[Ruwisc]

Week 14: June 26-July 2, 2023





June 26-27: Bees (49-29) vs. San Francisco Giants (40-40)
The Giants have played exactly half of their scheduled games, have a perfect .500 record and a .500 Pythag record as well, so this is a team as average as they come. They've actually played pretty poorly in June, erasing the good month of May they had. The NL West has a runaway leader, but it isn't the Dodgers like I assumed it would be. Instead, the game's preseason prediction that the Padres would win 91 games is looking strong - they have the same record we do right now, meaning San Fran is 10 games out.

Game 1 - Ray Gaither (1-1, 5.25) vs. Luke Heimlich (5-4, 4.44)
SFG: CF Murray, SS Madrigal, RF Walker, 2B Torkelson, 3B Keller, LF Riley, C Voss, 1B Drury, P Heimlich
SLC: SS Mota, 3B Guerrero, RF Robles, CF Mesa, 1B Ishihara, C Phegley, 2B Maezes, LF Garry, P Gaither

The less said about Heimlich's personal life the better. In this game, he's become a pretty reliable, pretty average pitcher, really in keeping with the Giants' total bland averageness. Last time out, though, he took the loss against the rival Dodgers and pitched inefficiently, only lasting for 4 innings. The Giant lineup as a whole has a bunch of intriguing names: Kyler Murray, Nick Madrigal, Spencer Torkelson... Gaither got his first win in a Bees uniform last time out, when he went 7 strong innings at New Mexico... the Giants would strike first. Murray drew a leadoff walk, and Steele Walker powered a ball into the right field stands for a 2-0 Giants lead... we would claw one back in the first though, Mota singled, went to second on a poor pickoff throw from Heimlich and scored on Mesa's hit with two out... Gaither helped his own cause in the third, hitting a first pitch single while leading off, going to 3rd on a hit by Guerrero and scoring on Mesa's RBI groundout to tie the game 2-2... San Francisco went back ahead in the 5th, Madrigal scoring Brandon Drury with another groundout... the Bees' 4-5-6 hitters came up with three straight singles in the 6th to tie the game again, Phegley driving home Mesa. Unfortunately it looks like Mesa was hurt while sliding into home plate. Gonna have to wait for an update after the game. Garry slides over to center and Granite takes over in left... Gaither was replaced by Nolan Blackwood to start the 7th, who struck out all three batters he faced. Nice game for Ray, another quality start - 6 innings, 3 runs on 4 hits, 8 K vs. 2 BB... after a single and two walks for us in the 7th off new pitcher Will Stillman, what would've been Mesa's spot comes up in the lineup. Instead it's the pitcher's spot, and pinch-hitter Ben Gamel delivered an infield hit to put us ahead for the first time tonight. Morio Ishihara followed with a two-run single to put us up 6-3! Our bullpen was sparkling tonight - hitless innings from Blackwood, Hand and Holder to seal a nice victory.


W: Nolan Blackwood (3-0) L: Will Stillman (0-1) S: Jonathan Holder (2)
PotG: Ray Gaither

Strong game from Gaither, settling down after being down 2-0 after 3 batters. On to Tuesday!

No update on Mesa yet, so we'll roll ahead without him to the second Giants game. We're flush with outfielders right now, even in AAA, so we could probably do without Victor even though he's having a good year.

Game 2 - Will Shirah (6-4, 4.48) vs. Gabriel Ynoa (4-9, 5.27)
SFG: CF Murray, SS Madrigal, RF Walker, 2B Torkelson, LF Riley, 3B Keller, C Voss, 1B Drury, P Ynoa
SLC: SS Mota, RF Robles, 3B Guerrero, 1B Ishihara, P Shirah, 2B Maezes, C Cottam, CF Garry, LF Granite

Ynoa is trying to avoid becoming MLB's third 10-game loser on the season - he's 0-3 in the month of June, during which he's seen his ERA rise by about half a run. Last time out, he got the loss against division rival Vancouver, with 4 runs against in 5 innings... Shirah is coming off his best pitching appearance in a major league uniform, Thursday against the Flyers. He only threw 6.1 innings but they were scoreless and he struck out 12 Charlotte hitters... it was a shaky top of the first, but he got through it. Murray, Walker and Torkelson all had singles, but in between Nick Madrigal hit into a double play so we got to bat still scoreless... San Fran had single hits in the second and third innings... the 3rd for us was magical. Garry led off by drawing an 8-pitch walk, which was followed by a Granite RBI triple in the gap, and then a Mota single that scored Zack from third to make it 2-0. Robles hit the next pitch for a single, and Guerrero had a long at-bat that also became a single, which loaded the bases. Ishihara up, and seemingly going for the knockout blow, he hit the first pitch right at Walker in right field. Shirah, though, helped his own cause majorly by singling through the left side scoring two runs! Maezes up next, and... oh, there's the death blow! He smacks Ynoa's final pitch of the day deep into the Utah sky for a 3-run home run and a 7-0 lead! Ynoa finishes the day with just 2.1 innings, 7 runs on 7 hits... Shirah continued to hold the Giants scoreless, but some lengthy, extended at bats means he probably wasn't too long for this game... in our half of the 5th, Ishihara led off with a hit against RP Julio Mateo. Shirah and Maezes both drew extended walks to load 'em up. Cottam's RBI single advanced everyone, and Garry's walk scored another run. Mateo finally recorded the first out getting Granite, but his grounder was smoked into the hole and Madrigal only had a play at first, making it 10-0. Mota then re-loaded the bases by walking, and Robles/Guerrero would each drive in a run to make it a silly 12-0 score... Shirah was done after 5.2 innings, again scoreless, with 6 K. That's 12 scoreless innings and 18 strikeouts over his last two outings! Perez on to pitch... This was probably the perfect time for Perez to have an absolutely awful outing. He allowed 3 walks, 3 hits, a sac fly and a wild pitch in the 7th, cutting our lead to 12-5, but it's not worth the minutiae... in a weird series of coincidences, we scored 3 runs in the 7th without any of our players getting an RBI. With men on first and second, Guerrero singled up the middle, but Kyler Murray misplayed the ball in center which allowed Mota to score. Robles scored on a wild pitch, and Guerrero scored on a passed ball which occurred while we had reliever Ben Parks hitting for himself... Parks would finish the game scoreless, while Mota tacked on one more run in the 8th on a fielder's choice RBI.


W: Will Shirah (7-4) L: Gabriel Ynoa (4-10)
PotG: Travis Maezes

A season-high offensive output for us - we had scored 15 runs once and 14 twice, but not more. Mostly done with well-timed singles, too - that's a more satisfying way to win IMO.

After the game, we also got word that Victor Victor Mesa's wrist injury had actually been really minor, and he would be at full strength as we headed out on a season-long 9-game road trip! We'll make four full stops, but also sneak in a makeup game from our April 5th rainout in Buffalo.

At 80 games played, we've reached the halfway point of our season, so I also got the midseason owner goals review Wednesday morning from Albert Torres, our owner. Peppered with faint praise, it was. I guess I haven't really fully accomplished any of the things he set for me in the preseason - he said, make the playoffs, upgrade from Shirah in left field, improve the state of the bullpen, bring in a Gold Glover, and chop the payroll down to $120MM. Minor improvements throughout. We're in a solid playoff position right now (7 1/2 games ahead of Houston - we actually would be the #2 seed in the NL if the tournament began today), Shirah has played better than he did last year but not by much, the bullpen is improved from 21st last year to 13th but he wants more, and the payroll has been cut from $131MM to $121 MM, just not all the way to $120MM. So he seems happy but has tons of little nits to pick.

June 28-29: Bees (51-29) @ New York Burros (47-35)
If the season ended today, we would face the Burros in the first round of the playoffs despite the fact that they're in 3rd place in the East - that's a pretty strong division, with the Beacons and Monarques also holding playoff spots at the moment. This team made their first playoff appearance last year, losing to the Astros in the first round (Houston then beat us in the second round before losing in the NLCS to Buffalo). We split a pair of games with the Burros in SLC in early May.

Game 1 - Michael Pineda (3-2, 3.54) vs. Alejandro Chacin (6-5, 5.02)
SLC: SS Mota, RF Robles, 3B Guerrero, 1B Ishihara, LF Shirah, 2B Maezes, C Cottam, CF Garry, P Pineda
NYB: CF Anderson, SS Hinds, LF Frisch, RF Dickerson, 2B Walker, 1B Carpenter, 3B Valbuena, C Cross, P Chacin

Chacin was the Burros starter who we bested in our earlier series, although it was more down to Lucchesi pitching very well against him. He gave up two runs in 5 innings, and we scored later against the New York bullpen to win 5-1... Chacin has won four consecutive decisions, and the Burros have won his last six starts (but lost the previous five). This time a month ago his ERA was above 6.50... Pineda has pitched well since coming off the IL, it's kind of a shame we haven't gotten him a win despite having won both games... Pineda allowed a triple to Jordan Anderson on his second pitch of the game, and he'd come in on a sac fly by Daniel Frisch... Frisch came up again in the 3rd with Rece Hinds on second, and singled him around to double the lead... Mota had a hit leading off the game for us, but we wouldn't get another until Cottam singled with one out in the fourth... Luis Valbuena had an RBI fielder's choice to score Neil Walker in the 4th making it 3-0... in the 6th, finally, we got it together. Ishihara singled to lead off, and Maezes would muscle up for his 12th home run of the year to get us within a run. That was it for Chacin - 5.1 innings, 4 hits and 2 runs. He leaves in line for the win... Pineda was lifted for a pinch-hitter in the 7th. In that half-inning, Robles singled with two outs, stole 2nd base and came in to score on Guerrero's game-tying single! Next half-inning, though, Frisch would come up with his 3rd RBI of the day, a double scoring Hinds again... in the 8th, we had Shirah at third base with only one out but couldn't get him in... Archie Bradley on for the save, trying to snap our eight-game winning streak at last. Gamel up first as a pinch hitter, slow ground ball to the right side... and he beats it out! Matt Carpenter can't get the transfer to the pitcher in time. Mota sacrifice bunts him into scoring position... Robles strikes out, though, so we're down to the last out... Guerrero now... he takes a 1-2 pitch just high for ball two... the next pitch is in the exact same spot and he belts it deep to left! IT'S GONE!!! What a signature Vlad Jr. moment! Ishihara then walks, and Shirah/Maezes both singled, but Cottam hit a ground ball right at Hinds for a 6-4 FC... Now Jared Miller on in the same situation: a 1-run lead, facing a pinch-hitter leading off. Thomas Dillard strikes out. Anderson's ground ball just eludes Mota up the middle, though. AI Mike goes for the switch right there, and goes to Jonathan Holder. Holder's quickly rising on Matheny's list of trusted bullpen arms... he uncorks a wild pitch, putting Anderson at 2nd, but does strike out Hinds. Next is Frisch. On 1-2 he hits a fly ball high and deep to right center... but it dies on the warning track! What a win!


W: Sam Bennerman (4-2) L: Archie Bradley (1-1) S: Jonathan Holder (3)
PotG: Travis Maezes

Absolutely huge win! Huge for Vlad Jr. as well, who has been in a really extended funk. His OPS actually fell below .900 last week, c/f 1.097 last year. Louisville lost today to the Cubs as well, so I can report that for the moment, we have the best record in the National League! That's pretty wild.

We're still five games worse than the AL-leading Las Vegas Scorpions, who have a 12-game win streak at the moment. TBH, if I showed you the stats from this season you'd assume that Vegas was the team being played by a human rather than the AI. They're the only team that has scored more than 500 runs, and they have 619 (that's about 7.5 runs per game!). Bryce Harper is on pace to drive in about 180 runs this year and has probably a 50-50 shot at the Triple Crown. Their pitching staff is actually kinda not good, but it doesn't matter. One of their starters has an ERA above 7 with a winning record anyway!

After the game I also got the alert that that was my 500th win with this franchise! We are 500-382 over 5 and a half seasons which I think I can be proud of.

Game 2 - Jack Flaherty (9-4, 3.62) vs. Jake Arrieta (2-1, 4.67)
SLC: SS Mota, RF Robles, 3B Guerrero, 1B Ishihara, LF Shirah, 2B Maezes, C Cottam, CF Garry, P Flaherty
NYB: CF Anderson, 1B Carpenter, LF Frisch, SS Hinds, RF Dickerson, C Dillard, 2B Walker, 3B Denton, P Arrieta

Jake Arrieta has actually spent most of this year as a minor league reliever. This is his first year with the Burros after 5 years out west with the 66ers and Mariners. Now 37, he missed a bunch of time last season with shoulder and back injuries, and as a result didn't meet the vesting option in his contract. Jake had to settle for a minor league deal here in New York, where he didn't make the team and reported to AAA Lehigh Valley. Finally, though, he got the ball at the end of May for the Burros and has pitched aight... Flaherty picked up his 9th win Saturday against New Orleans, and all 9 wins have come in his last 12 starts (since late April). One of those non-wins, though, was against the Burros at home on May 9, though he only allowed 3 runs in 6.1 innings that day... The Bees got buzzing quickly today. Mota led the game off with a single, and then was held at third on Robles' double to the wall. That turned out to be a smart move when Guerrero hit a ball to the warning track for an easy sac fly. After an Ishi groundout, Shirah hit a ball high, high in the air to right that had just enough carry to get out! 3-0 Bees... Back at it in the second, Cottam led off with a single and scored on Garry's RBI triple. The pitcher Flaherty drew a walk, and Mota's double made the score 6-0 and ended Arrieta's evening rather early. That's six runs in on six hits in 1.0 innings, and only 10 batters faced... good news for us though. Eric Stilwell seemed to stem the tide, retiring all 4 batters he faced... In the 4th, Flaherty reached base again via a single, Robles had another RBI triple, Guerrero's single made it 8-0, and Ishihara's towering, 453 ft. home run made it 10-0... Shirah had another RBI in the 6th, driving Guerrero in from 2nd... I haven't mentioned Flaherty's pitching at all, but that's because he dazzled. 7.1 innings pitched and only 1 hit allowed! He did hit 2 batters, walk 1 and need 110 pitches to do it, but he also racked up his first double-digit strikeout game of the year as well. New York gifted us one more run in the 9th on an error by Matt Carpenter at first, but that's all else that really happened.


W: Jack Flaherty (10-4) L: Jake Arrieta (2-2)
PotG: Jack Flaherty

Masterful from Jack tonight as we keep on rollin'.

That was our last game in the month of June, and what a month it was! We were 20-6 for the month, and increased our division lead from 1 1/2 games to 7 games!

Monthly Awards for June
Batter of the Month:
Austin 3B Chris Antrim - .462, 7 HR, 25 RBI, 32 R, 1.313 OPS, 9 SB. Between Antrim and LF Adam Wesche, the Violets dominated awards picks during the month of June. If Antrim hadn't missed the month of April Austin might be gunning for a playoff spot right now. He displayed an unusually high amount of power this month, while still racking up his usual calling card stats, steals and triples.
Reno RF Koshi Higuchi - .358, 12 HR, 31 RBI, 25 R, .412 OBP. Higuchi had 20 extra-base hits this month, to account for more than half of his overall 38 hits in June. Both he and Silver Sox 2B Brad Martin are likely All-Star starters, but Reno is still awful - 4th-worst record in the NL as I write this, and a 9 game losing streak including some pretty bad opponents like Cleveland and Arizona.

Pitcher of the Month:
Oklahoma SP Shohei Ohtani - 5-0, 1.67 ERA, 51 K, 37.2 innings over 5 starts. Ohtani has won his last 7 outings, in fact, and gone at least 7 innings in all of them while never allowing more than 3 runs and always striking out at least 8 batters. Really dominant stretch from Ohtani, who won the AL MVP in 2018 and 2019 and might be the only guy other than Bryce Harper who can win this year's award. Shohei has already racked up 6.6 total WAR on the season, about evenly split between his two sides of the ball.
San Antonio SP Kyle Marman - 4-0, 1.64 ERA, 28 K, 33 innings over 5 starts. Kind of a dream month for the 26-year-old Marman, who made his first start of the year on June 5 against Portland, in a game the Marshals bullpen blew for him. He won every start after that, though, including a game against us on the 15th in which we nearly erased the big deficit we were in, but only after he left the game.

Rookie of the Month:
New Orleans RF Alexis La Madrid - .327, 11 HR, 28 RBI, 23 R. La Madrid wins his second RotM award, also having won in April. A 27-year-old Cuban defector, La Madrid looks like the player that will be the centerpiece of the first-ever Crescents playoff team, whenever it comes. They're in a tie for the final Wild Card spot at the moment.
San Francisco SP Jeff Huff - 3-0, 2.73 ERA, 32 K, 33 innings over 5 starts. Huff was the Giants' first-round pick in 2021 from Rice University and is already established as a league-average starting pitcher. He didn't pitch this week against us, and it's a good thing since the Giants have won his last four starts.

July 1-2: Bees (53-29) @ Houston Astros (47-37)
The Stros were 16-9 in June, not quite what we were but really good and good enough to establish themselves as at least the division's second best team as the Suns faltered. They're the only team besides us who has won this division, and beat us in the playoffs last year, so this is a cool budding rivalry. This is our third meeting on the year, and the away team has won every game so far. They beat us twice in the second week of the season at home, but we won a pair of games in Houston in mid-May.

Game 1 - Joey Lucchesi (8-4, 3.51) vs. Daniel Clark (5-0, 4.46)
SLC: SS Mota, RF Robles, 3B Guerrero, 1B Ishihara, LF Shirah, 2B Maezes, C Cottam, CF Garry, P Lucchesi
HOU: SS Strumpf, 2B Vaughn, LF Martinez, 1B Olenek, RF Gutierrez, 3B Hartung, C Campbell, CF Jancarski, P Clark

SS Kenen Irizarry and 1B Greg Bird, two players who have given us fits in the past, get the day off since we're throwing a lefty. I imagine we'll see them hit against Gaither tomorrow... Clark has been a bullpen guy most of this year, and this outing represents a rare return to the rotation for him. He pitched in one game in each of the previous two Bees-Astros series, getting a win in our place in the wild 13-11 game we lost. In Houston in May, we beat up on him for 4 runs in a third of an inning, though... Lucchesi is on a roll right now, we've won his last six outings and he's gotten the win in four of them... we started quickly again in this game. Mota walked to lead off, and Robles tripled to put us up within two batters. Guerrero followed with a slow grounder to first that was slow enough to allow Robles to score, 2-0... Guerrero came up a bit short again in the second. We loaded the bases for him with two out but he grounded to second... in their half of the second, a Lucchesi wild pitch put runners at second and third for Jacob Campbell, who tied the game with his two-run single... JD Martinez gave Houston the lead in the 3rd with a two-run homer... in the fifth inning, Cottam smashed a game-tying two run homer onto the train tracks in left-center, a 456-foot blast to make it 4-4... Garry followed with a single, and then Matheny made the surprising move to pinch-hit for Lucchesi, ending his day after 4 innings. Gamel couldn't come through in his place, so Joey will get a no-decision today... Ben Parks allowed a hit and two walks in the 5th but induced a double play that kept the game tied... Daniel Clark was done after 5 innings, so a ND for him too... Sam Bennerman pitched a scoreless 7th, but allowed a first-pitch home run to a pinch-hitting Irizarry leading off the 8th, so we're gonna need some ninth-inning magic once again. On comes Billy Corcoran for the save, a bit surprising. Regular closer Nick Gardewine pitched the last two games, but the Astros were off yesterday just like we were... Corcoran hands out a 4-pitch walk to Shirah leading off. Maezes drops down for a sac bunt, putting the tying run in scoring position... Cottam gets a 1-1 pitch outside at shoulder height and plunks it right over the second baseman's head into center to score Shirah and tie the game! More magic! 5-5! Garry strikes out, though pinch-hitter and former Astro Te'Kwaan Whyte draws the second walk of the inning. Now Mota, who swings at what would have been ball four... and sneaks it just inside the 1st base line! Cottam around to score! Garry flies around from first to score! Mota is into third with a standup triple! What a ninth inning! Corcoran finally gets Robles swinging to end the frame, but we go to the bottom of the ninth up 7-5! Now Miller on for the save for us... Zach Jancarski grounds to short... Greg Bird goes down swinging, and Chase Strumpf is caught looking! Easy-peasy!


W: Sam Bennerman (5-2) L: Billy Corcoran (1-1) S: Jared Miller (18)
PotG: Kole Cottam

This team's got some magic about them, y'all.

Sunday is July 2nd, which means it's international signing day! There were a number of players who my scout thought were undervalued possible superstars, so I splashed a bunch of offers out. We have offers agreed to with OF Allan Hauer (Australia, $2.3 million), 3B Willis Bayona (Panama, $1 million), C Joel Avanzo (Venezuela, $400k), and, weirdly, a pair of Americans, CF Steve McLaren ($700k) and SS Alpha Woody ($500k, and what a name). It's not unheard of for Americans to go abroad and take steps to insert themselves into affiliated baseball at 16 - the Cardinals' Alex Reyes is one example, moving from New Jersey to live with family in the Dominican Republic so he could sign as an IFA - but interesting that two of the players I really liked fit that mold. There was also a really interesting North Korean player, Min-sik Yaung, that my scout adored, but I didn't quite have the budget space for him.

We'll have to wait and see how many of these players we are able to sign - unlikely that I'd get all five, for sure. Hauer is the headliner for me, but OSA vehemently disagrees on his potential. My scout views him as a legit future Triple Crown contender in right field, but OSA really views him as maybe just an average hitter. McLaren as well is somebody that my scout is incredibly high on, grading him at 95 potential on the 20-80 scale in Contact and Avoid K's, so if I could just walk away with those two I'd be really, really happy.

Game 2 - Ray Gaither (1-1, 5.00) vs. Gerrit Cole (5-3, 4.78)
SLC: SS Mota, RF Robles, 3B Guerrero, 1B Ishihara, C Cottam, 2B Maezes, CF Garry, LF Granite, P Gaither
HOU: SS Irizarry, 3B Hartung, RF Gutierrez, LF Martinez, C Posey, 1B Bird, 2B Vaughn, CF Jancarski, P Cole

Gerrit Cole was the Houston starter in the aforementioned 13-11 win they had over us back in April. We got to him in the 3rd inning of that start, scoring 5 runs and knocking him out of the game, but Griffin Canning and the Bees bullpen combined to muck up that five-run lead... Gaither faces his former team for the first time - he was a Rockies draftee that was traded to Houston as a prospect, and made his ML debut for them in 2021. We acquired him from the Stros this past winter along with Whyte in exchange for OF Mike Spooner, who is playing in AAA... both pitchers were in good form early. Both sides had three hits in the first four innings but never had multiple baserunners going... in the fifth, there was a breaking of the ice. Andrew Vaughn ambushed Gaither with a first-pitch HR that would've gotten out even without the Crawford Boxes there. Jancarski and Cole both reached ahead of Kenan Irizarry's two-run triple, and he scored on a sac fly by Tim Hartung to make it 4-0... JD Martinez led off the 6th with another solo shot and that was all for Ray - 5 runs in 5+ innings... Ishihara led off the 7th for us with maybe the perfect plate appearance. He saw 12 pitches, fouled eight of them off and took the other four for balls to reach base. Cottam followed with his 15th home run of the year to get us on the board and within three runs. That'd be it for Cole, going 6+ innings and allowing 2 runs. Our momentum could not be arrested, though, even with Max Scherzer coming in out of the bullpen (it's weird to me every time). Maezes hit a sharp single to right, and then Garry hit a sharp home run to right and we were suddenly within 1. That was Garry's first HR since his debut grand slam... We weren't done, though. Granite followed with another hit, as did Mota, and Robles tied the game on a sac fly. Next was Guerrero, who gave us the lead with a single to score Mota! Wow! I was starting to write this game off but we suddenly led 6-5... after the stretch, Kenen Irizarry reached third base with nobody out by singling and stealing both bags in front of him, but Brad Hand escaped with the lead intact by inducing a popup and 2 Ks... in the top of the eighth, both teams made mistakes on the basepaths. Garry singled but was caught stealing while Granite was at the plate, but Granite reached base safely on a passed ball strikeout! You don't see that too often... pinch-hitter Gamel singled, Mota drove in a run with a single, and then both runners scored on Robles' double making it suddenly 9-5... the Astros clawed 1 back against Holder in the 8th, but the run was one of those ironically unearned ones thanks to Holder's error. Jancarski had the RBI to score Posey... but we were feelin' it at the plate by now, and Granite/Mota each had an RBI single in the 9th. Irizarry's solo HR in the 9th against Paul Goodwin barely mattered.


W: Martin Perez (5-0) L: Max Scherzer (5-4)
PotG: Willie Joe Garry Jr.

This team just knows how to win! It's really remarkable the kind of wins they were able to string together this week. (It should come as no surprise that our Team Chemistry page lists us as "Ecstatic".) We had a total of four come-from-behind wins this week, including two where we came back in the 9th and another where we were down by 5 runs at one point.

I'm hesitant to even talk about it since I've felt like a jinx mentioning winning streaks in this space, but you can see on the standings page just how many consecutive games we've won.

Bees' Player of the Week:
A lot of Bees hitters with nice-looking statlines this week, but my player of the week is 3B Vladimir Guerrero Jr.. One of three Bees with double-digit hits on the week, he also had the clutch hits we needed on Wednesday and Sunday. 10-26, HR, 9 RBI, 3 BB

On the Leaderboard:
Vladimir Guerrero Jr.: 3rd in RBI (77)
Morio Ishihara: T-8th in RBI (70)
Jack Flaherty: T-1st in wins (10), 4th in pitcher WAR (2.8), 4th in innings (109.1), 4th in K/BB (4.9), 4th in BB/9 (1.7), 3rd in WHIP (1.09), 9th in FIP (3.93), 2nd in QS (13)
Joey Lucchesi: 7th in pitcher WAR (2.4), 8th in FIP (3.91)

Minor League Bees:
A difficult week for AAA Hawaii, who went 2-5. Lost series against Lincoln (Thunder) and Fresno (Solons). They're 48-27, 1 game back in the PCL Pacific.
In the AA league, I mistakenly scheduled an All-Star break without an ASG, so a light week for the Cedar City club. They won 3 of 4 against Farmington (Suns) and sit at 47-33, 6 games back of first.
A Burlington was also 2-5 this week, but still have a 5-game lead atop the MWL West. They lost series against Quad Cities (Blackbirds) and Great Lakes (Lynx).
The AZL Rookie Bees were also 2-5, splitting a four-game set with Sacramento but losing their other games against Texas and Cincinnati.
And the PRSL Rookie Bees went 4-2 to even their record at .500, winning 2 of 3 against both Oakland and Memphis.

All-Star Voting Update:
Two weeks to go until the ASG, and there have been a few changes in voting leaders. For us, it's all the same. Guerrero still leads among 3B, and his lead looks a bit more robust this week, and Cottam/Ishihara are second in their positions, not likely to overtake Posey or Bellinger respectively. New leaders:

NL RP: Steven Brault (Thunder) passes Hidekazu Hirose (Colts)
AL SP: Shohei Ohtani (Oilers) passes Noah Syndergaard (Yankees)
AL RP: Graeme Stinson (Cherries) passes Corey Knebel (Lynx)

Standings:



League News:
June 26: A sparkling pitching performance from Miami SP David Peterson, throwing the game of his life in Brooklyn against the Burros. Peterson allowed just two baserunners in a 1-hit shutout, those being a first-inning single and a 6th-inning HBP. The Marlins won 4-0.
June 28: Ottawa RP Michael Feliz gets a two-year extension for $19 million total. The elite Ottawa bullpen is gonna stay strong - they have Andrew Miller, Jandel Gustave, Corey Knebel all under contract through at least next year. The Lynx have the best pitching staff in all of MLB at time of writing and look likely to win the franchise's first division title.
July 1: Rough news from Pittsburgh, as SP Madison Bumgarner will miss the rest of the season. He suffered a partial labrum tear all the way back on April 9 and was expected back within a couple of weeks, but has had a setback that will require season-ending surgery. He finishes his year having made only 3 starts.
July 1: Another masterful pitching performance, this time from Philadelphia's Jimmy Schultz in Montréal against the Monarques. It very easily could've been a perfect game - Schultz faced the minimum 27 batters on the day, allowing one hit (not until the 7th inning) and having a batter reach on an error but erasing them both via double plays.
July 2: West Texas RP Tyler Skulina is done for the season and had Tommy John surgery today. I normally wouldn't mention it with a player this minor, but Skulina is a longtime Bee who we DFA'd on Opening Day when we were in need of a spot on the 40-man roster. He was a big help for us in 2021, making a full year's worth of starts due to injuries elsewhere on the team. He's estimated to not be ready to return until August 2024.
July 2: The Las Vegas Scorpions' 14-game win streak finally comes to an end at home against the 66ers. They lost convincingly 15-4, with San Bernardino's Alex Brewer reaching base 5 times and driving in 4. Brewer, Andrew Benintendi, Juan Soto and Freddy Galvis all homered for the winning 66ers, who are still having a disappointing season but can be happy today.

Players of the Week:
Indianapolis LF Anthony Santander - 11-22, 5 HR, 10 RBI. Indianapolis is 46-40 right now, but that's good enough to tie for first in the weak AL North. Santander has become a pretty desirable player - not a star but an outfielder that most teams would pretty happily take. He's hit safely in 14 straight games and had 2 HR in Saturday's win over Austin.
Omaha RF Grant Witherspoon - 13-25, 3 HR, 13 RBI. We haven't played Omaha since April, despite them being in our division, so I often forget about Thunder players, but Witherspoon is a good one. Acquired from Milwaukee as a rookie in a 2019 deadline deal that saw Miles Mikolas go to the Brewers, Witherspoon had a breakout year last year and is seemingly continuing to improve. We're gonna be playing Omaha a lot in the month of August so you'll see more of him then.

Power Rankings:
Las Vegas has been so good that I was thinking we might not move up this week, but we did! Last week we were #2, but now we're #1!
1. Salt Lake Bees (55-29)
2. Las Vegas Scorpions (60-26)
3. Louisville Colts (56-30)
4. Columbus Explorers (53-33)
5. Oklahoma Oilers (53-33)
56. Boston Red Sox (30-56)
57. Washington Nationals (32-53)
58. Cleveland Indians (32-54)
59. Reno Silver Sox (33-52)
60. Colorado Rockies (27-58)

Next Week: our road trip continues. We've got two games in San Antonio, a makeup game Wednesday in Buffalo, finish the road trip with a pair at Citi Field against the Mets, then return home to face West Texas on the weekend.