, the cap on IFA spending is just $6M, so I think I'm gonna have to adjust that upward juuuust a little bit.

And Josh Frederick was named AL player of the month for June, after a month going .391/7/33 and scoring 54 times.

July 1-3 vs DETROIT
Our first sighting this season against the Tigres, who are once again on top of the Central. At 47-41, they're a game ahead of Milwaukee. Third in runs for, and 4th in pitching, and actually only 2nd in home runs. Part of that last stat is having two regulars on the DL: 2B Hideki Matsuro and CF Luis Rodela. Rodela in particular is a loss, as he was batting .292/21/62, and will miss five more weeks. Pitching has been stellar despite missing 2048 Cy Young winner Mike Cote all year, and of late solid SP Alex Hidalgo for the rest of the season. Manager: Ethan Larrison, fifth season, and with only one season of fewer than 90 wins. Chemistry: Ecstatic, despite half the team not liking Larrison, and no team captain. Can't Miss Prospect? 1B Pat Townsand (MLB #8) is already in Detroit; he's struggling a bit, at .219, but looks like a 50-HR guy one day, no kidding. OF Roberto Gomez (#21) also looks like a pure slugger, combined with great defense. Where do these guys find all these sluggers?

HAW pitchers: RH Shamar Jackson (10-5, 3.91) / LH Mike Garfield (3-4, 5.01) / RH Ryan Ratliff (7-2, 4.52)
DET pitchers: RH Daniel White (5-6, 5.93) / RH Raul Bravo (9-2, 3.26) / LH T.J. Carroll (10-4, 3.31)

#81: LOSS 0-4 ... Jackson goes the distance, despite giving up 12 H and a pair of HR
#82: LOSS 0-4 ... another complete game, another pair of HR allowed, another loss...we outhit them 7-6 tho!
#83: LOSS 1-7 ... Lynn goes 3-for-3, but there's nothing else to see here

Well that went about as poorly as it could have. The only positive out of this series is no injuries. And the pen only appeared in the last game, so they're rested. Jeez.... Oakland's 8 in back of us now.... ELSEWHERE: Detroit's sweep makes them the second team to reach 50 wins.... Just past the halfway mark of the season (82 games), and LA closer Lorenzo Quinones has 30 saves.... Brooklyn's offense is cranking on all cylinders, first in every major offensive category except home runs. And they're 3rd in that stat.


July 5-7 @ KANSAS CITY
Currently bringing up the rear in the Central, at 37-43. Next-to-last place batting and ninth-place pitching are the culprits. Only one batter--LF Rich Humphrey--is batting higher than .270, and even he's on the DL for two more weeks. The money they spent on stud SP Chris Liles last year is finally (ahem) paying off, as he's been their best pitcher by far; but letting go of perennial .300 hitter 3B Juan Garcia hurt, as his replacement (Jake Powers) is only batting .218. Manager: Andy Raaff, seventh season; although he's been managing (four teams) since 2031. Chemistry: Happy, thanks to a strong leadership group and no crybabies. Can't Miss Prospect? SS Jose Valdez (MLB #20) is their best prospect by far (second place is ranked #164), and right now his ceiling as a hitter is sky high. But he's only 17, so that could change drastically; and he's got a glove made of stone, despite his other positive fielding attributes. Not a sure thing, no.

HAW pitchers: LH Eric Jones (11-2, 3.64) / RH Dennis Perry (7-5, 4.79) / RH Shamar Jackson (10-6, 3.92)
KCR pitchers: RH Ryan Swan (7-2, 3.57) / RH Adam Grossman (2-7, 5.10) / RH Phil Eckert (6-8, 5.35)

#84: WIN 4-0 ... only 6 hits a side, but I guess the 7 walks we took really helped...2 hits each for Daley and Frederick
#85: WIN 5-3 ... 2-run HR for Frederick, and Perry goes a strong 8 IP (5 H, 6 K)...Daley has an 18-game hitting streak snapped
#86: LOSS 7-8 ... a 5-run 1st quickly becomes a 6-5 deficit after two innings, and we can't come back...4 hits for Goodloe

One pitching horrorshow notwithstanding, a decent comeback series after the Detroit detbacle.... Daley losing his hit streak was some hard cheese, but he's still 3rd in AL batting.... Jones is really making a strong case for an extension, isn't he? Except the last pitcher I extended mid-season was Brandon Mercer back in '48. Remember him? He started out something like 15-1, but pretty much went into the dumper after I extended him around the All-Star break. Now he's with the Mets and hasn't pitched at all yet this year.... Third round pick Will McGee ignored my bonus offer and will go back into next year's draft. We'll get compensation for him, at least. And I'll shortlist him, as I still like his potential. (The last guy we couldn't sign? Josh Frederick; we re-picked him the following year. That's worked out pretty well for us.).... ELSEWHERE: Hey Richmond! The best way to ensure your extremely old pitching rotation (average age: 112) stays healthy is to have them pitch 11-inning complete games, tossing 133 pitches. 36-year-old Robby Liantonio agrees, despite needing his arm reattached after that game.... Austin the city may be fun and weird, but their baseball team just plain sucks: still the only team without 30 wins. And hey! They still have former Islander Mel Carrillo, a can't-miss prospect who turned into a perpetually-injured fan favorite: eleven MLB seasons, only four with more than 100 games played.... Draft pick signing deadline came and went, and every first rounder signed this year. The highest non-signee was Washington supplemental pick (#40 overall) 3B Mike Palmer. I shortlist him, as he looks pretty good.


July 8-10 @ MINNESOTA
Third place, at 48-38, just quietly hanging around and staying in the playoff hunt. Second-best AL offense, led by CF Emmanuel Garcia (.332/14/36), RF Josh Jacobson (.324//17/72), and DH Josh Conley (.318/11/40). Add in last year's #1 overall pick LF Jordan Foots, who's struggling at just .209, but has 14 HR and has gotten better every month. Pitching is just 15th, with a boatload of guys on the DL, but ace Conor MacLeod is having an all-star season, leading baseball with 179 K. Manager: Robert Woodard, second season (after 17 with Oakland). Chemistry: Content; everyone is just swimming along peacefully for now. Can't Miss Prospect? Well, there's Foots, ranked #11. After him, it's #64 Jerry Caprio, a 24-year-old SP who may never develop that crucial third pitch. I'm partial to Aussie 2B Lucas Tipping, who looks like a decent hitter and good-enough fielder to become the middle-class-man's Chuck Knoblauch.

HAW pitchers: LH Mike Garfield (3-5, 4.92) / RH Ryan Ratliff (7-3, 4.66) / LH Eric Jones (12-2, 3.40)
MIN pitchers: RH Bryan Crider (2-5, 6.26) / RH Conor MacLeod (10-6, 3.07) / LH Ed Holmes (2-0, 2.51)

#87: WIN 4-2 ... a pair of HR and seven not-so-bad innings from Garfield to boot...Matson goes 4-for-4, but gets stranded three times
#88: WIN 6-1 ... 10 K effort from Ratliff, and Goldthwait smacks his second HR of the series...25th double for Simmons, who adds a single as well
#89: Rain out! Rescheduled for September 6, as part of a (now) double header

Two nice wins, and we manhandled MacLeod too. We're now 11 games up on Oakland heading into the break.... So Adam Groff is tied for second in the AL batting race, and received the 3rd highest number of fan votes for the all-star game. And yet he's snubbed for the final roster, despite finishing only 14k votes behind 1B starter William Swanson. I will send a very strongly worded letter, yes indeed.... Rookie ball Wilmington won their first game of the season, after losing their first 13. Gulp.... ELSEWHERE: What a time to be an Alvarado, as Cincy's Alex and Brooklyn's Roberto each toss shutouts on 7/9, earning first and second stars of the day.... Pittsburgh is the hot squad right now, winners of 7 straight, to bring them back to .500, at 45-45. Washington has dropped seven in a row, and sits in last in the NL East, at 34-54.

......

All-Star Game interlude. This year's mid-summer classic is played in Montreal, which we only discover the day of the game. We place three guys on the team: LF Cam Daley (starter), RF Josh Frederick, and CL Jon White. Groff's snub is unforgiveable, and I will personally set out to destroy the reputation and career of AL manager SG Che, who helms the Brewers as his day job. And diddles small animals, or so I'm told. Anyway, off to the game....aaand the AL wins a rain-swept 7-4 contest at Parc Labatt, scoring all of their runs in the last two innings. Cam Daley went 3-for-5 and scored a run, Josh Frederick got a cheap RBI by walking with the bases loaded, and Jon White fanned two in one relief inning. Brooklyn closer Kymami Rhymes was hung out to dry, pitching three innings and yielding all seven AL runs. Richmond catcher Guillermo Diaz was named MVP, knocking two HR in the losing effort.

A few league notes before resuming normal programming and wrapping up...
...PIT and CIN make a rare, and odd, intra-division trade. PIT send CL Manny Gomez (25 SV, 2.08 ERA), and receives 23-year-old SS Scott Spicer (great fielder, terrible hitter) and 26-year-old 3B Sean Friedman (power but no average). Dunno about this one.
...The "stud" of the International Free Agent class was 1B Willie Maya, as mentioned above. Well the Miami Marlins got their man, but at the eye-popping cost of $29M. WHAT. Dude should retire RIGHT NOW, as his career can not get any better than that. Ten-to-one says he busts.
...so we make a little trade. ISLANDERS TRADE! We finally pulled the trigger on Manny Rangel, sending him to the Dodgers, along with a 20th round pick and a $500 gift card to the local Tires Warehouse franchise, for the next time they're in town. In return we get reliever Alex Mahoney and prospect pitcher Daniel Croft. Mahoney, 28, is a high-stuff power pitcher, with decent movement and control. He's signed through '52 at a reasonable rate ($3.8M). He's been erratic this year (4.98 ERA), but LA's terrible defense may be responsible for that. Croft is 19, a lefty, and a long way off. But he has good ceilings and is worth watching. This also means that Josh Matson moves into a full-time role at second, and we call up prospect Julian Cardenas (finally!) to spell him and provide late-inning defense.

......

TL;DR Version: 4-4 here, and not too bad...as long as we overlook that Detroit series. After 88 games we're 56-32, holding an 11-game lead over Oakland. With 74 games to go, we can't get comfortable. Our offense has really moved into gear, with four season-long regulars batting over .300, and Jim Klein at .293. To them, add new 2B Josh Matson (.342 in 73 AB), SS Bob Goodloe (.305 in 187 AB), and backup CF Joe Lynn (.353 in 51 AB). The pitching rotation has stepped up too, and we now have the 4th best starters ERA. Injuries: Stoneback has seven more weeks; gotta keep waiting. And Dan Brown's lost season will finally begin with a rehab stint in three weeks.