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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October 7 10, 2001 | Sacramento Advances to the ALCS | Columbus Await
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SACRAMENTO PRAYERS SWEEP THE CHARLOTTE MONKS
Sacramento is in the American League Championship Series for the second consecutive year, and the result should not obscure either how well they played through most of the division series or how close the final game came to extending into something uncomfortable. Lozano hit a three-run homer in the first inning of Game One and the Monks never really recovered from the momentum shift. Gil Cruz, the quietest superstar on a team full of them, hit two home runs and drove in four across three games. Navarro was the series MVP, scoring six runs and hitting .462 while playing his cleanest defensive series of the year.
But Game Three in Charlotte went eleven innings, went to Benson and then Ke to close it out, and featured Mario Espenoza blowing the save in the seventh before the bullpen steadied itself. The Monks outhit Sacramento twelve to thirteen in that game and had their best pitching performance of the series. Sacramento won because Navarro homered, because Cruz homered, because Lozano doubled twice in the extra frames when the pressure was highest. It was not comfortable, and it should not be remembered as comfortable.
The bigger news may not even be the result. Shinohara's injury designation, which read three weeks entering the division series, now reads simply unknown. That is worth watching very carefully.
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DID YOU CATCH THOSE GAMES? WHAT THE SCORECARDS SAY
vs. Charlotte, Games 1-3 (3-0)
Charlotte made the mistake of opening with Victor Hernandez who entered October having posted a 9.35 ERA over his last four appearances against a Sacramento lineup that had spent a week resting and scouting. The result was predictable: Lozano's three-run homer in the first inning put Sacramento ahead after the Monks had scored twice, Chavarria added a solo shot in the third, and Hernandez was pulled before recording his ninth out. Jeon worked five innings allowing two earned runs, scattered six hits against a Monks lineup that left eleven on base, and the bullpen handled the rest in a nine-to-four win that felt even more one-sided than the score suggested.
Game Two was the one everyone expected Game One to be Sacramento pounding Charlotte's best pitcher. Guerra lasted four and two-thirds innings, allowing seven earned runs. Choi delivered the killing blow: a bases-clearing triple in the fifth that stretched a two-run Sacramento lead into a five-run cushion. Cruz doubled and later homered. Nakazawa went two for four and scored twice. Eleven to five, and the Monks were facing elimination after forty-eight hours.
Game Three did not cooperate with the sweep narrative until the eleventh inning finally forced a conclusion. Cruz started and gave Charlotte's lineup more trouble than the Monks had seen at any point in the series six innings of three-run ball. But Espenoza's bullpen appearance in the seventh came unraveled quickly, Charlotte tying the game and extending it, and what had appeared to be a tidy clinch became a test of the bullpen's nerve. Benson steadied things over two innings, Ke closed it out, and Lozano's double in the tenth provided the winning run. Eight to seven, Sacramento. Castanon hit two triples for Charlotte in that game, tying the AL playoff record, and it was not enough. Navarro was named series MVP in the aftermath, and the designation was earned.
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THE SHINOHARA SITUATION
Three weeks entering the division series. Unknown entering the ALCS. That progression from a defined timeline to no timeline at all is the kind of change that deserves more than a footnote. Iliopsoas tendinitis is a notoriously unpredictable injury in its later recovery stages sometimes resolving cleanly, sometimes lingering in ways that extend well beyond initial projections. The organization has not offered additional detail, and in the absence of detail, the conservative interpretation is that his return is genuinely uncertain rather than simply delayed. Sacramento won the ALDS without him and can win the ALCS without him. Whether that continues to be true deeper into October is the question no one can answer with confidence right now.
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THE ALCS OPPONENT: COLUMBUS HEAVEN
Seventy-eight wins and eighty-four losses. Eleventh in the American League in ERA. Tenth in slugging, tenth in OPS, twelfth in stolen bases. Those are the numbers that describe Columbus Heaven's regular season, and they are the numbers that would tell you this team has no business being in the American League Championship Series.
Except Columbus beat Detroit one hundred wins, AL Central champions in three wildcard games. Then they beat Nashville in five. Jesse Coltharp was the ALDS MVP at .312 with four RBI. Cody Zeiders has been their best pitcher across the postseason, posting a 1.84 ERA over his last three starts. Giacomo Benoldi drove in one hundred twenty-two runs during the regular season. Marcus Hernandez hit thirty-two home runs.
This is a team that cannot be dismissed because it won seventy-eight games in April through September. What it has demonstrated in October is the capacity to win when games are decided by lineup depth and bullpen reliability and in those departments, Sacramento holds the advantage across every meaningful measure. Sacramento's pitching staff ERA was 3.65 to Columbus's 4.78. Sacramento's bullpen ERA was 3.41 to Columbus's 4.76. Sacramento scored nearly two hundred runs more than Columbus allowed.
What Columbus has is momentum, heat in exactly the right moment, and nothing to lose. The rotation beyond Zeiders is unreliable Ralevic finished the regular season at 6.11 ERA, Ramirez at 5.34. Sacramento's lineup will punish that depth. But Sacramento was supposed to beat Charlotte easily, too, and Game Three in Charlotte went eleven innings. The lesson of this postseason so far is that projected dominance and actual October performance are not the same thing.
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WHO'S HOT, WHO'S COLD
Who's Hot: Jang has a 0.79 ERA over his last four appearances and will start Game Two of the ALCS. Navarro, fresh off series MVP honors, is playing the most complete baseball of his career at the moment the stakes are highest. G. Cruz, who hit two home runs in the ALDS, has quietly elevated his postseason game in a way that the regular season numbers .239 average, ten home runs did not fully predict.
Who is Cold: Gutierrez's 8.20 ERA over his last fifteen appearances is the one persistent concern in an otherwise dominant pitching staff. The win he picked up in Game Two of the ALDS came in circumstances that required more luck than command. His role in a seven-game ALCS if it extends that long remains the most uncertain variable on the pitching staff.
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AROUND THE LEAGUE
The National League bracket resolved itself dramatically. Fort Worth eighty-eight wins, a team with no particular claim to October swept into the NLCS by eliminating Long Beach, the NL's best regular-season team, three games to one. Jayson Crumsey was the NLDS MVP, going .462 with four RBI for the Spirits. Cleveland, the NL Central champions, dispatched Phoenix in four games behind Jose Jimenez's remarkable .615 series average. The NLCS will pit Cleveland against Fort Worth a battle between the NL's best record and its hottest team. Sound familiar?
Also worth noting: Sacramento will retire the number 62 in honor of Luis Prieto, who recently announced his retirement after a career that produced two hundred ninety-eight saves. Three hundred saves has become the modern benchmark for a Hall of Fame closer, and Prieto fell just two saves short of it a career that deserved a number on the wall regardless of the round number. The retirement is a fitting gesture for a player whose contributions to this franchise extended beyond any single statistic.
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THE INBOX
From Yetunde Adegoke of Sacramento's Elk Grove neighborhood, a nurse, who asks: "Columbus beat Detroit and Nashville to get here. How seriously should we take them as a threat?"
Seriously enough that no one in the Sacramento clubhouse should be scheduling their World Series travel yet. The pattern Columbus has established in this postseason eliminating a hundred-win team and an eighty-win team in back-to-back series tells you something real about their ability to execute under pressure, even if their regular-season record tells you something different about their general quality. The honest assessment is that Sacramento is substantially the better team by almost every measure. The equally honest assessment is that substantially better teams have lost seven-game series before, particularly when the opponent's lineup is capable of a three-home-run night against the wrong starter. Zeiders is genuinely dangerous. Benoldi and Hernandez are legitimate middle-of-the-order threats. Sacramento should win this series. That is not the same thing as saying they will.
From Sψren Larsen of Sacramento's Arden Acres neighborhood, an architect, who asks: "Navarro was the ALDS MVP and the best player on the field across three games. What does that say about this roster's depth without Shinohara?"
It says exactly what this team has demonstrated all season: the depth is real. Navarro's regular-season numbers a .302 average, fifteen home runs, seventy-seven RBI were strong without being spectacular. What the postseason has revealed is a player whose performance elevates precisely when the opponent is preparing for everyone around him. Lozano filling Shinohara's slot, Cruz contributing two home runs from the second base position, Chavarria homering in Game One the roster has multiple players capable of seizing the spotlight when the team needs it. That is what championship-caliber depth looks like, and the ALDS provided a clean three-game demonstration of it.
From Preethi Venkataraman of Sacramento's South Natomas neighborhood, a software developer, who asks: "Shinohara's timeline is now unknown. What's the realistic scenario where he plays in the ALCS?"
The realistic scenario is that he is evaluated on a daily basis and returns when the medical staff clears him not on a predetermined schedule. The shift from a defined timeline to an open one suggests his recovery is not following the projected trajectory, which could mean anything from a minor setback that resolves within days to a situation where his postseason is effectively over. The best case: he returns for Games Five through Seven of a long ALCS and makes an impact when the series is on the line. The worst case: the unknown timeline resolves to no timeline at all, and Sacramento finishes October without its best regular-season player. What I know is that this organization does not make its plans around players who are unavailable it makes them around the players who are. And right now, those players are more than capable of winning a championship without waiting.
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The sweep is done, Charlotte is eliminated. Columbus, eighty-four losses in the regular season and two October upsets to their name, stands between Sacramento and a World Series. The ALCS starts Monday. Shinohara's timeline is unknown. Navarro is the hottest player on the roster. Jeon goes in Game One.
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Claude Playball is a baseball insider and analyst and host of the Hot Corner podcast, based in Sacramento, California.