[Westheim]

Raccoons (6-6) vs. Crusaders (7-5) – April 20-22, 2032

This series, starting on Tuesday, would pit the Raccoons against the Crusaders, who had so far allowed the fewest runs in the Continental League. They only ranked eighth in runs scored, but that was still ahead of the Critters, who were 6-6 but also had been drubbed for a -21 run differential already… Maybe we could draw strength from the fact that we had beaten New York in last year’s season series, 10-8. – Yeah, no, I also didn’t really think so…

Projected matchups:
Raffaello Sabre (0-0, 3.75 ERA) vs. Ramiro Benavides (1-0, 2.84 ERA)
Tom Shumway (1-1, 6.14 ERA) vs. Steve Younts (1-0, 4.76 ERA)
Jason Gurney (2-0, 2.75 ERA) vs. Mike Rutkowski (0-3, 4.37 ERA)

We would get a southpaw to begin the series, then two right-handed hurlers, so in fact this would be a series where the starting pitchers in each game would be opposite-handed.

Game 1
NYC: SS Obando – 1B Elder – 2B M. Hurtado – CF Coca – C Dear – LF Cambra – RF Reardon – 3B Ryder – P Benavides
POR: SS Ramos – 3B Perkins – 1B Zitzner – CF Braun – LF Wallace – RF Rodriguez – C James – 2B Marsingill – P Sabre

Like every other Raccoons pitcher, Sabre got taken apart before the first patrons had a chance to get to the bottom of their first beer. Guillermo Obando reached on an infield single in the first, but was stranded then, however, the second inning was a never-ending nightmare. Matt Dear drew a leadoff walk, raced to third on a Firmino Cambra single, and scored on Chris Reardon’s single. Zachary Ryder singled to load the bases, and while Benavides hit into a run-scoring double play, Obando plated the runner from third (Reardon) with yet another single, this one blooping in a whisker’s length in front of Wilson Rodriguez. Only Jay Elder’s pop ended the miserable 3-run second. Sabre would drag his kicked and beaten body into the fifth inning, while getting zero offensive support, only to get kicked and beaten more. He faced four batters in the top of the fifth, and retired none of them. Obando tripled. Elder walked. Mario Hurtado had an RBI single. There was a wild pitch, then another RBI single for Tony Coca. It was 5-0, runners on the corners, and the Raccoons again had to turn to an already obliterated bullpen. Sabre ended up charged with seven earned runs once Victor Anaya barfed up more singles to Dear and Reardon, putting New York up 7-0.

And yet, Portland would put the tying run at home plate come the ninth, a result of their pen holding together (but then again they had just gotten a break from pitching six innings every day…), and of Benavides eroding away slow enough that the Crusaders initially didn’t pay attention. Adam Braun doubled and was singled home by Wilson Rodriguez with two outs in the sixth. Two outs in the seventh, Perkins homered with Ramos aboard, which also made him the first Critter to double-digit RBI this season. Jarod Howden, batting fifth after a pair of double switches, doubled home Braun in the eighth. Only after that one did the Crusaders get their pen involved. That pen held up, but just barely. Both Ramos and a pinch-hitting Josh Wool reached base in the bottom of the ninth, but Adam Braun flew out to right to end the game. 7-4 Crusaders. Ramos 2-5; Braun 2-5, 2B; Howden 1-1, 2B, RBI;

Mike Rutkowski was assigned to the middle game in a rotation shuffle for New York, vacating Steve Younts for the moment. The Coons had nowhere to go but to Tom Shumway, who – it is true! – was remarkably decent his last time out…

Game 2
NYC: 2B M. Hurtado – 1B Elder – SS Obando – CF Coca – RF Reardon – C Dear – LF Cambra – 3B Ryder – P Rutkowski
POR: SS Ramos – RF Rodriguez – LF Wallace – 1B Howden – CF Braun – 3B Perkins – 2B Cass – C Wool – P Shumway

Not that this was ****ing buying him any favors with New York. The Crusaders had two on in the first two innings and twice chucked into a double play to kill their effort. Shumway continued to look a little less convincing with every batter he faced, and he sure hadn’t looked like anything but trouble in the first, with Hurtado singling and Elder walking. By the fourth, Matt Dear got hold of a hapless fastball and dished it over the fence in left for a 2-run homer bringing Reardon across with him, the first runs in the game, too, with the Raccoons only getting a Ramos single the first time through. It extended Berto’s hitting streak to 17 games, but he sure couldn’t do it all on his own…

Shumway lasted six innings and allowed one more run in the sixth. It wasn’t quite his fault; with two outs Zachary Ryder hit a fly to left that Jimmy Wallace egregiously and stupidly dropped to allow Reardon to come home from third base. It was Wallace’s second error of the game – he had overrun a single for an extra base earlier – and with that he had made the most Raccoons contributions to the scoreboard… Ramos tied him with a second single in the bottom 6th, not that that went anywhere nice. Top 7th, Fleischer came out and issued a leadoff walk to Hurtado, which gave the right-hander ten walks in seven innings pitched on the season. There was ill command, there was wildness, and there was just plainly sucking the leather off the baseballs. He then added a third error to the board, throwing away Elder’s comebacker, and loaded them up with an Obando single. At this point the pitching coach was sent out to inform him that nobody would dig him out here and if he didn’t do it himself he could still win a free trip to St. Petersburg. Tony Coca hit to short, but too slow for two, and a run scored anyway with Obando out at second. Wool threw out Coca trying to nip second, and Reardon struck out, keeping the score to a technically doable 4-0. There was just one problem – and that was Rutkowski suffocating every Critter not lovingly named Berto. The Coons did not get back on base until the ninth inning when Ramos hit a leadoff single off Rutkowski. The team had three base hits, all Berto’s. Rodriguez popped out foul. Zitzner hit for Chris Wise and grounded out. Giovanni James hit for Howden and popped out foul, completing the 36-year-old Rutkowski’s shutout. 4-0 Crusaders. Ramos 3-4;

I hear there was bickering in the clubhouse after this one. I dealt with it by loudly singing a tune from my youth on my way to the car, so I could pretend not to hear, but perhaps my choice of music was a bit inappropriate given how the chorus ended with “what a wonderful world this would be”, and contained yet no advice on how to hit the insidious hitting, pitching, and fielding on this team.

No, Berto. You’re fine. You are doing well. You are batting .414 …

Game 3
NYC: 2B M. Hurtado – 1B Elder – SS Obando – CF Coca – RF Reardon – C Dear – LF Cambra – 3B Ryder – P E. Cannon
POR: SS Ramos – 1B Howden – LF Hall – RF Wallace – CF Braun – 3B Perkins – C James – 2B Marsingill – P Gurney

Thursday brought Eddie Cannon (2-0, 1.44 ERA), but before he could get actively involved, the Crusaders had already taken the clubs to Jason Gurney. Walks to Hurtado and Coca surrounded an Obando single to load the bases in the first. Chris Reardon doubled home a pair, Matt Dear hit a sac fly, and Firmino Cambra hit a jack to right for a 5-0 deficit. I turned to Cristiano Carmona who was sitting next to me in his wheelchair and asked him whether sometimes he just wanted to run away, to which he bluntly replied “Yes.” …

Ramos led of the bottom 1st with a single for an 18-game hitting streak, but Howden, the dumb pig, grounded into a 6-4-3 double play on the first pitch. Gurney on his own retired nobody in the second inning and was yanked after four outs. Cannon singled, Hurtado singled, Elder walked, and with the bags full yet again, Obando hit an RBI single to right. Hurtado was sent, but not only thrown out at home plate by Jimmy Wallace, but also took a hit to the knee and had to leave the ballgame, to be replaced by former Baybird Tom Hawkins. Nick Derks replaced Gurney and gave up a sac fly to Coca before Reardon grounded out, closing Gurney’s line at seven runs just like Sabre’s two days earlier, except that Sabre had at least collected 12 outs. The miserable Coons got 11 outs from Derks with no additional runs for New York, while they even scored two runs themselves. Giovanni James got his first Critter RBI singling home Adam Braun in the bottom 2nd, although that was unearned for Braun had reached on an error. And Ramos opened the bottom 3rd with a triple and scored on Nate Hall’s sac fly. Good, good, boys – only five more to go! Forward to the sixth where the Critters had Hall and Wallace on the corners and nobody out, then choked quite good. Adam Braun lined out HARD to Obando, dropping his average to .148, Perkins hit a sac fly, and James fanned embarrassingly, keeping the team still a slam short. Maybe Berto could hit that one… well, for starters he hit a double in the seventh, actually putting him a homer shy of the cycle for the second time this season. It also moved Preston Pinkerton to third base with one out and pulled up Howden, who struck out, the dumb pig. Nate Hall flew out to left. Nobody scored. Nobody reached in the eighth, and like Rutkowski the day before, Cannon was still dealing in the ninth inning… James and Marsingill made outs before Pinkerton singled for the second time. That brought up Berto. He flew out to center. 7-3 Crusaders. Ramos 3-5, 3B, 2B; Wallace 3-4; Derks 3.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 1 K;

This was violent.

Can anybody on this team throw a ****ing pitch??

Raccoons (6-9) vs. Falcons (8-8) – April 23-25, 2032

Bad news: the Falcons were second in runs scored. They also had bad pitching, with the third-worst rotation and the fourth-most runs allowed, but both these numbers beat the Coons, as did their +2 run differential (Coons: -32). The Falcons were operating on the principle of win two, lose two, a pattern they had started late in opening week and were still carrying forward, and yes, they had lost their last two. They had lost four to the Raccoons in 2031, taking the season series, 5-4.

Projected matchups:
Ignacio del Rio (0-0) vs. Aaron Lewis (1-2, 4.50 ERA)
Rico Gutierrez (0-2, 6.75 ERA) vs. Doug Clifford (2-0, 4.57 ERA)
Raffaello Sabre (0-1, 6.75 ERA) vs. Brian Bowsman (2-1, 3.00 ERA)

Del Rio was 0-1 with a 4.05 ERA after two starts in St. Pete. He replaced Nick Derks on the roster, who was waived and DFA’ed, a thankless procedure after life-saving long relief on Thursday, but nobody was thanking me for persevering through this torrent of tragedy, either… del Rio was up as a spot starter for now, but could win the gig for as long as Bernie was out if he did better than the rest of the bunch, which wasn’t THAT HIGH A BAR to fall over …!

Meanwhile we expected a lefty in Clifford on Saturday.

Game 1
CHA: 2B D. Ruiz – CF N. Nelson – LF Salto – C Huichapa – 3B G. Ortiz – SS Vitale – RF M. Mendoza – 1B Gustafson – P A. Lewis
POR: SS Ramos – 1B Howden – LF Hall – RF Wallace – CF Braun – 3B Perkins – C James – 2B Marsingill – P del Rio

Both teams got only one base hit the first time through the order. For the Coons that hit was a del Rio single in the bottom 3rd, while for the Falcons it was a homer, and of course it was hit by Greg Ortiz. (bites his lip until a drop of blood creeps out on the side of his mouth) On the plus side, Ignacio del Rio pitched really, REALLY well, even though the final box score wouldn’t show as much. The Falcons hardly got a touch on him for many innings (and the Raccoons did absolutely nothing to Lewis, of course) before another Raccoons hurler got dog-piled on in an absolute abhorrence of a miscarried inning. After three hits through six innings, Ernesto Huichapa, Ortiz, and PH Dave Trahan landed three hits in a row in the seventh; single, double, single, and two more runs were on the board in a 3-0 Falcons game. del Rio finished the inning, whiffing eight eventually, but oh, again, what could have been… Well, there could have been a lead after the bottom 7th with Lewis walking Braun and getting taken deep by Perkins, but now that only cut the deficit to 3-2. Enter Jonathan Fleischer, who loaded the damn bases in the top 8th with two walks (…!!) and a single, then left for Garavito to clean that **** up. Somehow the pen did not actually implode here, leaving the Critters with another chance to come back. They did nothing in the bottom 8th. Come the ninth, and right-hander Tony Rivas, Braun popped out. Perkins grounded out. James doubled through Sean Gustafson! The tying run at second bas- … and Josh Wool popped out to shallow left. 3-2 Falcons. Perkins 2-4, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; del Rio 7.0 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 8 K, L (0-1) and 1-2;

Also, Berto’s hitting streak was snapped due to him … not hitting. He went 0-for-4 as he struck out, struck out, popped out, and flew out.

We can’t have anything, can we??

Game 2
CHA: RF Trahan – SS Coughenour – LF Salto – 3B G. Ortiz – CF N. Nelson – C M. Cooper – 2B Jewell – 1B Gustafson – P Clifford
POR: SS Ramos – 3B Perkins – 1B Zitzner – RF Rodriguez – LF Hall – CF Braun – C James – 2B Marsingill – P Gutierrez

When Justin Marsingill hit a sac fly to cash Nate Hall and his leadoff single with three on and no outs in the bottom 2nd, the Raccoons had a lead for the first time this week. Oh, well, it was only Saturday… Gutierrez bunted into a force at third base, Ramos grounded out, and the Coons failed to make a significant impact. Perkins and Hall made impact though in the third inning, hitting a pair of doubles for a 2-0 lead, and the real question was when impact would be made by Rico Gutierrez on the Falcons’ bats or alternatively their fly swatters. Rico came in with a staggering 26 hits in 12 innings, but managed to hold the Falcons to one hit per inning early on, and none of them outta here. Charlotte got no hits in the fourth, but then had Clifford drill a double in the fifth with one out. Braun robbed Dave Trahan in the gap to keep Gutierrez together, and Ramos handled Dave Coughenour (sounds with fewer letters more like Cough-ner) hitting a roller to short to end the fifth.

Bottom 6th, Marsingill hit another sac fly, 3-0, with Braun and James on the corners and no outs. Gutierrez bunted badly again, but James still managed to leg out the throw by Clifford to second base and the Falcons got nobody on the play. Neither did they get one when Ramos grounded to first. Gustafson lunged and knocked the ball down, but it rolled away a few feet, and Ramos legged it out for an infield single. This gave Perkins a chance with three on and one out. Perkins’ 14 RBI led the team by a country mile already, and he tacked on another one with a clean RBI single to right, 4-0. Zitzner struck out, Rodriguez flew out to right to end the inning… Nate Hall got on, stole second, and scored on a James single in the seventh, and oh, by the way, Rico Gutierrez was still out there. He entered the eighth on 89 pitches with right-handed pinch-hitter Travis Adkins opposing him in the #9 hole. He hit a comebacker on the first pitch, Trahan grounded out, and Coughenour flew out to Hall – all on six pitches, and with a 5-0 lead, Rico would come back in the ninth. (Of course the relief corps was cocked and loaded…) Graciano Salto struck out. Greg Ortiz grounded sharply to Perkins – out. But Rico Gutierrez fell to 3-1 on Nate Nelson, so the bullpen guard put one hand on the door handle out there. Nelson slapped at the 3-1, up in the air, behind home plate, James tossed the mask and made the catch…! 5-0 Critters! Ramos 2-5; Perkins 3-5, 2B, RBI; Hall 3-4, 2B, RBI; James 3-4, RBI; Gutierrez 9.0 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K, W (1-2);

Slappy? – Slappy? – Did you see it, too? – But you had a different sort of booze. – So it must be true?

Game 3
CHA: 2B D. Ruiz – SS Coughenour – LF Salto – C Huichapa – RF Trahan – 3B G. Ortiz – CF N. Nelson – 1B Gustafson – P Bowsman
POR: SS Ramos – 1B Howden – LF Hall – RF Wallace – CF Braun – 3B Perkins – C James – 2B Marsingill – P Sabre

The Falcons would score first against a Raccoons team that seemed to have left their sticks in Boston. Danny Ruiz, Salto, and Huichapa all doled out singles in the third inning for a run, and Nate Nelson homered in the fourth to make it 2-0. The Critters would get on the board in the bottom of the inning. Perkins legged out a infield single with one out, then raced for third base when Josh Wool singled to right. Dave Trahan wanted to see him thrown out, but misfired, and Ortiz had to chase the ball up the leftfield line, allowing Perkins to score and cut the deficit in half. Sabre remained mired in runners, though. Coughenour and Salto hit 1-out singles in the fifth. Huichapa popped out, and Dave Trahan grounded back to the mound. Sabre pounced, fired to first, or, rather, in the general vicinity. The ball however sailed over Howden’s head and took out a guy’s beer in the first row further up the rightfield line. That one cost two bases and thus a run, and brought up Ortiz, batting .274 with three dingers, with runners in scoring position. He grounded out to Howden, keeping the Falcons’ lead at 3-1.

Bottom 5th, three on, nobody out, one of THOSE spots… Ramos opened with a triple into the rightfield corner, and Bowsman walked them full against Howden and Hall, bringing up Jimmy Wallace, who had not gotten an RBI in a full week, but batted cleanup because somebody had to. He poked the first pitch, a liner to short, Coughenour leaping and reaching, but the ball got over his glove by no more than three inches and reached shallow left for a single! Because of the close play, only one run scored and the bases remained loaded in a 3-2 game. The Coons rolled up their priciest offseason acquisition, Adam Braun, a hitter feared from Atlanta to Alaska, and batting .129 … He popped out on a 1-2 pitch, Perkins tied the game with a sac fly, and Josh Wool dropped in an RBI single to put Portland up 4-3. That was it; Marsingill grounded out to end the inning.

Sabre lasted two outs into the seventh, but with Salto already having singled and stolen second. He was on third base and the tying run with two down and the left-hander Trahan up. The Coons sent Hennessy. The Falcons sent Matt Cooper to pinch-hit. Cooper homered to center, flipping the score to 5-4 Falcons. The Coons had no immediate answer, the eighth was uneventful, and in the ninth Chris Wise had both his arms removed with table spoons by the Falcons. Danny Ruiz singled, stole second, and scored on a Salto single, who also stole second, then scored on a Huichapa single. Quinn Jewell walked, and Wise was yanked after retiring one of five hitters faced… Garavito replaced him, but allowed a third run to score on a Greg Ortiz single… that one ended the game, with the lousy Critters now out by a slam. They couldn’t manage a single runner, and Brian Bowsman finished the game on an 8-hitter. 8-4 Falcons. Ramos 2-4, BB, 3B; Wool 3-4, RBI;

In other news

April 21 – Salem’s 22-year-old INF/RF Jose Castro (.406, 1 HR, 9 RBI) has a 20-game hitting streak that originated late in the 2031 seaso. Castro grabs two hits in a 5-3 loss to the Pacifics to reach the 20 mark.
April 23 – NYC 3B/SS Guillermo Obando (.366, 0 HR, 11 RBI) has five hits, including a triple, and drives in a pair in the Crusaders’ 13-6 smashing of the Thunder.
April 23 – SFB OF Ryan Cassell (.367, 1 HR, 7 RBI) plates five with a 4-hit effort in the Bayhawks’ 19-6 blowout of the Indians.

Complaints and stuff

To recap, we lost five of six this week, gave up 29 runs – bad, but not outrageous – and the offense was atrocious enough that three opposing pitchers tossed complete games. Our run differential is already at -32, and April is far from over. That bold statement that this could be a .500 team is not looking very great right now…

You want a really fun stat? Rico Gutierrez now leads the starters in ERA.

(shrugs and returns to the booze)

Fun Fact: Rico Gutierrez’ shutout on Saturday was the ninth of his career, his first not against a CL North team, and the first since *2026*!

Remember when he shut out the Loggers like it was breakfast? In the three years from 2024 to 2026, Rico shut them out no fewer than FIVE times. He also got the Indians twice, and the damn Elks once. His best performance was probably a 2-hitter against the Loggers on July 17, 2026 with no walks and eight strikeouts – and he followed that up with a 4-hit shutout against Indy in his next start.

Yeah, all that **** gave him a 9-year, $16.96M contract we’re still chewing on…