Another week, another Power Ranking…
Las Vegas Outlaws (119.1)
Los Angeles Leopards (118.2)
Seattle Metros (104.7)
Toronto Maple Leafs (102.3)
Pittsburgh Pipers (100.9)
San Jose Seals (66-57, .544, 3rd NL West) @ Los Angeles Leopards (76-47, .618, 2nd NL West)
Currently struggling through their toughest month of the season, the San Jose Seals look like a shell of their former selves so far in August where they’ve amassed an embarrassing 5-13 record to drop themselves a full 12 games off our division leaders’ pace. The problem, it seems, is that their once strong offense has suddenly gone cold, dropping from their lofty perch of 5th best in the NL down to 7th in less than a month… and, while their pitching staff has continued to turn in strong performances, it hasn’t been enough to lead them out of the darkness just yet. We’ll look to take advantage of that over these next 4-games, and, as winners of three in a row after sweeping Phoenix our last time out, are hoping that our current form is good enough to improve the 7-6 head-to-head record we have against the Seals so far.
124 of 162: Emerson Barros (2-4, 4.63) @ Peter Garcia (9-3, 3.78)
Win, 8-2. Our early, 6-2 lead, was extended by 2 more in the bottom of the 7th when
Andy Shepard brought
Otto around on a 2-run
TRUCK, completely deflating the opposition and all but entering this win into the permanent record.
Garcia got us started off on the good foot over 6.1 innings of work where he’d allow only 2 runners to plate while fanning 4, and
Igarashi closed the show admirably over the final 2.2 innings, needing a scant 34 pitches to do so. Offensively, we went off – 4 doubles, a triple, and two homeruns as a club, 3 total RBI for
Shep, 2 more for
Dom, and a swiped bag for
Otto, his 22nd, would round things out nicely for us as we managed to take the first of four in spectacular fashion.
Elsewhere: SP Toni Cartwright, a 26-year-old lefty putting in work with your
CITY OF COMPTON Raiders, spun a complete game shutout against the Abilene Roughnecks, fanning 7 and surrendering 5 hits. Compton would hang on to win it with very little run support by a score of 3-0.
Cartwright is pretty much ready, we just don’t have room for him in Los Angeles this year… but with several from our staff working on the last year of their deal, I expect to see him on the big club in 2079.
125 of 162: Brody John (9-9, 3.52) @ Merl Crawford (11-5, 2.66)
Win, 4-3. Our offense sputtered along a bit, scoring single runs in the 1st, 3rd, 4th, and 7th when
Hetereki Ailani broke the 3-3 tie with a run-scoring ground out… yeah, not the most exciting way to manufacture a run, but hey… the result is the most important thing, and we’ll make our living as a
function over fashion outfit if that’s what is required. Another good effort from the staff –
Merl went 8 strong, allowed 3 runners to plate on 6 hits and fanned 8, and
Turnbull, back on that good stuff lately, recorded his 42nd save of the year during a laborious, 19-pitch top of the 9th.
126 of 162: Julen Morales (6-8, 3.10) @ Trev Anderson (4-4, 3.89)
Score, 6-5. A 4-run, bottom of the 7th knotted it up for us at 5 runs each, and a lights out performance by the pen from the 8th on would help keep it that way until our offense could be bothered to put this one to bed during the bottom of the 9th as
Andy Shepard produced a run-scoring walk…
a walk off walk ladies and gents! And, with the way we’ve been putting it down lately, I can’t think of nothing that screams LEOPARDS BASEBALL with more vigor than a walk off walk.
Mullens went 3-for-5 with a 2-run
TANK and 3 total RBI to lead the offense,
Nakagawa and
Armendariz tried to give this one away, allowing 3 and 2 runners to plate each, respectively, after
Trev left early with a boo boo, and
Rishon Shaw secured the win, his 7th, over the last 2-innings of the contest. All in a day’s work, folks…
A nice comeback, walk off win to run our consecutive game winning streak up to 6!
127 of 162: Knox Hussman (6-13, 4.16) @ Dwight Beasley (5-1, 1.98)
Win, 5-0. An early, 398ft 2-run
TRUCK from
OH HONG during the bottom of the 1st was bested by a 430ft 2-RUN BLAST from
DOM a few batters later during that same frame to set the tone from the jump… and, once set, both clubs would go quiet until the bottom of the 7th when
OH HONG sent a solo shot over the fence just to make sure our home town crowd was still awake.
Beasley came correct – 7 innings, 2 hits, nothing earned with 6 Ks – and now has two solid performances under his belt after giving up 4 JACKS three appearances ago, and
Nakagawa was nearly flawless in relief, preserving the shutout and fanning 2 over the final two frames of the game.
7 straight for the La La’s… LET'S GO!
Record: 80-47, .629, 2nd NL West
Up Next: We’ll welcome the
Big Bad Wolf to Los Angeles for an incredibly important 3-game set against Las Vegas that could decide our division even though we’ll have 32-games left to play afterwards…