Portland Raccoons (ABL)

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by DatCloserKid

Westheim, how do you get head to head stats against teams.
Ex: Loggers vs Raccoons

By manually keeping track of them since the league's inception with an Excel sheet. That's where I keep track of no-hitters and similar feats as well.

This here is shrunk to unreadability so it doesn't break the width of the page, but actually it works pretty good.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (55-46) vs. Knights (43-58) – July 30-August 1, 1993

The Knights were not hitting much, they weren’t pitching very good, and while they had a few stars on the roster, like SP Carlos Asquabal, they did not have all too much, and even Asquabal was dragging himself along this season with a 5.05 ERA. He was scheduled for game 2.

First up was Pat Cherry, however, whose ERA was thrice that of Miguel Lopez. Baseball has a tendency to surprise you in this situation. Appropriately, the Knights put two runs on Lopez in the top of the first inning, including a Michael Root home run. It was Root’s 15th of the year. The Knights’ luck ran out quickly, though. The Raccoons fans would enjoy seeing the rare feat of having two players on their team having a multi-home run game. First, Mark Allen slugged a game-tying 2-run home run in the bottom 2nd, and then the go-ahead home run, a solo shot, in the fourth. Lopez held the Knights in check, while enjoying additional support from Neil Reece, who hit a 2-shot in the fifth, and a solo home run in the seventh. Daniel Hall added a home run of his own. 7-2 ahead, what could go wrong? Once Lopez left after the seventh, everything. Matthews, Vela, and West combined to surrender six runs in the final two innings. Raccoons fans left the park shell shocked. 8-7 Knights. Reece 3-5, 2 HR, 3 RBI; Allen 3-4, 2 HR, 3 RBI; Lopez 7.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 7 K;

Grant West has become completely unglued, which seems fitting. Why should anybody on this team hold up anything? Everything was bound to go to hell, so be it. We were just ahead of the trade deadline, but I had no idea, whom we should even send away. All suckers gone, we can’t even fill a lineup.

For the time being, Albert Matthews was demoted to AAA and Gabriel De La Rosa was called up to make his debut. The 22-yr old Cuban had dominated AAA since being promoted to there late in 1991. We had picked him 33rd overall in the supplemental round of the 1989 draft. His devastating splitter better work in the majors, too.

Game 2, bottom 1st, the Raccoons loaded the bases with a hit, a walk, and a hit batter, then brought up Neil Reece with no outs. Reece took Asquabal so deep, the ball was barely measureable. GRAND SLAM NEIL REECE!! That was Reece’s 15th shot of the year. The luckless Carlos Asquabal ended up not getting any outs, and was battered for six runs in what amounted to 0.0 innings pitched. Allen added a 2-run home run in the bottom 2nd for an 8-0 lead in support of Raimundo Beato. How could they blow that up? With two infield singles and a Tom Nicks error among a few clean hits, they even went out to a 12-1 lead after three innings. How could you blow this up? Well, you could have Beato pitch, who walked in two runs in a 3-run fourth. Beato had a horrible game, walking six men in the 5.2 innings I could stand his sight. De La Rosa made his debut right there. His first big league batter was 3B Tony Díaz, who grounded out to second base. The bullpen failed to blow the sizeable lead this time around, and the Raccoons romped to a 15-4 mauling of the Knights. All positional starters of the Raccoons had multi-hit games! O’Morrissey 2-5, BB; Higgins 2-4, BB; Allen 2-3, 2 BB, HR, 4 RBI; Reece 2-6, HR, 4 RBI; Hall 2-3, 3 BB; Quinn 2-5, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Adams 2-4, RBI; Rodriguez 4-5, 2B, 4 RBI; Proctor 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K;

Neil Reece and Mark Allen, who was promoted to the #5 slot in the order now, continued to glow bright white. Game 3 saw O-Mo and Lopez get on ahead of Reece, who tripled into the gap in right center, followed up by Allen’s 10th homer. 4-0 for Saito. Through five, Saito 1-hit the Knights and the Raccoons were up 6-0, with Neil Reece only lacking the four-baser for a cycle. He came up in the bottom 6th with Lopez on second base and no outs. Fans were antsy, and while Reece made audible contact, the ball didn’t go up at all and fell into shallow center for a single. With runners on the corners and no outs, the Raccoons didn’t score. As good as Saito had been – seven shutout innings and three hits at the plate – everything went wrong in the eighth with two soft singles and then a 2-run triple by Díaz that knocked out Saito. Martinez allowed Díaz to score, soiling Saito’s line further. Reece struck out in his AB in the eighth, while Allen homered to make it 7-3. Burnett remained in from the eighth to finish the game, but loaded the bases with two out and Díaz coming up. We sent in Daniel Miller, and Díaz was replaced with the lefty Jim Cutler. Miller struck him out. 7-3 Raccoons. A. Lopez 2-4, 2B, RBI; Reece 4-5, 3B, 2B, 2 RBI; Allen 2-5, 2 HR, 3 RBI; Saito 7.1 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 6 K, W (7-11) and 3-4, 2B;

Raccoons (57-47) @ Aces (53-53) – August 2-4, 1993

The Aces had their pitching in place, ranking 2nd in runs allowed in the Continental League, but their offense didn’t keep up. In many ways, their results mirrored ours.

Luckless 2-11 Jason Turner had the bad luck to face Manuel Movonda (10-4, 2.52 ERA) in the opener. Turner’s only hope against the uttlery dominant Movonda, who was on a good pace to reach 200 K’s this season, was to shut out the Aces – which he didn’t. He allowed one measly run over seven innings – and trailed. The Raccoons didn’t get anything going against Movonda. Their best bet then came in the top 8th, where Vinson led off with a double, which was about as far as the Raccoons had come so far in this game: second base. Hall pinch-hit for Turner and singled into shallow center. The tying run was at third base now. Salazar in the leadoff spot was up next, and sent a vicious grounder to short, where it glanced off Manuel Gomez’ glove and Vinson scored, taking Turner off the hook. Movonda collapsed as Lopez drove in a run, and Reece worked a bases-loaded walk. A Jose Sotelo wild pitch also came to help the Raccoons forge a 5-run inning en route to a 5-1 win. Salazar 2-5, RBI; Hall (PH) 1-1; Turner 7.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 4 K, W (3-11) and 1-2;

Jason Turner had not won a game since April 23, then against the Knights, also a 5-1 victory. In this stretch he had surrendered more than three runs only three times in 17 games. Now that that streak is over, maybe he can win a few more?

That was it for good news. The bad news on this day had Marvin Ingall suffer a fractured thumb in the clubhouse after the game. He will be out for seven weeks, which could almost end his season. Esteban Baldivía was called up. That clashed badly with my only-one-first-baseman mantra, but Glenn Adams wasn’t doing a lot and I wanted to see how Baldivía would do after getting mildly hot in AAA.

Game 2. Two control/groundball pitchers and strong defenses made for a quick game. Scott Wade pitched a 4-hit shutout through six and was pinch-hit for in the top 7th, when the Raccoons had the bases loaded and two out in a scoreless game. Hall grounded out to short. Vela pitched two shutout innings, while Rafael Espinoza blanked the Raccoons on four hits through eight frames. Still scoreless, the game saw Neil Reece hit a leadoff single in the top 9th. Allen struck out, and Baldivía came up. With no left-handed bats left, Baldivía batted and shot an RBI triple into the corner in deep right. Vinson doubled in Baldivía, and eventually scored on a wild pitch, as the Aces bullpen again couldn’t stop the rolling stone once it had overcome it’s inertia. Grant West entered in the bottom 9th with a 3-0 lead. His first pitch was converted into a howling line drive double by Edward Carter, but West surrendered the next three batters. 3-0 Raccoons. Baldivía 2-4, 3B, 2B, RBI; Vinson 2-3, BB, 2B, RBI; Wade 6.0 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K; Vela 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, W (2-0);

This was Esteban Baldivía’s first major league RBI. It may be considered an important one, too.

Also, the Thunder had beaten the Canadiens twice already in their series, and we were only 1.5 games out now. Keep winning, boys!

Winning would entail giving Miguel Lopez a bit better backup in his start in game 3. We faced Jou Hara, at 6-10 and a 2.90 ERA somewhat like the Aces’ Jason Turner. Jorge Salazar’s leadoff triple led to a run in the first inning, but the Aces came back in time, in the bottom 2nd. Two infield singles helped them tie the game. With two out, Lopez faced Hara, who had two runners on, and doubled to left. Kinnear threw out the second runner, Claudio Garcia, at the plate, but the Aces led, 2-1. Pitcher-on-pitcher duels however had their own thrill in this game. Hara was about out of the top 4th with two out and nobody on when Lopez came to bat, but he singled to right. Salazar walked and O’Morrissey grounded to the mound. Hara threw wildly past first base, O-Mo was awarded second base, and the game was tied as Lopez was pushed home. Unfortunately, Mark Allen flew out to end the inning. The Aces struck right back, placing their first four men on base in the bottom 4th. While they left two on, they led 4-2 now against Lopez. Baldivía however took care of that with his first major league home run, a 2-piece in the top 5th. Back and forth, always back and forth. The tie didn’t remain in place for long. Neil Reece socked a 2-piece in the top 6th, getting Lopez into the lead again. Lopez left after six so-so innings, but the backup was much better this time, as the bullpen held on to his 14th win of the year, although a crumbling Grant West surrendered another run in the ninth. 7-5 Coons. Reece 3-5, HR, 2 RBI; Quinn 2-5, 2B; Baldivía 2-4, HR, 2 RBI; Kinnear 2-5, 2B, RBI; De La Rosa 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K;

The Canadiens salvaged a 2-0 win in Oklahoma in their game 3, keeping the gap at 1.5 games. Our next homestand will be key, facing both the third-place Loggers and the first-place Canadiens in four games each.

Raccoons (60-47) vs. Loggers (56-52) – August 5-8, 1993

A 2-out, 2-run double by Jim Stein put the Raccoons and “Pooky” Beato down 2-0 in the first inning of the opener. It took five innings for the Raccoons to rally from that, but they tied the game in the fifth, 2-2. They also left the bases loaded in that fifth inning when Vinson struck out. Beato left in the 2-2 tie after seven, and the Raccoons only barely scratched a run together in the bottom 8th, a 2-out RBI infield single by Salazar with a bang-bang play at first. With West being shaky anyway and pitching two days straight, Juan Martinez was sent out to protect the 3-2 lead in the ninth, which he accomplished, although not without making Neil Reece run and make an awesome catch in deep dead center. 3-2 Raccoons. O’Morrissey 2-5, 2B; A. Lopez 2-4; Vinson 2-3, BB, 2B; Beato 7.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 5 K;

Beato’s runs were unearned due to a passed ball on David Vinson in that first inning. Good thing I forgot to mention him throwing out two base stealers in a game against the Aces, so he will get no major scolding here.

Game 2. Out of the blue, Rafael Garcia (13-4, 2.97 ERA) had become a wildly successful pitcher. The Loggers’ first round pick from 1985, he had never been better than average in his career, but this year was dealing a hotter sauce than usual. His walks were still way up there, almost 3.5 per nine innings. He faced Saito, who surrendered a solo home run to 1B Drake Evans in the second inning. Garcia surrendered … nothing. He held the Raccoons as short as one could, and survived the bases loaded in the bottom 2nd (Saito made the final out himself) and got out of the bottom 7th with a Vinson double play. Saito went eight frames, got zero love from his team, and the Raccoons would have lost after Miller surrendered a run in the ninth, if not for the awful battery combo of closer Raúl Perez and catcher Miguel Vela in the bottom 9th. Perez walked Alejandro Lopez and Daniel Hall, while in between Reece got Lopez forced out at second base. With one out, a wild pitch advanced the runners, and Allen grounded to second base to score Reece. Quinn was 0-2 behind with two out, when Vela had a low pitch get away and Hall blitzed home to tie the game. Quinn then flew out on the next pitch for extra innings. Perez walked two more in the bottom 10th, enough to bring up Lopez again, who ended the game with a fiery rocket way over the wall in right field – WALKOFF HOME RUN!! 5-2 Raccoons! A. Lopez 1-4, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Saito 8.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 7 K; Vela 1.2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, W (3-0);

We had more runs (5) than hits (4) in this game, thanks to the awful Raúl Perez. Please pitch him more often against us. Pleeease. Also, the Canadiens lost 6-3 in New York. We were in striking distance now!

With our seventh consecutive win, we could not only catch the Canadiens with win #8 in game 3 – we could also achieve something epic: the Raccoons in their 17th season could stop being a losing franchise for the first time since Opening Week in 1977!! It was on Jason Turner to get things done.

Jason Turner started out by being shelled by left-handers for two runs in the top 1st, but the Raccoons put their first four men on against Martin Garcia to tie the game in the bottom 1st (and leaving two in scoring position). Although the Raccoons scored two more runs in the third inning, Turner almost didn’t qualify for the win. In an abysmal start he needed over 100 pitches for five innings and just barely clung on to a 4-3 lead with Gates Golunski starving two men in scoring position by nailing a pitch from Turner directly in front of home plate, which Jose Rodriguez easily made into the final out in the top 5th. Rodriguez in turn left the dishes full in the bottom 5th. The game remained exciting. Daniel Miller entered with me hoping he could cover two innings, but he could barely cover one. He walked the #7/8 guys to start things, then got a lucky grounder to O-Mo for a force out at third base, and only then struck out the #1/2 batters. Back-to-back homers by Glenn Adams and O-Mo made it a 6-3 game in the bottom 6th. More breathing room! Proctor faced three men in the seventh, Martinez three in the eighth, West came in for the ninth, up by three. The scoreboard flashed “Let’s get even!” as he made his warm up tosses. Miguel Vela got on with one out and was on second base when West faced the slugger Cristo Ramirez. The 1-1 pitch was lined into center, Neil Reece came on – and made the catch! 6-3 Raccoons! O’Morrissey 2-5, HR, RBI; Reece 2-4, RBI; Allen 2-4, 2 RBI; Kinnear (PH) 1-1; Adams 1-2, HR, RBI;

“WE’RE EVEN!!!” was jingling on the scoreboard as the Raccoons, having won eight in a row, came pouring from their holes and huddled each other in a huge furry ball off happiness on the mound. We were no longer a losing franchise, for the first time in over 16 years. After 2,702 regular season games, the Raccoons are back to .500!! Oh the joy …!!

We didn’t catch the Canadiens that day, though, since they held on to a 6-5 lead to beat the Crusaders.

One more against the Loggers to complete a Loggers-from-competition-removing sweep, and Scott Wade would be tasked to protect our winning streak and our recently established not-losing-anymore status. Wade was mildly electric early on with six strikeouts in the first four innings, before gliding over into his other mode, where he made them hit groundball after groundball. Meanwhile, the Raccoons failed to score, with Reece leaving the bags full in the third, and the fifth. Lopez popped out with one out before Reece in the latter instance. Wade working a 1-out walk against Scott Murphy in the bottom 7th helped generate a run, finally, when Salazar also got on, and O-Mo drove in Wade with a single. Alejandro Lopez made it back-to-back innings with inning-ending double plays then. Emilio Román reached base for the Loggers in the top 8th and was on third base with two out and Drake Evans coming up, a left-hander. Wade could use relief from Burnett, I decided. The Loggers countered with a right-handed pinch-hitter, Serafim Laborinhos, a rather mediocre batter. Burnett put in two strikes, then surrendered a single that went just past Salazar at short. The game was tied again, and the Raccoons left the bases loaded once more in the bottom 8th when Kinnear popped out with one out, and Hall struck out. Would this sorry collection of batless omnivores actually turn their all time record into the plus column DESPITE not hitting crap in this game? Well, the Loggers sent in Raúl Perez. He got Salazar, before he faced O-Mo, who fired Perez’ second shot into the stands behind left field. WALK OFF!!!! 2-1 Raccoons!! Salazar 3-4, BB; O’Morrissey 3-5, HR, 2 RBI; Wade 7.2 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 K;

The Canadiens’ Ruben Prado was clobbered in time in the final game in New York, and the Canadiens lost, 7-0.

Tee-hee. (grins fiendishly)

In other news

August 2 – OCT RF/LF Vonne Calzado (.318, 4 HR, 45 RBI) has suffered a torn hamstring and will be out for up to four weeks.
August 3 – WAS 1B Fred Rodgers (.324, 7 HR, 39 RBI) goes 2-3 as the Capitals beat the Gold Sox, 8-4. It is the 20th consecutive game in which he has hit safely.
August 3 – As the Knights are dissected 15-4 for the second time in a few days, this time by the Loggers, while MIL OF Gates Golunski (.270, 6 HR, 46 RBI) goes 5-6 with a triple, two doubles, and 4 RBI. He narrowly misses the cycle by the home run.
August 4 – Chronic back soreness will keep IND RF/LF Raúl Vázquez (.244, 13 HR, 52 RBI) out of the game for two weeks.
August 6 – The Buffaloes trump the Capitals 11-4, and also own Fred Rodgers, whose hitting streak ends at 21 games.
August 8 – IND SP Jesus Lopez (3-9, 4.07 ERA) 2-hits the Titans as the Indians win 2-0.

Complaints and stuff

1,352 - 1,351 ... LOSER TEAM NO MORE!!!!!!

Neil Reece was named Batter of the Month in the Continental League for July, batting .366 with 8 HR and 24 RBI, and also racked up Player of the Week honors for the week ending with the Knights series for batting 13-25 with 6 HR and 17 RBI. You could hardly have more success at the plate in any given week.

How big is Neil Reece for this team? Let’s say it this way: in this first week in August, he had 6.9 WAR assembled for the season. There is NO OTHER PLAYER – pitcher or batter – within even 1.5 WAR of that mark in either league. VAN SP Arnold McCray’s 5.4 WAR are closest to him. He ranks top 3 in all triple crown categories (but has no shot due to VAN Salvador Mendez and MIL Cristo Ramirez hitting in the .380 range).

I can’t remember the last time a Raccoon managed to pick off a runner from first – must have been a season or two. We managed that twice in this update, with Proctor and Beato getting people sent off.

The following stats show Baldivía not on the roster. The reason is: he isn’t. When I designated Sixto Moreno for assignment, I forgot to waive him, and now his designation was up, but since he hadn’t cleared waivers I couldn’t demote him and YES, I actually AM that dumb.

-.-

[Questdog]

Well, this is nice.....

I had a rough week and these little furballs cheered me up!

Thanks and congrats on losing your official Loser status!

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by Questdog

I had a rough week and these little furballs cheered me up!

The critters and me are glad we were helpful. Here's to things coming up heads again (hopefully):

Raccoons (64-47) vs. Canadiens (63-47) – August 9-12, 1993

We should better not blow this series. I wouldn’t mind extending that 9-game winning streak, right here. It would however not be easy to survive the Canadiens’ onslaught. Winning three of four actually would already be rather swell. They were outscoring us by 94 runs at this point, ranking 1st in the Continental Leauge (POR: 6th).

Miguel Lopez and Arnold McCray went out in the opener, perhaps the best matchup already that this series would see, although McCray had taken a few beatings recently and his ERA had bloomed from 3.05 at the end of June all the way to 4.06 entering this game. For Lopez, things went very wrong very quickly. Between a leadoff walk, a passed ball on Vinson, a hit batter, and a double the Canadiens scored two runs in the top 1st. That was before McCray took the mound, and he was battered for three runs in the bottom 1st. Sadly, the Raccoons failed to hold on to that 3-2 lead, neither did they extend it. Lopez was taken deep by SS Kelly Carpenter to tie the game in the fourth, and fell 4-3 behind in the sixth. The Raccoons missed a few chances. In the bottom 8th then, Higgins lined into right with two out, then went to third on Kinnear’s single. Vinson grounded to right, but neither 2B Bob Edwards nor 1B Salvador Mendez made the play and Higgins scored, the game was tied again. Hall pinch-hit for Tony Vela, but grounded out. The top 9th saw Juan Martinez put on the first two batters, before Michael McFarland’s grounder hit Yoshinobu Ishizaki for the latter to be called out on runner’s interference, essentially saving Martinez’ furry bottom. The Raccoons walked off in the bottom of the inning mostly due to even more fools’ luck: Salazar hit a clean single and advanced on O’Morrissey’s groundout. Alejandro Lopez’ grounder was not played well and became an infield single, before Neil Reece grounded through Carpenter, who had made a wrong step. Salazar scored, 5-4 Raccoons! Salazar 3-5, 2B; A. Lopez 3-5, 2 2B; Reece 2-5, 2B, 3 RBI; Higgins 3-4, RBI; Vela 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K;

Jackie Lagarde came off the DL, sending Gabriel De La Rosa back to AAA. His debut had been very fine, nevertheless.

Game 2 went even more wrong even quicker. Raimundo Beato was impaled for four runs in the first inning, where on top of all O-Mo was ejected for arguing strike three. The Raccoons were set up for a long day here, as the Canadiens stole bags against Vinson at will (5 for 5), and makeshift starter Dave Beck dominated them. Glenn Adams hit a solo home run in the third, the Raccoons’ first hit of the game, and they scored two runs in the sixth, finally knocking out Beck, but still trailed 4-3. The bullpen survived a Christian Proctor outing in the eighth that put two men on with no outs thanks to Jackie Lagarde coming off the DL with a sharp arm and striking out two en route to escaping the inning unharmed. Bottom 9th: Quinn’s leadoff double put the tying run on second base. Vinson walked, Adams flew out, and Higgins pinch-hit in the #9 slot. He singled to right, Quinn and Vinson both tried to get that extra base, and the Canadiens only got to Vinson at third – Quinn tied the game. Extra innings were upon us, where Juan Martinez instantly blew the game with a leadoff walk and a Raúl Solís RBI triple. The Furballs didn’t score in the bottom half, ending their winning streak, and setting up another battle for the division lead in game 3. 5-4 Canadiens. Quinn 2-4, 2B, RBI; Adams 2-4, HR, RBI; Higgins (PH) 1-1, RBI; Lagarde 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

Game 3 saw no-hit bids developed by both Kisho Saito and Vernon Robertson. Saito’s came apart first, in the top 5th with two out, when LF Orlando Penn lined into shallow left, uncatchable for anybody. Glenn Adams broke up Robertson’s in turn in the bottom 5th with one out and Allen on first base. Allen went to third, presenting the first genuine chance for anybody to score in the game to Alejandro Lopez, who fouled out. With backup catcher Jose Rodriguez batting, chances to score sunk – but for a passed ball on Javier Salcido on Robertson’s first pitch. Allen hustled home, 1-0 Coons. The Canadiens tied the game right back – on an Adams error and wild pitch by Saito. It was one of those facepalm games, obviously. O-Mo’s leadoff jack in the bottom 6th represented the first non-fluke run in the game, and the Coons took a 3-1 lead in the inning. It was far from over, with Roland Moore homering off Saito in the seventh, 3-2, and Saito barely stalling the tying run in Penn on third base. Miller and Burnett hobbled through the eighth with the tying run in scoring position, while the Raccoons offense failed to kick in again. West had no cushion in the ninth, but managed to get through 1-2-3. Oh, hell, yes!! 3-2 Raccoons!! O’Morrissey 2-3, HR, RBI; Saito 7.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 6 K, W (8-11);

I don’t usually post box scores, but this one illustrates very well what kind of game it was, one of scratching and clawing, and our beloved omnivores were just better equipped for the clawing game.

VAN – 0 0 0 – 0 0 1 – 1 0 0 – 2 5 0
POR – 0 0 0 – 0 1 2 – 0 0 X – 3 4 2

It could also well be the deciding game of the season, since it assures us to keep the recently-conquered division lead past this series. On another note, Esteban Baldivía was back for Sixto Moreno, who was finally assigned to AAA.

There was still one game left against the cross-border pests, started by Jason Turner. Doug Hill stole his way first-to-third against a hapless Vinson in the first inning to score on a sac fly and we trailed yet again. Turner started the third with a leadoff walk to pitcher Manny Ramos, and Vancouver loaded the bags with no outs before Turner wiggled out with a K and a double play started by Matt Higgins. Turner in turn (oh, that pun hurts) doubled to lead off the bottom 3rd, and the Raccoons also loaded them up with no outs. Alejandro Lopez never got a chance to hit a slam since Ramos’ first pitch to him was wild and past catcher Edgardo Ramos for the tying run to score. Lopez hit a sac fly, which was all the Raccoons did, but they led 2-1 now. Offense died for good at this point as neither team amounted to much in the middle innings and Turner and Ramos just clicked off batters. In the top 8th, Turner put a man on second base with one out and was removed for Lagarde, who conserved the fragile 2-1 lead. Grant West got good ground balls in the ninth, but Baldivía dropped a throw from O-Mo, making fans howl in horror. But it was all good: West did not surrender anything countable and the Raccoons survived this 1-run game as well. 2-1 Furballs! Turner 7.1 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 3 K, W (5-11);

The amount of games in which he have only four or five hits is getting alarmingly high again (four in this), but at least we distanced the Elks to 2.5 games. Hhew!!

Raccoons (67-48) @ Gold Sox (58-55) – August 13-15, 1993

Neil Reece really needed a day off in this long stretch of continuous play, and got it in game 1 against the Gold Sox, who were hanging on, 2.5 games out in second place, in the free-for-all FL West despite not scoring a lot (477 runs to the Raccoons’ 504) and a really sub-par pitching staff (9th in starters’ ERA, 11th in bullpen ERA). We would encounter Kiyohira Sasaki once again, who has pitched very well against us in several postseasons, in game 2.

Scott Wade did not match up too well with the Gold Sox lineup, which broke him up by the sixth inning. He had fallen 2-0 behind early on, and the Raccoons had just clawed their way back into a tie in the top 6th, when Tom Oliver’s 2-run homer ended Wade’s day. The Raccoons were easily dominated by Kevin Williams (9-8, 4.49) in another pathetic offensive outing. In the top 8th they had the bases loaded but Mark Allen made a poor final out and sealed the deal. Closer Cory Maupin was not to be touched. 4-2 Gold Sox. Quinn 3-3, 2B, RBI; Baldivía (PH) 1-1;

We had only six hits, this is getting serious again.

Now for Sasaki (8-8, 3.53 ERA). The Raccoons got a run in against him in the first, but the bottom of the inning showcased David Vinson’s defense … negatively. He failed to prevent a steal, made a throwing error, and was charged with a passed ball, as the Gold Sox took a 2-1 lead. The Raccoons flailed hopelessly against Sasaki into the sixth. Still 2-1 behind, Allen in the #8 slot had runners on the corners with one out – and popped out. No, we have to score here – Miguel Lopez was pinch-hit for with O’Morrissey, who had a day off at third base. O-Mo shoved a single into right, scoring Daniel Hall from third. Not only did they take Lopez off the hook, Matt Higgins even got him ahead with an RBI single up the middle. The Raccoons would get another big 2-out PH performance from Glenn Adams in the eighth, with an RBI double to score Baldivía from first base. And yet, it was all for crap. Juan Martinez came in for the bottom 8th, walked the first two, and all spun out of control into a 3-run inning. Raccoons lost, 5-4 Gold Sox. Higgins 2-4, BB, RBI; Baldivía 2-2, 2 BB; O’Morrissey (PH) 1-1, RBI; Adams (PH) 1-1, 2B, RBI; Miller 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K;

Vinson and Martinez ****ed this one pretty well. Thankfully the Canadiens lost as well, keeping us 1.5 ahead.

Game 3. Beato against Lázaro Alba and his 6.08 ERA. Scratch singles by Vinson and Beato with two out in the top 2nd drove in Baldivía and Kinnear for an early 2-0 lead, which Beato blew instantly in the bottom 2nd. Agony began to settle in again. Top 6th: Neil Reece led off and got a 3-0 pitch right where he liked it, nailing it for a leadoff triple. In a 2-2 game, that has to be your lead. It wasn’t. Lopez and Baldivía popped out, and Kinnear whiffed. How could they not … SIX OH EIGHT ERA!!!! Alba remained in the game starting the eighth, and finally somebody whacked him. Higgins led off with a single, and O-Mo hit an RBI triple breaking up the tie. The Gold Sox did not pitch to Reece, instead going after the suckers behind him, but Lopez this time managed to be remotely useful with an RBI single to right. Alba was knocked out and the Coons scored four runs in the inning. Burnett came out for the bottom 9th with a 6-2 lead and managed to get Grant West into the game with a single to Jesus Garcia and a homer to Avery Johnson, and no outs registered. West shrugged the Gold Sox off with ease and three easy plays for the defense. Not even Vinson managed to blow this one, and Martinez had been left locked up in the clubhouse. 6-4 Coons. Reece 1-2, 2 BB, 3B; Baldivía 2-4, 2B, RBI; Vinson 1-2, BB, 2 RBI; Beato 8.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 4 K, W (9-5) and 1-4, RBI;

In other news

August 11 – LF/RF Mito Kamida, a 24-year old former international discovery from Japan and now in the Rebels organization, announces his retirement after a freak accident in the weight room shatters his ankle into a million pieces. Kamida was rehabbing just exactly from a fractured ankle at the time. Kamida had 29 AB’s for the Rebels in 1992, going .207 with a home run and three RBI’s.
August 13 – LAP SP Greg Cain (11-7, 3.38 ERA) will miss several starts with a sprained ankle.
August 14 – RIC OF/1B Gabriel Cruz (.252, 12 HR, 51 RBI) smacks a 2-run home run off Oklahoma City’s Luis De Jesus, as the Rebels win 4-1, for his 300th career home run. He is the second player to reach the mark, trailing all time leader Mark Dawson by only four home runs now.
August 14 – Never-a-Coon SWF SP Bill Smith (8-11, 4.05) has torn his UCL and will require Tommy John surgery. Whether he will be able to stage a comeback at age 36 then has to be seen.
August 15 – LAP SP Bastyao Caixinha (13-8, 3.25 ERA) 3-hits the Loggers in a 1-0 pitchers’ duel against Scott Murphy.

Complaints and stuff

Alejandro Lopez wants a new contract. Well, his OBP is way under .300, which is certainly not a great way to market yourself. He was on the minimum this year after signing a minor league contract in May. His power is sweet, but he’s not really #3 hole material, as I have to realize now. I have no idea how to set up the outfield for next year. Daniel Hall also wants to continue his career. (winces)

Both Lopez and Allen are horrible once you look past their home run numbers. Instead of reverting to his old self, Allen is repeating his horrible season in Salem from last year. Not looking good here, since he has another year on his contract.

On the other hand, Baldivía is lighting it up more now. Not on the big ball board. But is average has come up very well, and now he has to show that he can maintain that. Glenn Adams is no auto-defeat for Baldivía, despite me not liking him a whole lot. He’s batting .250, but has decidedly more pop than Baldivía at this point.

And what does Tetsu Osanai have with the Pacifics? I can tell you what he does not have: playing time. He has SEVEN at-bats since the trade, and no hits. Well, like I said, the Pacifics management really has to be shot and quartered for accepting that trade. Thinking of it, shot and quartered is too good for them.

Not that I am complaining from a Portlander’s viewpoint.

On OBP's, David Vinson's .404 mark is massively fake. He has been batting in the #8 hole for most of the last few months and is absorbing a lot of intentional walks. I can't tell how many of his 58 walks were intentional, but I'd guess up to one third of them.

As a side note, the scoring pattern in the ABL has shifted the last few years. The Federal League used to score quite a bit more, up to .4 ER/G in the early years of the league, and in the .1 ER/G range in the mid-to-late 80s. Last season, the CL had a higher ERA than the FL for the second time in history (4.00 to 3.94; the other time was in 1988, the last year before the mound was lowered, I think, 3.70 to 3.60), and this season the difference is really significant, with the CL clocking in at 3.99 ER/G to the FL’s 3.82. Times are changing, but the Raccoons are not responsible. We score significantly less than in previous years of our 1989-ongoing dynasty, although we have recovered a fair bit from that 4.0 R/G mark we posted in June/July.

Oh, and one more thing. Somebody, I won’t tell who, has 499 of something for his career, but I won’t tell of what. It’s not a big mystery, though.

[Orcin]

Originally Posted by Westheim

And what does Tetsu Osanai have with the Pacifics? I can tell you what he does not have: playing time. He has SEVEN at-bats since the trade, and no hits. Well, like I said, the Pacifics management really has to be shot and quartered for accepting that trade. Thinking of it, shot and quartered is too good for them.

I wonder what motivates the AI to make trades like this. I don't think it is just programmed to be nice to us, so it must have seen value in the deal. So why not play the guy?

[Westheim]

Raccoons (68-50) vs. Blue Sox (42-76) – August 16-18, 1993

The Blue Sox dynasty of the mid-to-late 80s had come to an end some time ago. By now, this team had zero hitting, zero pitching, and certainly little fanfare about it. That ABL ranked SP Dennis Fried, a Raccoon castaway, as their fourth best player, had to count for something.

Kisho Saito lost the opener because he basically couldn’t get anybody out. He went seven innings without any strikeouts. It cost him an early 2-0 lead in the fifth inning, when the Blue Sox landed several base hits against him in 2-strike counts, plating three runs. The Raccoons were physically, mentally, and willingly unable to stem against that weakest of tides, and another run was charged against the useless dirt stain Proctor in the eighth. 4-2 Blue Sox. O’Morrissey 2-3, BB; Salazar 2-4, 2B; Baldivía 2-4;

A 2-12 Javier Macias with an ERA just shy of six faced the Raccoons in game 2, and surrendered one hit while striking out four in the first three innings. Jason Turner at least matched the zeroes until he was blown up in the fourth inning with three runs. O’Morrissey, Reece, and Lopez loaded the bases with singles in the bottom 4th, nobody out. Baldivía singled, before luck run out and Kinnear killed the inning with a double play. Turner went seven innings with three runs, like Saito, but was less unlucky in that a 2-out RBI double by O-Mo in the bottom 7th took him off the hook. It took the Raccoons eight innings to get Macias out of the game, when Kinnear drove in the go-ahead run in the bottom 8th with an RBI double. Since the Coons enjoyed to leave runners on third base, they left Kinnear there in that inning, and Grant West came in with no cushion, facing the bottom of the order in C Miguel Castillo, SS Izumo Sasaki, who had hit a 2-run triple in the fourth, and replacement RF Lawrence Meehan. None of them with power, none for a meaningful average higher than .252 – that was West’s task to collect save #500. Castillo grounded to Higgins for the first out. Sasaki walked. West then struck out Meehan. CF Russ Cote was 0-4 on the day in the leadoff spot, and slapped a 2-0 pitch into the ground roughly five feet in front of the plate. Vinson got to it and converted to first. 4-3 Raccoons. O’Morrissey 3-4, 2B, RBI; Baldivía 3-4, RBI; West 1.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K, SV (34), career SV (500);

Team mates ran out to huddle West, who had become just the second pitcher to save 500 games in ABL history (joining Andres Ramirez), while the fans stood and applauded for minutes. If there had been two rocks on the Raccoons’ roster the last 12 to 13 years, it had been Hall in left and West to close. Both rocks were slowly being eroded by the sands of time.

While we didn’t face Dennis Fried in this series, we faced Jose Fernandez, another Raccoon castaway, in game 3. He was a horrid 5-15 with a 6.00 ERA. Still, the Blue Sox struck first, in the third inning with two runs against Scott Wade on an RBI double by Horace Henry (who pulled something and had to be replaced) and a throwing error by Higgins. The Raccoons scrambled awkwardly to get back into a tie through the fourth, but required a wild pitch by Fernandez to move Baldivía to third base in the fourth inning, from where he scored on Quinn’s sac fly. Baldivía and Quinn worked together again in similar manner in the sixth inning, where Quinn scored the newcomer on an RBI single with two down. Cote, making the historic out last night, then punished me for leaving Wade in the game in the eighth with a leadoff home run, tying the game. The Blue Sox similarly left in Fernandez, and were promptly punished when he gave up another run. With one out, the Raccoons had two in scoring position, but both Vinson and Kinnear struck out. Despite hitting a batter, the “Demon” didn’t rest long on 500 saves and made it 501. 4-3 Raccoons. Reece 2-4; Baldivía 2-3, BB; Quinn 2-3, 3 RBI; Vinson 2-3, BB;

That’s a series against the worst team in baseball without beating up their terrible pitching, and with two barely won games. Wow, let’s hope we don’t face a real team any time soon!

Thankfully, the Canadiens lost two of three against Cincy and we gained a game despite failing to outscore the miserable Blue Sox.

Raccoons (70-51) @ Crusaders (50-71) – August 20-22, 1993

At least we came in knowing that we had owned the Crusaders so far this year, 9-2 in 11 games, and 54-27 in runs scored. To be exact, we had won nine in a row against them, since the two losses came up in our first two games against them back in April, and both had been 1-run affairs. They were also unable to mound any reasonable pitching, giving us a week full of 4+ ERA starters (5+ for four out of six) and in parts massively losing records, like Danny Ramirez’ 5-14 mark in game 1 here.

Ramirez dominated the Raccoons. That was it. Miguel Lopez, with 40% of Ramirez’ ERA, was whacked and removed in the bottom 6th in a 3-0 hole, nobody out, and runners on the corners. Juan Martinez stranded the runners, a nice change from his previous outings. The Raccoons made a terrible impression. To start the top 7th, Reece and Higgins made quick outs and Hall was 0-2 behind when he was brushed by Ramirez. That was the one pitch Ramirez later wished he had back. Baldivía singled, and Rodriguez doubled into the far right corner to score both. 3-2, tying run in scoring position, Alejandro Lopez pinch-walked for Martinez. O’Morrissey came up, batting leadoff against the lefty Ramirez despite his 15 home runs. Well, sometimes I know what I’m doing. O-Mo homered, and suddenly the Raccoons were ahead. They certainly didn’t deserve it in a game where they ended up out-hit 13-7. And as things sometimes go, you don’t get what you don’t deserve. Lagarde gave away a run in the eighth, the team was unable to add anything to their lead, and Grant West was defeated in the bottom 9th with a 2-run, walkoff shot by 1B Victor Martinez. 6-5 Crusaders. O’Morrissey 2-5, HR, 3 RBI;

The misery continued. Game 2 featured the next pushover starter for the Crusaders in Luis Andrade, and the Raccoons not doing anything, apart from falling behind early. Beato was not helping the cause with giving up two early runs, and the Crusaders could have bashed him much more hadn’t they helplessly flailed to leave the bases loaded twice in the first five innings. An RBI triple by O’Morrissey kept the Raccoons close at least, at 2-1 behind, and they remained close the whole game – but never came back. 3-1 Crusaders.

That’s four hits against a pushover team.

Kisho Saito faced Dan Barnes in game 3, who made his first start of the season. The 22-year old had lost his three starts before this year. He certainly did not get a good start, loading the bases with the first three Raccoons up, but they only scored two when Higgins grounded into a force at home and Hall fouled out. Reece upped to 3-0 with a leadoff jack in the third. This was the start for a long inning, which Barnes did not survive after his control went away wholly and completely, not getting a strike, that was not put in play successfully, in to four consecutive batters before he was yanked. It didn’t get better with the bullpen, with Xavier Herrera walking in two runs after Barnes’ exit. In total, the Raccoons sent up 13 men and scored seven runs. With a 9-0 lead and Saito shutting out the Crusaders without a lick of stuff, the offensive department stopped work completely. Saito was whacked for three runs in the bottom 7th when suddenly everything stopped working once again, by which time the Raccoons had had ZERO hits since the third inning. An accidental RBI triple by Higgins got us over the double-digit hump, and Hall sacrificed him in, but those runs were collected back off Tony Vela by the Crusaders. 11-5 Raccoons. Salazar 2-5, BB, RBI; Reece 3-5, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Higgins 2-5, BB, 3B, 2 RBI; A. Lopez (PH) 1-1; Saito 7.0 IP, 5 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 3 K, W (9-12) and 1-4, RBI;

The Canadiens won two of three in Indy, getting us back to the distance we had had before the week. While we had catastrophically failed in everything against last-place teams, the Canadiens had at least faced franchises worthy of being mentioned by name, the Cyclones and Indians.

In other news

August 20 – SFW Aaron Anderson (10-4, 2.91 ERA) 3-hits the Wolves in a 6-0 shutout.
August 21 – The Capitals lose INF Nuno Andresen (.272, 4 HR, 52 RBI) for four weeks due to a herniated disc.
August 21 – DAL CL Matt Sims (5-10, 3.97 ERA, 26 SV) holds on to 7-4 lead against the Pacifics to earn his 300th career save.

Complaints and stuff

Four of five outfielders (all sans Reece) and Allen are labelled as cold at this point. Which is true. I can’t even assemble a lineup that is not mega-horrible. The offensive demonstrations of this week have reassured me that this team won’t make it to the postseason. The second they face a good team, they will be washed away completely. With the exception of O’Morrissey, Reece, and Baldivía, our new King of Singles, we had NO offense this week.

[Questdog]

Congrats to Grant West!

I miss Vern Kinnear.....

[Westheim]

Raccoons (71-53) @ Indians (57-67) – August 24-26, 1993

The Indians had just been defeated two games to one by the Canadiens, with their win a shutout behind SP Albert Zarate, who was not scheduled for this series. Instead we had to expect to face three left-handed starters.

The Raccoons squeezed two runs out of 15-game winner Neil Stewart in the first four innings, before Jason Turner ran into trouble in the bottom 4th, loading the bases with no outs. A slow grounder by Angelo Duarte was then converted into a double play, home and first, by Turner. O’Morrissey made a great play on Antonio Gonzalez’ grounder to end the inning with two in scoring position. It still didn’t help. Turner was hurt again by his bad control this year. He issued a walk in the fifth, then lost his 2-0 lead in the inning with a home run by Raccoons outcast Matt Brown. The game continued deadlocked into the bottom 8th. Vela retired the first Indian, then would have faced the left-hander Brown. Burnett came in and the Indians removed their only source of meaningful offense in the game for righty Mario Haider, who made the first of two quick outs, and the 2-2 tie stood. In the top 9th, the Raccoons had the bases loaded with one out after three soft singles. Bobby Quinn was up and Stewart still in the game. He flew softly to right and into the glove of Raúl Vázquez, but Vinson was sent home from third and scored. Although Neil Reece capped an 0-5 day with a strikeout, Grant West held on to that fragile 3-2 lead. 3-2 Coons. O’Morrissey 2-5; Salazar 2-5; Vela 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

Matt Higgins left the game in the seventh inning with a sore shoulder. He would be DTD for about a week, which was pretty bad, since it left us with no spare middle infielders – not the best situation.

The miserable lineups continued to flail in game 2, as Scott Wade and Arthur Young dueled. Young had almost no-hit the Raccoons earlier this year, and struck them out in scores, but was too cocky in the bottom 3rd, when he singled his way on and was then thrown out stealing. The pitching duel ended in the fifth, when Wade had runners on the corners with the obnoxious Young up and two out. In a 1-2 count, Young shot a double off the wall in center for two runs to score, and a 3-run homer two batters later ended Wade’s day after 4.2 innings. The Indians pitchers registered a dozen strikeouts against a team that didn’t even present a flicker of hope and was held to four hits. 5-2 Indians. Quinn 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI; A. Lopez (PH) 1-1; Miller 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

Game 3 saw the Raccoons’ starter also cracked up early, when Miguel Lopez surrendered three runs in the third. The Indians weren’t hitting for a lot, but that was a lot more than what the Raccoons did. The only Raccoon to significantly hurt Indians starter Jesus Lopez was Mark Allen, who had two RBI hits, but that made for a 4-3 deficit once both starters were gone in the seventh. The Raccoons left the tying run on third base in both the seventh and eighth innings, and on first base in the ninth. 4-3 Indians. Allen 2-4, 2 2B, 3 RBI; Lagarde 1.2 IP, 0 H; 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Neil Reece had one hit and seven strikeouts in this series. If he stops producing, it is OVER. We have NOTHING.

Raccoons (72-55) @ Condors (79-49) – August 27-29, 1993

And here came the team with the best record (tied with the Capitals) in the league. With the way the Raccoons were going, it was over well before it even began.

Game 1 remained a close contest, but not for the Raccoons’ hitters. Raimundo Beato held the Condors from scoring until he made a throwing error himself in the fifth inning, and then surrendered a 2-run double to Tadanobu Sakaguchi. That was in fact all there was to the game. Beato went seven, it was not enough, and the Raccoons were shut out on four hits. 2-0 Condors. A. Lopez 2-4;

While we were not able to capitalize on an error by SS Cipriano Ortega in the top 1st in the middle game, the Condors were less choosy in the bottom 1st. Kisho Saito hit Theobald with his second pitch of the game, and O-Mo dropped a ball for an error that helped the Condors starting the scoring. The Raccoons were down 2-0 in the third, had the tying runs in scoring position with nobody out, and didn’t score when O-Mo struck out and Saito was thrown out at home on Lopez’ flyout. Top 6th, Condors 4-1 ahead, the Raccoons loaded the bases with three singles by Reece, Allen, and Baldivía. Hall came up with no outs, facing starter Charles Bywaters. He popped softly up the right field line, where Theobald caught it. Reece scored, 4-2. Vinson struck out, bringing up Saito, who had to be his own offense. Saito doubled to left, but Baldivía couldn’t score and held at third. Salazar left the runners on. O-Mo led off the seventh with a double, and Lopez walked, and a wild pitch advanced the runners with Neil Reece at the plate. Reece then fell 1-2 behind, and grounded out to Bruce Boyle at second base, holding the runners. Allen came up and also grounded to Boyle, but under the Condor’s glove for a single and this time the runners scored. Saito left with a 5-4 lead after seven innings, and had to watch from outside as Lagarde put the first man on in the bottom 8th, but got through. Grant West threw only five pitches in the ninth – it was enough for three outs. 5-4 Raccoons. Salazar 3-5, 2 2B, RBI; O’Morrissey 2-5, 2B; Reece 2-4, BB; Allen 2-5, 2 RBI; Saito 7.0 IP, 4 H, 4 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 5 K, W (10-12) and 2-3, 2B, RBI;

In game 3, the Coons got an early run in the first inning off Reece’s bat. All was fine for Jason Turner until the fourth, when two singles and a walk loaded the bases with no outs with the Condors threatening to score. Turner somehow wiggled out of the mess with a soft flyer to shallow center, where Kinnear made the play of the week, and two punchouts. Reece brought in another run in the fifth inning, where the Raccoons lost Mark Allen to an undisclosed injury, forcing the ailing Higgins into the game. A throwing error by Vinson helped the Condors to score an unearned run in the bottom 6th, 2-1 Raccoons that far. Top 7th, Quinn led off with a double, before O-Mo singled. Reece drew a walk, no outs with the bags full for Higgins, who hit a sac fly. Baldivía doubled off the wall in right, and now the Condors were cracking, as the Coons scored three in the inning for a 5-1 lead. Three Raccoons pitchers barely managed to starve two Condors in scoring position in the bottom 7th – this game was far from over. Accordingly, Miller was scorched for two runs in the eighth and the lead was down to two runs. Grant West came in and sat down the side in order for the second day in a row. 5-3 Raccoons. O’Morrissey 2-4, BB; Reece 3-4, BB, 2 RBI; Kinnear 1-2, 2 BB, 2B; Turner 6.1 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 3 K, W (6-11);

Juan Martinez was the only reliever not used in this game, as we bobbled together a series win against the Condors.

Raccoons (74-56) @ Thunder (60-69) – August 30-September 1, 1993

Game 1 saw Scott Wade pitching in a scoreless game for a while. Wade was batting far below .100 for the season, but singled up the middle with the bases empty and two down in the top 5th. That scratch single past 2B Dave Browne would turn out to be worth four runs, since Salazar got on, O-Mo singled in Wade, and Alejandro Lopez uncorked a 3-shot against Bob MacGruder. In the bottom 5th, Wade wiggled out of the bases loaded with one out. Wade stalled again in the seventh and with left-handers up, Burnett replaced him and held Wade’s ledger clean. The Raccoons had not shown any offense outside the fifth inning, but loaded the bases with nobody out in the top 9th. They got two runs, as Lopez walked to force in a run, and Reece hit a sac fly. 6-0 Coons! Salazar 2-4, BB; A. Lopez 2-4, BB, HR, 4 RBI; Wade 6.1 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 1 K, W (10-7) and 1-3; Burnett 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Allen was still not diagnosed and we remained playing a man short on August 31.

Daniel Hall took care of a lead for Miguel Lopez early in the middle game by powering his fifth home run of the year in the top 2nd, a 2-shot. Lopez didn’t hold on to that lead for long, though. With two on and one out in the bottom 2nd, pitcher Jorge Gutierrez bunted and Lopez tried to get the out at third base, but everybody was safe. From there, everything went to hell, as the Thunder scored five runs off Lopez, who was completely off at this point. The game was not lost, however: Hall doubled in another pair in the third and O-Mo tied the game with a 2-out RBI single in the fourth inning. Lopez still sucked and was yanked in the fourth with two men on. Miller failed to keep the tie on the board, as everything went south again. The Thunder had plenty of singles fall into all the right places, while the Raccoons had nothing going now. The Thunder had 17 hits as they sunk the Raccoons, 8-6. A. Lopez 2-4; Higgins 2-4; Hall 3-4, HR, 2 2B, 4 RBI; Martinez 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 1 K;

Again, we just could not build momentum after a few wins in a row. If they could at least take this series.

For bad news, Mark Allen was out with a quad strain, and would miss the rest of the regular season with an estimated recovery time of five weeks. To make up for that loss, we called up five players on September 1: Chih-tui Jin, Glenn Johnston, Sixto Moreno, Albert Matthews, and Gabriel De La Rosa.

After Matt Higgins tripled in a pair of runners in the top 1st, “Pooky” Beato loaded the bags before retiring anybody, then retired three in a row. That didn’t change the fact, that he had a terrible outing, walking five men in the first three innings, in which the Thunder had nine runners, and left eight on. When they couldn’t score on their own, Beato helped them a big deal with a timely wild pitch in the fourth that advanced a runner from second to third, just enough to score on the next fly ball out. The mess didn’t get any better, with De La Rosa shot down for three runs in the fifth. Down 5-3, the Raccoons had the bases loaded with no outs in the top 6th. Another epic fail later, they still trailed 5-4 following a pinch-hit RBI single by Glenn Adams and three pathetic outs. They left two more on in the seventh. Top 8th: Richard Cunningham loaded the bases with one out (a K to Adams), then K’ed Lopez. Neil Reece stepped in and shot a 1-2 pitch to deep right, where it fell in and bounced off the wall. Two runs scored, O-Mo, trying to score from first, was thrown out. Still, 6-5 ahead! Then came the ninth, and Grant West, and blew it with three sharp line drive hits that tied the game and sent it to extras. In the top 12th, Sixto Moreno hit a fluke home run to break the 6-6 tie. Lagarde had pitched the last two innings already, but we only had three arms left, all right-handers, and all were either shaky or had thrown 30+ pitches the day before. Go Jackie. He got one out, then put two on, facing Browne. The lefty bounced to Higgins, who went to second, but Moreno failed to close the game with a timely throw to first. Instead, Lagarde faced slugger Vonne Calzado, another lefty. In a full count, Calzado also grounded to Higgins, who ended the struggle. 7-6 Raccoons. Moreno 1-1, HR, RBI; O’Morrissey 3-7; A. Lopez 3-7, RBI; Reece 3-7, 2B, 2 RBI; Higgins 5-6, 3B, 2 RBI; Jin (PH) 1-1; Lagade 3.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K, W (5-4);

Extra innings basically served the purpose to hurt Jorge Salazar, who suffered a herniated disc in his back and will be out for three weeks.

In other news

August 27 – PIT INF/LF Claudio Ayala (.298, 7 HR, 67 RBI) is out for the year with a torn labrum.
August 27 – SAC SP David Castillo (11-8, 3.19 ERA) 3-hits the Miners – now without their second baseman Ayala – in a 5-0 Scorpions win.
August 29 – NO-HITTER! Pittsburgh’s Leland Lewis (12-12, 3.69 ERA) crowns his 15-year career with a no-hit performance against the Scorpions, giving up three walks in the 16th no-hitter in ABL history, and the second for the Miners (Wilson Cordova, 1989). It also marks the fifth consecutive season in which a no-hitter is tossed. Lewis, the 2nd overall pick in the 1979 draft, has spent all of his career with the Miners, and was the 1982 FL Pitcher of the Year, when the Miners went to the World Series. He is 226-184 with a 3.30 ERA in 538 starts. Lewis has started 35 or more games *every* *year* since *1980*.
August 30 – An RBI triple in the fifth inning of a 5-4 loss to San Francisco extends the hitting streak of MIL RF/LF Cristo Ramirez (.381, 3 HR, 49 RBI) to 20 games.
August 31 – 23-year old RIC SP Edgar Rey (6-8, 3.93 ERA) 1-hits the Pacifics in a 6-0 win for the Rebels.
August 31 – VAN INF/RF Michael McFarland (.325, 0 HR, 41 RBI) is out for three to four weeks with a sprained ankle.
September 1 – TIJ SS Cipriano Ortega (.303, 0 HR, 46 RBI) is out for a month with a strained quad.

Complaints and stuff

They are SO annoying. Nothing is going as it is supposed to be. Basically, everybody’s struggling a ton. The Canadiens are playing well under .500 (6-12 since leaving Portland in mid-August), which is the only reason we are still in first place. Great shape to be in for September.

Plus, two middle infielders gone for most or all of the month. Yeah. Right. There is no way to compensate for Salazar with ANYTHING we have in the organization, he is irreplaceable. With Allen also out, it means we have to play Higgins plus one useless goon like Moreno in the middle infield, which does not cause excitement.

Big surprise: Esteban Baldivía was named the CL’s Rookie of the Month for August with a .344 with 1 HR and 7 RBI.

Grant West blew his sixth save of the year. Ten years back, he would go several years without blowing six in total. He is signed for next year ($525k), but it is time to look for a closer option. May Lagarde be that guy?

[Westheim]

We are entering the weekend home series against the Loggers sitting 5.5 games ahead of the Canadiens, be it through crumbling slightly less than them more than anything else – god forbid we achieve something on our own! – but with a magic number at a count-down suitable 25 games, our goal got into sight a bit clearer now.

That didn’t change that Mark Allen was at least out for the regular season and possibly an eventual CLCS, and that we had just lost Jorge Salazar for the bulk of September. He was DL’ed after the 12-inning win in Oklahoma on Wednesday as we flew home on our off day.

That left us with two middle infielders, one of which was the recently-DFA’ed Sixto Moreno, whom nobody wanted to touch with a pole. With our AAA team in St. Pete being bad this year and 13 games below .500, we could take all we wanted from there. I wanted 2B Pat Parker. He was our second-round pick from 1991, and had batted for an .803 OPS in AAA this season. His defense was okay. He was a new Dani Perez, if you remember him. He also had seven entries in his injury log since being drafted, so we better play him while he’s healthy.

He was not on the 40-man roster for obvious reasons, so we had to DFA somebody to make room, which turned out to be MR Yasushi Suto, 29. He had some stints with us a few years back, but had been superseded by about anybody on the AAA staff.

Raccoons (76-57) vs. Loggers (65-68) – September 3-5, 1993

With only right-handers scheduled for the Loggers on the weekend, Parker was thrown right into things as starter at second base in the opener, where Kisho Saito pitched against Davis Sims (12-9, 3.86 ERA), and Higgins played short and batted leadoff. Higgins singled to start the game, stole second, and got home on two outs, and that was right where things stopped working. Saito was eaten up in the sixth inning with three runs, while the Raccoons had managed all of three hits at that point. The score jumped to 4-2 in the eighth with an unearned run on Baldivía’s inability to pick up a roller, and a solo home run by Alejandro Lopez. In the bottom 9th, the Loggers sent Raúl Perez to close the game, and he hit the first two batters, Baldivía and Vinson. Parker and Hall made outs before Perez walked both Higgins and O’Morrissey. One more gaffe away from tying it, Lopez grounded out. 4-3 Loggers.

Pat Parker hit a double in his first big league AB, then struck out three times. He never scored after that double, leading off in the third, either.

In game 2, the Raccoons took an uncharacteristic 4-0 lead after the first inning, key piece of which was a 3-run homer by Glenn Adams. Jason Turner was filthy in the first three innings, whiffing six, before he came apart in the fourth, with the Loggers scoring twice and leaving the bases loaded when pitcher Rafael Garcia grounded out. Turner was fine outside of that miserable 2-hit, 3-walk inning, though, and struck out ten Loggers in seven innings. The Coons managed a few add-on runs in this game, two in the sixth, and two more in the eighth, the latter scored through a titanic home run by O’Morrissey. Jackie Lagarde cleaned up a mess left behind by Vela and Proctor in the top 8th and finished the game, netting him a save despite the 6-run difference at the end. 8-2 Raccoons. Higgins 2-5, RBI; O’Morrissey 3-5, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; A. Lopez 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Adams 2-3, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Hall 1-2, 2 BB; Turner 7.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 4 BB, 10 K, W (7-11); Lagarde 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, SV (4);

Neil Reece got a day off in game 3, with Johnston in center. Adams batted cleanup. All of this was asking for trouble with Scott Wade on the mound, who face the King of Walks, Scott Murphy. Wade was hit in the first inning with a 2-run homer by Cristo Ramirez, which looked like a supersized line drive, while the Raccoons had one of their double play games – when they were batting. By contrast, they completely failed to walk against Murphy, who had 144 walks on the year, in the first five innings. Bottom 6th, still down 2-0: Wade reached on an error leading off, and only with one out did we draw a walk with O’Morrissey being patient. Lopez came up and got one in the wheelhouse that he didn’t miss, and it became a 3-run homer to turn the game around. Wade went seven, then almost saw the 3-2 lead go up in smoke in the eighth, where Martinez walked the leadoff man, callup Jessie McGuire. Burnett replaced him and barely got out of the inning. The Coons added some offense against Murphy in the bottom 8th, before West closed the game. 5-2 Raccoons. A. Lopez 2-4, HR, 3 RBI; Adams 3-4, 2B, RBI; Quinn (PH) 1-1, BB; Wade 7.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, W (10-7);

The Canadiens won their first two in New York, but were helpless against Danny Ramirez in game 3 and took a 2-0 loss there, so the gap remains unchanged.
Games ahead of VAN: 5 1/2 (was 5 1/2)
Magic number: 22 (was 25)

Raccoons (78-58) vs. Titans (60-78) – September 6-8, 1993

We continued a string of not seeing left-handed starters, with the three guys up for competition in this series also all throwing right-handed. Bob Arnold – who had been injured for most of his time in AAA – was added to the 25-man roster before this series started.

Game 1 was all pitching, not a lick of offense by either team. Like Turner two days earlier, Miguel Lopez struck out ten, but he did it in a losing effort, trailing 1-0 after the top 8th. Hall batted for him in the bottom 8th, leading off, and singled, only our fourth hit on the day. Higgins got Hall forced at second, but went to third on a throwing error by catcher Luis Lopez when Higgins set out to steal second base. One out, tying run at third base, O-Mo at the plate. That was the best recipe one could have these days, yet O-Mo lined out and Higgins was left on by Alejandro Lopez. Daniel Miller was blown up in the ninth, and Kinnear made the final out trying to stretch a single with nobody on base anyway. 3-0 Titans. Hall (PH) 1-1; M. Lopez 8.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 10 K, L (14-7);

I gave a start to De La Rosa in game 2. He has two pitches, like Wade, but the filth of his splitter needs to be tested over several innings. Beato will be either skipped or start game 3, depending on how insane I will get after this game.

De La Rosa walked the edge of annihilation early in the middle game, but pulled himself out of trouble in the first two innings. Well, defense helped some, too. The game was scoreless until the bottom 4th, where Dan The Man hit a 2-run double that set off a 4-run inning. De La Rosa went into the sixth, where he ran aground amidst two walks and had to be removed. Proctor got the final out, keeping DLR’s ledger clean. The Raccoons scored two more runs in the seventh with a jack by O’Morrissey that tied Reece for the team lead, and another run-scoring double by Dan The Man. The Titans failed to mount anything past the sixth inning and were handily defeated this time. 6-0 Raccoons. Higgins 2-5, RBI; O’Morrissey 2-5, HR, RBI; Reece 2-2, 2 BB; Hall 3-4, 3 2B, 3 RBI; De La Rosa 5.2 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 4 K, W (2-0) and 1-2, RBI;

Dan The Man having another 3-XBH day made me smile :-)

Rubber game. Beato went, and was utterly brilliant. A Dave Dixon leadoff double in the third was the only hit he surrendered until rain forced a 29-minute delay in the seventh, getting in the way of a gem. Meanwhile, he wasn’t even in line for the win, since the Raccoons just didn’t score once more. Beato finished the seventh, then had to hope for offense. Adams singled to start the bottom 7th, then stole second base. The Titans walked Hall to get to Moreno, which was a mistake, since Moreno managed to get a flyer past RF Matt Smith for a 2-run double, and Moreno was also brought in to score. 3-0 ahead, and having thrown only 71 pitches, Beato went out for the eighth and got through on 11 pitches, but Dixon had another hit. Beato still did not get a shutout. A leadoff double by Smith ended his day in the ninth. Grant West came in, and tried to keep the shutout together, but the first grounder he got was thrown away by Higgins. 3-1, tying run coming to the plate, no outs. West surrendered a double to Luis Lopez with two out, putting the tying run in scoring position, and Jack Burbidge singled up the middle, but Reece got to it quickly, and Lopez held at third base. Dixon, the only guy to hurt Beato all day, was replaced by righty Gary Lang, and West got him to ground out, just barely ending the game for his 40th save of the year. 3-2 Furballs. Higgins 2-4; Moreno 2-3, 2B, 2 RBI; Beato 8.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, W (10-7) and 0-2, RBI;

The Canadiens matched us day by day in this series, leaving our lead unchanged.
Games ahead of VAN: 5 1/2 (was 5 1/2)
Magic number: 19 (was 22)

In other news

September 2 – Talented 23-year old LVA OF Royce Green (.284, 19 HR, 66 RBI) is out for the season with a fractured thumb.
September 4 – RIC SP Craig Hansen (18-10, 3.52 ERA) goes eight innings in a 3-2 win over the Cyclones, earning his 200th career win. The 35-year old was the first overall pick in the 1981 draft by the Miners, with whom he won his first 119 games, before signing up with the Rebels. For his career, he is 200-136 with a 3.15 ERA. He is in a contract year.
September 8 – VAN LF/RF Ronald Moore (.303, 12 HR, 63 RBI) completes a 20-game hitting streak with a third-inning RBI single in a 3-2 win over the Loggers.

Complaints and stuff

Miguel Lopez is 0-3 in his last six starts, with a 4.81 ERA in 33.2 IP. Talk about different halves of a season.

Fans in Portland are running a fundraiser so we can sign a proper batter in the offseason.

Below is also Scott Wade's pitching resume, since I posted it in the other thread in the general discussions. The BABIP is way off this season. Other pitchers that were full time starters last year as well:

Kisho Saito .264 -> .281
Jason Turner .292 -> .270
Raimundo Beato .280 -> .297

Shouldn't our defense be better with Osanai gone?

First stage on our upcoming tri-city road trip: Vancouver!

[Westheim]

The Canadiens lost their game on our off day, increasing our lead to six games and bringing the magic number to 18.

Raccoons (80-59) @ Canadiens (74-65) – September 10-12, 1993

Since they had left Portland in August, the Canadiens had gone 10-14, compared to the Raccoons’ phenomenal run of 13-11. Seems like this division goes to the team that sucks least past the three quarter mark – every year. In this series, it will be about good pitching (Coons) having to beat good hitting (Smelly Elks). They had outscored us by over 100 runs by now.

Saito faced Ruben Prado (13-11, 4.94 ERA) in the opener. Quinn played despite Prado being a righty, instead of Lopez, while Kinnear was in left, and Vinson batted third in front of Reece. Daily juggling of the lineup is a sign of desperation. After little action in the first two innings, both halves of the third mirrored each other to some extent. The Coons had a man on second base with two out, when Prado drilled Vinson, but Reece made the final out, leaving two on. In the bottom 3rd, the Canadiens had a man on second base with one out, when Saito drilled Kelly Carpenter. After a K to callup Francisco Sandoval, David Brewer hit a 2-out, 2-run triple. With two on in the top 4th, Glenn Adams double played the team out of it, and in the bottom 4th, Saito blew up completely, failed to retire anybody and was knocked out being charged with six total runs. Next, Prado came apart, and was whacked in the top 5th. The Raccoons plated three and had two on with two out and Pat Parker at the plate. Down 0-2, he was hit by a pitch too far inside to load the bags. Alejandro Lopez came out to pinch hit in the #9 spot, but he struck out. The Canadiens got a run off Matthews in the bottom of the inning, before the Raccoons got another chance in the top 6th. Higgins got on, and O-Mo was plunked. Both pulled off a double steal and Higgins scored on Vinson’s groundout. Then, Reece was drilled by Prado, who was due for a knock now, too. First, Quinn grounded to third, and Sandoval bobbled the ball. O-Mo scored, the tying runs were on. They were left on by Kinnear and Adams. Top 7th, and another chance to score developed. Would they take this one, these little furry critters? Hall pinch-hit for Matthews and singled up the middle. Higgins walked. O-Mo came up, having his average dropped below .320 recently. But he didn’t miss Manny Lopez’ 1-1 pitch and instead lined it into deep center, where it hobbled around to become a game-tying 2-run triple. Vinson popped out, and Reece whiffed, and O-Mo trotted off from third base. Top 8th: Baldivía pinch-hit for Lagarde with two out and two in scoring position. He grounded out. The bottoms of innings lacked excitement at this point, but the tops were pretty interesting. Higgins took the fourth plunk of the day to lead off the top 9th. He stole second, but the team was not helpful. O-Mo, Vinson, and Reece left him on third base, and the team lost in the bottom of the inning on a 2-out RBI double by Luis Arroyo. 8-7 Canadiens. Higgins 3-4, BB; Kinnear 2-3, 2 BB; Hall (PH) 1-1;

Player LOB: 33!!! Team LOB: 15. Yeah, great way to blow everything, bloody suckers. I ate myself through all the chocolate the hotel had that night. It didn’t sooth the pain a bit.

Game 2. Jason Turner was rocked early on with a leadoff homer by Raúl Solís and another run in the bottom 1st. The Raccoons found their bats only slowly, but tied the game in the fourth with two fluke singles by Hall and Moreno. Vernon Robertson was pitching effectively so far, but with two out in the top 5th, O’Morrissey singled his way on. Reece pressed a grounder into right, and O-Mo went to third base aggressively, and the throw didn’t get him. Instead, Reece moved up to second, and Baldivía came up. He took Robertson’s third pitch into shallow left and both runners were able to score. Moreno upped it to 5-2 in the sixth with a solo home run, while Bobby Quinn took one away from Arroyo in the bottom 6th that saved two runs. Turner went seven, holding the Canadiens to their two early runs on seven hits. He was pinch-hit for with Alejandro Lopez in the top 8th with two on and nobody out, and the chance to end this game. Lopez grounded into a fielder’s choice and Higgins into a double play, and nobody scored. They left two more on in the ninth inning, before Grant West came in. He put two men on with two out, as Solís came up. He grounded to Moreno, who collected the force out at second base. 5-2 Raccoons. Higgins 2-4, BB, 2B; Reece 2-5; Baldivía 3-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Moreno 3-4, HR, 2 RBI; Turner 7.0 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 1 K, W (8-11);

Player LOB: 21; Team LOB: 12. That’s not the kind of numbers that I find enjoyable. Not at all. Since chocolate was out all over Vancouver, I resorted to screaming again.

And that was with the rubber game still to play.

The rubber game also meant pitching Scott Wade. He could be either way. Manny Ramos, who went for the Canadiens, was usually the other way, at 8-15 and a 5.50 ERA. Higgins led off with a single, and went to third on O’Morrissey’s subsequent single. Alejandro Lopez was back in the lineup (Quinn played left) and took a mighty rip – outta here, 3-0 Coons, no outs registered. Lopez came up the next time leading off the third inning. He took Ramos deep again. 4-0. So far, so good. It didn’t stay that way. Wade was torn apart in a 5-run fourth inning, and both pitchers were knocked out in time. Even with Wade out of the game, the Canadiens delivered more of the same: pain. Pure pain. Against a sorry collection of appearances of Miller, Proctor, Vela, and Matthews, they scored five more runs. Ten unanswered runs by the Raccoons, who were not even close to responding. Astonishingly, the Canadiens even left more runners on base in this game (11-7). 10-4 Canadiens. A. Lopez 2-4, 2 HR, 4 RBI;

Since chocolate was now out all over Canada, we left that country. I don’t enjoy being there anyway.

In other news

September 12 – TIJ Woody Roberts (16-5, 2.41 ERA) tosses a 2-hitter in a 5-0 shutout win over the Falcons.

Complaints and stuff

I’m hurting.

[Westheim]

As you may or may not know, December 24 starts Christmas festivities over here in Germany. Which means I have already eaten half an oxen plus change, feel horribly engorged, and won’t be able to see my toes again for weeks, if ever. Tomorrow will bring another orgy, starring heroically deceased ducks. I could burst open any minute. Bear with me.

Raccoons (81-61) @ Loggers (68-75) – September 13-16, 1993

Unfortunately for the Loggers, their strong run had not held up. By now they were seven under .500 and we would do everything we could to increase that. We had to. The Canadiens were only five games behind. Our magic number is 16.

Matt Higgins drilled a leadoff home run in game 1, setting the tone for a rocky outing for 13-10 Davis Sims, who surrendered five runs in the opening inning. With that 5-0 lead, Miguel Lopez was pretty much cruising, although the Loggers managed to spot him here and there with a Gates Golunski home run in the third and another run in the sixth. The Raccoons missed a chance to end the game early in the seventh, leaving the bases loaded in a 7-2 game when Vinson and Quinn struck out in succession. A pinch-hit 2-out, 2-run triple by Jessie McGuire knocked out Lopez in the bottom 7th. In the top 9th, Alejandro Lopez came up to bat, a double shy of the cycle. While he shot a grounder into right, Cristo Ramirez got to it quickly and Lopez had to hold at first base. The top 9th saw the Coons put up another 4-spot on the Loggers, and Lagarde pitched a 2-frame save that almost got out of hand at the end. 11-5 Raccoons. Higgins 2-4, BB, HR, RBI; O’Morrissey 2-5; A. Lopez 4-5, HR, 3B, 3 RBI; Reece 2-4, 2 RBI; Baldivía 2-5, RBI; Lagarde 2.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 2 K, SV (5);

Matt Higgins stole his 40th bag of the season in this game. He has long broken Armando Sanchez’ franchise record of 33 stolen bases from 1987. He also far and away holds the franchise record for stolen bases overall with 152 bags, ahead of Daniel Hall’s 99. On the ABL leaderboard however, Higgins ranks merely 29th. He has not even half of career leader Xiao-wei Li’s 347 bags.

3B Jose Perez reached base leading off in the bottom 1st of game 2 on an uncaught third strike, then stole second about unopposed by a clumsy David Vinson. The team as a whole tumbled through shoddy first three innings, trailing 1-0 behind “Pooky”, before Daniel Hall set the score right in the top 4th with a huge 2-run homer. The next inning, two infield singles helped the Raccoons get man on for Neil Reece to drive home with a 2-run single. Hall again flew to deep left, but this time just short of the wall and into the glove of Emilio Román. “Pooky” would not get a win, though, since he left in the fifth inning with an uncomfortable feeling in the shoulder. The Raccoons were up 5-1 into the bottom 9th with Burnett still in from the previous innings, but he walked Jim Stein and surrendered a triple to Raúl Rodriguez, and Grant West came in with no outs and the tying run in the on-deck circle. West couldn’t prevent Rodriguez from scoring, but he ended the inning in time to ensure us of the win. 5-3 Raccoons! Higgins 2-4, BB, RBI; A. Lopez 3-5, 2B; Quinn (PH) 1-1;

The Canadiens lost 4-3 against the Crusaders after taking an 11-10 scorefest the day before, increasing our lead to six games.

Raimundo Beato has a mild shoulder inflammation. He will be fine, but he will not be available for at least one start, which means that De La Rosa will get another shot at the end of this road trip.

It was not Kisho Saito’s year. In the third game of the series, with the Coons no-hit so far by the ill-controlled Scott Murphy, Saito manufactured a run for the Loggers in the bottom 4th all on his own with an error, a balk, and a wild pitch. It was a sad sight to see. Hall ended Murphy’s no-hit bid in the fifth with a single, but the Raccoons still didn’t score. Saito remained without the least little bit of luck on the other side of the linescore, too. The Raccoons left two on in the fifth, the sixth, and the seventh, where he was pinch-hit for to no effect. Miller surrendered a run in the bottom 7th, and we left two more on in the eighth. It was one of those games. 2-0 Loggers. A. Lopez 2-4; Baldivía (PH) 1-1; Saito 6.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 4 K, L (10-14);

INF Marvin Ingall, who had broken his thumb in little heroic ways in his first game as a Raccoon, came off the DL to bolster the middle infield.

The Loggers put up five left-handed batters against Jason Turner in game 4 of the series, which mirrored the first one quite awfully close. The Raccoons were 1-hit through five by Martin Garcia, and Jason Turner trailed 2-0. In the top 6th, Higgins reached on an error and Garcia then issued full count walks to Quinn and O’Morrissey, and there were no outs. Reece singled in Higgins, before Baldivía grounded into a double play, home and first, and Rodriguez, following Hall walking, grounded out. Top 8th, Quinn and O-Mo reached base leading off. Reece grounded out, and Baldivía came up with another killing double play. Top 9th, Hall led off with a walk and represented the tying run. He never progressed past second base, as the Raccoons managed to lose another pitcher’s duel. 2-1 Loggers. Kinnear (PH) 1-1; Turner 7.0 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 6 K, L (8-12);

Since the Canadiens also split the latter half of their series against the Crusaders, our lead was back down to five games now. Magic number: 12 (was 16).

Raccoons (83-63) @ Bayhawks (78-68) – September 17-19, 1993

The Bayhawks were about to be eliminated in the CL South, so no triple-rematch was going to take place and we would most likely face each other the last time this year.

Pat Parker hit his first big league home run in the top 2nd of the opener, a 3-shot with two out off Pedro Gonzales (9-12, 4.40 ERA). That masked for a second how ineffective Scott Wade was. Through three innings, Parker’s shot was the Coons’ only hit. Wade had surrendered six hits and a run. The Coons extended their lead in the fourth, and Wade managed to wobble through six with a 5-1 lead without blowing it. In the eighth, all hell broke loose. Lagarde surrendered a run and slow Didier Bourges was on first with two out, as West came in to end it quickly. He couldn’t, surrendered two infield singles, and then a 2-run double to Pedro Villa. The losing runs were in scoring positions, and slugger Pedro Perez came to bat. Perez fouled away a 1-2 pitch and Vinson was able to get just in front of the net. The lead was down to 5-4. O’Morrissey managed to drive in Parker for an insurance run in the top 9th, and West now had a 6-4 lead, but had already thrown 22 pitches. Juan Martinez was getting ready. West surrendered another two hits and a run, and Martinez came in facing Bourges with the tying run at second base. Martinez got a slow grounder from him and converted to first to end the game. 6-5 Raccoons. Parker 1-3, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Hall (PH) 1-1; Arnold (PH) 1-1;

The Bayhawks lost INF Roberto Rodriguez to a shoulder injury in this game and he would be out for the rest of the season.

The Canadiens blew a close game in Las Vegas late and lost, 3-2, so we were back to a 6-game lead.

Game 2 saw San Fran’s Pepe Martinez (8-15, 5.19 ERA) torn up in the second inning, where things started rather innocently with a bloop single by Neil Reece and a 1-out RBI double by Dan The Man. From there, the Raccoons made hard contact a few times, but also were lucky that 1B Ramón Ramirez dropped a ball. Alejandro Lopez’ 2-out, 3-run triple was the final bang in a 6-run inning in support of Miguel Lopez. The game was about over right there. The Raccoons had quite a few more scoring positions, left the bases loaded once, and sprinkled a few more runners left on in other innings, while the Bayhawks threatened exactly once against a solid Lopez, but didn’t score. He was toast after eight shutout innings, though, and Matthews blew the shutout in the bottom 9th. 6-1 Raccoons. Higgins 2-4, RBI; A. Lopez 2-5, 3B, 3 RBI; Kinnear (PH) 1-1, 2B; Parker 2-4, BB, RBI; M. Lopez 8.0 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 3 K, W (16-7);

With Beato having shoulder issues, De La Rosa was to start game 3. Also, we got Jorge Salazar back from the DL after his herniated disc had gotten better. He was penciled in as a late-inning replacement to ease him back into things here, then use him more regularly back at home. By now we had 18 batters on the roster, which was making lineup building no less challenging than with 13 batters. Moreno started at short, and Kinnear in left, feeling out the best combo for the final two weeks.

De La Rosa got an early 2-0 lead, but things quickly turned for the worse in the second inning, where the Bayhawks scored five unearned runs after an error by Higgins on the first play of the inning. The bulk of the trouble was however caused by De La Rosa himself. Higgins made two more errors in the fourth inning for another unearned run with Daniel Miller pitching. That he also hit a home run in the fifth inning did little to help his game score on my card, which read a big fat X and “KILL”. The Raccoons meanwhile came close to tying up the game in the seventh after getting the score to 6-5 and putting two in scoring position, but Kinnear flew out to end the frame. The unlikeliest combo of strugglers managed to tie the game in the eighth then: a long-slumping Vinson doubled with one out, and Moreno doubled over excellent CF Dave Burton to score him and tie it up. Bob Arnold made the second out, bringing up Salazar with Moreno on third base. He grounded to the left of the mound and pitcher Alex Byrd’s throw to first was good, but Mauro Granados’ catch was anything but. Salazar was ruled safe, Moreno scored, and the Raccoons had stumbled into a lead. Byrd remained in the game and surrendered a line drive single to O-Mo, before Lopez doubled to deep left, right to where the inning had started with Vinson’s double to score both runners. Up 9-6, it wasn’t over yet. Jackie Lagarde led off his second inning of work with a home run off Rich Tracy’s bat. Lagarde sat down the next two, and Burnett retired the last man in the inning. Grant West finished the game without any more collapses. 9-7 Raccoons. A. Lopez 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Parker 1-1; Baldivía 2-5, 2 RBI; Moreno 2-5, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; Miller 2.1 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 1 BB, 3 K;

Matt Higgins had made six errors all year, and then suddenly three in one game. Nobody has any explanation for this at this point. He was removed mid-game in a double switch. It was one of the few linescores worth posting:

POR 2 0 0 – 0 1 0 – 2 4 0 – 9 13 4
SFB 0 5 0 – 1 0 0 – 0 1 0 – 7 .9 2

Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than anything else. Thanks to the sweep, our lead is now six, and the magic number is down to eight. It could end next week. Or we could be tied at the end of next week.

In other news

September 13 – Vancouver’s Ronald Moore extends his hitting streak to 25 games with two hits in an 11-10 win of the Canadiens over the Crusaders.
September 14 – Ex-Coon TOP SP Antonio “Woody” Lopez (9-11, 3.61 ERA) will be out until next summer with a torn labrum.
September 15 – The Falcons’ Jose Galvez (13-14, 4.73 ERA) tosses a 3-hitter in a 2-0 win over the Aces.
September 19 – The Condors crash through the Loggers, 11-1, and thanks to the Bayhawks’ loss to Portland clinch the CL South. It will be the teams’ fifth playoff appearance and the first since 1990. They have not finished below second place in the division since 1984.
September 19 – Ronald Moore knocks three hits in the Canadiens’ extra-inning win, 8-7, over the Aces, to extend his hitting streak to 30 games, by far the longest streak this year, and t-7th all time. He has 17 games to go to tie Claudio Rojas’ mark of 47 games.

Complaints and stuff

Ken Burnett is arbitration eligible for the final time this fall. We have fielded an offer to him for a 3-year extension for $750k.

I have zero idea where I want to go with my outfield next year. Alejandro Lopez has posted great offensive numbers, and his defense is good, too. I have an eye on Las Vegas’ Royce Green, too. He is however still under team control and they would be entirely mad to give him up.

That Lopez ain’t bad, may be reflected in the fact that he was named CL Player of the Week for batting 13-29 with 3 HR and 10 RBI this week.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (86-63) vs. Falcons (71-78) – September 20-22, 1993

Game 1 opponent Jose Galvez had tossed a shutout his last time on the mound, something Kisho Saito had not come close to in a while. SS Adam Kent hit a leadoff home run off Saito, so that was put to rest in this game as well. Galvez wouldn’t toss a SHO either, with the Raccoons coming back in the bottom 2nd and Saito driving in the go-ahead run with a clean single to right. Not that Saito would be able to hold on to his own lead, though. The Falcons rocked him hard his entire outing, which ended in the sixth with Kinnear pinch-hitting for him in a 4-4 tie, but the 1993 Kinnear only made outs and the Raccoons didn’t score despite a runner on base. As both teams collected nine hits in this game, the team with less runners left on turned out to win, and that were the Falcons, who scored off Juan Martinez in the seventh. Their LOB: 4; our LOB: 7. 5-4 Falcons. Reece 2-4;

The Canadiens conquered the Condors meanwhile, 10-6, and cut the lead to five games.

After the Raccoons had taken a 1-0 lead in the bottom 2nd on Adams’ RBI groundout, they had the bases loaded in the bottom 3rd with one out and O-Mo and Reece up. In July, probably four runs would have scored somewhere between them. Here, nobody scored after a pop up and a grounder to short. In turn, Jason Turner loaded the bases in the top 4th with one out, including an O’Morrissey error, and the Falcons at least managed to tie the game. Turner not only ended the fifth inning with two runners on base (and Rodriguez lined into a double play to end the sixth with two on), he also actively threw away the game in the top 7th with a four-pitch walk to the pitcher Carlos Castro and then hit batsmen on consecutive pitches. Next, Christian Proctor pitched himself out of a job, allowing all three runners to score. The Raccoons had nothing going. Quinn hit a solo home run in the bottom 8th, and to lead off the ninth, Salazar reached on a throwing error and scored on successive outs, but it was not even close, despite the score. 4-3 Falcons. Ingall 2-3; Vela 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

The Condors did us a favor by holding off the Canadiens in a 6-5 win. Gap remains at five games, and the magic number drops to seven. Still, the sucking had to stop now.

We designated outfielder Cristian Ortíz (0-13 for us this year) for assignment and added left-handed reliever Tim Mallandain to the roster. The 23-year old Canadian has been decent at AAA this year.

Rain loomed over game 3, in which the Raccoons would have to out-hit Scott Wade’s pitching. They led 3-1 on six hits, four of them doubles, against Ernest Fleming, when rain forced a short 18-minute delay after three innings. The Falcons reappeared replenished by the moist and damp air over the field, and tied the game by the fifth, aided by another moronic error by David Vinson. The misery was to continue. With two out in the top 6th, Wade allowed a double to Augusto Garza. An intentional walk got us to Fleming, but Jose Madrid pinch-hit for him, and Wade walked him, too, before he was knocked out by Kent with a 2-run single. Down 5-3 in the bottom 8th, Daniel Hall had the bags full and two out. A bloop to center off reliever Jose Ramirez tied the game, and Baldivía brought home the go-ahead run with another single. Pat Parker came in for defense in the top 9th, and made the error that cost Grant West a save, the Raccoons a win, and him a job. 7-6 Falcons. O’Morrissey 2-5, 2B; A. Lopez 2-5, 2B, RBI; Hall 2-4, 2 RBI; Baldivía 3-4, RBI;

The mood in Portland reached zero with this game, completing a sweep by a losing team. The Raccoons had not only lost three games, and two games on the Canadiens (10-3 win to end their Tijuana series), but they also lost Neil Reece for the rest of the season with a hamstring strain sustained on a play in the eighth inning.

In other news

September 20 – IND RF/LF Raúl Vázquez (.250, 18 HR, 67 RBI) is out for the season with a strained oblique.
September 20 – TIJ C Andres Manuel (.250, 6 HR, 41 RBI) is hit by a pitch in the foot – it is fractured and Manuel is out for the year, including the playoffs.
September 22 – VAN 1B Salvador Mendez (.352, 3 HR, 93 RBI) has suffered an oblique strain and is out for the year.

Complaints and stuff

Proctor will go after this season. What a useless douche. I hate his arm, I hate his face, I hate the whole ****ed up pile of ****.

Regardless, with Reece down and out, the year is over. They won’t be able to stink up to the Condors. It’s over.

Too depressed to post pictures.

[Westheim]

Neil Reece will not be put on the disabled list. Our medical staff says that he will be back in two weeks, which would be right in the middle of the CLCS. We will play the opening games a man short. So be it.

Unless we manage to blow it. We would have a slumping O’Morrissey in the cleanup spot from here on.

Raccoons (86-66) vs. Indians (73-79) – September 24-26, 1993

Tomas Maguey’s 2-run homer got the Indians ahead in the first inning of the opener, but the Indians blew that lead on time. Johnston and Rodriguez singled with two out in the bottom 2nd, bringing up pitcher Miguel Lopez. The Indians’ Alonso Santana balked over the runners, before Lopez’ slow grounder was thrown wide of first base by SS Jose Martinez. Two more singles helped the Coons to score four unearned runs in the inning. Santana scored a fifth run with a wild pitch in the bottom 3rd. Lopez had to work pretty hard to complete six innings, but no more damage was done by the Indians against him, while a 2-run homer by Bobby Quinn made it 7-2. Between themselves, Matthews, Vela, and Lagarde allowed only one more base runner to the finish line. 7-2 Raccoons. Moreno 2-4, 2B; Quinn 3-4, HR, 2B, 4 RBI; Hall 2-4, 2B;

The Canadiens defeated the Titans in Boston, 9-5, surviving a late rally, behind Arnold McCray. That keeps the gap at four games, the magic number is six. Roland Moore has a 34-game hitting streak going at this point.

De La Rosa made another start in game 2, with “Pooky” scheduled for game 3.

We faced Arthur Young in game 2, who had given us nothing but fits in recent times. Overall he was 13-10 with a 3.56 ERA, but against the Raccoons, in three starts, he was 2-0 with an 0.44 ERA (1 ER in 20.2 IP). While the Raccoons were unable to hurt him, his defense did in the second, allowing an unearned run on an Angelo Duarte error. Whether that would be enough for De La Rosa to win? In the fourth, the Indians almost tied it, but Alejandro Lopez threw out the tying run at the plate. De La Rosa pitched five scoreless innings on 93 pitches, which was enough for him. Young also was out in the sixth, being on a 2-0 hook then. The Raccoons struggled to mount more offense, but at least could fall back on the bullpen, which shut down any Indians attempts to get back into the game. Glenn Johnston, just playing for the injured Neil Reece, drove in both runs in the game. 2-0 Raccoons. Johnston 3-4, 2 RBI; De La Rosa 5.0 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 4 K, W (4-0); Miller 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

The Canadiens lost, 5-2, getting us to five ahead and four as the magic number.

I still pitched Kisho Saito in game 3. Beato would pitch in New York. Saito’s struggles continued. He barely got out of the third inning, when Eduardo Germán grounded into a double play with the bases loaded. Four singles in the fifth plated two runs for the Indians, while the Raccoons at that point were 2-hit by Jesus Lopez. While Saito struck out seven in his six innings of work, he also allowed 11 hits and those two runs. To top it off, Saito again got no love from his team mates, who were 4-hit over eight innings by Jesus Lopez, whose stuff could be had in six-packs at Dollar General. O-Mo represented the tying run with two out in the bottom 9th, and rolled out to closer Jim Durden. 2-0 Indians. O’Morrissey 2-4; Martinez 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Since the Canadiens clobbered the Titans 12-6, the gap is down to four, and the M# remains four with one week to play. We will however play the bottom two teams in the division, the Crusaders and Titans, in the final week, while the Crusaders look at the marginally better Indians and Loggers.

Raccoons (88-67) @ Crusaders (70-85) – September 27-30, 1993

This was a 4-game series. Under normal circumstances this would present us with an opportunity to win enough games to end the division race in due time.

Daniel Hall drove in two runs with two out in the first in the opener, then hurt his knee sliding into second base, and had to leave the game. Beato and Vinson however, were in no form to hold a lead of any size in this game with their pitching and catching. Beato was wild, walked people indiscriminately, and Vinson made a throwing error that almost cost the game in the fourth, and was unable to keep people from stealing bases, either. On the other hand, Beato got eight pop outs in this game, helping him more than his right arm ever could. Beato was pinch-hit for in the sixth with the bases loaded and two out, but Johnston made the final out after Bob Arnold had already failed to produce before him. With a tender 3-2 lead after the top 8th, Vinson was so bad that he was replaced by Rodriguez for defense. Lagarde and West, together with Rodriguez, finished the game without any more catastrophes. 3-2 Furballs. A. Lopez 2-5; Hall 1-1, 2B, 2 RBI; Baldivía 2-4, HR, RBI;

The Canadiens walked off in the tenth inning against the Indians, 3-2, to keep the gap at four. M#: 3.

Dan The Man has a sprained knee and is out for a week. He could play in the CLCS, but will he be good to go on time? With Reece hurting, entering with three outfielders would be … below 100% on the comfort scale.

The Crusaders sent Dan Barnes (0-3, 21.00 ERA) for game 2. Boys, this one counts! The Raccoons appeared to take the knuckleballer Barnes for a ride with three runs in the first inning on two hits and three walks, but Jason Turner gave two of those runs right back in the bottom 1st, and then the Coons started to flail. Barnes actually looked like he was gonna make it until he was finally broken up in the fifth with a 2-run triple by Bobby Quinn. But Turner wasn’t any better, and didn’t get out of the sixth inning. 5.1 IP, 10 H, 3 BB, and the bags full, he left it to Daniel Miller to get out of there. Miller held on to the lead, but one run scored on a Pete Thompson single. At this point, the Raccoons led 7-3 despite being out-hit 11-9. Miller was almost knocked over by the Crusaders in the seventh, but held on. Alejandro Lopez hit another home run in the eighth for two more, and that was the final score, 9-3 Raccoons. Salazar 2-4, BB; Higgins 2-5; O’Morrissey 3-3, 2 BB, RBI; Kinnear 2-4, 3 RBI; Miller 1.2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K; Matthews 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

The Canadiens also romped over their opponents, 9-2. Gap: 4; M#: 2;

Game 3. Reluctant cleanup man O’Morrissey botched a chance to break up a 1-1 game in the top 3rd with the bags full and one out. He popped out, and Quinn couldn’t do it either, and the Raccoons didn’t score. In turn, Scott Wade was clobbered by a 2-run homer by C Ruben Melendez in the bottom 3rd. With two in scoring position and one out, Wade and Salazar couldn’t even put the ball in play in the top 4th, and they left two more on base in the fifth. The Raccoons hardly amounted to anything past that, while Haywood Lammond, as weak batting a middle infielder as they come, hit a 3-run homer off Juan Martinez in the eighth. 6-1 Crusaders. Salazar 2-5; Higgins 2-5;

Luckily, the Canadiens continued to match us game by game now, and lost 7-5 to the Indians. That means that we can clinch the division with a win in game 4, or if the Indians help us a little.

I messed up my rotation, I think. With the way things are rolling, Saito would pitch in the final series against Boston, but I would (despite his horrible year) want him to open the CLCS in Tijuana. Yet, that would require not one, but two starts by relievers in our final series of the year, and that sounds hard to manage, unless we would have Jason Turner pitch game 3. Hmmmmm.

If nothing else, we were able to send our winningest guy for this task, Miguel Lopez. His final start of the year turned into a pitcher’s nightmare. The stuff wasn’t quite biting, and to make things worse, the offense was crap and the fielding behind him was, too. Lopez lasted six, allowed five runs (two unearned after an error by Chih-tui Jin), and took a loss in another disillusioning game. 6-2 Crusaders. Salazar 2-4, BB; Vinson 2-4, 2B; Ingall 2-3, 2B, RBI; Quinn (PH) 1-1;

Sometimes it is better to be lucky, which is very true for this team. The Indians defeated the Canadiens, 4-3, ending the CL North race in favor of the Raccoons, who almost blew it down the stretch. We have clinched the division for the fifth time, the third consecutive year, and the fourth time in five years.

In other news

September 24 – The Rebels mow down the Miners, 9-0, but are still eliminated in the FL East race, as the Capitals win 6-3 in Cincy. It will be the Capitals’ fourth postseason appearance, all consecutive.
September 25 – Vancouver’s Roland Moore (.317, 14 HR, 76 RBI) extends his hitting streak with a solo home run off Boston’s Francisco Vidrio. He has now hit in 35 consecutive games.
September 26 – In the FL West, all six teams are mathematically still in contention with one week of games left. The Gold Sox lead the Stars by one, the Scorpions by two, and the Warriors by three. The Pacifics and Wolves are only theoretical options, though.
September 27 – The Scorpions’ SP David Castillo (14-9, 3.00 ERA) finds his stuff at the right time, as he strikes out 15 Gold Sox in a 7-0 win of the Scorpions. The Scorpions move into a tie for second place with the Stars, one game behind the Gold Sox.
September 28 – Next game in Sacramento, next feat: DEN LF Dale Wales (.335, 6 HR, 58 RBI) has a 2-hit day in a 5-4 Gold Sox win, joining the exclusive 2,000 hits club. Wales’ milestone hit comes as a single off Jose Sanchez, leading off the third inning.
September 29 – The Knights are done for the year, but September callup Jai Utting (.273, 2 HR, 6 RBI in 33 AB) isn’t: the 26-year old sparkled as the Knights drubbed the Aces, 11-5, HITTING FOR THE CYCLE. It is the 18th cycle in ABL history, the fifth consecutive against a CL South team, and the first for the Knights, who were on the receiving end three times before. It also comes one year and two days after the last cycle, which the Condors’ Bruce Boyle hit for *against* the Knights.
September 30 – The Indians get the better of not only the Canadiens, 4-3, but also of Roland Moore, whose hitting streak ends at 39 games, the third longest such strike in history.

Complaints and stuff

In the FL West, the Gold Sox lead the Warriors, Scorpions, and Stars all by two games. These four will all play against each other on the final weekend, as the Stars host the Gold Sox, and the Scorpions welcome the Warriors. No tie at season’s end is possible for teams in either pairing with each other, and thus no three-way tie either.

The current return estimates for Daniel Hall and Neil Reece are the day after the final game of the regular season (Hall) and the home portion of the CLCS (Reece). Also, Mark Allen would be healthy in time for the CLCS and would be eligible for the roster. Problem? He hasn’t played in a month.

Daniel Hall wants another contract really badly. While I am dying not to lose him into the endless ether of retirement, I am just not sure how I could even fit him on the roster next season.

Either way, we extended the contract with scout Vicente Guerra, which would have run through 1994 anyway, by four years.

[Westheim]

I was going through the ancient history of the Raccoons, looking to fill up empty cells in my Excel sheet of achievements, when I found something completely different. In 1977, the Raccoons were tormented by the closing un-abilities of Ben Green, whom we non-tendered after the season. In May, I shopped him and got one offer back, from the Wolves. That offer was Bob “Butcher” Haines, then a prospect. I passed, since I looked for instant improvement (would take five years to improve in the end…). While Green dorked everywhere he played, Haines would go on to enjoy a very respectable career in all pitching roles there are, including tossing a no-hitter as a spot starter for the Pacifics in 1984. Haines went to the mound 603 times in his career (220 starts), went 108-73 and saved 90 games with a 2.70 ERA.

The trades I do, and sometimes don’t.

By the way, that no-hitter was his only complete game ever.

Raccoons (90-69) vs. Titans (71-88) – October 1-3, 1993

Just get it over with, without suffering additional casualties. Pleeeease.

Game 1 was started by De La Rosa, who no-hit the Titans through four before they landed two scratch hits in the fifth. He got no love from the offense, even after he doubled in the bottom 3rd and was left on third base, as Quinn lined out and Alejandro Lopez whiffed against Francisco Vidrio. Lopez finally came through in the sixth with a solo shot just a few feet inside the foul pole in right, his 18th of the year. That was all De La Rosa got, and he stalled in the seventh, putting two on, but Burnett came in to dig him out. The Titans would strike back in the ninth, where Grant West blew another save opportunity. The Titans drew a walk, a hit batter, and two line drive singles to score two runs. The Raccoons were wholly unable to recover from that blow and West took the loss. 2-1 Titans. A. Lopez 2-4, HR, 2B, RBI; Kinnear 2-3, 2B; De La Rosa 6.1 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 6 K and 1-2, 2B;

Grant West’s reign is about to end, that much is sure. The closer question will be raised in earnest for the first time in over a decade this offseason.

Kisho Saito was preserved for game 1 in Tijuana, and “Pooky” Beato was sent to start game 2. Baldivía singled in a run in the bottom 1st and it appeared once more that that was all support the pitcher would get. That pitcher loaded the bags with no outs in the top 4th, but Jack Burbidge grounded into a double play, home and first, and Alejandro Espinoza grounded out – a terrific feat normally only achieved by the furriest of teams! The furriest of the furriest teams left the bags full in the bottom 4th when Beato made the final out, and Lopez and O’Morrissey left another runner in scoring position in the fifth. It HAD to come back to bite us, and it DID. Hjalmar Flygt extended his hitting streak to 20 games with a game-tying RBI single in the top 6th, where the Titans took a 2-1 lead on Beato, who was pinch-hit for in the bottom 6th, but Higgins made the final out to deep right, leaving two on. Moreno got on in the bottom 7th, and went to third when catcher Luis Lopez threw the ball too wide of second base on his steal attempt. With one out, Alejandro Lopez struck out, and O’Morrissey grounded out on a 3-0 pitch. Tim Mallandain gave up another run, but it didn’t matter. The Raccoons had nothing going. 3-1 Titans. Moreno 3-4, 2B; Baldivía 3-4, 2B, RBI;

Remember that the Titans have a pitching staff about as bad as you can have.

Mark Allen was activated from the DL in time for the final game. He had to get warm one way or another so he was to start at second base. A slumping Salazar sat with the recently strangely hot Moreno manning short.

The Titans sent a 5.38 ERA pitcher to victimize in game 3, Chris O’Keefe. The first three innings, the Raccoons had one hit and trailed 1-0 after Flygt drove in a run in the second inning off Jason Turner. In the bottom 4th, however, Lopez got on, and then O’Morrissey crushed his 20th home run of the year to give Turner a lead. Glenn Johnston drove in two runs in his next two plate appearances while making outs both times, and the 4-1 lead was handled with care by Turner. O’Keefe however was not knocked out until the seventh when Kinnear upped to 6-1 with a 2-out, 2-run double. All important parts of the team that could still walk were removed for protection after that. In the top 8th, Turner put a man on, and Proctor came in with the easy task to collect the final out without allowing that runner to score, but instead put two on. Martinez ended the inning then. The ninth inning, the meltdown. Up 7-2, Matthews got one out, then put two on. Burnett came in and allowed three hits, scoring Matthews’ runners. The bags were full with the tying runs, and we called on the walky Lagarde. Note that there was no trust in Grant West at this point. Lagarde promptly forced in a run with a walk to Gary Lang, but then struck out Burbidge, bringing up Joey Tucker. Lagarde made Tucker flail helplessly to end the regular season. 7-5 Raccoons. O’Morrissey 2-4, HR, 2 RBI; Kinnear 3-4, 3 2B, 2 RBI; Turner 7.2 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, W (10-13);

In other news

October 1 – DEN LF Dale Wales (.333, 6 HR, 58 RBI) extends his hitting streak to 20 games in a 2-1 loss to the Stars, which further narrows down the FL West. The Warriors blow an 11-4 lead in a ninth-inning meltdown of epic proportions, allowing the Scorpions to send the game to extra innings, where they walk off in the tenth, 12-11. The Warriors are eliminated.
October 2 – The Stars not only beat the Gold Sox, 6-1, to move into a tie for first in the FL West, they also chill Wales’ hitting streak at 20 games. The Warriors beat the Scorpions, 4-2, leaving both teams one game behind, and eliminating the Scorpions from contention. The winner of the Denver-Dallas matchup tomorrow will carry the division.
October 2 – IND SP Neil Stewart (18-9, 2.86 ERA) tears his meniscus in his final start of the season, but there should be no issues for him to be ready for Opening Day in 1994.
October 3 – Not one, but two players reach the 2,000 hits plateau on the final day of the season. Richmond’s Gabriel Cruz (.244, 14 HR, 63 RBI) lands the hit, a first-inning single against Juan Arroyo, in a 1-0 loss to the Buffaloes. SAL 2B/SS Eddy Bailey (.254, 6 HR, 57 RBI) gets his hit in a 2-1 win over the Pacifics, a second-inning single off John Hall.
October 3 – The Stars complete a stunning upset of the Gold Sox with a 6-3 win, clinching the FL West on the final day of the season. For Dallas, this will be the sixth time they make the playoffs, and the first time since 1990. The Gold Sox, who have not been to the postseason since 1985, are left to writhe in agony.

Complaints and stuff

Ken Burnett signed that 3-yr, $750k contract I had pitched him a few weeks ago. Took some time. Say, Kenny, ain’t your heart in Portland? He’s from New Jersey, so chances are he rooted for the Capitals as a teen (born in ’63), which makes him unreliable in the World Series.

But then again, who rooted for those early Capitals, who were on the verge of leaving town every year?

Current relocation talks are going on in Sioux Falls and Charlotte, by the way. And the Loggers are looking for a bigger market, too.

[Westheim]

1993 CONTINENTAL LEAGUE CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES
Portland Raccoons (91-71) vs. Tijuana Condors (100-62)

The Raccoons play in their fifth postseason, and their third straight, and are the defending World Series champions. The Condors in turn are also in the fifth postseason, but the first since 1990, after losing out to the Bayhawks the last two years. The Condors have never won a championship.

The two best defensive teams of the league are going to face up. The Raccoons allowed 596 runs, the Condors only 11 more. But while the Condors also ranked 4th with 753 runs scored, the Raccoons managed only 704 runs, good for merely 8th in the Continental League.

While the Raccoons used to draw on their murder pitching for years, there are spots on their staff this year. Closer Grant West is not aging gracefully, despite logging his 500th save this year, and ace Kisho Saito had his worst season in memory and lost 15 games. The bullpen as a whole is still about the best in the league.

The Condors will field an 18-, a 17-, and a 16-game winner for this postseason, and a rotation with four guys safely below 4 in terms of ERA. The main weakness is their lack of effective left-handed arms, with only two southpaws on the entire staff. Closer Jose Lopez lost 11 games this season, even trumping 1-6 Grant West.

Offensively, the loss of C Andres Manuel will hurt the Condors, but they can draw on other sources for runs, like outfielders Preston O’Day (.314, 19 HR, 89 RBI) and Paul Theobald (.355, 2 HR, 73 RBI). Their infield is especially dense, with five players having logged 130 hits or more.

The Raccoons’ offense has revolved around Ben O’Morrissey (.308, 20 HR, 85 RBI) and Neil Reece (.323, 18 HR, 94 RBI) all season, with surprise walk-on Alejandro Lopez (.272, 18 HR, 56 RBI) doing a lot of damage in just four months on the team. However, O’Morrissey has been slumping all of September, and Neil Reece strained his hamstring in the penultimate week and will not be available for at least the first couple of games, and maybe only for potential games 6 and 7. Whether the Raccoons will survive for that long?

Condors have the upper hand here, and should win in five games.

---

Yeah, those guys at BNN are not kind to us for sure. But they are right. The offense was bad all year. O-Mo is in a valley, and Reece is hurt until at least game 4 or so. The rest of the team hasn’t done many uplifting things in the meantime.

We had 26 playoff roster eligible players, with INF Marvin Ingall the odd man out. Had Glenn Johnston been eligible, I would have taken him over 1B Glenn Adams, but he wasn’t. It would have merely been for defense, starting in center as long as Reece was knocked out. Reece *is* on the roster (and there are no issues this time with roster befuddlements), but will have to wait for that leg to heal up.

Heal up faster!!

[Westheim]

As far as our rotation was concerned, I removed Scott Wade due to his high ERA, although I could have struck Turner just as well. Kisho Saito had had a horrible season, but he still started up front. Don’t ask. He has that sword and will do all possible things with it if he doesn’t start game 1.

I have Lopez, Beato, and Turner lined up behind Saito.

Batting wise, there weren’t many things to discuss. I put Baldivía over Adams at first, because Baldivía had a much better average, despite worse defense. Higgins was put over Allen, the King of K’s. The left side of the infield was not even in question.

Out there, we had four people for three spots, two lefties (Lopez, Kinnear) and two righties (Hall, Quinn) as long as Reece was out. Lopez was the only sensible option in center, so he was nailed down there, and I was inclined to play Bobby Quinn in all games, and Kinnear and Hall as things developed. Kinnear would most likely start the first two games in left, since the first two Condors up were right-handers.

1993 CONTINENTAL LEAGUE CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES
Portland Raccoons (91-71) @ Tijuana Condors (100-62)

Game 1 – Kisho Saito (10-15, 4.07 ERA) vs. John Douglas (13-14, 3.44 ERA)

How can two playoff teams start their series with TWO losing pitchers? I dunno. Anyway, Douglas posted a 1.55 WHIP during the season, issuing 123 walks. That was the way to get him.

In the bottom 1st, Saito allowed singles to Paul Theobald and Cesar Baéz. Two on, nobody out, way to go. But the next man made an out to Lopez, and while Theobald advanced, Baéz then tried to steal second base during the next at-bat, but was thrown out by Vinson, and Saito escaped the inning unharmed.

In the top 3rd, Vinson then had the first hit for the Raccoons, a shy single that barely made it to the grass behind second base. Saito tried to bunt him over, but stabbed himself into an 0-2 count, at which point he swung away, hitting a howling double to center. Salazar was up next and dealt damage with a 2-run double to the gap in left center, and he would eventually score on a groundout by Lopez. 3-0 Raccoons, now Saito had to hold it.

What Saito did, certainly didn’t look good. Baéz and Tadanobu Sakaguchi both came just short of hitting 2-run dingers in the bottom 3rd, but Quinn and Lopez got to them just in front of the fence and they made two outs. But it was just enough to keep the Condors in order here. They left another runner on third base after a leadoff double in the fifth, and the Raccoons seemed to be in a good position.

In the bottom 6th, Saito put the first two men on, bringing up Preston O’Day, who sent a mighty fly ball to dead center. Again, just short, and again, Lopez was there. But Saito would score a run in the inning with a wild pitch, and the lead was down to 3-1.

The Raccoons were not taking enough pitches from Douglas in the game, and only drew four walks in eight innings. And when they had chances to score, they hit into a double play (Baldivía) or flew out harmlessly. In the top 7th, Matt Higgins tripled with two out, but Lopez failed to drive him home with a fly out to Sakaguchi in left.

Bottom 7th. With two out, Douglas batted against Saito and flew to center, where Lopez caught, then dropped the ball. Saito remained in to face Theobald with Douglas on second base, and the rightfielder flew out to Lopez. This time, he caught it.

Leading off, Baéz hit an infield single to start the bottom 8th, which with the righty Sakaguchi next, ended Saito’s day. Lagarde struck out the guy from Japan, then yielded for Burnett to deal with the left-handers O’Day and Boyle. It didn’t work. O’Day doubled to dead center, and Baéz scored. The Condors then tied the game against Miller.

The Raccoons weren’t doing anything at this point. Miller remained in for the bottom 9th, got two outs, then loaded the bases. Grant West came in and had to retire O’Day to at least force extra innings. In a full count, O’Day swung and grounded to Higgins, who went to first for the out.

The Raccoons STILL couldn’t hit a lick. West was still pitching in the bottom 11th after we burned through most of our pen in the eighth. Sean Bergeron had a 1-out single as a pinch-hitter, and with two out, Baéz lifted a looper to shallow center that Lopez just barely did not get. Two on, two out, Sakaguchi up. In a highly tensioned 8-pitch at-bat, West walked him, and now once again faced O’Day with the sacks full. I had zero trust in Proctor to handle this situation and West had to pitch. O’Day drummed a high fly ball to deep left field on the second pitch of the at-bat. It was very high, but just short of the fence, and Kinnear caught it.

And the band played on.

The top 12th saw Mark Allen bat for West to lead off and he singled to left. Allen advanced on Salazar’s grounder, then advanced again on a wild pitch. Allen on third, one out, and Higgins in a 1-0 count. This had to work out. Higgins singled to right to break the tie.

Now we just needed someone to protect that lead. We had Vela, Proctor – and Wade! This was for him. Give all the juice you have! Wade came in, and Boyle singled as the first man up. Cipriano Ortega bunted, but badly and right to Wade, who hopped off the mound and started a double play. Jesus Jimenez was left to be dealt with. He flew to deep center, but Lopez got to it, and it was over.

Raccoons 4, Condors 3 (12); Salazar 2-6, 2B, 2 RBI; Higgins 3-6, 3B, RBI; Allen (PH) 1-1; Saito 7.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 3 K and 1-3, 2B; West 2.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 0 K, W (1-0);

Game 1 of the FLCS also went past the ninth. Dallas’ Matt Sims hit Freddy Gonzalez with a pitch with the bases loaded in the 11th to walk off the Capitals, 5-4.

Game 2 – Miguel Lopez (17-8, 2.81 ERA) vs. Jose Macias (16-12, 3.61 ERA)

Grant West was not available for this game after throwing 43 pitches. Apart from that we had everybody available. Sans Reece of course. Contrary to my anticipation however, the Condors started lefty Jose Macias in this game, so Hall was in left in place of Kinnear.

Macias pitched only one inning, then left with an injury. However, that didn’t help Miguel Lopez a thing, as he was drubbed for three runs (two earned after a Higgins error) in the bottom 2nd.

Lopez did have little to no control over his stuff, pitched in 3-ball counts a lot and gave up plenty of contact to the Condors then. The Raccoons in turn had one hit through three innings, trailed 3-0, and looked done.

Top 4th. Alejandro Lopez got on with one out, and Hall came to bat with two outs after O-Mo had done nothing once again. Hall unleashed a shot to the gap in left center which caromed awkwardly off the wall and became an RBI triple for Hall. Salazar walked, bringing up Baldivía with runners on the corners. He pressed a grounder through 3B Jimenez, which eluded Sakaguchi in left as well and became a game-tying 2-run double.

All could have turned out well, but Lopez still sucked. Theobald and Baéz hit back-to-back doubles to start the bottom 4th, and the Condors led 4-3. The offense had to out-suck the pitching here, and the Condors were burning up relievers at quick speed now. In the top 5th, Charles Bywaters put two men on, then faced O’Morrissey, who doubled to left to tie the game. Hall and Salazar left the runners in scoring position.

Lopez somehow managed to go six innings, but the score remained tied at four. Neither team amounted to much after the fifth. The Condors left the go-ahead run on second base in the bottom 8th against Juan Martinez, that was about it.

This game went to extra innings, too. Proctor put on the winning run for the Condors in the bottom 10th, but was yanked for Lagarde, who ended the inning with a fly out by Boyle.

With two out in the top 11th, Higgins doubled to center. Quinn singled to shallow right, and Lopez walked, leaving it to O’Morrissey to finish off reliever Jerome Vogler. O-Mo sent a high line drive into deep center, which O’Day just barely missed. Two runs scored. Daniel Hall added two more runs with a single up the middle. Lagarde easily protected the 4-run lead in the bottom 11th.

Raccoons 8, Condors 4 (11); A. Lopez 2-4, 2 BB; O’Morrissey 2-6, 2B, 3 RBI; Hall 2-6, 3B, 3 RBI; Baldivía 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Martinez 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K; Lagarde 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, W (1-0);

The Capitals bowled over Dallas’ Tia Fa early in game 2 and romped to an 11-4 win to take a 2-0 lead in the FLCS heading to Dallas. A double-rematch of the last two World Series does not seem all too unlikely.

[Westheim]

No insult to Mexico, but … let’s not go back there!

1993 CONTINENTAL LEAGUE CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES
Portland Raccoons (91-71) vs. Tijuana Condors (100-62)

Game 3 – Raimundo Beato (11-8, 2.80 ERA) vs. Woody Roberts (17-6, 2.46 ERA)

There were good news and bad news before this game. Neil Reece had been massaged and had bathed in soothing oils and all that crap and declared himself ready for game 3. He was instantly assigned the cleanup slot. On the other side, Alejandro Lopez had come down with the flu (in Mexico, hopefully not swine flu, because it can’t be a common cold) and had green things hanging from his nose. He was DTD for our stint in Portland.

Quinn was benched after not having a great time in Tijuana. Dan The Man had come up with two important hits in game 2 and this was home, and maybe the last time he appeared here. He played until he would break something. Call it sentimentality, which has killed many men before.

And with all that preparation for game 3, Beato failed to get outs. The Condors scored two runs in the first inning, and while the Raccoons got one run back in the bottom 2nd after a Baldivía triple, they left four on in those first two frames.

But Roberts was not very good for the Condors, either. He found himself out of control in the third inning, repeatedly pitching to Coons in 3-ball counts, and they were quite good at managing those. Baldivía tied the game with a 2-out RBI single to left and then Vinson singled into almost the same spot for Hall to try for home from second base. He crawled in under the tag of catcher Paul Carter by mere inches, but the Raccoons took the lead.

More traffic for Roberts in the fourth. Salazar and Higgins got on with nobody out, and while he got two outs and to 0-2 on Vern Kinnear, he made a bad pitch that Kinnear took into shallow center for Salazar to score. Hall came up. The park was chanting for him as he took a Roberts offering into deep left to score two more runs, 6-2 Coons. He lifted his helmet standing at second base and the park was a giant box of noise as the Condors’ pitching coach and manager picked up Roberts and went to their bullpen early.

But this was not all apple pie yet. Beato was still bad, and the Condors were still hitting him. With two on and two out in the top 5th, O’Morrissey made a great play on a hissing line drive by Sakaguchi that ended that inning without any more damage taken, but there were another 12 outs to get.

A triple by Theobald in the seventh would stunt Beato’s attempt to take at least half of the remaining wickets. With one out and three left-handers up, he departed for Proctor. Now, I didn’t trust Proctor for a quarter, but the tying run was not in the on-deck circle, so you could wager on him to get two outs, even if he gave up Theobald’s run.

Now, while Proctor did finish the inning, and only allowed that one run to score, he did that with a screaming single to the first guy he faced, Cesar Baéz. He just had no composure, no bite, no nothing. Why did I trade for that sucker?

The Raccoons still nursed a 6-3 lead. Daniel Miller surrendered nothing but hard contact in the eighth, but the Condors didn’t score thanks to some good D by Reece and O-Mo.

Reece. He came to bat with two out and two on in the bottom 8th. Bywaters pitched to him, and Reece shot a liner into deep left. Both runners scored and Reece fell into third base. And hurt himself.

The park fell silent as he yielded for pinch-runner Jose Rodriguez. While Vela pitched a scoreless ninth, the question was: what now?

Raccoons 8, Condors 3 (Raccoons lead 3-0); Higgins 2-4, BB; Reece 2-5, 3B, 2 RBI; Hall 1-3, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Baldivía 2-4, 3B, RBI; Quinn (PH) 1-1;

Ramón Ortíz shut out the Stars over eight innings in game 3 in Dallas, and Domingo Rivera finished the deal. 4-0 Capitals, as they hold a 3-0 series lead, just like we do now.

Game 4 – Jason Turner (10-13, 3.16 ERA) vs. John Douglas

Neil Reece was not diagnosed heading into the possibly deciding game 4. With Lopez sneezing, we had little options for centerfield. The best bet was to put Quinn there, and let hope and prayers do the rest. [On a 20 scale, Quinn had 3 and Hall 1 in CF, so …] Also, Mark Allen played at second and Higgins moved to first, Baldivía was out.

The Condors decided to use Douglas behind the 8-ball, which could certainly go either way for them. Draw walks, boys, draw walks! And a slam here or there would not hurt, either.

Bobby Quinn was bound to have a long day in center. The first chance he got, he missed capitally, putting Sakaguchi on in the second inning, and the Condors used the opportunity to zip ahead on an unearned run. That Quinn had no idea what he was doing out there in center, was apparent quickly, and he failed to make a play in the third inning that Reece would have made while fixing a sandwich. The Condors didn’t score here, though.

The score remained 1-0 for the wrong team. Salazar got on with one out in the third and moved to second when Higgins grounded out. Hall came up, batting third, because we’re the team of a thousand lineups. Hall had struck out the first time up, but this time didn’t miss and doubled to deep right to tie the game. The park was howling in excitement.

Top 5th. First up was Paul Carter, who reached on a double to – yeah… - center. Quinn wasn’t even in the same ZIP code. Turner struck out Douglas and then got out of the inning against Theobald and Baéz.

The Coons however, didn’t score. Turner was then knocked out in the sixth, as the Condors went ahead 2-1, and Turner then put two more batters on, the latter with a hit to the hip. Kevin Lewis looked grimly at him, but no brawl ensued. The Condors scored another run against Daniel Miller, 3-1.

Worst of all, John Douglas didn’t walk the scores of people he used to. He went six innings, then left being sore. The Raccoons had been 3-hit by him and sat in a deep hole. Very deep for a team one win away from the World Series.

Miller and Burnett gave up a run in the top 7th, digging the hole even deeper. The Condors sent the so far not terribly effective Bywaters for the bottom 7th, and while not registering an out, he walked twice as many people as Douglas had: the first two he faced, Quinn and Allen. Vinson came up, cocking his bat. Against the righty Bywaters he could hit from his stronger side, left-handed, but also worked a walk.

Bases loaded, no outs. Never had it been more important to come through. Baldivía pinch-hit for Burnett, but grounded into a double play. Right. Into it. The Raccoons got only one run, and trailed 4-2.

While Wade came in to pitch a quick eighth, the Raccoons still continued to bring the tying run to the plate. Higgins singled to start the bottom 8th, bringing up Hall, but there was no crowd exciter this time, as he flew out to Theobald in right. O-Mo did so, too, and the inning fizzled out. The Condors then ended the game with force, a 3-run homer by O’Day off Wade in the ninth. There would be no sweep.

Condors 7, Raccoons 2 (Raccoons lead series 3-1)

That’s right, there were no performances worthy of reporting. The Capitals couldn’t seal the deal, either, they lost 4-2 in Dallas.

Game 5 – Kisho Saito vs. Jose Macias

No matter how sickly, Lopez had to play center. Quinn had been abysmally bad. I won’t say he lost the game, but he certainly didn’t make it better by being on that particular spot of green. He played right, and Kinnear was out. Allen was also recycled.

I don’t want to go back to Mexico.

Early on, signs hinted at a return to Baja California, though. Saito appeared off, hitting Sakaguchi in the first inning, which remained scoreless. But in the second inning, we lost Higgins on a defensive play, and had to make do without backup middle infielder now, as Allen still got into the game. Vinson threw out Ortega stealing just before Jimenez homered off Saito to make it a 1-0 game. Again.

It didn’t get any better. Saito failed to remove both Macias and Baéz in the third after getting into 0-2 counts. Both singled, and both ended up scoring. 3-0.

Meanwhile the offense wasn’t able to even make it close. The first time through the lineup, we had one hit, the second time, we had two and a double play hit into by Baldivía.

Saito went through seven innings without any glamour, yet also without any more runs surrendered, but the Raccoons were unable to mount a lick of offense. Then came the bottom 7th. O’Morrissey and Hall hit singles to get the frame going and stood on the corners. Nobody out, tying run at the plate in Salazar.

Salazar popped out, but then came Baldivía and lined into left, and past Sakaguchi, it became an RBI double. The tying runs were in scoring position for Vinson, who was unfortunately batting .188 in the series and struck out. Adams hit for Saito. He struck out, too.

Rain began to fall.

A delay was called in the ninth, just after the Condors had scored a tag-on run against Martinez. 46 minutes later, Lagarde ended the frame.

4-1 Condors.

Bottom 9th. O’Morrissey struck out to get things started, or not. Daniel Hall came up. People were standing up and chanting for him. His last at-bat in this park? He lined a double past Theobald to stand at second base.

A sad sight to see. 1,844 regular season hits stood in a soaking drizzle on second base, as Salazar stepped in against closer Jose Lopez. 38 years, the last hurrah? It was about to go to hell, capitally.

Salazar took Lopez’ third pitch, but popped it up to shallow left. But neither Jimenez nor Sakaguchi were able to locate it quickly and it plopped in, scoring Hall. Baldivía came to bat, representing the tying run. He grounded out.

Up came Vinson. Vinson struck out.

Condors 4, Raccoons 2 (Raccoons lead series 3-2); Hall 2-3, BB, 2B; Salazar 2-4, RBI; Baldivía 2-4, 2B, RBI;

The Capitals ended their struggle with the Stars, 8-4, to win in five games.

We have to go to Mexico.

[Westheim]

We got injury news on the off day between games. Neil Reece had a knee contusion. He was out for two weeks, which in any case was the rest of the playoffs. The same was true for Matt Higgins, only that his injury was much more serious. He had torn his labrum on a slingshot throw, and whether he would be ready come Opening Day in ’94 was up to discussion. It couldn’t possibly getting any worse.

No abla Espanol. Get me outta here.

1993 CONTINENTAL LEAGUE CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES
Portland Raccoons (91-71) @ Tijuana Condors (100-62)

Game 6 – Miguel Lopez vs. Robbie Dadswell (18-8, 3.79 ERA)

We were left with 11 batters now, which was not all that much, to be honest. Included were two catchers and two first basemen, so we had in fact one spare player left over. And those that we did have, did not produce a lot.

Some guy in the park was constantly screaming “Arrrriba! Arrrriba!” once the players appeared on the field.

A walk by Salazar, Quinn getting drilled, and a clean single by Lopez loaded the bases with nobody out in the top 1st. Time for a double play, right? Yeah. O’Morrissey took care of that. Salazar scored, but that was it, as Hall’s low flyer was just caught off the grass by Theobald in right.

I was about to mention that that would be all Miguel Lopez – who hadn’t fit the description of stopper since probably July – was going to get, but that was not true, since a Baéz error in the second inning plated another run for the Raccoons, who took a 2-0 lead for a moment, but Lopez put the first three men on in the bottom 2nd and the Condors cut the lead back to 2-1.

Lopez was awful. The defense made some nice plays around him, but overall, he was awful. In the top 5th then, Vinson somehow singled his way on as the first man up. Lopez failed to get the bunt down and Vinson was forced out at second base. Salazar then singled. One out, two on, still a big chance. Quinn singled up the middle, loading the bases. Alejandro Lopez had to make something work, but grounded into a force at home.

Bases loaded, two out, O’Morrissey up, whose .208, 0 HR, 3 RBI in the postseason was only about average as far as the Raccoons were concerned. In fact, they had not hit a home run at all.

And O-Mo didn’t hit one here, but his fly ball eluded O’Day in center and bounced away from him, and O-Mo crashed into third base with a bases-clearing triple! The park fell silent in shock, even the guy that had been screaming “Arrrriba! Arrrriba!” since play had begun.

Lopez went back out to the mound. The next four batters he faced hit three singles, one run scored, and Sakaguchi stepped in as the tying run, and that was it for Lopez. Lagarde came in, but didn’t necessarily end the suffering quickly. One run scored, and Quinn threw out another runner at the plate to end the inning.

While the Raccoons added an unearned run in the seventh, but left two on in both the sixth and seventh innings, Lagarde was still pitching to start the bottom 7th, but Carter ejected him with a leadoff triple.

Will you please get a 6-3 lead home?

While Tony Vela came in to pitch, the idiot Vinson allowed the runner to score with a passed ball that made it 6-4, and STILL nine outs to collect. Vela collected two, then walked Baéz. Sakaguchi came up, and homered to left.

The game was tied. That Arriba crier started again. Everything was going to be just a sea of pain.

Top 8th. Vinson singled to right, Adams singled up the middle, and Salazar singled through the diving Jimenez. Bases loaded, nobody out, again. Quinn lined into left center, but Sakaguchi made a great catch. Vinson had already been going and had to hustle back, no chance to tag and score now. Lopez struck out. O’Morrissey.

The Raccoons still had yet to hit a home run in the series. O’Morrissey faced Jose Valentin and ripped at the second pitch, which lined into shallow center. Two runs scored as Adams almost caught up with Vinson at home.

Again no home run. But the inning continued with Daniel Hall at the plate. He quickly fell to 0-2 against Valentin, then took the biggest swing he had. The crier stopped at the second R in Arriba, as Dan The Man’s blast vanished in the left field stands. DANIEL HALL HAD HIT A ****ING HOME RUN!!! RACCOONS UP BY FIVE!!!

Hall was almost crushed by his peers in the dugout. Now, only six outs left, play down the clock, boys. Miller managed a scoreless eighth. Martinez was tasked with the ninth.

Martinez got two outs before Baéz doubled to left, and then Martinez drilled Sakaguchi. Grant West warmed up hurriedly, as Martinez faced O’Day. The slugger had only batted .214 in the series, and jabbed at the first pitch from Martinez, which he grounded to right. Adams, having replaced Baldivía for defense, made the play.

Raccoons 11, Condors 6 (Raccoons win 4-2); Salazar 2-5, BB; A. Lopez 2-6, 2B, RBI; O’Morrissey 2-4, BB, 3B, 5 RBI; Hall 1-5, HR, 3 RBI; Baldivía 2-5; Vinson 2-4, BB, RBI; Lagarde 1.2 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 0 BB, 1 K;

Mental exhaustion feels exactly like that.

Daniel Hall is batting .318 with 1 HR (100% of our output) and 9 RBI (almost 30%) for the series. He’s OPS’ing 1.057. Now all chant DAN THE MAN! DAN THE MAN! DAN THE MAN! until I will come up with the World Series.

[Questdog]

Wow! Definitely did not think this team would make it to the Series....congrats on earning a manager of the year award for this one!

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by Questdog

Wow! Definitely did not think this team would make it to the Series....congrats on earning a manager of the year award for this one!

Neither would I have dared to dream. We will send a Thank You card to Vancouver for them not playing us hard down the stretch.

---

1993 WORLD SERIES
Portland Raccoons (91-71) vs. Washington Capitals (100-62)

It seems like the World Series is contested annually between those two teams. This is the third time, the Big Show will feature these contenders – in a row! The previous two contests were split evenly, with the Raccoons being the defending champions.

The Raccoons have lost some feathers on the way. Their pitching is not what it was last year, all year, and they illustrated that again in the CLCS against the Condors, blowing a fine-sized lead in the sixth game before soldiering through against a collapsing Condors bullpen. Their batting is not what it was last year, either, and with Neil Reece and Matt Higgins they have now lost two big contributors from that lineup, offensively as well as defensively. Surviving slugger Ben O’Morrissey had a middling CLCS, but provided a few neatly timed RBI hits, while old war horse Daniel Hall drove in nine in the series, despite not starting game 1. He also hit the only home run for the team. The Raccoons offense was average at best in the Continental League, while their pitching led the league despite a drop off from the last one or two years.

Contrast that with the Capitals. They consistently ranked top 3 in almost all hitting categories in the Federal League, but they didn’t walk a lot, and instead struck out quite often. Their lineup will for the most part face punchout pitchers, so they will have to watch out.

But the Capitals also had the 2nd best team in preventing runs in the Federal League and a pitching staff that led many categories. While they lost SP Ethan Thomas in the FLCS to injury (their only 40-man player on the DL) they can still field a scary 1-2 punch in Ramón Ortíz and Archie Dye, who won 26 games two years ago. He went 16-10 this year, but Ortíz won 21 games. Their bullpen is not shabby either, and was the best relief corps in the league. There are no real weaknesses on this staff.

The Capitals will be able to field four .300+ batters, including batting title winner Jeffery Brown, and can hit for power almost completely throughout their lineup, which could help them even more in the narrower confines of Raccoons Ballpark in games 3 to 5.

Prediction: the Capitals become the first team to win three titles, and they will do so while still in Portland.

---

Again, BNN thinks very lowly of us. I trusted their judgement before the CLCS (and still don’t know how we effectively beat the Condors), and I tend to trust them here. Then, we upset the Capitals last year, but those were two teams that had identical regular season records.

We have added Sixto Moreno and Bob Arnold to the playoff roster to offset the injuries to Matt Higgins (heal, labrum, heal, we need him next year!) and Neil Reece (bad knee! Bad, bad knee!). Both are going to be sorely missed.

We will lead off the series with Raimundo Beato, and then with Kisho Saito, who will pitch on regular rest in game 2, followed by Lopez and then Turner. Then we will see.

I have put the tickets for the best seats in the house into the mail now, they should arrive at all dear followers in time for game 3.