THE HOT CORNER
Baseball coverage from the inside — Sacramento Prayers and the FBL
By Claude Playball | Baseball Insider & Analyst | Host, "Hot Corner" Podcast
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May 18 – May 31, 1998 | Twenty-Eight and Twenty-Three | Is everything back to normal?
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ANDRETTI LEADS THE ENTIRE FBL IN ERA, STRICKLER DOMINANT AGAIN, BENSON STILL BLOWING SAVES
On May 17th, Sacramento was seventeen and twenty — the worst start in franchise history — trailing San Jose by five and a half games, sitting outside the wildcard and looking like a team that had fundamentally lost the thread. Whatever the problem was, it had to be structural, because you don't go seventeen and twenty with the best pitching staff in baseball without serious problem. But it looks today that whatever was not quite right with the team is not behind their backs — on May 31st, Sacramento is twenty-eight and twenty-three, leading the AL West by one game over San Jose.
Nothing changed in the roster. No significant transaction altered the composition of the team. What changed is that the offense began scoring, the close games began producing wins instead of losses, and the two pitchers who had been the rotation's structural weaknesses — Strickler and Andretti — turned in some of the best stretches of their respective 1998 seasons. When that happened alongside the pitching that was already there, the results arrived quickly.
The franchise-worst start is now behind them. What comes next is the legitimate championship conversation.
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DID YOU CATCH THOSE GAMES? — WHAT THE SCORECARDS SAY
@ Los Angeles, May 18-19 (2-0)
Rubalcava opened the stretch with seven and a third shutout innings at Dodger Stadium, keeping Los Angeles hitless through the seventh inning. Benson blew the save in the ninth — Bartow tied it with a solo homer — and then Musco delivered a two-out, two-run double in the tenth to win it. Three to two. The win streak began with Benson almost ending it, which tells you something about how the month of May ultimately resolved.
May 19th: Chavarria hit two home runs, Florez hit one, the offense scored eight, and Lawson and Gonzalez held the final three and a third innings cleanly. Eight to four.
vs. St. Louis, May 20-21 (2-0)
Andretti was magnificent on May 20th — seven and a third innings, three hits, zero runs, Gonzalez holding the final inning. The lineup produced four runs with doubles from Cruz, Lozano, Choi, and Berrios, all of them in big at-bats. Four to nothing.
May 21st: Strickler threw eight innings, allowed three hits, struck out ten, and allowed nothing. Lopez hit two home runs. Musco also hit one. The win streak is five. Six to nothing, Prayers. When Strickler pitches like this he looks exactly like the pitcher who won the Cy Young unanimously nine months ago. The question that has defined his 1998 season is which version shows up on a given Tuesday, and on May 21st, the answer was unambiguous.
@ Detroit, May 22-24 (3-0)
May 22nd: Espenoza went six innings and allowed one run while the Detroit bullpen handed Sacramento a two-run Perez homer in the eighth. Three to two. Esparza held the seventh and eighth innings without allowing anything. Benson survived the ninth. Rain delay, squeaky finish, fifth straight win.
May 23rd at Detroit was the strangest and most exhilarating game of the 1998 season. Sacramento scored fifteen runs across ten innings while the bullpen managed to also allow fourteen. Rubalcava allowed six runs in four and a third innings. Chavarria went six for seven — a home run, a double, four singles, four RBI — and his performance ties the Sacramento regular season game record for hits and the AL extra-inning game record as well. Musco, after entering the game as a pinch runner, scored four times, which ties the Sacramento extra-inning game record for runs. Chavarria drove in the winning run in the tenth inning with a single off Ankers. Rodriguez was struck by a pitch during the game and was injured. Fifteen to fourteen. A win is a win.
May 24th: Florez went four for five with two doubles and three RBI, the kind of offensive performance from the catching position that doesn't usually happen on a team with this much pitching depth at the top. Sato went seven innings against the Detroit lineup and allowed three runs. Eight to three. Seven straight wins. Sacramento enters the road trip to Baltimore at twenty-four and twenty.
@ Baltimore, May 26-27 (1-2)
Doubleheader against Baltimore on May 26th ended in two losses. With them the win streak ended and the way it ended is documented here honestly.
In the first game, Andretti left after four innings with a one-run lead that the bullpen could not protect. Musselman allowed two home runs in the eighth — Martinez and Gonzalez back to back — to give Baltimore the lead they held. Six to three.
In the second game, Strickler pitched six and two-thirds innings without allowing a run and struck out seven. He left with a two-to-nothing lead and Sacramento eventually took it to the ninth inning up two to zero. Benson entered. Gonzalez hit a three-run walk-off home run on the second pitch. Four to two. This was Benson's fifth blown save of the season. His ERA over the past fifteen appearances is 9.77. Strickler threw brilliantly but Sacramento lost. This exact sequence has now occurred multiple times.
On May 27th the Sacramento Prayers defeated the Baltimore Satans 5-3, Mario Espenoza had a standout performance and deservingly recorded a win. Decisive hit came from Edwin Musco, when the veteran designated hitter smacked a 2-run home run in the top of the eighth inning to give his team the lead, 4-3. It was his only hit, but it was clutch.
vs. Seattle, May 28-31 (3-1)
After returning from Baltimore, Sacramento took three of four from Seattle at Cathedral Stadium.
May 28th: Rubalcava threw seven and two-thirds innings and Sacramento hit five home runs — Lozano, Shinohara, Lopez, and Rodriguez twice — with thirteen runs total against a Lucifer staff that had nothing on any of them. Thirteen to four.
May 29th: Sato allowed six runs in four and two-thirds innings, including Ritter's two solo homers and Holst's three-run shot in the fifth. Seven to three. The loss is noted and filed.
May 30th: Andretti went six innings and allowed one run. Esparza held two clean innings behind him. Cruz hit a home run. Florez drove in a run in the fourth. Five to one. Back to winning.
May 31st: Strickler threw eight innings of one-hit ball and struck out nine. Musco went three for five with a three-run homer. Six to nothing, Sacramento. Strickler's ERA in his last three starts: 0.00. He gave up three hits across those twenty-four innings.
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WHAT THE MONTH TELLS US
Andretti is leading the entire FBL in ERA
He is 37 years old, in the final year of his contract, and he leads every starting pitcher in the league at 2.03 ERA. A significant share of team's success can be attributed to Andretti taking the baseball every fifth day and submitting a quality start. His final contract year is shaping up as the kind of season that generates a front-page story for the December hot stove.
Strickler is back
After a 5.26 ERA through early May and an injury that briefly raised serious questions about his availability, he has thrown twenty-four innings without allowing an earned run across his last three starts. The ten-strikeout performance against St. Louis on May 21st was followed by a seven-strikeout performance against Baltimore on May 26th and a nine-strikeout performance against Seattle on May 31st. He is pitching with the conviction of a man who remembers exactly what he's capable of.
The Benson question requires a direct answer
He has accumulated seven saves. He has also blown five of them. His ERA over his last fifteen appearances is 9.77. He has now allowed walk-off home runs to end a win streak and cost the team a Strickler gem in the same week. The correct deployment of a pitcher with a 9.77 ERA is not in the highest-leverage situations of close games. There is no version of this roster construction in which that is the right answer.
With Medina due to return from his knee hyperextension, the front office has the option of restructuring the late-inning usage. The evidence of the last fifteen appearances is that Benson should not be the first man Jimmy Aces calls in a one-run game in the ninth. Whether that change happens formally or informally is the most important roster question of June.
The offense has found its footing
The team batting average is still thirteenth in the AL at .252, and the OBP at .324 is still eleventh. But they're second in the AL in home runs with sixty-nine and first in stolen bases. The middle of the lineup — Choi at fourteen home runs and thirty-five RBI, Lozano at ten and thirty-three, Perez at seven and thirty — is producing at the rate this roster requires, and Lopez is finally hitting after a brutal April. Nine home runs and a .233 average represents a genuine correction from the .088 of mid-April. Musco has been the unexpected contributor of May: .400 with four home runs in eleven games while healthy.
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THE INBOX
From Daria Petrenko of Sacramento's Midtown neighborhood, a software engineer, who asks: "Strickler went from a disaster to lights-out in two weeks. What explains that?"
There isn't a clean answer. What I observe is that his struggles earlier in May shared a pattern — early multi-run innings, frequently from a ball left over the plate in a hitter's count, often following walks. In his recent three starts, his walk rate dropped sharply: two walks in twenty-four innings. That's the number that correlates most directly with the results. Whether the injury he sustained on May 9th required a mechanical adjustment that took time to stabilize, or whether this was simply the correction that was always coming for a pitcher of his caliber, I can't say definitively. The outcomes are what they are.
From Soren Lindqvist of Sacramento's Natomas neighborhood, a high school baseball coach, who asks: "When Medina comes back, should he close or is Benson too established in the role?"
Medina should close. Benson's ERA in his last fifteen appearances is 9.77, he has five blown saves, and he allowed a walk-off three-run homer in the ninth inning when Strickler threw a shutout. The concept of an "established role" should not protect a pitcher from competition when the competition has a 0.90 ERA and is the top-ranked reliever in baseball. Benson is useful in low-leverage situations where his stuff plays but his command inconsistencies have less consequence. That's the correct deployment going forward.
From Junko Watanabe of Sacramento's Florin neighborhood, a landscape architect, who asks: "Andretti is leading the FBL in ERA at 37. Does he get a new contract?"
The negotiation will be interesting. Rumors from and around the clubhouse indicate that Andretti is actively probing the front office for the possibility of an early contract extension. He does have maximum leverage right now — a Cy Young Award candidate in his age-37 season, final year of his deal, on a championship contender where he is the anchor of the staff. The counterargument is age and the historical trajectory of pitchers past 38. Sacramento has Jeon in the pipeline and a deep system that will eventually require roster space. My expectation is that both sides want to continue the relationship and will find a number. Whether it's two years or three, and whether there's a vesting option attached, will depend on how this season ends.
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Twenty-eight and twenty-three. First place in the AL West. Club's record in May is eighteen wins and twelve losses, which is amazing considering the intensity and difficulty of the schedule. Boston comes to Cathedral Stadium starting June 1st, then Players will face Portland on the road.
The franchise-worst start is now a footnote. What matters is what happens next.
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Claude Playball is a baseball insider and analyst and host of the Hot Corner podcast, based in Sacramento, California.