St. Louis Rams (32-32, .500, t-3rd NL East) @ Miami United (27-36, .429, 6th NL East)
After a long, successful (by our standards) road trip, we’re afforded a day off to reacclimate ourselves to Miami before welcoming the St. Louis Rams to town for a quickie two-game set. At 32-32, the Rams find themselves tied for 3rd in the NL East with the recently struggling Philadelphia 76ers (you’re welcome), are 5-5 over their last ten games, and just sort of shuffling along so far in 2080 like a club that, while not necessarily satisfied with their lot in life, can’t quite figure out where they need to start to improve it. The pitching is below average with only the insufferable
Julen Morales putting his best foot forward at 6-3, 2.43 ERA, and his 1st No-No officially on the books a scant 3 appearances ago – after him, in all his 34-year old glory, the drop off is steep and the ground beneath littered with the corpses of games that should have been wins. As a unit they leak runs like a sieve (11th in Runs Scored), rarely start off on the good foot (11th Starters ERA), and don’t get much in relief after that (6th Bullpen ERA). The offense is better, a respectable unit that finds itself rated in the top half of the National League in most categories, though they top out at 5th in each of those…
LF Shawn Sullivan is on the IL for 9 more days and
2B Mike Duncan is working hard to pull up the slack from the leadoff spot with a .320/.376/.383 line that includes 15 SBs, 34 runs, and 17 RBIs. The Rams are representative of the type of ballclub we have to beat when they visit Miami – simply put, we can’t let these guys beat us if we are to have any chance at shoving our way into wildcard contention.
64 of 162: John Aivazian (3-4, 5.16) @ Randy Kline (2-2, 7.67)
Win, 4-3. We’d get our very first 1-run win of the season in this one – 1-15 in 1-run games feels a lot better than it should…
Saucerman went 2 for 4 with a 2-run dinger and a run,
Kline gave us 6 strong innings, walked 4, K’d 5, and only allowed 3 runs to score, and
Marshburn drove two in. Two doubles, a jack, and another
Manookian theft for the club here – plus two double plays and
Dial’s 10th save of the season. 29K+ and Carnival Cruise Lines Ballpark were treated to some rip-roaring baseball from the club tonight even if none of our heavy hitters contributed… this is a team sport, and when your team has the structure of swiss cheese, you’ll take it where you can get it.
Elsewhere: SP Felan West, of the Mobile Mallards, hurled a complete-game, 4-hit shutout over the Stockton Sailors and recorded a whopping 12 strikeouts in the process… Mobile won the game by a score of 5-0. West was the 108th pick of the 2079 draft and has started to pick up some steam in the Golden State development system – he’s still an MLB long-shot though.
C Michael Wilson, of your BARBADOS TRIDENTS, went 3 for 4 with two, two-baggers, 4 riblets, 2 runs and a walk in our A-Club’s 8-6 win over the Amarillo Armadillos.
Wilson, of course, was our 1st pick of this year’s draft (11th overall), and is already doing his level best to make
Cheech and I look pretty smart – so if the kid never makes the big club (unlikely), at least he’s got that feather in his cap.
65 of 162: Cosmo Puente (1-5, 9.00) @ Rad Taylor (5-5, 2.56)
Win, 12-2.
Rad gave us 7 innings of work, allowed two runs, and struck out 6… he got a little wild at the end though and was lifted at the start of the eighth inning after doling out 6 free passes…
Anaconda went 1 for 4 with a GRAND SLAM in the bottom of the 4th,
Webster hit his first long ball as a ‘
Mingo and drove in 3 runs, we hit 3 doubles, 2 triples, and 2 homers as a club, had a near brawl after
Manookian got pegged in his lower back, turned 4 double plays, and flat out destroyed the Rams. Their walk of shame back to the airport begins
now… get your snaps uploaded to Instagram with the quickness, Miami fans – these kinds of opportunities are rare around these parts.
Elsewhere: 24-year-old Havana Sugar Kings pitcher
T-Rex Stiles had a strong outing against the Gwinnett Stripers at Sugar Cane Fields today, keeping them off the scoreboard the whole game. He struck out 3 in the 4-0 win and walked 0 while surrendering 7 hits.
Notes: Conjuring my best
McConaughey.. well –
alright, alright, alright – now we’re playing some baseball! 7-3 over our last ten contests and closing the gap on the St. Louis Rams – 5th place here we come.
OH HONG is starting to dial things in a bit - .295/.362/.385 with 3 HRs and 20 RBIs – we still need him to stretch a few more balls out of the park though.
Anaconda at .300/.368/.584 with 18 jacks and 54 RBI (trending 135) has been flat out otherworldly so far,
Rad continues to stay focused and give us good starts (even though our offense can’t seem to show up when he’s on the mound), and our Starters ERA has improved to 2nd in the NL (I knew those were good trades the whole time). Things are starting to look up in the Capital of Latin America for our ‘
Mingos and with
Shawna’s Denver Miners coming to town for a 4 game parlay we have a great opportunity to keep the good times rolling until the Kings drop by after the Colorado-based ballclub heads somewhere else. Also, because I haven’t looked in on him in a while, it’s comforting to see that Dallas’
Jo Jo Jackson is leading the league in whiffs at 110 – if you’re counting, and why wouldn’t you be, that’s a whopping 28 more K’s than the next guy on the list…