Before we get back to our regularly scheduled programming, there are a few things that we need to talk about…
1B Oh Hong, a Long Beach Dirtbag and prospect in the Los Angeles Galaxy’s farm system that I shortlisted as much for his name as I did for his skill, has taken home the RL Player of the Week honor in the International League. The former Duke Blue Devil is somewhat of a late bloomer – he went undrafted, spent a couple of seasons in the Bush League, and eventually was signed by the Galaxy in 2075. He’s not much of a fielder, has no arm, and is a terrible baserunner – but the guy can hit. He’s tracking to be a pretty good contact hitter with a little bit of pop – and he had himself a week in the International League going 15 for 27 with a HR and 6 RBI. He’s turning some heads early in 2076 and it should be fun to track this guy’s career – he’s no lock for making the majors, but he’s getting better and is starting to look like he has an outside chance at it.
Expansion… I didn’t do it for the tricentennial season. I mean. I should’ve, but it takes time, and that game 7 loss we took kinda took the wind out of the ol’ sails a little bit – so I decided to just let it roll, stay on the sea, relax, and ride the tack (you know, like when you grope for luna…). 2077, then, on the 100th anniversary of the Clash’s S/T debut, I will definitely pull the trigger and expand Strangeverse’s MLB to a 28-team league (I’ll also fix my broken playoff format) – definitely maybe. The OKC Thunder will reappear (in the AL) and I’ll also add clubs in Ottawa (because it’s a great city – if you’ve not been, I recommend that you remedy that), Denver, and Indianapolis. I think I’m 75% certain that those will be the clubs. Indianapolis is suspect, though, if I’m honest.
Roster moves… With our offseason acquisition, Nat Millard, on the 10-day IL, we’ve moved emergency spot starter, Merl Crawford, into the rotation and called Charles Fane up to the big club from Compton. He’s a specialist who appeared in 7 games for the big club last season, but only pitched two innings worth of baseball – in that stretch he gave up 2 runs and had an 18 BB/9 - so, he’s like a short term, we couldn’t remember anyone else’s name type of call-up.
San Diego Chargers (7-5, .583, 3rd NL West) @ Los Angeles Lakers (7-6, .538, 4th NL West)
At 5-5 over their last 10, it would seem that the San Diego Chargers may not be who we thought they were – but, it’s early, let’s not make any rash proclamations. They are, by far and away, the top offense in the league – they rank 1st in every offensive category with the exception of Homer Runs, where they rank 10th. They have some power in their lineup though, so the smart money says that they will remedy that, and when they do – all bets are off. Their pitching has been an issue early in the season, where no one not named Burt McElheny or Reed Pirelli is throwing the ball at a major league level. Of course, they haven’t met us yet and we have a way of making people look good – the lighting in LA is the best in the world. Of the four starters we will face in this series – another 4-game stretch (I don’t like 4-game series, and I hate a 2-game set (or is it a pair?) – two of them have ERA’s over 6. We’ll see Reed in game two though and he’s scary enough on his own…
14 of 162: Shiro Nakamura (1-0, 4.15) @ Case Tunnell (1-0, 6.00)
Win, 5-3… Larry Williams hits a timely HR in the 5th and is named the Player of the Game for his 2 for 4, HR, RBI, and 2 R day, while Newman draws a walk that allows a run to plate in the 5th – padding our lead just enough for Barbaccia to earn his 5th save of the year. Case pitches well – he’d give us 7 innings with only 3 earned runs despite allowing 12 hits. In fact, we were outhit by the Chargers 12 to 7 in this one, but ours were the more meaningful shots – that’s called effective aggression folks. Not really. No one calls it that in Baseball.
Elsewhere: The unfortunately named Tad Monroe, of the Orlando City, went 3 for 3 with 3 RBI’s in City’s 7-5 win over the St. Louis Rams – he hit a 2-run single for Orlando in the bottom of the 8th against McKinley “Call me Denali” Moore, who was charged with his first blown save of the year and is now 0-2 with a 4,26 ERA out of the pen for the Rams.
15 of 162: Mike Augustine (1-1, 6.17) @ Phillip King (2-0, 1.10)
Loss, 6-3. Well crap… King gives us 8 innings of 5 hit, 1 ER domination and Barbaccia gives San Diego one inning of batting practice – he gave up 5 runs in the top of the 9th. I had high hopes for him and based on those hopes and the advice of a scout that shall not be named – we mustn’t speak of such evil – I paid him a princely sum to deliver on that promise. This decision may not have been among my best. Zarate goes 1 for 3 with 2 RBI and Pepper drives one in off a well-hit double in the bottom of the 9th. As a team we completed 3 DP’s, but so did they – so do they really count? This one bums me out – we had it in our sights.
16 of 162: Reed Pirelli (2-0, 0.53) @ Merl Crawford (0-0, 0.00)
Loss, 7-1. Kelford Jackson killed us in this one – 3 RBI’s (2 off a homer, one off a single). Merl got shelled for 4 runs in 7 innings of work, and Mason Sandoval gave up 4 hits, 3 runs, and could only retire one batter before we had to bring Miyakawa into the game. Our offense stunk it up again, we just can’t put many good AB’s together, and when we do, we have a tendency to follow that up with a few bad ones to erase whatever good could have come from them. We kinda suck so far this year – a .500 ballclub doing .500 ballclub type bull****.
Elsewhere: Former Laker and Current Montreal stalwart, Sammy Fregoso went 4 for 4 with a double, a homer, and 4 RBI’s in Montreal’s 9-7 loss at home to Pittsburgh – dig on that. Nice to see him having some success, even if his club was unable to secure the win. Former Laker, Nehemiah Jenkins’ younger brother, Latroy Jenkins went 5 for 5 for Notre Dame with 5 runs and 1 batted in during ND’s 20-9 win over the Grand Lakes University Hooters. Our scouts, the trustworthy ones at least, tell me that they believe he’ll be a better big leaguer than his big bro.
17 of 162: Aden Grey (0-2, 9.35) @ Dejuan Burns (1-2, 3.48)
Win, 3-2… Dejuan gives us 7 innings and only allowed one run to plate – Barbaccia gets his 6th save (he’s either lights out or a big floozy on the mound (everybody gets a hit)). Pepper finished at 1 for 2 with a HR and a BB, and Otto’s slow start has continued – the former stud and current Playoff A-Rod clone is batting an unacceptable .232 so far this season. It’s hard to figure what could be wrong with the guy – we always have kale on hand (he’s on a hippy/organic kick here lately), let him control the stereo in the clubhouse, and our equipment guy assures me that his pine tar jar is always full – so what gives? I should trade him so that it’ll come back to haunt me as he takes his new club all the way to the promised land – I’m a glutton for punishment.
Hey, a 2-2 series! We'll take it - because that's what .500 ballclubs do - they take what they can get. Hopefully, when Green Bay gets to town (Interleague Play already?), we'll start to awaken from this malaise and start playing Laker baseball. Unless we just suck. Hmm... maybe we just suck. Not the unlikeliest of scenarios, I guess.