[Westheim]

Monday was off, with old friend Matt Nunley coming by and presenting the newest model of BBQ grills he was promoting.

We expected the team to play slooowly on Tuesday.

Raccoons (21-10) vs. Stars (16-15) – May 11-13, 2038

The Stars were third in the FL West, fourth in runs scored and third from the bottom in runs allowed, which was no surprise given their shoebox of a ballpark. Surprisingly they were first in stolen bases in the league, with *51* bases taken in just 31 games. For comparison, the Raccoons led the CL in stolen bases, with a paltry 29. And silly us thought that one base per game was about as it good as it got …! These teams had met last season, with the Raccoons sweeping the series.

Projected matchups:
Bryce Sparkes (3-1, 2.58 ERA) vs. Mario Bojorques (3-2, 5.15 ERA)
Jared Ottinger (3-0, 3.41 ERA) vs. Antonio Vega (3-3, 4.78 ERA)
Josh Weeks (3-1, 6.30 ERA) vs. Joe Murphy (0-1, 5.10 ERA)

All right-handed pitchers here.

The thing was that offense played best in their ballpark, but speed played the same everywhere. This had the potential to get ugly.

Game 1
DAL: CF M. Fuentes – SS J. Ramos – 2B H. Acosta – 1B A. Zacarias – C Zarate – LF Nieves – RF Korecky – 3B Olea – P Bojorques
POR: 3B A. Ramos – 2B Trevino – LF M. Fernandez – RF Greenway – CF Maldonado – SS Myers – C Morales – 1B Stedham – P Sparkes

The top three in that lineup all had 11+ stolen bases, while the Raccoons had nobody in double digits. Jon Ramos and Hugo Acosta promptly reached base on singles in the first, but when they tried to go for the double steal, Ramos was thrown out by Tony Morales, short-circuiting their inning once Alex Zacarias flew out to Manny. The Raccoons had a Berto single in the bottom 1st, but he never got off first base, while Will Korecky hurt himself on a Fernandez drive and had to be replaced by Miguel Velasquez, who hit a sac fly after Danny Zarate and Marco Nieves had gone to the corners with leadoff singles in the top 2nd. Nieves would hit a 2-run homer with Zarate aboard in the fourth, giving the Stars a sizable 3-0 lead over Raccoons that hadn’t reached base since the Berto single in the first, and when they did with a Cosmo single in the bottom 4th, Manny hit into a double play.

And they didn’t get more productive afterwards, either… Andy Olea’s solo homer in the seventh extended the lead to 4-0 on Bryce Sparkes, who fought valiantly, but in vain. The Raccoons didn’t score until the bottom 7th, with Cosmo and Maldonado landing base hits to scratch out one run, but one run was not enough. Danny Zarate countered with another solo homer in the top 8th, knocking out Sparkes for good, and while the Raccoons scratched out a run in the bottom 9th against Paul Metzler when Cosmo singled again, stole his 9th base, and was brought home by Greenway with a sac fly, that was absolutely all the team managed to cook up in six innings. 5-2 Stars. Trevino 3-4;

I blame Matt Nunley!

Game 2
DAL: CF M. Fuentes – SS J. Ramos – 2B H. Acosta – 1B A. Zacarias – LF Nieves – RF Velasquez – C Huichapa – 3B Harroun – P A. Vega
POR: 3B Myers – 2B Trevino – LF M. Fernandez – RF Greenway – SS Maldonado – CF Hooge – C Morales – 1B Stedham – P Ottinger

Ottie was torn up right away, with Manuel Fuentes and Jon Ramos opening and reaching the corners with singles. A sac fly, Ramos’ stolen base, and a Nieves single got the runner across for a 2-0 lead. While unwatchable on the mound and issuing four singles and three walks in the first two innings alone, Ottie also had the only Raccoons hit the first time through, a 2-out single in the third that led nowhere. It followed Tony Morales’ leadoff walk and Jesse Stedham’s prompt double play grounder.

Then both teams got stupid. The Stars started to swing and pop out in 3-ball counts against Ottinger in the middle innings, and the ****ing Raccoons did the same…! Maldonado was on second base with nobody out in the bottom 5th, having stolen his way there, and both Ed Hooge and Tony Morales swung at 3-0 pitches and made outs. I was screaming the first time, but my jaw got unhinged the second time and I just sat there, snout agape, for the next two innings, and no, dismal Jesse Stedham didn’t plate Maldonado, either. Ottinger battled his guts out for six and a third before being yanked after both Vega (…) and Fuentes reached base. David Fernandez got out of the inning on a pop and a fly to left, but the Raccoons were yet waiting on their third base hit. And somehow it was still a 2-0 game, but it felt a lot worse. Manny opened the bottom 7th with a double to right, and it still felt nothing like slugging toy Troy being the tying run at the plate. He lined out to Hugo Acosta, but Maldonado snapped an RBI single to left-center. Hoogey fell to 1-2 before hitting a ball to right-center. Loud ball! Long ball! GONE BALL!! A score-flipping 2-run homer by Ed Hooge! Coons back in business!!

And then Zacarias hit a leadoff jack off Prieto in the eighth and it was all gone again. Tied at three, Nieves got on base, stole second and reached third on an error. Soung gave up a 2-out liner to PH Orlando Ortiz – but Stedham snagged it. At least his glove worked… That inning ended, and Myers and Trevino occupied the corners with leadoff singles in the bottom 8th! Manny Fernandez lined out, Greenway hit into a double play, and the agony had me roar. Soung had the Stars under control in the ninth, though, and the Raccoons could walk off if they could cobble a run together with the bottom-ish part of the order against righty Orlando Leos and his 0.77 ERA. Maldonado flew out to center, but Hooge singled … and Morales hit into another double play. (bites into fist)

Ben Feist retired 4-5-6 in the top 10th to stave off defeat, while Leos remained around for the bottom of the inning. Stedham drew a leadoff walk, and after that was Elijah Williams in the #9 hole, having entered with Feist in a double switch at Hooge’s expense (with Maldonado to center). Williams was asked to bunt, knocked them foul twice, and in despair the Raccoons went for the run-and-hit, because why not... Stedham threw the anchor in time when Williams flew out to Nieves, and retreated to first base. Leos then nailed Myers, but Cosmo flew out. Manny was up with two outs and the runners would be going on noise. Noise came at 1-1 and with a single into center. Stedham had gotten a great jump and was waved around against Fuentes – and arrived well ahead of the throw, walkoff!! 4-3 Raccoons!! M. Fernandez 2-5, 2B, RBI; Maldonado 2-4, RBI; Hooge 2-4, HR, 2 RBI;

Uh. Ben Feist (4-0) leads the team in wins once again…

Ah who cares.

More wins, boys! More wins!

Game 3
DAL: CF M. Fuentes – SS J. Ramos – 2B H. Acosta – 1B A. Zacarias – C Zarate – RF O. Ortiz – 3B Harroun – LF Velasquez – P Holliday
POR: 3B A. Ramos – 2B Trevino – LF M. Fernandez – RF Greenway – CF Maldonado – C Kilmer – 1B Stedham – SS Williams – P Weeks

A win would have to come over Mark Holliday (4-1, 2.57 ERA), a tall order considering the Stars ravaged Josh Weeks for six singles and three runs in the top of the first inning. Manny Fernandez hit a solo homer in the bottom 1st, but the second inning started with a walk to Fuentes, who was thrown out at third base on Jon Ramos’ single, and somehow the defense collected more outs for a completely outta-whack Josh Weeks, who batted with Jeff Kilmer and Elijah Williams in scoring position in the bottom 2nd and perversely sunk a ball in the gap to tie the game, then gave up the go-ahead run right away on another pair of hits by Orlando Ortiz and David Harroun, then a well-placed groundout by Velasquez. He was yanked after filling the bags with one out in the fourth; Prieto gave up a sac fly to Zarate, then exited the inning with a K, leaving the Critters down 5-3 and phoning St. Petersburg for their opinion.

The Raccoons got Citriniti to pitch three shutout innings after Prieto dug the team out of the fourth-inning mess, but didn’t get any meaningful offense at all against Holliday, continuing to trail 5-3 after seven. Jermaine Campbell was then sent into action in the eighth inning and while trailing, because he just wasn’t getting any work otherwise. Bottom 8th, Cosmo’s leadoff single knocked out Holliday. Manny singled off lefty Allen Medcalf, putting the tying run on base, too, but Greenway flew out. Daniel Hernandez replaced Medcalf – he was the guy we had gotten in the Jimmy Wallace trade (besides f.e. Bryce Sparkes) and then flipped for Fernando Garcia last year. He threw one pitch, Maldonado grounded and reached on an error by Acosta, then left with some tweak. Mike Barnett took over with the bags full and one out. Jeff Kilmer was right-handed like Barnett AND a good double play candidate, so Brad Ledford batted for him and grounded back to the mound. Cosmo was out at home, and the inning ended when Stedham also grounded out in the worst way. Both Mauricio Garavito and former Raccoons closer Josh Boles allowed no runners in the ninth. 5-3 Stars. Trevino 2-4; M. Fernandez 2-4, HR, RBI;

Our lead was down to half a game at this point.

The game ended Josh Weeks’ Coons career. Up to a 7.02 ERA the Raccoons asked him to go St. Petersburg. He refused. He was thus waived and designated for assignment. Steve Fidler (1.80 ERA in AAA) was promoted.

Raccoons (22-12) vs. Crusaders (17-17) – May 14-16, 2038

We were up 2-1 in the season series against the fourth-place Crusaders, who were fifth in runs scored and runs allowed in the Continental League with a +8 run differential (Critters: +28). They were playing very good defense. We weren’t. At least they weren’t going to rob us blind on the basepaths…

Projected matchups:
Raffaello Sabre (2-2, 4.54 ERA) vs. Matt Brost (3-4, 5.79 ERA)
Steve Fidler (0-0) vs. Joe Feltman (3-2, 3.35 ERA)
Bernie Chavez (2-3, 4.26 ERA) vs. Ignacio del Rio (4-3, 3.42 ERA)

All right-handers; in fact both teams now had an entirely right-handed rotation.

One notable regular for New York on the DL was Greg Ortiz.

Game 1
NYC: CF L. Herrera – 3B Sifuentes – C D. Phillips – 2B Duenez – 1B K. Henderson – LF Hawthorne – RF Salmeron – SS Stalker – P Brost
POR: 3B Ramos – 2B Trevino – LF M. Fernandez – RF Greenway – CF Maldonado – C Morales – SS Myers – 1B Stedham – P Sabre

Ramon Sifuentes and Devin Phillips hit singles before Alberto Ramos picked Mario Duenez’ bouncer and spun a 5-4-3 double play in the first, which wasn’t something we had seen often so far. The Raccoons would score first after straight singles by their 6-7-8 batters in the bottom 2nd, which loaded the bases, then a Sabre sac fly, then nothing else. But when the Crusaders had the bases loaded with one out in the fourth, they scored two on a George Hawthorne single, then another run on Ricardo Salmeron’s groundout… At that point the Raccoons had already twice had Cosmo on second base with less than two outs and had stranded him just as often.

With two outs in the fifth, the Crusaders unfurled straight singles by Sifuentes, Phillips, and then Duenez. The latter one went to center, where Maldonado had opened the previous half-inning by popping out on a 3-0 pitch, causing me additional agony. Here he threw out Sifuentes at home plate to end the inning and at least get half his after-game food bowl restored… Greenway singled home Cosmo with two outs in the bottom 5th to make up a run, but the team was still 4-2 behind and only reached base on a Tim Stalker error in the sixth.

Sabre was gone after six, and Ben Feist was put into the seventh in the hope that his W magnet would spark a rally in the bottom 7th. Berto drew a leadoff walk off Jamal Barrow for a neat start, but then the team went groundout, flyout, strikeout. Feist walked two in the eighth and had to be bailed out by David Fernandez, which in turn meant that there was no hope for a comeback. (pops bottle of Capt’n Coma) Bottom 8th, leadoff single by Maldonado off Jorge Villegas jr., which put the tying run in the box again. Morales’ bouncer to first was botched by Kumanosuke Henderson, and Myers lobbed a 2-2 pitch over Stalker for an RBI single, bringing the tying run to second base with nobody out. Stedham, useless, flew out to left, but Rich Vickers had a pinch-hit single to load the bases in the 4-3 game, bringing back Berto, who hit a fly to center that caught, but was good enough for even Tony Morales to crawl home with the tying run. Cosmo slapped his fourth single off the day to score Myers, and the Coons took the lead! New pitcher Eddie Cannon got a pop from Manny to end the inning, and then the Raccoons sent in Campbell, who had pitched uselessly on Thursday… and allowed a leadoff single to Stalker. TIM! NO!! … Cut it out!! Omar Freeman’s grounder forced Stalker, Herrera struck out, and at 3-1 to Sifuentes Campbell … balked. I grabbed Slappy’s arm for additional comfort that Honeypaws couldn’t provide, then screamed like a girl when Sifuentes took the king of all rips on the next actual pitch – and grounded out to Cosmo. 5-4 Critters…! Trevino 4-5, 2B, RBI; Myers 3-4, RBI; Vickers (PH) 1-1;

That one was … –

(shivers)

Something new on Saturday – the Raccoons would give Steve Fidler his first start in the majors, while Rich Vickers was to start at *first* to get his bat into the lineup. He was 6’1’’, same as Stedham. He was batting .467, which was 274 points more than Stedham.

Game 2
NYC: CF L. Herrera – 3B Sifuentes – RF Salto – 2B Duenez – 1B K. Henderson – C Duryea – LF Salmeron – SS Stalker – P Feltman
POR: 3B Ramos – SS Trevino – LF M. Fernandez – RF Greenway – CF Maldonado – 1B Vickers – SS Myers – C Kilmer – P Fidler

Lorenzo Herrera opened with a double, while Sifuentes made an out. Graciano Salto’s single scored a run, and then Duenez hit a bomb to center. Henderson singled. Michael Duryea hit ANOTHER bomb to center. It was 5-0, there one out in the game, and the Raccoons were at a loss where to find any pitcher at all. Ricardo Salmeron singled and advanced to second on Maldonado’s flubbed pickup. Tim Stalker drove him in, and with two outs Herrera dropped another RBI hit. Sifuentes grounded out to Trevino, ending the first inning with seven runs on eight hits and with me hanging on another bottle.

Since the game was obviously in the bin already, Fidler would remain in to absorb more damage before being sent back to St. Petersburg. Portland scratched out a run in the bottom 3rd, Cosmo singling home Kilmer, which was obviously not going to matter. Rich Vickers hit a solo homer to right in the fourth, while Fidler had his sorry bum dragged through five innings without allowing another run, leaving down 7-2. The Raccoons had no faith; Ledford hit for Fidler in the bottom 5th, and the inning went on until Manny Fernandez popped out to strand a pair. He was then replaced with Ledford to take the chance and spare him a few innings, since he usually played every out of every game. The next marker on the scoreboard was for a solo homer Duenez hit off Citriniti, who allowed no other runners in two innings of work. 8-2 Crusaders.

That was … hard to watch. Which is why I closed my eyes early here. Slappy was so kind to cover Honeypaws’ eyes, too. That was not a game that one could reliably let little stuffed toy raccoons watch.

Rubber game, maybe with more luck for Portland this time was we tried to stave off a losing week in a battle of two of the three pitchers that were supposed to lead us to rings when they were prospects. They were going hard on 30 now and neither one of them had a ring.

Game 3
NYC: CF L. Herrera – 3B Sifuentes – C D. Phillips – RF Salto – 2B Duenez – 1B K. Henderson – LF Hawthorne – SS Stalker – P del Rio
POR: 3B Myers – 2B Vickers – CF Maldonado – RF Greenway – LF Hooge – C Morales – SS Williams – 1B Stedham – P Chavez

Bernie faced an all-righty lineup, which had my hopes up initially, but there was loud noise off him from the start and it was only a question of WHEN the Crusaders would hit six bombs off him. The Raccoons meanwhile had runners on early, but Maldonado in the first and Morales in the second hit into inning-ending double plays. Come the bottom 3rd, Williams drew a leadoff walk and Stedham legged out an infield roller for a single. Bernie bunted them over, and two runs scored, one each on a Dave Myers sac fly to center and then Vickers’ single to left. Maldonado struck out, while the bottom 4th began with walks issued to Greenway and Hooge. Morales singled to right to load the bases, and Williams’ fly to center was good for a sac fly against Lorenzo Herrera’s not too impressive arm, extending the lead to 3-0. And then Stedham found the team’s third inning-ending double play of the game, and the first 4-6-3 for variety… (gnaws on his own forearm)

Tim Stalker almost went yard, being caught at the fence in the fifth, but the Crusaders remained off the bases most of the time. They had three hits through five, and struck out six times against Bernie Chavez, who opened the bottom 5th with a single to right. Vickers and Maldonado joined him to load the bases for Greenway, who hit a grounder up the middle that Duenez got dangerously near to, but couldn’t reach; it escaped for an RBI single, Vickers being held at third base. Hooge popped out, but Morales drew a 2-out bases-loaded walk for the Coons’ fifth run on del Rio’s fifth walk. Williams flew out to right to strand all runners.

And then Bernie came apart with the usual great noise. Dan Dalton drew a leadoff walk in del Rio’s spot in the sixth and whiel Herrera struck out, Sifuentes ripped an RBI double. Phillips made another out before the Crusaders railed off three singles against Bernie, scoring two more runs before Hawthorne found Myers with a groundout. The lead was down to 5-3, and my mood was back to negative a thousand. Here was the pain of having three left-handed relievers in the bullpen – how to efficiently replace your right-handed starter against an entirely right-handed lineup, keeping in mind that the last off day was almost a week in the past? The Raccoons couldn’t, and Bernie stuck in there even after Stalker’s leadoff single in the seventh. He got the next three guys out and maintained his 5-3 lead through seven, and that was all that could be asked of him on reasons of pitch count. Maybe an insurance run would help us – Jamal Barrow gave up a double to Vickers at the start of the bottom 7th for a nice start. Maldonado grounded out to third base, which didn’t help, and Greenway was scary and put on intentionally. Thankfully nobody thought anything of Ed Hooge, still. Ed Hooge mauled Barrow with a 3-run homer to right, and that looked like a case of “ballgame”, up 8-3! More yet, Jorge Villegas jr. was ripped for three straight hits and a run before Manny batted for Chavez, scoring a run with a fielder’s choice. Myers found another single, but Vickers ended the 5-run inning with a groundout. Elijah Williams had another sac fly against Eddie Cannon in the eighth, scoring Troy Greenway, while Prieto and David Fernandez finished the game on the pitching side. 11-3 Critters! Myers 2-4, RBI; Vickers 3-5, 2B, RBI; Greenway 2-3, 2 BB, RBI; Hooge 1-2, 3 BB, HR, 3 RBI; Morales 3-4, BB, RBI; Williams 1-2, BB, 2B, 2 RBI;

In other news

May 11 – Elbow ligament damage renders LAP SP Julio Palomo (2-3, 4.08 ERA) out for the season.
May 12 – SFB SP Ryan Kinner (3-1, 1.18 ERA) is out for the year with a bad case of shoulder inflammation.
May 13 – MIL SP Sal Chavez (3-2, 3.71 ERA) 1-hits the Cyclones while walking three and striking out six. Milwaukee wins 1-0. The Cyclones’ only hit is a single by SP Trevor Corrigan (3-1, 2.76 ERA) while the Loggers’ run comes on a home run by … Sal Chavez (.333, 1 HR, 3 RBI).
May 13 – Another player is out for the year, with DEN SP Mike Hodge (1-4, 7.61 ERA) having his struggles to throw the ball well traced back to elbow ligament damage; he will miss a full year.
May 14 – Loggers INF Ted Del Vecchio (.350, 3 HR, 31 RBI) lands four base hits, including two homers, and drives in seven runs in the Loggers’ 17-0 crushing of the Indians.
May 14 – WAS OF Ken Gibbs (.275, 1 HR, 10 RBI) will miss a month with a biceps strain.

FL Player of the Week: PIT 1B Danny Santillano (.360, 7 HR, 29 RBI) hitting .455 (10-22) with 3 HR, 9 RBI
CL Player of the Week: MIL C Felipe Gomez (.354, 3 HR, 28 RBI), batting .444 (8-18) with 2 HR, 12 RBI

Complaints and stuff

Several teams have claimed Josh Weeks and his 7.02 ERA and he was awarded to the Pacifics in the end. Bless them. We’re off the hook for his contract. We still need some warm body to get outs and Fidler isn’t it. Gene Tennis had a sore elbow and was not currently available for lackluster fill-in duty. Thing is, we’ll need the fifth starter twice more before we arrive at an off day.

The only other realistic candidate by ERA with the Alley Cats is Jon Hass, signed as extended depth for $300k this winter. He was 28 and had never wound up in the majors. He had not even been on the roster, unused, for a last-place team in September. Hass was 1-1 with a 1.58 ERA in six starts, but that masked some ugly numbers, including a .253 BABIP and 6.5 BB/9. Inviting him also extended an invitation to more shellackings.

The path forward was probably a trade. Unfortunately it was only the middle of May and few teams were really out of it, and the teams that were like the 11-26 Gold Sox had no pitchers to crave. The 12-25 Buffos had David Elliott (3-6, 3.48 ERA), but Elliott not only had a $4.44M contract for this year, but also *next*. We wanted no part of that.

Besides, given our defensive “setup” (bold name for it), we really need a strikeout guy. Strikeout guys ain’t be coming cheap, and we didn’t have many prospects left.

The Loggers lost 94 games last year, and 87+ for six straight seasons. What are they doing in third place, 22-14? Their run differential was +15, a bit on the shy side, but they seemed to be playing a successful brand of small ball, having taken the lead in stolen bases in the CL this week and being second in OBP and third in runs scored. Few homers, though. The Raccoons had dropped to second in runs scored this week (behind the damn Elks), and would take a close look at the Loggers next week, opening with four games in Milwaukee. They have about as many .300 hitters as we do.

Fun Fact: No, offense in general is not up significantly in the CL.

The current league batting average is .258, which is the highest it’s been since 2020, but that only means that it has been .256 or .257 a lot. ERA was at 3.94, totally about the long-term average.

Offense was actually *down* in the Federal League, with the 3.84 ERA over there presently representing the lowest mark since the little ice age for offense in the late 80s.

+++

The draft pool is out, but since the Raccoons won’t pick in the top 50 I will spare myself the three hours of going through it guy by guy. That also means no draft pool analysis this season.