[Westheim]

Raccoons (53-66) vs. Miners (58-60) – August 18-20, 2070

The Miners were also done with the season as they sat 11 games out in the FL East. This was the final interleague matchup for the Raccoons this year, meeting with the #5 offense and #4 pitching in the Federal League, but somehow that +41 run differential had not translated into a surfeit of wins. They were in the upper half of all major stats in the FL, except for OBP, where they somehow ranked tenth. The Raccoons had won *12* series against the Miners in a row, including a two-outta-three in each of the last three seasons.

Projected matchups:
Jimmy Wharton (7-8, 4.29 ERA) vs. Aldomiro Campion (12-8, 3.97 ERA)
Nick Walla (7-10, 4.40 ERA) vs. Tom Delaney (8-9, 5.32 ERA)
Tony Gaytan (8-11, 3.70 ERA) vs. Steven Fenstermacher (9-11, 3.96 ERA)

They only had right-handed starters in the rotation.

The week then started with a rainout on Monday and a Tuesday double-header. Moist weather and gloomy clouds hung around on Tuesday still, and it was doubtful whether we’d get two games in.

Game 1
PIT: LF N. Chapman – C Beckner – 2B Selep – CF Schneider – 3B Frasher – SS Maudlin – RF X. Contreras – 1B Engard – P Campion
POR: 2B Yocum – LF Otal – SS Katzman – CF T. Wharton – RF Corral – 3B Gallo – C Flowe – 1B Huckaby – P J. Wharton

Little occurred on the bases in the first two innings, but a leadoff walk to Jeremy Engard soon led to the first run of the game in the third inning, as the Brazilian pitcher Campion bunted him to second, he got third on a wild pitch by Jimmyboy, and then scored on Norm Chapman’s sac fly. The Raccoons answered, though, and quick, as Flowe and Huckaby hit soft singles to begin the bottom 3rd, were bunted over by Jimmyboy, and then Yocum singled them both in with a ball dropping into shallow right-center, before getting doubled up by Otal’s grounder to Matthew Selep. Wharton issued another leadoff walk in the fourth, and the Coons stranded Big Wharton and Gallo on base in the same inning.

Jimmyboy overall did really good, and held the Miners to two hits and the one run through seven innings, albeit at the cost of 112 pitches, at which point he was clearly done with the game. The Raccoons had only three hits off Campion at the stretch, but Corral and Gallo hit singles to begin the bottom 7th and Corral aggressively went to third base, Xavier Contreras’ throw was not on, and Gallo jiggered up to second behind him (while also getting over the fiendish .200 mark!), with nobody out. Campion then gave Flowe’s uniform a gentle waft with a breaking ball that sent Flowe to first, dooming the Coons with three on and nobody out. Huckaby grounded sharply to first for a force out at the plate (…) and when Mireles pinch-hit for Lil’ Wharton, he smashed into a 6-4-3 double play. (loud facepaw!)

Nava pitched a scoreless eighth despite somehow giving up a single to Campion, and instead the Coons tacked on in the bottom 8th. Yocum hit a leadoff single, but was forced out by Otal’s grounder. Otal was on the move though when Katz doubled to left-center and scored quite easily from first. Campion walked Wharton intentionally, then got meek outs from the 5-6 batters, and then the ball went to Valentin, against whom the Miners didn’t get the ball out of the infield. 3-1 Raccoons. Yocum 2-4, 2 RBI; Gallo 2-4; Flowe 1-2; J. Wharton 7.0 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 8 K, W (8-8);

Really good start by Jimmyboy! Minor effectiveness issues here, but if we’d get that regularly, we wouldn’t be in the swamp like this…

Game 2
PIT: LF N. Chapman – 3B Frasher – CF Schneider – 2B Selep – C J. Gutierrez – SS Maudlin – RF Holcomb – 1B H. Gomez – P Delaney
POR: 2B Yocum – LF Otal – RF Corral – CF T. Wharton – SS Mireles – 3B Murcia – C Brown – 1B Huckaby – P Walla

While Walla, coming off a terrible start, retired the Miners in order the first time through and whiffed three, the Raccoons did get four runners – half on singles and half on walks – in the first three innings, but Rafael Murcia got himself picked off first, and the remaining three were stranded. Chapman drew a walk to begin the fourth inning, stole second, and then was caught when greed overcame him and he wanted to steal third base as well, and Walla continued to face the minimum through four, but then leaked another leadoff walk to Matthew Selep in the fifth. This time Jeff Maudlin added a 1-out double, but Nate Holcomb flew out to Wharton in shallow center, and Wharton threw out Selep at home as he tried to score, ending the inning. All counts in the inning were long, and Walla was now already approaching 70 pitches.

Like Jimmyboy, Walla would pitch seven innings of 2-hit ball, but didn’t allow a run; however, he was also well over 100 pitches at that point and would be removed from the game. Unlike Wharton he got no run support and thus had to settle for a no-decision. Sullivan got the ball in the eighth, walked left-handed pinch-hitters Dan Burns and Alex Romero, struck out right-handed pinch-hitter Xavier Contreras, and then, with two outs, yielded for McMahan against the left-handed Chapman, but the Miners sent another pinch-hitter, Mitch Beckner – who struck out to leave the runners stranded. The Coons faced right-hander Jorge Sanchez in the bottom 8th. Otal grounded out, but Corral singled. Wharton’s grounder to Maudlin was mishandled for an error, Mireles’ soft single loaded the bases, and Murcia’s fly to right as caught by Romero, but deep enough to get Corral home on the sac fly. Sam Brown then clipped another soft single, but Wharton had stayed at second on the previous play and now only got to third. Gallo batted for Huckaby and walked in a full count – but only after a passed ball on Beckner had brought in Wharton’s run. Flowe pinch-hit, but flew out to Anthony Schneider. With Valentin already used, the Coons then gave the 2-0 lead to old man Victor Ramirez, who got three outs in order. 2-0 Blighters. Yocum 2-3; Mireles 2-4; Murcia 3-3, RBI; Walla 7.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 7 K;

No W for NDalla, but the Raccoons somehow bagged their 13th straight series win against the poor Miners.

Baseball’s this fun little game that refuses to make any amount of sense.

Game 3
PIT: LF N. Chapman – 3B Frasher – CF Schneider – 2B Selep – C J. Gutierrez – SS Maudlin – RF A. Romero – 1B H. Gomez – P Fenstermacher
POR: 2B Yocum – LF Otal – SS Katzman – CF T. Wharton – 3B Gallo – C Flowe – RF van Otterdijk – 1B Colter – P Gaytan

The Wi(n)dowmaker allowed only two singles to the Coons in the first four innings, while Tony Gaytan allowed a single in each of the first two innings, in which nothing overly bad happened, but then got triple-bombed in the fourth and fifth and left the game down 6-0. Jonathan Gutierrez hit a 2-run homer in the fourth, and in the fifth Eric Frasher and Anthony Schneider went back-to-back with two outs, Frasher finding Romero and Hector Gomez on base for the additional runs. Holzmeister then pitched two innings and walked three, but somehow didn’t allow a run. The Raccoons scored a token run in the bottom 6th when Huckaby, who had entered with Holzmeister in a double switch at van Otterdijk’s expense (Colter went to right), hit a double, Otal singled, and Katz hit a sac fly to left, but that was that for the inning, as Wharton ended it with a grounder to short. Edgar Gutierrez pitched another two scoreless innings at the end, but Gaytan turned out to have done well enough damage to lose this game. The Wi(n)dowmaker went eight, and Chad Brown cleaned up the 2-3-4 batters on seven pitches in the ninth. 6-1 Miners. Flowe 3-3; Huckaby 1-2, 2B; Holzmeister 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 1 K; Gutierrez 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

Thursday was an off day and the Raccoons recycled personnel. Jason Holzmeister (0-2, 2.34 ERA) and Danny Huckaby (.204, 0 HR, 4 RBI) were sent back to St. Pete, from where Gabriel Rios returned from his rehab assignment after two dominating starts against kiddos, and we brought up a third catcher slash first baseman in Tony Spink. I know, no reason to be excited here. AAA infielder Jacob Davis was put on waivers to make room on the 40-man roster for Spink.

For pitching arrangements, Val Centeno remained on the roster, but would be a long man until rosters would expand, and then we’d add him back to a 6-man rotation.

Raccoons (55-67) @ Indians (55-66) – August 22-24, 2070

Indy was up 7-5 in the season series, sat seventh in runs scored, and eighth in runs allowed, with a -21 run differential (Coons: -36). They were weak on power (except against the Coons), and stole bases rather rabidly, with 116 thefts, second-most in the CL. They had the best rotation by ERA, and the worst bullpen by ERA. Been there, seen that, ain’t fun.

Projected matchups:
Vinny Morales (6-8, 3.50 ERA) vs. Pablo Apodaca (4-6, 4.46 ERA)
Gabriel Rios (6-0, 2.00 ERA) vs. Girolamo Pizzichini (6-9, 4.21 ERA)
Jimmy Wharton (8-8, 4.14 ERA) vs. Victor Perez (11-8, 2.81 ERA)

Apodaca would be our only left-handed opposing starter this week, as Mike DeWitt (10-8, 2.80 ERA) had pitched on Thursday.

Game 1
POR: 2B Yocum – LF van Otterdijk – SS Katzman – CF T. Wharton – RF Corral – 3B Murcia – C Flowe – 1B Spink – P V. Morales
IND: CF Hilario – LF W. Griffith – 1B M. Rogers – C A. Gomez – RF T. Torres – 3B Ma. Martin – SS Valadez – 2B G. Lujan – P Apodaca

Almost immediately, Vinny Morales was in a 2-0 hole on a wallbanger double by Wade Griffith and Matt Rogers’ homer to right. He put two more runners on base as he walked Matt Martin and nicked Guillermo Lujan in the second, and in the third was taken deep again by Rogers – his 25th homer of the year – and then walked Alex Gomez and gave up another single to Tony Torres before the inning somehow ended on two pops by Martin and Fernando Valadez.

The Raccoons had only two hits in the first three innings, then scattered singles by Katz (who was forced out by Wharton) and Murcia in the fourth without scoring as Flowe grounded out. Tony Spink then came and bopped a homer to left to begin the fifth, so what the **** do I know about baseball? Yocum singled and was caught stealing in the same inning, being denied his 30th bag of the year.

Morales did pitch scoreless middle innings and got two outs into the seventh before losing Alex Gomez in a full count and being replaced with Ramirez, who got a groundout from Torres to end the inning. Yocum dropped a leadoff single in the eighth, putting the tying run in the box, and van Otterdijk smacked into a 5-4-3 double play, putting the tying run in the on-deck circle. Katz whiffed, putting the tying run in the ******* dugout. But in the ninth, the tying run was actually on base after Wharton and Murcia hit singles off the left-hander Ryan Croft. Mireles was the only righty bat on the bench, batted for Flowe, and found Valadez for a fielder’s choice, keeping the tying run on first base. Somehow we ended up sending Spink (a career .186 hitter) up as the final out and felt not even terrible about it, since the alternatives were even more depressing. He grounded out to Lujan. 3-1 Indians. Yocum 3-4; Murcia 3-4;

Tyler Wharton was batting 1-for-29 at this point and got another day off – technically his third day off this week. Just, go a bit to the cage, maybe look at your swing, and just don’t do any damage by flailing, okay?

Game 2
POR: 2B Yocum – CF Otal – RF Corral – SS Katzman – 3B Gallo – 1B Murcia – LF van Otterdijk – C Brown – P Rios
IND: CF Hilario – LF W. Griffith – 1B M. Rogers – C A. Gomez – RF T. Torres – 3B Ma. Martin – SS Valadez – 2B R. Cabrera – P Pizzichini

The Raccoons managed an Otal walk and an immediate double play grounder from Corral the first time through, while the Indians at least got a run on the board on a 1-out triple to right-center by Valadez, who scored on Rich Cabrera’s sac fly. Yocum landed a leadoff single in the fourth inning and stole his 30th base off Pizza, while Otal whiffed, Corral grounded out, and Katz finally got the damn run home with a single to center. Gallo lobbed an RBI double into the rightfield corner, then scored on Murcia’s clean RBI single to left. The Otter grounded out, ending a 3-run inning.

The lead didn’t last, because Valadez and Cabrera hit singles to begin the bottom 5th and Brown threw the ball away on the double steal, bringing in one unearned run immediately, and the other on Jose Hilario’s sac fly after Rios rung up Pizza, getting the teams even at three. Top 6th, and the Coons got Corral and Gallo on base, leading to Tim Tennant replacing Pizza – and giving up a 3-run homer to Rafael Murcia immediately! This was Murcia’s first homer in the brown shirt and the sixth on the season.

The Coons immediately started to blow the walls off the new 6-3 lad again as Rios walked Gomez with one out, then allowed a single to Torres that was misfielded by Corral for extra bases. Brown then glitched in a run on a passed ball, and another scored on Matt Martin’s double. Valadez grounded out, Rios was yanked with the tying run on third base, as Nava came in and got a groundout to third from Cabrera, ending the inning. Jamel Robinson and Hilario then hit singles off Nava to begin the seventh, but he got three more outs while I was cleaning the blunderbuss, and maintained the 6-5 lead. Instead, McMahan blew the lead in the eighth, giving up four singles to the five batters he faced, and left with runners on the corners. Hilario and Griffith both flew out to Corral to end the stupid inning against Todd Sullivan. Mireles and Wharton made pinch-hit outs against Croft to begin the ninth. Yocum singled, but Otal flew out. 7-6 Indians. Yocum 3-5; Gallo 2-4, 2B, RBI; Murcia 2-4, HR, 4 RBI;

Blech.

Game 3
POR: 2B Yocum – LF Otal – 3B Katzman – CF T. Wharton – RF Corral – 1B Murcia – SS Mireles – C Flowe – P J. Wharton
IND: CF Hilario – LF W. Griffith – 1B M. Rogers – C A. Gomez – RF T. Torres – 3B Ma. Martin – SS Valadez – 2B Leggett – P V. Perez

The first ten pitches in the bottom 1st yielded a 2-base throwing error by Jimmyboy, a hit batter, and then a wild pitch, which allowed Matt Rogers and Alex Gomez to hit a pair of RBI groundouts for unearned runs on basically nothing of the Indians’ own making before Torres popped out to Katz in foul ground. Martin walked to begin the bottom 2nd, but was caught stealing, and Wally Leggett doubled with two outs and then scored on Perez’ single, as I was despairing of Jimmy Wharton’s see-saw start-to-start rollercoaster rides.

The Coons then also reached with their first two runners on nothing but ******** in the top 3rd as Perez nicked Flowe and Jimmyboy reached on an error. With a runner in scoring position, Yocum obviously grounded out, but Otal hit an RBI single and Katz got a sac fly to Hilario for a 3-2 score before Big Wharton bigly whiffed. The big salary draw was back at the plate with two outs and Otal and Katz on the corners in the fifth inning – but tied the game with a single up the middle! Progress! And Corral then floated one out for Torres to bag with one hand.

Jimmyboy pitched mostly clean until Torres singled and Martin walked with two outs in the bottom 6th, but then rung up Valadez, his seventh strikeout in the game, in which he had crossed the 100 K mark for the season already. Yocum singled with one gone in the seventh, but was thrown out at third by Torres on Otal’s single to right and the inning amounted to nothing. Wharton retired Leggett, Lujan, and Hilario in order in the seventh, with another K on the middle batsman, and then was done for the day. He got no support in the eighth and thus no decision, while Edgar Gutierrez put Griffith and Rogers on base to start the bottom 8th before Gomez flew into an 8-2 double play. McMahan then came in for Torres, but faced right-hander Jamel Robinson instead, who lifted one out for Corral to take, thus stranding the go-ahead run on third base; the winning run would get on base in the bottom 9th when Malcolm Spicer singled off Sullivan, but he was also left on base, and we had another extra-inning game on our paws.

The Coons went in order against starter Miguel Lopez in the ninth and tenth, while Sullivan was back for the bottom of the 10th, allowed a hit to Hilario, an infield single to Rogers, and then fumbled Robinson’s comebacker for a 2-out error to load the bases for Matt Martin, who grounded out to Mireles. The 11th was uneventful, with Victor Ramirez keeping the game going, but the Coons just couldn’t get on base, and we ended up sending in Val Centeno in the 12th inning. He struck out Hilario and Cabrera in a 1-2-3 first frame out there. The Coons then unexpectedly broke through in the 13th against lefty Felix Morales, who got two outs before Wharton singled off him, and then gave up a gapper to Corral for a double. Wharton rushed around from first base to score and break the tie that had persisted since the fifth inning. Spink batted for an 0-for-5 Murcia, but struck out, and the Raccoons stuck to Centeno for some odd reason. Alex Gomez and Jamel Robinson hit towering fly balls to left that Otal picked on the edge of the warning track, but Rogers struck out to end the game. 4-3 Critters. Otal 3-6, RBI; T. Wharton 2-5, BB, RBI; Corral 2-6, 2B, RBI; J. Wharton 7.0 IP, 4 H, 3 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 8 K; Sullivan 2.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K; Centeno 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K, W (2-3);

The Corral double was our only extra-base hit in the game, and nobody below Corral in the order found a hit OR walk all game long.

In other news

August 19 – MIL RF/LF Carlos Dominguez (.383, 16 HR, 91 RBI) rakes for two singles and two RBI in a 6-5 loss to the Capitals, but extends his hitting streak to 20 games.
August 19 – The Bayhawks walk off against the Wolves, 4-3 in ten innings, on a wild pitch by SAL CL Tony Castellanos (6-8, 4.04 ERA, 11 SV).
August 20 – The hitting streak of Carlos Dominguez (.380, 16 HR, 91 RBI) lasts no more than 20 games, as the Loggers slugger goes 0-for-4 in a 12-2 loss to the Capitals.
August 22 – SFW SP Alex Diez (13-3, 2.17 ERA) 1-hits the Wolves in a 5-0 shutout, striking out nine batters. SAL UT Tyrese Armstrong (.293, 8 HR, 57 RBI) hits a single in the second inning for the only Salem hit in the game.
August 22 – The Crusaders beat the Canadiens, 2-1. All runs score in the first inning, and neither team manags more than three base hits.
August 23 – Rebels SS/2B Casey Ramsey (.257, 5 HR, 26 RBI) gets his 2,000th career hit in an 8-2 win against the Blue Sox.
August 23 – The 28-game hitting streak of Vancouver’s Roberto Barraza (.333, 0 HR, 54 RBI) ends with an 0-for-5 in a 7-5 win against the Crusaders.
August 24 – CHA 1B Andy Metz (.286, 18 HR, 68 RBI) whacks two homers and drives in half the runs in his team’s 12-4 win over the Thunder.

Player of the Week (FL): NAS RF Austin Gordon (.301, 18 HR, 62 RBI), batting .409 (9-22) with 3 HR, 10 RBI
Player of the Week (CL): OCT INF/LF Carlos Gutierrez (.326, 9 HR, 69 RBI), hitting .545 (12-22) with 6 RBI

Complaints and stuff

Val Centeno remained in the game in the 13th on Sunday because the lead was only one run and if Valentin had blown it we would not have had another long option (or many options at all). Also, we won’t be using Centeno for consecutive games anyway (although Monday was off), so I was happily letting him have multiple innings at a time. In the end it all worked out, and when does that ever happen in Coon City? Okay, it worked out far from Coon City. Maybe that’s our problem. Something in that Willamette water.

Tyler Wharton is 3-for-35 in his last 10 games, at which point you can stop having hopes or dreams. But Humphries should return by the roster expansion at the latest, so we’ll at least get to see the top of the order we actually built for the last month.

Unless Katz breaks a leg now or something.

Monday off, as mentioned, and then three games in Loggerland. We have the Falcons at home to finish the month, which will be the start of a 10-game homestand also featuring the Thunder and Titans.

Fun Fact: Casey Ramsey has batted for the league average in all but one of his 13 ABL seasons.

He debuted in 2058 with the Condors and has since played for the Knights, Rebs, Loggers, and now the Rebs again. A consistent performer who put up at least 4 WAR in each of his first eight seasons (but not since due to defensive impediments for the most part), the sole below-average season for him so far was in 2067 with the Knights, when he only hit for a 99 OPS+. This year he was at exactly 100.

Overall he’s gone .296/.331/.435 with 112 homers and 872 RBI, and has also stolen 185 bases. He was an All Star twice and won a Platinum Stick in ’64 with Tijuana, but has never led the league in any category.