Jacksonville Jaguars (10-5, On Road: 3-4) @ Los Angeles Lakers (9-2, At Home: 5-1); Lakers lead 1-0
After a satisfying game one victory, where our pitching staff was dominant and offense were serviceable, we’ll look to go up 2-0 in the 2075 World Series against the Jaguars. Our Game 2 starter, Michael Brisk, has been up & down in the playoffs so far – consistently inconsistent – but is coming off a clutch 7 inning, 1 earned run, game 5 performance against the Montreal Impact. His 8 K’s were the most he’d posted since a June 13th regular season game against that same Montreal club – in fact, he only registered 8 or more K’s 4 times in the regular season, with three of those coming in the 1st month of the 2075 season. So, he’s not necessarily due – but we’re hoping that his latest wave of solid pitching doesn’t crest in this contest. On the other side, we’ll get Joseph Thompson, who, at 13-14 with a 5.04 ERA in the regular season, was good enough when he had to be, averaging ~5.8 innings per game. The New York, NY native has a fantastic curveball and, when he’s on, his movement defies the laws of physics – he gave the Jags 6 innings of shutout baseball in their 1-0 game 3 win over the Chicago Fire in his last start. He has the ability to give us fits in this one – could be a long night.
Joseph Thompson (1-0, 2.45) @ Michael Brisk (2-1, 4.50)
Brisk started us off well – he’d retire the first two batters on fly balls, walk the next, and get Isidro Lutz on a weak grounder – 12 pitches, only 5 strikes – so, we’ll take it but he’s not all the way dialed in yet. In the bottom of the frame, Newman starts us off with a base knock from the leadoff spot, Mullens would trade spots with him on a grounder and then steal second (a close one) but ultimately got stranded – we put some good AB’s together though, so we just needed to keep chipping away. Top of the 2nd – Brisk starts making mistakes and throws an absolute meatball to RF Paul Swift who takes it on a ride over the RF fence for a Solo HR to take a 1-0 lead. He was able to reel it back in, retiring the next three, but the Jags draw first blood in this one. We’d get back on top off of a 3-run bottom of the 3rd when Mullens brought Clay Daniels in from second on a well-hit single followed by a 2-run double from Dom Cooke (who’s been a stud in this series so far) – 3-1 lead for the Lakers. The Jags wouldn’t go silently into the night though – they tied it up in the top of the 4th when Jason Dalton – who worked as a bouncer while attending Illinois – hit a 2-run single off of Brisk. Swift drives in his second run in the top of the 5th to put his club up 4-3, and both teams traded zeros from there – a tough home loss for the La-La’s. Paul Swift finished 4 for 4 with a HR and 2 RBI for the Jags – easily the man of the match – and outside of Cooke’s 2-RBI single, we don’t really show much of note in this one. Neither pitcher was great – Thompson, though, was just better enough to get it done today.
