Portland Raccoons (ABL)

[wpnads]

Looks like 2013 has been horrible for pitchers getting injured. Can't wait until 2014 and the return of Brown!

[Westheim]

It is certainly the worst year for injured pitchers across the league that I have witnessed in 37 years in the ABL. More on this ... now:

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Raccoons (50-47) vs. Bayhawks (52-47) – July 22-24, 2013

The Bayhawks were easy to drum on, conceding the second-most runs in the league, which gave them a -6 run differential despite the fourth-best offense. The Raccoons with their strong -4 run differential were 2-1 against them so far.

Projected matchups:
Bill Conway (3-6, 3.32 ERA) vs. Reynaldo Rendon (10-3, 4.39 ERA)
Hector Santos (4-8, 4.12 ERA) vs. Milt Beauchamp (6-9, 5.01 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (6-5, 3.81 ERA) vs. Jared D’Attilo (5-8, 4.80 ERA)

A full set of right-handers before our next off day. Combined with the rainout on the preceding Sunday, Sergio Vega will not get another spot start, and Juan Gallegos was demoted as the week began, bringing up – because there was really no other semi-sensible addition, Jason Seeley.

Game 1
SFB: LF J. Gomez – 3B J. Rodriguez – RF Alston – 1B A. Young – CF Holt – C McClendon – SS Ingraham – 2B Brazeal – P Rendon
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – LF Sambrano – SS Palmer – 3B Rodgers – P Conway

Conway was taken to town in the first inning, conceding two runs on four hits, most of them hard, including a 2-out RBI triple by Jasper Holt. The Coons would make up the deficit without a single hit in the bottom 1st, with Yoshi Nomura getting drilled, a Zack Ingraham error adding Bednarski to the base paths, and then three walks by an out-of-control Rendon. Rodgers then poked and lined out to Jose Gomez in left, and also hit into a double play in the fourth. While Rendon remained wild, the Coons were unable to get a hit off him, while Conway just kept bleeding, conceding a run in the second, and another one in the third, in which Adam Young hit a leadoff jack, #18 for him on the year. Carmona hit a leadoff single in the bottom 5th to get the ineffective Rendon out of the game, then was promptly caught stealing once again. Yoshi hit an infield single, and Bednarski hit into a double play against lefty Mike Tharp.

Micah Brazeal’s 1-out single between Quebell and Nomura was the tenth hit off Bill Conway and finally got the struggling starter out of the game in the sixth inning. Although George Youngblood balked Brazeal to third after Mike Tharp’s bunt, Gomez struck out to strand the run and the score remained 4-2, at least until Youngblood faced three more left-handers in the seventh and didn’t retire any of them. Tom Constantino held the damage to a run, but with the Raccoons doing absolutely nothing offensively… 5-2 Bayhawks.

The Raccoons were out-hit 13-3 in this game.

Game 2
SFB: LF J. Gomez – 3B J. Rodriguez – RF Alston – 1B A. Young – CF Holt – SS Ingraham – C Lefebure – 2B Brazeal – P Beauchamp
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C Bowen – LF Sambrano – SS Palmer – 3B Canning – P Santos

There was hardly a batter in the first two innings that didn’t hit a really hard ball off Hector Santos – but the Bayhawks got only one man on, didn’t score, and then somehow Walt Canning ran into a 2-out, 3-run homer in the bottom 2nd to give the Coons a lead. When “Monte” Alston was thrown out at home plate by Bednarski to end the fourth inning after three singles allowed by Santos, that tasted especially good. However, the singles kept piling up on Santos, who conceded two runs on three hits and a walk in the sixth inning, most of that crap coming with two outs, and then issued a leadoff walk to Jose Gomez in the seventh that was his demise. The Raccoons absolutely didn’t do anything after Canning’s shot, yet arrived with a 3-2 lead in the ninth, when controversially Youngblood, who had gotten the last out in the eighth, remained in the game to face the 9-1-2 batters, left-switch-left with Sugano used, Thrasher used days prior, and Watanabe not being trusted. Yeah, you’re not trusting Watanabe – fine – but then you’re trusting Youngblood?? Are you nuts?? Omarion Thompson promptly opened the inning with a pinch-hit double. Youngblood was still going to handle the ball. Gomez and Javy Rodriguez both lined absolute rockets to left, and Sambrano sold out to make both catches! Alston came up, raked hard, missed, and struck out. 3-2 Blighters. Canning 1-3, HR, 3 RBI; Youngblood 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K, SV (1);

Really starting to sour on Santos…

Game 3
SFB: LF J. Gomez – 2B Brazeal – RF Alston – CF Holt – C McClendon – 3B J. Rodriguez – 1B A. Simmons – SS Ingraham – P D’Attilo
POR: LF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – CF White – 3B Rodgers – SS Whitehouse – P Baldwin

The Critters actually managed to get one of their chumps to 50 RBI before August broke over them when Quebell slogged a 2-run double off the centerfield wall in the first inning. The lead was short-lived with Baldwin allowing a leadoff hit in each of the first three innings and a lot of contact otherwise, too. Especially sour was the leadoff single that the opposing pitcher had in the third inning, to which Baldwin soon added a Jose Gomez double and conceded both runs to create a 2-2 tie. The Coons stranded a man in the bottom 3rd, two in the fourth, and looked like leaving a full complement in the fifth when Pat White’s grounder narrowly escaped Brazeal into centerfield for a 2-out, 2-run single. Baldwin wobbled through six with the 4-2 lead before being pinch-hit for with Palmer to absolutely no gain in the bottom of the sixth inning.

The Coons in the bottom 7th had two outs and nobody on when Bowen pinch-hit for an 0-3 D-Alex against Tharp. He worked a walk – sensation, sensation – before Quebell and White both singled to score him for a sneaky extra run. Thrasher logged five outs in an almost faultless bullpen performance – more sensation – and the Bayhawks, when they did get a leadoff single by Alston in the ninth, soon had Jasper Holt hit into a double play to kill their chances. 5-2 Coons. Carmona 2-5, 2B; Nomura 2-5; Bednarski 2-4; Quebell 3-3, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; White 3-4, 3 RBI; Thrasher 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

Interlude: waiver claim

The Raccoons were awarded the contract of Boston’s Mauro Castro (1-0, 1.80 ERA) on Friday after claiming him off waivers. Castro is essentially the Titans’ Sergio Vega, being in the organization for like forever, and bouncing between the Bigs and AAA for about as long (although they didn’t draft him – Castro actually went undrafted in 1998 and was picked up by the Miners later that year). The last three years this right-hander pitched a meaningful amount of innings in the Bigs, he racked up 5+ ERA’s.

To accommodate Castro on the roster, where he would take over the open rotation slot, Pat Slayton was sent back to AAA.

Raccoons (52-48) vs. Knights (48-53) – July 26-28, 2013

The Knights had the second-worst rotation by ERA, but were only a bit below average when it came to preventing runs as a whole. They were sixth in runs scored, another team with a slightly negative run differential at -5. The Raccoons had already claimed the season series from Atlanta, winning five of six games so far. But that’s what a team that has Ed Bryan closing and as one of their five best players should see coming.

Projected matchups:
Rich Hood (5-6, 4.49 ERA) vs. Ted McKenzie (5-5, 3.69 ERA)
Bill Conway (3-7, 3.47 ERA) vs. Stephen Quirion (3-3, 4.35 ERA)
Hector Santos (5-8, 4.07 ERA) vs. Shaun Yoder (6-7, 4.85 ERA)

Three right-handers, as we miss their southpaw by a day.

Game 1
ATL: C W. Jones – SS Hibbard – LF M. Reyes – 1B Rockwell – 2B Downing – CF C. Morán – 3B Tolwith – RF McIntyre – P McKenzie
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – LF Sambrano – SS Palmer – 3B Canning – P Hood

Marty Reyes’ solo shot put the Knights 1-0 ahead in the top of the first. While the Raccoons tied the score when Carmona came in on D-Alex’ sac fly in the bottom of the inning, a Quebell error and a hit off Hood created enough traffic in the top 2nd for an unearned sac fly by Will McIntyre to hand the lead back to the Knights at 2-1. Another unearned run was added to Rich Hood’s ledger in the third inning when Devin Hibbard reached on a real bad throwing error by Walt Canning. Actually, TWO unearned runs were charged to Hood in the third, because Hibbard scored on Gil Rockwell’s 27th homer of the season, 4-1. Hood ran out of excuses in the fourth inning. Five Knights logged hits off him in that inning, most of them hard, and Reyes’ 2-out, 2-run double sent Hood to the showers, and the Knights soaring to an 8-1 lead. The Raccoons’ comeback started to pick up pace in the bottom 4th, when Palmer hit a 2-out single that was their second hit on the - … oh, and McKenzie picked him off first. Bednarski and D-Alex hit back-to-back singles in the bottom 6th, and Quebell hit into a double play. The highlight of the day were doubtlessly three innings plus change pitched by Sergio Vega in long relief, just before Constantino got lit up for two runs in the eighth. The Coons scored two unearned runs in the bottom 9th because apparently the Knights could make errors, too. 10-3 Knights. Quebell 2-4, 2B; Palmer 1-1, 2 BB; White (PH) 1-1, 2B, RBI; Vega 3.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K;

Following this game, the Knights acquired SP Dave Hogan (2-12, 5.37 ERA) from the Condors for 3B/2B Tom Fish (.207, 5 HR, 16 RBI), who had currently dwelled in the minors. The Knights had already acquired INF Antonio Luján (.287, 3 HR, 29 RBI) from the Blue Sox for CF/RF Conor Shearing (.247, 8 HR, 27 RBI) and #92 prospect SS Kyle Burns earlier in the week.

The Raccoons could not find takers for a number of players, including Quebell, Baldwin, and … Bowen.

Game 2
ATL: CF Arnette – SS Hibbard – LF M. Reyes – 1B Rockwell – RF J. Garcia – 2B Downing – 3B Luján – C Luna – P Yoder
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – LF Sambrano – SS Palmer – 3B Canning – P Hood

John-Alexander-less John Alexander Bobblehead Day saw the first runner in scoring position in the bottom 2nd, although it was not quite a Raccoons achievement. Gil Rockwell dropped Adrian Quebell’s easy pop before Shaun Yoder drilled Sandy Sambrano. Two on, nobody out, but the Raccoons wouldn’t score despite loading the bases on Canning’s walk. Palmer grounded to short before that, Conway struck out, and Carmona grounded to short again. The home crowd got something to cheer about an inning later, when D-Alex cracked his 15th homer of the year, a 2-piece and the first tally in the game. Alexander soon enough got the home crowd’s frustration, however. Top 5th, Luján hit a long home run to start the inning, 2-1 Coons. Ruben Luna, a rookie catcher, then singled to right, bringing up Yoder, who predictably bunted, and on that bunt Alexander made a colossal throwing error that put the go-ahead runs in scoring position with nobody out. However, Conway buckled down, struck out Pat Arnette, caught a singed liner from Devin Hibbard, and whiffed Marty Reyes to strand the runners.

The Raccoons fans then were soon completely confused as to whether to cheer, or jeer, or wrap hot dog wrappers into balls and throw it at the most conveniently placed brown-clad fielder. Bednarski reached on a sorry bloop in the bottom 5th, and D-Alex came up again and rammed a 2-1 pitch to deep left for another 2-run homer! The first one had been to right. Soon after, a strange game got even stranger when it started to rain, and the game was delayed for more than half an hour in the middle of the sixth, knocking out both starting pitchers. The Coons added single runs with sac flies in both the sixth and the seventh, with D-Alex walking and scoring in the latter. To get him up once more for a chance at three dingers, one Coon would have to get on and stay on base against Steve Arritt in the bottom 8th, and Gil Rockwell’s second error of the game putting on Carmona certainly came in handy. Yoshi singled to left, and Bednarski singled to the clumsy pitcher, bringing up D-Alex with three on and nobody out. First pitch, to center, but an easy out for Pat Arnette. Carmona tagged and scored, however. 7-1 Raccoons. Nomura 2-4, BB; Bednarski 3-5; D. Alexander 2-3, BB, 2 HR, 5 RBI; Sambrano 1-2, 2 BB; Conway 6.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 8 K, W (4-7) and 1-2; Sugano 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Stephen Quirion was booted from this series for good, and the Raccoons did get to face the left-hander Dave Butler (12-7, 4.25 ERA) after all.

Game 3
ATL: CF Arnette – SS Hibbard – LF M. Reyes – 1B Rockwell – RF J. Garcia – 2B Downing – 3B Luján – C Luna – P D. Butler
POR: 2B Nomura – CF White – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Palmer – LF Sambrano – 3B Canning – SS Whitehouse – P Santos

The Coons were legendarily bad against left-handed pitching, so Santos had to buckle up and not bleed hits and runs again. The Raccoons indeed scored first, again in unusual manner. Sandy hit a leadoff single in the bottom 2nd, then stole two bases during Canning’s at-bat, and only barely scored on Whitehouse’s grounder to short. The Knights didn’t get much off Santos, but D-Alex added to the lead with a solo homer in the bottom of the fifth, handing Santos a 2-0 advantage.

Santos’ turn to bat came up twice with runners on first and second and less than two outs. The first time, in the fourth inning, he hit into a double play that let the air out of the frame. The second time he hit a looper to right that fell in barely fair and then raced away from Jorge Garcia for a 2-run double, 4-0! Santos would score on a 2-out infield single by Pat White, but as soon as he was the hero, he turned south with his pitching and loaded the bases in the top 7th. The Raccoons turned to Manobu Sugano in that situation, who got a high pop to shallow left from Ruben Luna for the second out before right-hander Aaron Tolwith and his .232 clip hit for reliever Jorge Cortez. In the leadoff spot was another left-hander in Pat Arnette. Sugano stayed in, Tolwith hit a huge drive to left, and Sambrano seemed to shred at least a few limbs on a flying catch that turned into a wild tumble at the edge of the warning track, but he bounced up fine and the inning was over. Sambrano doubled and scored (on Canning’s single) in the bottom of the inning, becoming the toast of the town. The Raccoons shut out the Knights en route to a dominant 7-2 season series win when Youngblood got a grounder to short from Josh Downing that Whitehouse turned into a double play to end the game. 6-0 Furballs. D. Alexander 3-4, HR, RBI; Sambrano 3-4, 2B; Canning 3-4, RBI; Santos 6.1 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 4 K, W (6-8) and 1-3, 2B, 2 RBI;

In other news

July 22 – The Gold Sox trade aging star LF/RF Lionnel Perri (.291, 13 HR, 51 RBI) to the Capitals for promising yet unranked outfield prospect Julio Candela and a minor leaguer.
July 23 – The Crusaders announce the annual DL trip for RF/LF Stanton Martin (.331, 27 HR, 79 RBI), who has suffered a strained hamstring and will miss a month at least.
July 23 – The Warriors’ defensive wizard at short, Jaime Wilson (.273, 5 HR, 34 RBI) has been diagnosed with shoulder inflammation and will be out until September.
July 25 – The Titans lose 2B Jesus Ramirez (.270, 5 HR, 53 RBI) for the season with a broken elbow.
July 26 – CIN SP Brian Doumas (6-3, 2.56 ERA) will miss three weeks with a strained hamstring.
July 27 – A hamstring issue will also sideline IND 2B Jong-beom Kym (.256, 9 HR, 33 RBI) for two weeks.
July 27 – LF Dave Graham (.274, 4 HR, 38 RBI) is sent to Richmond by the Miners, who receive MR Evan Carrell (0-0, 4.66 ERA, 1 SV) and #73 prospect SS/2B Adam Gnall in this deal.
July 28 – The 2,000 hits milestone is reached by BOS 1B/2B Bob Butler (.257, 2 HR, 31 RBI) with a 3-hit performance in the Titans’ 12-2 rout of the Aces. Jimmy Young surrenders the milestone, a single, in the bottom of the fourth, the second of fifth consecutive Titans to reach base in the inning. Butler has never won any decorations, and never led the league in anything other than strikeouts, but sometimes longevity will do the trick. He is batting .263 with 167 HR and 959 RBI for his career, and won a ring with the 2008 Crusaders.

Complaints and stuff

And another PR disaster in Portland. Oh well. Now, Maud, please come out of hiding! – Maud! – Maud, come out now! – Maud, we need to … I … I don’t know how the coffee thing works! It won’t stop blinking! – Maud!? …

Stanton Martin; amazing batter, yet with the health of an immune-system-deficient homeless guy in a gutter in Calcutta. Sad. He’s 34, and currently has 229 homers, mostly because he’s played more than 125 games in a season only TWICE. He also didn’t become good until he was 26, but then led the league in slugging three straight years (while barely qualifying).

Matt Pruitt will be on rehab in St. Pete starting Monday.

More injury news – something everybody seems to enjoy – out of St. Petersburg, where Jon Merritt started a rehab assignment on Sunday, and on Monday left the game with an oblique strain. He has thus gone back to the DL and will remain there until the end of August. He’s now 37, and will damn sure take that player option for 2014.

The Danny Arguello bidding war rages on. We have reached $388k (and if he signs for that, we will only be able to sign one player for more than $60k in ’14), but it looks like the price might go up still.

Yoshi Nomura had a contract suggestion this week. He asked me how ten years for $30M sounded to me. Since then I’ve had this ringing in my ear and it is really loud and won’t stop.

[edtheguy]

He asked me how ten years for $30M sounded to me.

Ieygads!

[Westheim]

Raccoons (54-49) @ Aces (46-60) – July 29-31, 2013

The Aces were really close to the worst record in the Continental League, but had fabulously killed the Raccoons for five games out of six this season. They couldn’t do anything right, ranked 11th in both runs scored and runs allowed, didn’t field too well, either, and yet… 5-1. They had only scored 21 runs against us, with no loss by more than three runs, but… well.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (7-5, 3.77 ERA) vs. William Hinkley (8-11, 4.59 ERA)
Mauro Castro (1-0, 1.80 ERA) vs. Nehemiah Jones (7-7, 3.88 ERA)
Rich Hood (5-7, 4.73 ERA) vs. Jaquan Wagoner (9-4, 3.44 ERA)

The Aces only had right-handed starters, so that was that. They also had NO injuries, and they were still in last place in the South. With the end of July fast approaching, nobody’s job on the Raccoons was safe right now… We’ll trade Slappy for prospects, if there’s a good deal for an apprentice plumber on the table.

The Raccoons – while having penciled Baldwin in to start the opener – scratched him at the last minute. Mauro Castro, who hadn’t pitched in a week, moved up to the Monday game…

I’m sure that means nothing.

Game 1
POR: LF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – CF White – SS Sambrano – 3B Canning – P Castro
LVA: LF J. Garcia – 1B McDermott – RF Zackery – 2B H. Jones – SS Dahlke – C D. Rice – CF Alvarez – 3B F. Soto – P Hinkley

Mauro Castro’s first pitch as a Raccoon was right into Jaime Garcia. He then had Sean McDermott retired on an amazing catch by Bednarski before putting on Rusty Zackery with a single, then left the game with an injury, or maybe just had his snoot full. Thus, a bullpen day was declared, with George Youngblood replacing Castro and conceding four straight singles, three of those in 2-strike counts, for the Aces to take a 4-0 lead, which they upped to 5-0 in the second. Sergio Vega replaced Youngblood thereafter and soon found himself with three men on and nobody out in his second inning, the bottom of the fourth, only for Sambrano to muff a perfect double play grounder. The Aces scored two unearned runs in the inning, 7-0, and then an earned one in the fifth, 8-0. The Raccoons had a sudden offensive outburst after five innings of futility when they scored three in the sixth inning on a Bednarski RBI double and D-Alex’ subsequent 2-run homer, and then two more in the seventh on Ken Rodgers’ pinch-hit homer, but it was not really a rally because those were literally almost their only base runners against Hinkley past the second inning. Things got worse and worse for the Raccoons. Ron Thrasher walked everybody in the bottom 7th and was charged a run, and Hoshi Watanabe pitched for two walks and two homers in the bottom 8th before also giving up and getting a massage for some ailment or other. 12-7 Aces. Carmona 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Canning 2-4, 2B; Rodgers (PH) 1-2, HR, 2 RBI;

Wait, how many pitchers are we down now? Hoshi Watanabe had back issues, mild ones, and would be DTD for a few days. Castro was an uncertain case right now.

Interlude: Big Trade!

There was a reason why Colin Baldwin didn’t pitch in the series opener, and it had to do with communications with the Dallas Stars, who were looking for additional players for the stretch drive in a crowded FL West. The Raccoons parted with a total of four players in the trade, and we would not cry for some of them.

The Raccoons picked up #19 prospect SP Graham Wasserman, a right-hander that just turned 23 years old and just a few weeks ago debuted in AAA. The #9 pick in the 2011 draft, Wasserman throws a cutter clocking in at 93mph, a really good fork, and a lesser slider, but also a budding changeup that could become his best pitch. So far he has some walk issues, but that is getting better, too.

The price the Raccoons paid is not as bad as “four players” sound. In fact, one of the players was C Craig Bowen (.183, 4 HR, 17 RBI), who would suck for the last two and a half years of his contract in Dallas, or maybe Cumming, their AAA team. Also included: INF Michael Palmer (.242, 2 HR, 30 RBI), SP Colin Baldwin (7-5, 3.77 ERA), and AAA SP Andy Hackney.

How desperate can the Stars be for Craig Bowen? Their catchers are Mark Thomas and Richard Speed, basically two career backups. Thomas was a Coon once, and Speed was with the Indians behind Jose Paraz for a few years. Neither is hitting much of a lick.

The Raccoons shed $1.1M in 2013 salaries (nobody really cares) and almost $5M in future commitments to Baldwin and Bowen. Palmer would have been a free agent. Hackney was not on the 40-man roster.

Gaping holes had opened on the Raccoons’ 25-man roster. We called up Jonathan Toner, declaring his time to have arrived, and throwing him out of bed at three in the morning to get his furry butt to the airport to start in Las Vegas THAT NIGHT. Also added: C Tom McNeela (.260/.339/.347 in AAA) and 3B Matt Nunley.

Raccoons (54-49) @ Aces (46-60) – July 29-31, 2013

Game 2
POR: LF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 3B Nunley – 1B Sambrano – CF Seeley – SS Whitehouse – P Toner
LVA: SS R. Avila – 1B McDermott – RF Zackery – C Durango – 2B H. Jones – CF Kelsey – LF J. Garcia – 3B Dahlke – P N. Jones

Adrian Quebell was conspicuously absent from the lineup here.

Jonathan Toner started his major league career with a grounder to short hit by Ricky Avila, and got his first K in the second inning against Howard Jones. Soon after that he got his first lead when the Coons threw up a 3-spot in the third, sparked by Seeley’s leadoff double, with Yoshi doubling in a pair and scoring on Bednarski’s single, both with two outs. While Toner got all kinds of “first”s knocked off, including first walk (to Rusty Zackery) and first wild pitch in the fourth inning, Yoshi doubled in Carmona once more in the fifth, 4-0. Zackery singled in the sixth, a liner into right, with the Aces sending Avila from second base, but Bednarski threw him out at home. Toner struck out Eduardo Durango then to stave off “first run allowed” for a bit longer. The Aces couldn’t get him, even though they loaded the bases in the seventh inning. Ahmed Williams struck out, and Avila grounded out gently to Pat Whitehouse to keep three runners stranded, but Toner then ran out of juice and opened the eighth inning with consecutive walks to Sean McDermott and Rusty Zackery. Ron Thrasher was probably not the right guy to take care of two on, no outs, but the bullpen had burned mightily in last night’s game and not too much personnel was available. Of course Thrasher continued to be no use dead or alive and conceded both runs by allowing sound contact. Thankfully, Yoshi had homered (after two doubles) in the seventh and the Coons were still up by four. Gibson got the bottom 9th, with Tom Dahlke homering right away, and he then walked PH Ron Richards. Before the total meltdown could be set in motion, the Aces hit into a double play and the game ended quickly. 6-3 Raccoons. Carmona 3-4, BB; Nomura 3-5, HR, 2 2B, 5 RBI; Toner 7.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 5 BB, 6 K, W (1-0);

Game 3
POR: LF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – 3B Canning – C McNeela – CF Seeley – SS Whitehosue – P Hood
LVA: SS R. Avila – 2B H. Jones – RF Zackery – LF Alvarez – C Durango – 3B F. Soto – CF J. Garcia – 1B McDermott – P Wagoner

Rich Hood gave himself the lead with a leadoff home run in the third inning, the first tally in the game. The Coons had a man on in almost every inning, but … it was only one man. Hood on the mound didn’t explode at the mere sight of the batboy, which was progress, and nursed a one-hitter when he drilled Jaime Garcia in the bottom 5th. Garcia had also been knocked by Castro in his ill-fated Monday start, and when McDermott grounded to short Garcia got knocked again when he collided with Yoshi Nomura. That was one knock too much, and he left the game, being sore all over.

The score was still 1-0 in the bottom 7th when Hood’s spot came up with the bases finally loaded on a walk and two soft singles and one out in the inning. On one hand, a real batter could help here, on the other hand the bullpen was badly depleted and Hood had at least one more inning in him and was STILL nursing that one-hitter. Hood hit a terrible bloop to shallow center, it fell in, and the second run came home, and then Ricardo Carmona hit a 2-run single to rather deep left, 4-0. Of course, Hood then felt the need to correct things, walked Francisco Soto with one out in the bottom 7th and conceded a homer to John Kelsey to cut the advantage in half and also punch his exit ticket. Not that the Raccoons’ bullpen brought any relief. Constantino and Sugano conspired for two hits and two walks in the bottom 8th, with Sugano offering a bases-loaded walk to Soto with two down before striking out Kelsey. Watanabe turned out to be unavailable to try his best with a 4-3 lead in the ninth, and so Sugano kept fudging along. McDermott hit a leadoff single before Yoshi made the niftiest play on Danny Rice’s grounder and turned it into a double play you would have had to see to believe. Avila grounded out to Canning. 4-3 Coons. Carmona 3-4, 2 RBI; Hood 6.2 IP, 2 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 4 K, W (6-7) and 2-3, HR, 2 RBI;

So, looks like Quebell only had a day off on Tuesday, huh?

Rich Hood had the first homer by a Raccoons pitcher since Gil McDonald in ’11.

Oh, by the way, Mauro Castro was diagnosed with radial nerve compression, and he’s out for this season and then some. Hooray! More DL fodder! Castro was filed away on the 60-day DL right away to be swiftly forgotten along with his 54.00 ERA.

With another gaping hole in the rotation having been opened, Sergio Vega was reappropriated to make another spot start on Saturday while I try to work something out with the crumbs I have left. Juan Gallegos was recalled.

Raccoons (56-50) vs. Loggers (47-61) – August 1-4, 2013

The Loggers were eighth in runs scored and ninth in runs allowed, not nearly as futile as in recent years, but still not very good at all. They were a slow team, didn’t field too well, and also had not exactly a lot of power. Yet, somehow they had managed to stay afloat, 4-3, against the Raccoons in 2013.

Projected matchups:
Bill Conway (4-7, 3.38 ERA) vs. Matt Crisler (0-4, 5.36 ERA)
Hector Santos (6-8, 3.88 ERA) vs. Jim Pennington (6-7, 3.70 ERA)
Sergio Vega (2-2, 1.76 ERA) vs. Bruce Morrison (7-10, 4.27 ERA)
Jonathan Toner (1-0, 2.57 ERA) vs. Gabriel Caro (7-11, 4.21 ERA)

Another full set of right-handers. 1B Mike Rucker had been the CL Hitter AND Rookie of the Month in July, batting .289 with 16 homers for the season.

Game 1
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – RF Dally – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – 3B Jennings – CF MacNamara – 2B O. Sandoval – P Crisler
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – LF Sambrano – SS Canning – 3B Nunley – P Conway

Rucker was at the plate in the first with runners on the corners (with Rob Howell getting nicked by Conway), struck out in a full count, and D-Alex threw out Howell racing to second. Crisler walked the bases full in the bottom 1st, but the Coons only managed a sac fly by Quebell, and Conway conceded that lead and more in the fourth inning. Despite Oscar Sandoval being walked intentionally to bring up Crisler with the bases loaded and two outs, Crisler singled to center and the Loggers plated two to zip 2-1 ahead. The Loggers added two more in the fifth on Raúl Hernandez’ homer and an RBI triple by Brian MacNamara, and the Raccoons in five innings had only one hit – and that was Conway’s. Wicked game!

Wicked didn’t mean the Coons had any fun, though. Conway continued to get lit up and was knocked out with one out in the sixth inning when Rob Howell doubled to center to score Zach Knowling. Youngblood replaced Conway, Justin Dally reached on an infield single and Mike Rucker – freshly minted CL Hitter of the Month – crushed a 3-run homer to blow the doors off the opener. Youngblood stayed in, walked Hernandez, walked Dave Jennings, then conceded an RBI double to MacNamara. Constantino surrendered the remaining runners on a 2-out single by Corey Martin, who had opened the inning by hitting for Crisler and had made the first out. The Loggers’ 7-spot hurt quite bad and Bednarski was removed from the game after the sixth to get him off his feet in this long stretch. Carmona came out after singling in the top 7th, in which the Raccoons scored two on Walt Canning’s homer, but c’mon, who gave a ****? 12-3 Loggers. White 1-1; McNeela (PH) 1-1; Seeley (PH) 1-2;

Five batters faced, five runners on, five runs in – George Youngblood fired up his ERA to 5.51, and was sent to AAA the next morning. The heavily unloved Pat Slayton was recalled.

Game 2
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – RF Dally – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – CF Gilmor – 3B Jennings – 2B O. Sandoval – P Pennington
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – LF Sambrano – SS Canning – 3B Nunley – P Santos

Jim Pennington pitched four no-hit innings before leaving with an injury – it was the year of the broken pitcher after all – while Santos spilled three singles but was still nursing a shutout through four. Long man Melvin Alvarado walked more than he struck out and put on Quebell with an infield single to start the fifth inning. The Coons loaded them up with Sandy walking and a bloop single by Nunley before Santos flew out to Nick Gilmor (more on him below), Quebell tagged and was thrown out. Justin Dally’s double in the top of the sixth would break the ice, scoring Zach Knowling, who had reached on a soft single past Quebell to start the inning. The Coons would have Carmona on to start the bottom 8th, but he was caught stealing for the 300th time. Santos pitched a complete game on 98 pitches, about the most he could throw, but support was still sorely lacking in the bottom of the ninth inning, with Jose Ramos facing the 4-5-6 batters. When D-Alex hit a leadoff single, Seeley ran for him. Quebell grounded out, moving Seeley to second, but Ramos buckled down and retired Sambrano and White in short order to save the game. 1-0 Loggers. D. Alexander 2-3, BB; Santos 9.0 IP, 9 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 8 K, L (6-9);

That Hector Santos is 6-9 is truly heartbreaking…

Matt Pruitt came back from hitting .500 on rehab to replace Seeley, who was returned to AAA with a .178 batting average.

Game 3
MIL: 3B Jennings – SS Howell – RF Dally – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – CF Gilmor – LF MacNamara – 2B Ito – P B. Morrison
POR: LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – CF White – SS Canning – C McNeela – 3B Rodgers – P Vega

The Saturday game brought yet more horrors, as Vega lasted only three-plus innings, with a third inning that seemingly never ended, in which the Loggers plated three, and in which Quebell stood out with clumsy defense for two generous singles that could just as well have been errors. Vega couldn’t get anybody out in the fourth inning either, with Thrasher inheriting runners on the corners. He casually struck out the side. If he just once could do that in a winning effort…

Matt Pruitt’s first AB back in the Bigs came batting for Thrasher in the bottom of the fourth. Morrison was on seven strikeouts already (not his usual nature, though), but had allowed a single to Pat White, who had moved to third base on a passed ball and a wild pitch. Rodgers had walked to bring up the pitcher’s spot, and Pruitt hit a 25-foot grounder that was easily taken for the third out at first base by Raúl Hernandez. Despite the Raccoons flailing left and right against Morrison they would hold a 4-3 lead after six innings. Yoshi hit a solo homer, Sambrano scored a run with some quick dashing in the fifth, and in the bottom 6th, D-Alex hit for Gallegos with two on and one out and hit a liner into right that scored both runners with a 2-run double, flipping the score. It didn’t stay flipped for too long, however. Manobu Sugano couldn’t be trusted with anything, much less a 4-3 lead. He walked two in the seventh, then served up a booming 3-run homer to pinch-hitter Tim Pace. The Raccoons tied the game once more in the bottom of the inning when Quebell singled against Kevin Cummings, who then went on to surrender doubles to Pat White and Walt Canning, the latter scoring both runners and knotting the score at six. The Raccoons’ drained bullpen dragged itself just barely into extra innings, but not for long. Justin Dally ravaged Josh Gibson for a 3-run homer with two outs in the 10th, and the Raccoons were staring at the prospect of getting swept in a 4-game set by the horrendous Loggers. 9-6 Loggers. Nomura 2-6, HR, RBI; Quebell 2-5, RBI; White 3-5, 2B; Canning 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Rodgers 2-2, 2 BB; D. Alexander (PH) 1-1, 2B, 2 RBI; Gallegos 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Slappy? Is that liquor stash still there were I left it before … - Why isn’t it there anymore? – Of course you did.

Game 4
MIL: 3B Jennings – SS Howell – RF Dally – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – CF Gilmor – LF MacNamara – 2B Ito – P Caro
POR: LF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – SS Canning – CF White – 3B Nunley – P Toner

In his second go-round Toner was not only much less successful than in his first, no, I could also barely resist the urge of sending him straight back to St. Petersburg and have Yoshi Nomura start and finish every game on the mound from here until the season would mercifully end. Toner allowed hits to the first three batters in the game, with Dave Jennings and Rob Howell hitting singles before Justin Dally doubled, 1-0, then walked three batters and made a mind-boggling error on Gabriel Caro’s grounder. The Loggers scored four in giveaway fashion, and the Raccoons were so getting swept…

Carmona reached on an error and was caught stealing in the first, as usual, and from there it was just rolling up and waiting for dinner for the Raccoons. Gabriel Caro spilled two singles in four innings, throwing barely 50 pitches, but Toner was done with almost 100 pitches and five runs allowed. When Pat Slayton started an effort of long relief in the fifth, Raúl Hernandez led off with reaching first base on an uncaught third strike. Gilmor reached with an infield single and soon enough the Loggers had added a run and led 6-0. Gilmor would hit another infield single his next time up, that one with the bases loaded and two outs, and Slayton then walked MacNamara to force in another run. The Raccoons would lose Dylan Alexander to a hyperextended elbow sustained in an on-base collision on a ****ty double play grounder by all-****ty Matt Pruitt in the sixth inning, shortly before Raccoons Ballpark decided it had seen enough and with the sound of rolling thunder monumentally collapsed and buried everybody in attendance (not too many…) underneath the ruins. 8-1 Loggers. White 2-4, 2B, RBI; Nunley 2-4; Gallegos 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K;

(has found a bottle, will certainly also find mental peace before long)

In other news

July 29 – The grand tour around the CL North continues for 1B/3B Daniel Sharp (.258, 5 HR, 42 RBI). The 36-year old is dealt from the Canadiens to the Crusaders for MR Johnny Smith (0-4, 4.78 ERA) and a prospect. The only CL North team Daniel Sharp has never played for now are the Titans.
July 29 – The Thunder trade LF/RF Johnny Crum (.318, 4 HR, 24 RBI) to the Knights for MR Andrew Wills (1-4, 4.10 ERA) and a middling catching prospect.
July 30 – Milwaukee’s 24-year old RF/CF Nick GIlmor (.280, 4 HR, 21 RBI) hits for the cycle in a 15-1 roadkill of the Knights. Gilmor has four hits and drives in two while becoming the fourth Logger and the first in the 21st century to hit for the cycle, the 52nd in ABL history. It’s the second time that consecutive cycles are hit for in the same ballpark, as the Knights’ Gil Rockwell hit a natural cycle against the Canadiens just five weeks ago. The other instance was just a few years ago, LVA Ricardo Garcia cycling at Denver in ’10 before Denver’s Eugene Carter cycled against the Bayhawks in the same building a year later.
July 30 – The Thunder pick up SP Wes Yates (5-9, 4.48 ERA) from the Condors for two prospects.
July 31 – The Thunder beat the Canadiens 6-3 on the strength of only three hits, living off nine walks, an error, and a hit batter.
August 2 – The Buffaloes strand 16 in a nine-inning game in Washington, losing 7-6 despite out-hitting the Capitals 17-9.

Complaints and stuff

And thusly, Raúl Castillo’s record for coming here and breaking was … broken. Congrats, Mauro Castro. Must be the surname.

On one hand, I would like the Loggers to not finish last for a while. No team should finish last for so many years in a row (except the Canadiens), but come on, does it really have to be like that!?

When is the right time to mention that all those hitters we drafted in the first few rounds in June are batting well under .200 in Aumsville?

Meanwhile the price tag on Danny Arguello is up to $440k and in his latest player report, Calderón slashed the ratings of both Daniel Dickerson and Nick Brown, the latter being hacked from 20 stuff to a mere 17. Fun times ahead.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (56-54) vs. Canadiens (59-51) – August 5-8, 2013

On their way to a sad end to a season that began with lots of hope for another run, the Raccoons next had to face the disgusting Elks again, against whom they held a 6-5 advantage for the season after winning five of the four-and-four double series around the All Star break. The Elks were third in runs scored, fourth in runs allowed, but they were nevertheless dropping back more and more compared to the Crusaders and Indians, 5.5 games off the pace now. Following up on the Loggers’ work and sweeping the Raccoons for four was exactly what they needed right now.

Projected matchups:
Rich Hood (6-7, 4.62 ERA) vs. Bill King (7-7, 4.83 ERA)
Bill Conway (4-8, 3.64 ERA) vs. Juichi Fujita (11-10, 3.84 ERA)
Hector Santos (6-9, 3.70 ERA) vs. Alfredo Rios (7-8, 4.14 ERA)
Sergio Vega (2-2, 2.17 ERA) vs. Jimmy Sjogren (3-4, 4.33 ERA)

The Elks, who have one left-handed starter in Sjogren, had just placed SP Rod Taylor (9-6, 3.79 ERA) on the DL with a triceps issue, but he should not miss much more than 15 days. Also, leadoff man Ross Holland and 2B Steve Madison were on the shelf. The Raccoons meanwhile added Dylan Alexander to their pile of broken bodies, where he would remain until about the middle of September. 24-year old switch-hitter Pedro Torruellas would be added to the 25- and 40-man rosters, taking the place of Alexander. Torruellas, our 2007 seventh-rounder, is odd in that he is actually really fast, but unfortunately he has a big burning desire to hit homers when he can’t hit much of anything. Torruellas probably wouldn’t be around for long, however, since the Raccoons were quick to throw a waiver claim at a proven veteran™.

Game 1
VAN: SS Irvin – LF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – 3B Suzuki – RF Medina – C Hurtado – CF Luxton – 2B Lawrence – P B. King
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Sambrano – SS Canning – C McNeela – 3B Rodgers – P Hood

Neither pitcher managed a good first inning. Hood had loaded the bases with hits by Jeremiah Irvin and Ray “****ing” Gilbert and a walk to Mitsuhide Suzuki when he was bailed out by Juan Medina’s perfect two-for-one service to Yoshi Nomura. In turn, the first three Raccoons in the bottom 1st all had hits, including doubles by Carmona and Bednarski, and together with a Canning single later, they scored three runs on four hits. But while King got better real quick, Hood didn’t. Hood only got worse. Hood’s pitching was best described as utter horse ****.

Of all leadoff batters Hood faced, only one didn’t reach, Enrique Garcia in the fourth. He threw right down the middle, except when he threw four consecutive pitches into the dirt, or over poor sod McNeela’s head. The Elks were held back by a base-running gaffe of Gilbert in the third inning (Gilbert had driven in a run with a single just before being caught in a rundown on the following single by Suzuki), but in the fifth, the fun really stopped for Hood and the Raccoons, whose manager had little bullpen available and also next to no imagination and thus calmly watched on while Rich Hood retired absolutely nobody for a prolonged stretch of time. The bleeding continued well into Tom Constantino’s appearance, but in the end the Elks had thrown up an 8-spot and taken a 9-3 lead. Hood was charged with all runs, 12 hits, and four walks against a single strikeout (Medina, the fool). Constantino got the Coons through seven and turned two bunts into force outs at second base before walking the bases full in the seventh and bailing out on consecutive pops by Medina and Pedro Hurtado to either middle infielder. The Raccoons were largely absent from the base paths after the first inning, but “****ing” Gilbert had a chance for something special in the ninth, coming to the plate with a 5-for-5 performance, but Hoshi Watanabe struck out the pig face and the Raccoons managed to lose shamefully but not in total disgrace. 9-4 Canadiens. Carmona 2-4, 3B, RBI; Quebell 2-4, 2B; Pruitt (PH) 1-2;

If there was ANY warm body in AAA that could be plugged and thrown into the rotation in Portland, I’d do it right away, and Rich Hood would be herding cattle in Abkhazia tomorrow night – but there is nobody. And before we replace Hood, we should perhaps fill Vega’s spot with an actual pitcher… Jack Berry is still a month off.

Also, Ron Thrasher went onto the disabled list – because why not? – when he retired one batter in this game, but tweaked an oblique while doing so. The minimum 15 days might just be enough for Thrasher, but who knows, maybe he can contract cancer on the DL, which is about the last thing this team lacks in ****ed-up luck.

Useless George Youngblood was called up for the one-hundredth time this season.

Game 2
VAN: CF K. Evans – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Luxton – 3B Suzuki – 2B C. Aguilar – SS Irvin – C Hurtado – P Fujita
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Sambrano – SS Canning – C McNeela – 3B Nunley – P Conway

By now the Coons’ best bet for a decent start, Conway didn’t allow a hit until a fourth-inning single by Gilbert (who else) and was also spotted a lead in the first inning as well when Quebell doubled home Yoshi for a 1-0 advantage. The Coons had the bags full in the bottom 4th for Matt Nunley (who along with Jason Bergquist had been hot cards in my back pocket to replace Yoshi and Merritt in an free agency event…) to foul out to the screen to end the inning. To make up for that expected event, an unexpected event happened in the bottom of the sixth when Sandy Sambrano cracked a 2-run homer to extend the lead to 3-0. Conway was still nursing a 2-hitter, but had control issues and had already walked four. A walk to Garcia in the eighth did him in, bringing up Gilbert with a man on. Watanabe’s K was still the only time that Gilbert had been retired in the series, and wasn’t going to be confined by Josh Gibson, either. A single upped his average to .364 (****ing hell!), and Gibson soon enough walked Robbie Luxton to have the tying runs on with one out. Suzuki’s grounder to short remained the only run they got in the inning, but Gibson threw 13 pitches and never got a strike past a batter.

Canning’s RBI double restored the 3-run lead in the bottom 8th, but when Watanabe came into the ninth, the results pointed at disaster quickly. Irvin singled hard, and then Hurtado and Clint Southcott (the ****head) drew walks to load them up with no outs. Kurt Evans hit a sac fly to right, 4-2, before Watanabe managed to get a few breaking balls over that struck out Garcia … and Gilbert, too. 4-2 Raccoons. Quebell 2-4, 2B, RBI; Sambrano 1-2, 2 BB, HR, 2 RBI; Conway 7.1 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 5 BB, 3 K, W (5-8);

**** you, Ray Gilbert, just **** you.

Interlude: waiver claim

The Crusaders had employed their former franchise catcher Daryl Anderson as third fiddle in Lexington for most of the season, had just recently called him up, now wanted to send the 36-year old back – but the Raccoons snatched him up. Anderson, a right-hander, is still an excellent defensive catcher, and hit for a .824 OPS as recently as 2011, but then already in a backup role. He will be a free agent at the end of the year and was added to the roster with Pedro Torruellas sent back to St. Petersburg without getting into a game.

Raccoons (56-54) vs. Canadiens (59-51) – August 5-8, 2013

Game 3
VAN: CF K. Evans – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Luxton – 3B Suzuki – 2B C. Aguilar – SS Irvin – C Hurtado – P A. Rios
POR: CF Carmona – RF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – C Anderson – SS Canning – 3B Nunley – P Santos

Colossal contact off Santos started in the second inning and didn’t stop until he was removed from the game. Luxton homered in the second, Evans homered in the third and the Raccoons were down 3-0 before Yoshi Nomura hit a 1-out, 2-run double with the bases loaded in the bottom 3rd, only for the middle of the order to completely tune out of proceedings and to leave the tying and go-ahead runs in scoring position. Business as usual in the city that had a lot of hair in inconvenient places.

Quebell’s defense broke down again on consecutive plays in the top 5th, which was something new indeed, but now happened with increasing regularity. A medium-difficulty grounder by Evans eluded him for a leadoff single, before he made a complete mess out of a slow bouncer by Garcia, and the Elks were assessed two singles and nobody out. Somehow they didn’t score, with a great catch by Sambrano included in the run-prevention package more than any pitching. Quebell’s spot came up again with Carmona and Yoshi on the corners and one out in the bottom 5th, and he successfully hit into a double play.

Hector Santos made it through five and two thirds with Eric Paull – who had replaced an injured Jeremiah Irvin – flying out to Sambrano in right to get there when he abruptly stepped off the mound and met a perplexed trainer at the dugout steps. SOMETHING was wrong, and it was probably a cerebral hemorrhage.

While Constantino was blown up for two runs in the eighth inning and the Coons trailed 5-2 in the ninth, they DID get the tying run to the plate against Pedro Alvarado. Daryl Anderson walked in his Furballs debut, but Nunley could not find a bat with even a shy single in it in his bag – but reached on an error anyway. Pat White singled to load the bases with Bednarski hitting for Youngblood in Carmona’s vacated spot (no injury here, for once). Alvarado balked in the first run, Bednarski plated one with a groundout (yaaay…), and Sandy tied up the score with a single up the middle. The pitching-deprived Raccoons got to play extras (yaaay…!). Gibson pitched two scoreless before Slayton got into the game. Gilbert had already hit another ****ing single in that top 12th when Quebell dropped a throw from Nunley to extend the inning, and the Elks had the bases loaded when Hurtado flew out to Pruitt in really deep left to leave three stranded. Bottom 12th, Quebell barely stayed out of a double play (but César Aguilar visibly thought about it), and his groundout instead moved Yoshi to second after his leadoff single. Pruitt grounded out, Yoshi advanced. Daryl Anderson grounded hard to first, past ****ing Gilbert, and the Raccoons crawled off. 6-5 Blighters. Carmona 3-4, 2B; Whitehouse (PH) 1-1; Nomura 4-6, 2B, 2 RBI; Anderson 3-6, RBI; Youngblood 1.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K; Gibson 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K;

Okay, a few things. Congrats Daryl Anderson, you will be the team’s Player of the Month. Nothing you will do from here will change that. Nothing. Rape Maud’s cat, nobody will bother.

Second, Hector Santos ditched being euthanized when Ivan the Druid couldn’t come up with anything worse than back spasms of the light sort, and he should not even miss a start.

Third, for crying out loud, Quebell. As useful a cleanup man as the complete fiery wreck of Bednarski, and promised another $5M+ from here on. For ****’s sake!

Point four, Slayton is tied yet again for wins as far as players still with the team go.

Game 4
VAN: CF K. Evans – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Luxton – 3B Suzuki – SS Irvin – 2B Madison – C Baca – P Sjogren
POR: LF Carmona – CF White – RF Bednarski – 1B Pruitt – C Anderson – 2B Rodgers – 3B Canning – SS Whitehouse – P Vega

INCREDIBLY, Sergio Vega would walk SIX batters in this start, yet somehow also made it through six innings on two hits and allowed no runs, despite the leadoff batter reaching in EVERY inning. The Elks hit into two double plays, numerous more grounders to short that weren’t turned for two by Whitehouse, and eventually Pat White threw out Robbie Luxton at home plate to end the sixth inning and also Vega’s day after 96 pitches. Even more mind-boggling: Vega with a 2-out RBI single and White with a leadoff jack had procured a 2-0 lead for the Raccoons by the third inning. Fabulously, even the bullpen held up, although it took more double plays to bail out Sugano in the seventh and Constantino in the ninth. The teams pooled together for just ten hits, of which nine were singles, but White’s homer helped the Coons claim the series. 2-0 Raccoons. White 2-4, HR, RBI; Vega 6.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 6 BB, 4 K, W (3-2) and 1-2, RBI; Sugano 1.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K; Constantino 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, SV (1);

Raccoons (59-55) @ Gold Sox (46-66) – August 9-11, 2013

The Gold Sox were really, really bad. They were 11th in the Federal League in both runs scored and runs allowed, with the worst batting average and the worst rotation. They led the league in stolen bases, but that was literally all they had going for them. We had taken two of three from them in ’12, the first series against them since 2007.

Projected matchups:
Jonathan Toner (1-1, 4.91 ERA) vs. Yuzo Hayashi (2-4, 6.45 ERA)
Rich Hood (6-8, 5.09 ERA) vs. C.J. Fishel (7-9, 6.34 ERA)
Bill Conway (5-8, 3.52 ERA) vs. Bryant Roberts (2-8, 5.68 ERA)

Fishel is another southpaw after facing Sjogren on Thursday. These are the worst of their starters, but not by all that much. Jerry Counts (5-11, 4.90 ERA) leads them by ERA. If “Brenda” Teasdale (4-2, 4.56 ERA) hadn’t departed to the DL, his ERA would lead them.

Game 1
POR: CF Carmona – SS Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – LF Pruitt – C McNeela – 3B Nunley – P Toner
DEN: SS Oosterom – 3B F. Reyes – LF V. Sanchez – RF Hiscock – 1B Denunez – 2B Kinkade – C G. Brown – CF Fonseca – P Hayashi

Toner gave up his first walk to a Dutch Antillean when he walked Piet Oosterom in a full count to begin his day, and we better stop ticking off firsts with him now. Oosterom would steal second base and eventually score on Bill Hiscock’s single, ruining Quebell’s accidental RBI single from the top of the first. Oosterom would hit a 2-out, 2-run double in the bottom 2nd to put the Sox 3-1 ahead, leading us to look for the future elsewhere than in our current rotation.

The Coons had had McNeela thrown out at home in the second inning, and then didn’t figure until the fifth. Sambrano was drilled and scored on Yoshi’s double. Quebell singled, moving Yoshi to third. Bednarski came up and there was still room for an inning-ending double play, but Yuzo Hayashi threw a really fat pitch right down Broadway and Bednarski couldn’t miss that one. BOMB ALARM – 5-3 Portland! However, the little **** Toner managed to hit TWO batters in the bottom 5th around Fernando Reyes’ double and was removed from the contest, still up 5-4 with runners on the corners and two outs. Josh Gibson struck out J.R. Kinkade to end the inning. Bednarski would also feature on the defensive end a bit later. The Coons’ pen was crumbling and the Gold Sox had the tying run on second base with two outs in the seventh when Gallegos served a deep drive to J.D. Brock. Bednarski warped to the track to catch a real rocket and keep the 5-4 lead in one piece. Jorge Denunez hit a leadoff single off Gallegos in the bottom 8th, but Kinkade grounded straight to Yoshi for a double play. The Coons clawed hard for an insurance run in the top of the ninth with Carmona leading off with a scratch double (there are things like that for him) and scoring on Yoshi’s single. Eugene Carter hit a 1-out single off Watanabe in the ninth, but Oosterom, unretired til then, hit into a game-ending double play started by the otherwise completely replaceable Matt Nunley. 6-4 Furballs. Carmona 4-5, 2B; Nomura 3-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Quebell 4-5, RBI;

The Wolves beat the Canadiens, 5-3, and the stinking Elks are now actually tied for third place with us.

Game 2
POR: LF Sambrano – CF White – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Pruitt – C Anderson – 3B Canning – SS Whitehouse – P Hood
DEN: SS Oosterom – 3B F. Reyes – LF V. Sanchez – 1B Denunez – RF Hiscock – 2B Kinkade – C G. Brown – CF Fonseca – P Fishel

Bednarski gave his team the lead for the second day in a row when he hit a leadoff jack in the second inning. Too bad that a 1-0 lead was NOTHING with Rich Hood pitching, who conceded a leadoff double to Hiscock in the bottom 2nd, threw a wild pitch and walked Kinkade, and somehow made it out alive with only the tying run allowed. Top 3rd, Whitehouse was thrown out at third base after a leadoff double (not: leadoff triple), making me wonder again why exactly he was occupying a roster spot. Victorino Sanchez hit a 2-out double in the bottom 3rd, knew where to stop, then scored on Denunez’ single, 2-1 Gold Sox.

Although Sambrano was caught stealing in the top 6th, the Raccoons still managed to tie the game when White got on and scored on Nomura’s double. The Coons had a chance to break free in the seventh when a bad throwing error by Kinkade put Anderson and Canning in scoring position with one out, but Whitehouse was useless anyway and Carmona also grounded out batting for Hood. Instead, Gallegos and Youngblood were bludgeoned for four runs in the bottom 7th and the Raccoons raced to a handy loss, wasting another three on, one out situation on the way there, while Slayton got also clobbered for two runs in the eighth. 8-3 Gold Sox. Sambrano 2-4, BB; White 2-5; Anderson 2-4; Quebell (PH) 1-1;

(sigh)

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – SS Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – LF Pruitt – C McNeela – 3B Nunley – P Conway
DEN: SS Oosterom – 3B F. Reyes – LF V. Sanchez – C Carter – RF Hiscock – 1B Denunez – 2B Kinkade – CF Fonseca – P B. Roberts

Quebell singled home the fast Sambrano from second in the top 1st to get Conway a lead, but Conway walked Fernando Reyes and Victorino Sanchez in the bottom of the inning and both came in to score after Eugene Carter’s double past Pruitt. A week of futility in stealing bases ended when Carmona swiped his 28th off Roberts and Carter in the fifth inning, then scored on a single by Yoshi Nomura, tying the score. After Quebell doubled, Bednarski was walked intentionally to load the bases with one out for Matt Pruitt, who was nursing an 0-for-19 streak, but singled up the middle into center to plate two runs, 4-2. Conway held on to the lead for zero innings, with Sanchez hitting a solo shot, and then it went Carter single, Quebell error, Denunez single to tie the game. Kinkade singled to load them up, and Conway issued his fifth walk of the day to Alberto Fonseca with the bases loaded to hand a 3-spot to the Gold Sox who reclaimed the lead at 5-4.

Constantino cocked up a run in the bottom 6th before the Raccoons had runners on the corners with one out in the top 7th. Canning hit for Nunley, popped out to shallow right, nobody scored, and White hit for Constantino, lined out to Kinkade, and nobody scored there either. Top 8th, Jeff Lyon conceded singles to Carmona and Sambrano before walking Quebell to load the bases with one out. Eddie DeBlock replaced him, struck out Bednarski, struck out Pruitt, inning over again. 6-4 Gold Sox. Carmona 2-4, BB, 2B; Sambrano 3-4, BB; Quebell 2-4, BB, 2B, RBI; Pruitt 2-5, 2 RBI;

And Conway might STILL be the Coons’ best chance at a decent start…

In other news

August 6 – MIL SP Jim Pennington (6-7, 3.60 ERA) could be out ten months with a stretched elbow ligament.
August 7 – Indy’s Tom Weise (10-11, 2.82 ERA) spins a 3-hit shutout of the Loggers.
August 7 – DAL 1B Mun-wah Tsung (.294, 10 HR, 46 RBI), recently acquired from the Indians, will miss a few weeks with a hip strain.
August 8 – RIC OF Danny Flores (.300, 4 HR, 34 RBI) has five hits, four singles and a homer, in the Rebels’ 13-inning, 11-8 win over the Capitals, but this mark is bested by his teammate, 2B/SS Kunimatsu Sato (.280, 1 HR, 15 RBI), who slaps SIX hits, five singles and a double, in the game. The first 6-hit performance for the Rebels in over 30 years (Riley Simon, 1978), Sato has the 49th 6-hitter in ABL history, and the second this year after Washington’s Alberto Rodriguez.
August 8 – CIN SP Jeremiah Bowman (10-11, 4.65 ERA) has a no-hit bid broken up by Herb Beckmann’s 1-out single in the ninth inning. Bowman is replaced immediately, with Ian Johnson saving the Cyclones’ 4-0 shutout eventually.
August 11 – Indy’s Juan Ortíz (.261, 21 HR, 74 RBI) hits his 300th career homer, a 2-run shot off Billy Bengston in the Indians’ 13-inning, 6-5 loss to the Warriors. Ortíz spent most of his career with the Blue Sox and has batted .271 with 1,272 RBI. He was also a base stealer in his younger years, racking up 107 bags. He was the 2005 FLCS MVP.

Complaints and stuff

Ken Rodgers and his agent are up in arms because Rodgers is not in the starting lineup on a daily bases and demand a trade right now. – Listen, dip****s! Rodgers got over 250 ****ing at-bats already this season!? What did he expect? Batting cleanup while wearing street clothes and licking ice cream?

Yeah, things are breaking down here. It has a certain 1997 feel to it. Including the bitching third baseman.

Ricardo Carmona was named CL Player of the Week! Batting .500 (13-26) with one RBI was good enough. Our 21-year old Panamanian did hit three doubles and a triple, though. He’s everything but a home run hitter, yet he’s easily and handily outslugging everybody on the roster (among surviving regulars) other than Yoshi Nomura.

Yoshi. Sadness.

Danny Arguello finally signed a contract – WITH THE RACCOONS! It cost us $640k (500 grand for Arguello, plus tax), and I can’t wait to be monstrously disappointed by him by 2018. He’s got a deadly-looking flu right now, by the way. Also, the U is silent.

The Arguello signing would not have happened if not for the Wasserman trade in which we dumped Palmer, Baldwin, and most importantly Craig Bowen. Wasserman, meanwhile, was blown up for an ERA of 18.00 in his first games in St. Pete.

Good times, good times.

[Westheim]

As early as Monday, and less than a week after coming here, Daryl Anderson reminded me that he was not a role player and was a *primary* catcher. He might be a primary ****hole* if anybody’s digging my opinion…

Raccoons (60-57) vs. Blue Sox (52-65) – August 12-14, 2013

The Blue Sox were struggling with most of the things you liked on a baseball team, like, scoring runs, not allowing runs, defense, and so on. They were in the bottom four in both runs scored and runs allowed in the Federal League, and their rotation and bullpen were both in the bottom three in ERA. We had dropped the last series between the teams, 1-2, in 2011 after winning the last three encounters. Overall, we are just better than even against them at a .522 clip.

Projected matchups:
Hector Santos (6-9, 3.74 ERA) vs. Felipe Ramirez (4-5, 3.82 ERA)
Sergio Vega (3-2, 1.95 ERA) vs. Alfredo Collazo (11-7, 3.37 ERA)
Jonathan Toner (1-1, 5.74 ERA) vs. Jason McDonald (4-6, 5.04 ERA)

Three more games, then finally an off day! We get their two least horrendous pitchers, all right-handers. Collazo, 32, is a CL veteran, spending 11 years with the Falcons before coming to Nashville this season. His career ERA is more than a full run higher than his 2013 performance, though.

This will just be a quick 3-game set at home before we go on another 2-week long grand tour of two countries (including an inconvenient double header), but at least we have an off day every week until the start of September now – it helps the colossally beleaguered bullpen a whole bunch, I’m sure!

Game 1
NAS: LF Kretz – SS M. Garza – 3B A. Esquivel – CF Shearing – 1B Griffin – C C. Ramos – RF Beckmann – 2B Barton – P F. Ramirez
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – C Anderson – 3B Nunley – SS Whitehouse – P Santos

The mini-homestand started in cringeworthy fashion with a leadoff home run by Joey Kretz. The Coons made the third out in the bottom of the inning at third base, which was a no-no, but Carmona was thrown out by Herb Beckmann trying to go first-to-third on Quebell’s 2-out single. Quebell’s defense also continued to be severely lacking, and two grounders escaped him rather easily in the fourth inning to help the Sox score another run. Ineptness would turn into absurdity in the sixth inning. Santos was approaching 100 pitches already after consistently throwing junk in the dirt that no kindergarten player would club at. The Blue Sox spit him out and he was yanked with two runs already in and T.J. Barton on second base with one out. Gallegos came in to face the pitcher Ramirez, who not only slugged an RBI double to deep center, but also then stole third base off a completely befuddled battery. Kretz scored him with a sac fly, bringing the Blue Sox up to 6-0. Daryl Anderson then hit into a double play in the bottom 6th, erasing Bednarski from first, who had only made it there after being plunked by Ramirez. Three left-handers hit singles off Youngblood in the top 7th to add another run for the Blue Sox, while the Raccoons would get only one run off Robby Delikat, a reliever in the class of Slayton and Youngblood and the like, and that was all. 7-1 Blue Sox. Carmona 2-3; Quebell 2-4;

The Blue Sox outslogged us 18-7. Mind that they are not a good offensive team.

I want to demote / fire / set on fire so many players…….

Game 2
NAS: LF Kretz – SS M. Garza – CF Shearing – C Walston – 1B Griffin – RF Adkins – 3B Harman – 2B Barton – P Collazo
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – SS Canning – C McNeela – 3B Nunley – P Vega

Sergio Vega hadn’t made a name for himself in going deep into games as a makeshift starter, but here he retired the first seven Blue Sox in just 20 pitches before Barton singled to right, but was left on base. 32 pitches for three shutout innings was exactly the pace that managers loved to get from their starters, makeshift or not. While the pace didn’t hold up quite as crisply, the shutout did hold up long enough for the Raccoons to actually score the first run of the game in the bottom 6th after being drawn a nose by Collazo just as well through five innings, as both pitchers nursed 2-hitters. But Ricardo Carmona led off the sixth with a triple and came home on Sambrano’s single into center, with Sandy stealing second, moving up on Yoshi’s groundout, and then coming home on a wild pitch. Bednarski would draw a 2-out walk, then got picked off first by Collazo. Daron Griffin opened the top 7th with a liner up the rightfield line that Bednarski cut off. Griffin raced around second base, but found himself thrown out at third by Bednarski. Vega visibly didn’t have it anymore, walking Jamie Adkins, but he got a double play grounder from Tommy Harman, completing his day with seven shutout innings. Josh Gibson was rescued with another double play hit into by pinch-hitter Herb Beckmann in the eighth, and in the ninth – after Quebell had stranded runners on the corners in the bottom 8th – the Raccoons turned to Manobu Sugano, with the left-handed middle of the order coming up, despite Watanabe being available. The Blue Sox’ Marcos Garza, Conor Shearing, and Pat Walston all looked exceptionally bad, and went down 1-2-3. 2-0 Critters. Sambrano 2-4, RBI; Vega 7.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 4 K, W (4-2);

Game 3
NAS: LF Kretz – SS M. Garza – 3B A. Esquivel – CF Shearing – C Walston – 1B Griffin – RF Adkins – 2B Barton – P McDonald
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – C Anderson – RF White – SS Canning – 3B Rodgers – P Toner

Toner early on again failed to channel his first semi-successful major league start, and got waffled hard from the start. Conor Shearing hit a 2-run double in the first inning, while the Raccoons scuffled as usual. When they did have two men on in the third inning, Adrian Quebell hit into an inning-ending double play. Daryl Anderson led off the bottom 4th with a hard single to center, then got washed up in Pat White’s double play. Then, singles by Canning and Rodgers, and McDonald, who had struggled with control from the start, walked Toner to fill the bases with two outs for Carmona, who lined out to Shearing.

Bottom 5th, still down 2-0. While the Sox didn’t miss many pitches, they hit mostly at fielders in these middle innings. Sambrano led off with a single, and Yoshi singled as well, sending Sandy to third base. Quebell grounded to T.J. Barton once more, but Barton missed it and Quebell had an RBI single. The Coons would somehow get in the tying run as well, but left the go-ahead run on third base in the inning. Toner held up through seven innings after an incredibly rocky start to this game, and was hit for with two outs and two on in the bottom 7th. Facing right-hander Nick Melendez would be Matt Pruitt, which looked like another forfeit, but the anemic leftfielder actually managed to single into right, scoring Walt Canning from second base to take a 3-2 lead. Melendez then walked Carmona, but Sambrano grounded out to end the inning with three Coons stranded. They scratched out an insurance run in the eighth, 4-2, before Josh Gibson faced Antonio Esquivel to start the ninth. Gibson had pitched the eighth, and Sugano was penciled in for the ninth again once the right-hander Esquivel was out of the way. Unfortunately, Esquivel singled, and Sugano faced the tying run at the plate and nobody out. Shearing struck out, and Walston and Griffin were both retired on pops over the infield. 4-2 Raccoons. Nomura 3-4, RBI; Quebell 2-5, 2B, RBI; Anderson 2-5, 2B; Canning 2-5; Rodgers 2-3, BB; Pruitt (PH) 1-1, RBI; Toner 7.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 4 K, W (2-1) and 1-2, BB;

We out-hit the Blue Sox 15-4 in this one and left SIXTEEN men on base.

Raccoons (62-58) @ Crusaders (52-65) – August 16-18, 2013

The Crusaders had won four straight to grab a half game lead in the CL North. They ranked second in both runs scored and runs allowed, but they had suffered a few injuries recently, including Daniel Sharp, who was perhaps not as much of a key to success for them as Stanton Martin, who came off the DL *just* in time for this 3-game weekend set. They held a 7-4 edge over the Coons in ’13 after winning only three games against Portland last year.

Projected matchups:
Rich Hood (6-8, 4.99 ERA) vs. Pancho Trevino (19-2, 2.79 ERA)
Bill Conway (5-9, 3.64 ERA) vs. Kelvin Yates (1-0, 5.40 ERA)
Hector Santos (6-10, 3.90 ERA) vs. A.J. Bartels (9-8, 4.44 ERA)

Three more right-handers. Trevino was actually looking for his 20th win in the middle of August, and his chances against Hood were certainly not bad. Kel Yates was just returning from the DL as well, having missed almost all of 2013 so far.

Game 1
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – C Anderson – RF White – SS Canning – 3B Rodgers – P Hood
NYC: CF Brissett – 2B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – C G. Ortíz – SS J. Hernandez – 3B Petersen – P Trevino

Trevino dipped one into Yoshi and walked two in the first inning, but the Raccoons couldn’t find a hit and didn’t score. Hood struggled from the start, but the Crusaders didn’t hit them hard enough to get them past the outfielders in the early innings and the game was scoreless through three. In the fourth, Trevino had a bout of wildness again. Ken Rodgers found the bases to be loaded with one out, hit the first pitch high to right, where Stanton Martin sold out on a catch, much to the shock of his manager, but came up allright. Rodgers’ fly was deep enough to bring home Quebell with the game’s first run, however. Hood grounded out to leave two on.

After a 1-2-3 top 5th, Hood allowed a leadoff single to Trevino in the bottom 5th, and Amari Brissett reached on an infield single. Caraballo bunted the runners into scoring position, bringing up the Crusaders’ heart of the order, which had 67 homers between them (POR: 13). The Martin Brothers didn’t go deep (enough), but did a good job, with Martin Ortíz bringing home Trevino with a deep sac fly to center, and Stanton Martin singled to left, plating Brissett, and New York was up 2-1.

With Rodgers at first base in the seventh inning, Hood was left in the game to bunt him into scoring position and hope for some extra base magic from Ricardo Carmona. Hood bunted into a double play instead, then conceded ANOTHER leadoff single to Trevino in the bottom of the inning. With right-hander Bob Morris batting for Amari Brissett, Tom Constantino came out. Constantino hadn’t pitched in the Blue Sox series and ran 3-ball counts to Morris, who grounded out, and Francisco Caraballo, who walked. Sugano came on to face the left-hander Ortíz and try to salvage at least a comeback chance. Ortíz lined out Sambrano in left (bssss…!) and then the Raccoons took a page out of the handbook for mad managers and walked right-hander Stanton Martin intentionally with only third base open. Sugano would face B.J. Manfull (a left-handed batter) with the bases loaded – and he grounded out to end the inning! Gallegos and Youngblood narrowly avoided being blown up by the bottom of the order in the bottom 8th, giving the Coons’ 5-6-7 batters a chance to come back from a 2-1 deficit against Micah Steele. The most the Coons managed was a pinch-walk drawn by Bednarski, and nobody hit a ball out of the infield. 2-1 Crusaders.

Well, four hits most of the time ain’t enough to win any game. We actually walked more Crusaders (5) than that.

Things are so bleak in every regard right now, I booked myself TWO rooms in the same hotel in New York. The team thinks I’m in a suite on the ninth floor, but I’m actually in a storage room on the second floor, and sleeping on a stool, slumped against the ball. I just can’t have anybody bugging me after the daily loss. And I found out the hard way that we imported complainers onto the roster the entire year. Daryl Anderson would be the worst. Whether the Crusaders would take him back?

The bandits at the hotel are charging the same price for the storage room, which is full of brooms and buckets, than for the suite, by the way. They should all be thrown into the oubliette.

Game 2
POR: LF Carmona – SS Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – CF White – C Anderson – 3B Nunley – P Conway
NYC: CF Brissett – 2B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – SS J. Hernandez – C Case – 3B Petersen – P K. Yates

Carmona walked and stole second base, then scored on Yoshi’s single in the first inning, just before Quebell hit into another double play. Conway retired the Crusaders in order the first time through and their first runner would be Brissett legging out an infield single, but that was all they got in the fourth inning. Conway walked Manfull on four pitches to start the bottom 5th, but he was erased in a double play. Aaron Case then singled (only the third hit in the entire game), and Conway walked Tommie Petersen on four pitches again. Kel Yates snipped a grounder past Yoshi into rightfield, and Case scored handily to tie the score. The Crusaders took the lead the next inning when Caraballo led off with a double and scored on consecutive groundouts by the Martin Brothers, and Conway continued to issue walks.

The Raccoons, held to one hit through six innings, had a leadoff single by Bednarski in the top 7th, another single by Anderson, and then Nunley hit a bouncer to his opposite Petersen, which appeared to bounce right on the edge between the grass and the dirt and escaped into left over Petersen’s glove. ****ty luck gave the Coons bases loaded with one out, with Pruitt batting for the pitcher again. Kel was melting, walked him to tie the game, and the Crusaders now through Alex Ramirez at the top of the order, and both Carmona and Sambrano were retired on easy pops. Bottom 8th, Martin Ortíz hit a 1-out double off Pat Slayton. Stanton popped out to Yoshi, and Manfull was walked intentionally to bring up Ramirez, who had logged three quick outs in the top 8th and had originally entered in a double switch, and force the Crusaders to show a pinch-hitter. It was left-hander Jesus Flores, and Sugano got the assignment, retiring him on a grounder to Yoshi to end the inning. Against Robbie Wills in the ninth, Pat White led off with a single, but would be stranded at third base. Constantino got the game into extras with a scoreless bottom 9th, and Yoshi legged out an infield single in the top 10th, only for the obnoxious Quebell to hit into another double play. Two hits and a walk won the game for the Crusaders against Constantino in the bottom 10th, with Bob Morris hitting a pinch-hit walkoff single to plate Martin Ortíz. 3-2 Crusaders. Nomura 2-4, BB, RBI; McNeela (PH) 1-1;

Matt Nunley, batting .190, was demoted before the series finale, with Keith Ayers getting added back onto the roster.

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Pruitt – SS Canning – C McNeela – 3B Rodgers – P Santos
NYC: CF Brissett – 2B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – SS J. Hernandez – C Case – 3B Petersen – P Bartels

The Raccoons’ recipe for a first-inning run worked again. Sambrano singled, stole second, and scored on Yoshi’s single. Bednarski also singled, but Pruitt struck out and Canning grounded out to leave two on early. Santos struck out three of the first four batters he faced before B.J. Manfull cracked his 24th homer in the second inning to tie up the game early. Top 3rd: Carmona singled, stole second, Yoshi doubled him in. Once again, Santos failed to hold on for long, the Crusaders smacked three hard hits in the bottom 4th and the game was tied again at two. Three more singles, two of the infield variety, were good enough for the go-ahead run in the bottom 5th, driven in by Martin Ortíz. The Coons had runners on the corners in the top 6th with one out, but Canning struck out and RBI-less McNeela grounded out to Caraballo to end the inning.

But then Yoshi came up with two outs and runners on the corners in the top 7th. He was unretired on the day with two doubles, exactly what the Raccoons needed down 3-2. Alex Ramirez was pitching in relief of Bartels, had one strike on Yoshi, two strikes on Yoshi, then contact, a bouncer to left and through – tied game! Bednarski, the tool, struck out of course. The Coons’ Pruitt and Canning opened the top 8th with back-to-back singles before three at-bats of nuthin’ left them in scoring position. Top 9th, Sambrano got on with one out against Wills. He stole second and made it to third on Gabriel Ortíz’ errant throw. Here comes Yoshi! But … he had already four hits on the day, and would not get the fifth. He popped up a 1-2 pitch and the Coons left Sandy at third. Ken Wood homered off Josh Gibson in the bottom 9th to sweep the Raccoons. 4-3 Crusaders. Sambrano 3-5; Nomura 4-5, 2 2B, 3 RBI; White (PH) 1-2;

Once Yoshi Nomura will depart this fall, the Raccoons will never score a run again. NEVER.

In other news

August 14 – IND SP Tristan Broun (12-9, 3.04 ERA) has a 2-hit shutout against the Buffaloes. Broun allows both singles in the first inning before retiring 26 consecutive batters.
August 17 – SFW OF Jose “Dingus” Morales (.342, 18 HR, 94 RBI) will miss the rest of August with a strained rib cage muscle.
August 17 – IND 2B Jong-beom Kym (.255, 9 HR, 33 RBI) is injured yet again and will miss a month with a strained hammy.
August 17 – Stars sophomore OF/1B Hugo Mendoza (.271, 15 HR, 57 RBI) will miss a month after suffering a shoulder strain.

Complaints and stuff

Ron Thrasher suffered a setback with his ****ty oblique and will take about another week before he can return. Maybe even more.

Last week, I was THIS close to call up Chris Brown from Ham Lake to start a few games. Brown was up at St. Pete last year and to start this season, but got tarred, feathered, and sexually assaulted while there. But… just look at the misery. However, this week we actually got a good start from Vega, and Toner had luck on his side, so no chances will be made right now. Jack Berry is still two weeks off and then will need rehab, so he won’t help us in the short term, either. D-Alex is going to be out until the middle of September, too. You might argue that the Raccoons need a bat more than anything else… T-10th in runs scored now. Only the Falcons have plated less.

[MarkCuban]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Interlude: Big Trade!

There was a reason why Colin Baldwin didn’t pitch in the series opener, and it had to do with communications with the Dallas Stars, who were looking for additional players for the stretch drive in a crowded FL West. The Raccoons parted with a total of four players in the trade, and we would not cry for some of them.

The Raccoons picked up #19 prospect SP Graham Wasserman, a right-hander that just turned 23 years old and just a few weeks ago debuted in AAA. The #9 pick in the 2011 draft, Wasserman throws a cutter clocking in at 93mph, a really good fork, and a lesser slider, but also a budding changeup that could become his best pitch. So far he has some walk issues, but that is getting better, too.

The price the Raccoons paid is not as bad as “four players” sound. In fact, one of the players was C Craig Bowen (.183, 4 HR, 17 RBI), who would suck for the last two and a half years of his contract in Dallas, or maybe Cumming, their AAA team. Also included: INF Michael Palmer (.242, 2 HR, 30 RBI), SP Colin Baldwin (7-5, 3.77 ERA), and AAA SP Andy Hackney.

How desperate can the Stars be for Craig Bowen? Their catchers are Mark Thomas and Richard Speed, basically two career backups. Thomas was a Coon once, and Speed was with the Indians behind Jose Paraz for a few years. Neither is hitting much of a lick.

The Raccoons shed $1.1M in 2013 salaries (nobody really cares) and almost $5M in future commitments to Baldwin and Bowen. Palmer would have been a free agent. Hackney was not on the 40-man roster.

I mean, come on, not even The Agitator can put a bad spin on that move. Even if it is essentially "Baldwin-for-prospect" -- with the amount you cleared up in cap space should help you... somehow.

What are the odds some of that ~2 million ends up in "your cash on hand"? The "cash on hand" you can send to another team in a trade? I've used that to complete many trades with the CPU, usually a few hundred thousand and suddenly they're willing to talk ball.

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by MarkCuban

What are the odds some of that ~2 million ends up in "your cash on hand"? The "cash on hand" you can send to another team in a trade? I've used that to complete many trades with the CPU, usually a few hundred thousand and suddenly they're willing to talk ball.

Squid. The Mexican Prick collects everything to spend it on helicopters, herbs, and hookers. The Raccoons have to make do with about $300k cash each year.

+++

Raccoons (62-61) @ Indians (56-68) – August 20-22, 2013

The Indians might be tied for last place with the Loggers, but they sure knew how to handle those pesky Critters, handling them to a 7-5 advantage over the season. Both teams are tied for 10th in runs scored with a paltry 496 (just over 4.0 R/G for Portland, and exactly 4.0 R/G for Indy), and even the third-best rotation in the league couldn’t manage to keep the Indians afloat. Not properly utilizing a top 3 rotation was most likely while the Raccoons were playing meager .500 ball. All those millions on the DL!

Projected matchups:
Jonathan Toner (2-1, 4.76 ERA) vs. Tristan Broun (12-9, 3.04 ERA)
Rich Hood (6-9, 4.91 ERA) vs. Samuel McMullen (6-10, 4.63 ERA)
Sergio Vega (4-2, 1.75 ERA) vs. Aaron Walsh (12-8, 3.78 ERA)

This series would start with us facing two left-handers, but Sam McMullen left his last start early with shoulder woes and personally I don’t think he’ll pitch. Their rotation might thus be in a bit of a state of flux right now.

The Raccoons will utilize this Monday being off to set themselves up for next Monday, when they will play a double header with Oklahoma City. The rubber-armed Sergio Vega was moved to the back of this series to be available on short rest for the second game of the double header, because I’d rather have the 30-something endless rhubarb gum pitching on short rest against an evilly good team than a youngster that gets clobbered anyway. Rich Hood will have the first half of the double header then, meaning plenty of bullpen action for that day, presumably.

Game 1
POR: LF Carmona – 3B Canning – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C Anderson – 1B Sambrano – CF White – SS Whitehouse – P Toner
IND: CF J. Wilson – LF Kui – 1B S. Guerra – RF J. Ortíz – C Padilla – SS Mathews – 3B G. Rice – 2B Larsen – P Broun

Yoshi continued to do what he could and doubled home Carmona in the first inning for an early 1-0 lead. The same could be said for the rest of the team: they continued to do what they could, it was just nothing much. Toner drilled Joey Mathews in the bottom of the second, and Mathews came around to score on a couple of singles, including one with two outs by Tristan Broun. However, the Indians lost two players to injuries in that second inning, first Shane Larsen while fielding, replaced by Tom Bowers, and then Broun on the base paths when he clobbered clumsily into Walt Canning at third base. Canning was fine, Broun not so much, suffering some kind of core or back injury. Charlie Fritsch appeared to pitch in relief for the Indians, loaded the bases with no outs in the fourth inning, but the Critters didn’t manage more than a run-scoring groundout by Pat White (not house). The continuously beleaguered Cal Holbrook spun three scoreless innings in relief for the Indians, holding the Raccoons at bay long enough for Mathews to flip the score with a 2-run homer in the sixth inning. Toner at least went seven and a third before bumping into 100 pitches. The completely insufferable George Youngblood took the ball, walked a pair and then allowed a 2-run double to Gary Rice, 5-2. Amusingly, the Raccoons would load the bases in the ninth with one out, with Sambrano walking, White singling, and Matt Pruitt, batting for Pat White (with house), reaching on Tom Bowers’ error. Quebell’s pinch-hit sac fly was all they got. 5-3 Indians. Anderson 2-4, 2B; White 2-4, RBI;

Game 2
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – SS Canning – C McNeela – 3B Rodgers – P Hood
IND: CF J. Wilson – 2B Bowers – 1B S. Guerra – RF J. Ortíz – C Padilla – SS Mathews – LF J. Gonzalez – 3B Preto – P Spears

As expected, Sam McMullen missed his start, and the Indians sent Scott Spears (2-13, 7.07 ERA), whom they had tried quite hard to forget about, but he was still sucking up resources.

Spears faced the minimum in the first three innings, thanks to two double plays hit into by Sambrano and Rodgers, and an early 20-minute rain delay was also creating more annoyance. Quebell made his 12th error early on, Hood nicked two batters, and finally surrendered a run on a Jose Gonzalez sac fly in the fourth inning. Gonzalez also drove in Mathews in the sixth inning after the former had hit a 1-out double. That gave the Indians a 2-0 lead, with the Raccoons having hit four singles against Spears, plus a drive to deep right by Bednarski that was too high and not deep enough and caught on the track by Juan Ortíz. Top 7th, leadoff walk by Yoshi, then nothing. Top 8th, leadoff infield single by Tom McNeela, then another double play by the fabulous Rodgers. Hood went six, Slayton and Constantino provided scoreless relief, but Scott Spears endured into the ninth inning with a 2-0 lead and the top of the order coming up. Carmona grounded out on the first pitch (and only Spears’ 91st of the game), but when Sambrano worked a full count walk, it got too damn dicey for the Arrowheads, and Hélio Maggessi was bothered. Yoshi flew out to left easily, and Bednarski hit another hard one to right, where Clint Philip made an amazing play to end the game. 2-0 Indians. Carmona 2-4; McNeela 2-3;

And finally the Raccoons have arrived beneath .500, deserving every bit of the indignity.

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Anderson – 3B Canning – 1B Pruitt – SS Whitehouse – P Vega
IND: CF J. Wilson – LF Kui – 1B S. Guerra – RF J. Ortíz – C Padilla – SS Mathews – 3B G. Rice – 2B Preto – P Walsh

If humanly possible, the Raccoons would try to hold Sergio Vega to no more than 80 pitches today to facilitate an easier start on Monday – whenever there was an easy start against a team like the Thunder in the first place. Since the Critters were rampantly inept anyway, Juan Gallegos would be piggy-backed with Vega to pitch several innings in what would doubtlessly be another losing cause.

Then, lo and behold, the Raccoons threw up a 3-spot in the second inning. Starting with an Anderson double, they would plate two runs on infield singles by Whitehouse and Carmona, and Sandy had a hard RBI single past Santiago Guerra to top off the effort. The Indians also got a leadoff double by Joey Mathews, but stranded him on third base in the inning. Pruitt added an RBI double in the third, then an error that almost caused calamity in the fourth, but Vega needed only 64 pitches for a 2-hit shutout through five innings, holding a 4-0 lead, and then spent only seven pitches on the sixth. Meanwhile the Critters continued to hit singles and double plays and failed to tack on runs despite 15 hits in seven innings. When Vega’s 79th pitch was hit for a 2-out single by Rice in the bottom 7th, it was not Gallegos to come into the game, but Sugano, as we had just arrived at three left-handed bats and the pitcher inside the next four batters. Sugano struck out Silvestre Preto to keep Vega’s sheet – amazingly – clean again. Sugano had a perfect eighth, the Coons added a run against Holbrook in the ninth (hooray!), and then Constantino came into the bottom 9th and was blasted with Santiago Guerra’s leadoff jack right away. Ortíz singled, Padilla doubled, and Watanabe replaced Co(o)nstantino. He conceded one of the runs on base on a sac fly, but somehow managed to steer the game to conclusion while avoiding the sweep. 5-2 Raccoons. Carmona 3-5, RBI; Sambrano 3-5, RBI; Nomura 3-5, RBI; Bednarski 2-4; Pruitt 2-4, 2B, RBI; Whitehouse 2-3, BB, RBI; Ayers 1-1; Vega 6.2 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K, W (5-2); Sugano 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

The Raccoons once more had three runners caught stealing in a game by a mediocre catcher with a success rate barely topping 30%. Carmona, Pruitt, and Whitehouse were all lasered down by the unseemingly effective Dave Padilla.

Raccoons (63-63) @ Condors (58-70) – August 23-25, 2013

The Raccoons’ pen had holes, okay, but the Condors’ was quite abysmal, completely ruining all efforts by a rotation that still had the odd decent pitcher despite the departure of “Midnight” Martin two months ago. They conceded the second-most runs in the Continental League, and ranked seventh in scoring (with about 50 more runs scored than the Critters…). We were 4-2 against them this year and needed to avoid a sweep to extend our string of winning seasons over them to nine consecutive years.

Projected matchups:
Bill Conway (5-9, 3.62 ERA) vs. Michael Colvard (7-7, 4.09 ERA)
Hector Santos (6-10, 3.92 ERA) vs. Manuel Rojas (12-6, 2.60 ERA)
Jonathan Toner (2-2, 4.50 ERA) vs. Micah Kirchberg (2-3, 4.10 ERA)

Erik McMahon (2-6, 5.03 ERA) would have been our second southpaw this week, but the Condors would skip him to get the good things up early. That leaves only the dismal Broun came, and he pitched only two innings. It could have been three games against lefties this week, so we might just as well consider ourselves lucky.

Game 1
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Anderson – 3B Canning – 1B Pruitt – SS Whitehouse – P Vega
TIJ: SS Dasher – C Bedinghaus – RF Branch – CF Feldmann – 1B May – LF Newman – 2B Eroh – 3B Fish – P Colvard

In a slow offensive start, a Pat Whitehouse single was the entire offensive output the first time through either team’s orders, but then Sandy exploded for a leadoff homer in the fourth inning, 1-0 for the brown team. The Coons had three more singles in the inning, with Pruitt bringing home a run to make it 2-0, and Conway retired Craig Dasher on a grounder to start the fourth inning before suddenly the wheels fell off and the Condors smacked five consecutive base hits, most of them hard, including a game-tying 2-run double by Nick May. Four runs scored in the inning and the Raccoons sat in a hole yet again, a hole that only grew deeper when Carmona was caught stealing yet again in the top of the fifth inning.

Doubles by Yoshi and Anderson plated a run in the top 6th to get back to 4-3 before Conway was starting to get whacked again by the middle of the order. Ezra Branch and Ryan Feldmann hit hard singles before May struck out and Will Newman hit into a double play nicely started by Canning. An error, a single, and a walk loaded the bases for the Coons with two outs in the top 7th. Colvard was yanked for reliever Ted Scott who had rather dubious credentials, including an ERA of almost seven, to face Bednarski with the bases teeming. But, well, it’s the Raccoons. And Bednarski flew out softly to center on the first pitch he got. Top 8th, Pruitt hit a 2-out single off Kaz Kichida, pitching change with Quebell hitting for Whitehouse, and lefty Scott Vigil faced him, surrendering another single. Pitching change again, to righty Kanichiro Miura, even before Ken Rodgers came out to bat for Conway… and struck out.

Top 9th. Carmona grounded out to start the inning, but Sandy singled deep behind second base where Matthew Miller didn’t even make a throw. Speed on first and Yoshi up next was exactly what the doctor ordered and a hit-and-run was called. Sandy went, Yoshi raked, and a crying RBI double into the corner in rightfield later the Raccoons had tied the ballgame. Then they left Nomura on second base.

When Josh Gibson struck out Nick May with two on and nobody out in the bottom 9th, May couldn’t quite believe it. The umpire had none of it and tossed him, which created a prickly situation for the Condors, who were out of bench players. Thusly, starting pitcher Manuel “Doom” Rojas would get a few reps at first base once Newman rolled into a double play to generate extras for everybody. They also would have their closer bat in the bottom 10th, with one out and Jose Vargas on third base after a leadoff double against Pat Slayton, who now ran a 2-2 count before surrendering a cracking hard grounder, right to Yoshi, and Vargas went, Yoshi’s throw home – OUT BY A MILE! Slayton pulled through, somehow, but it wasn’t until the 12th that the Raccoons did something against that miserable pen of theirs. Daryl Anderson led off with a homer against Derek Pinnell, and after McNeela crew a pinch-walk, Quebell also went deep to create a sizeable 3-run lead. Watanabe had to tend to that, allowed a leadoff single by Tom Fish, then … (facepalms) … then with two outs drilled Pinnell(!) with a 1-2 pitch. That brought up the tying run in Ezra Branch, a left-hander with ten homers, but he would not get one here, instead popping out to Yoshi. 7-4 Coons. Sambrano 4-7, HR, RBI; Nomura 2-4, 2 BB, 2 2B, RBI; Anderson 3-6, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; Pruitt 2-4, RBI; Quebell (PH) 3-3, HR, 2 RBI; Slayton 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K, W (7-1);

How anyone can send Jose Vargas on any play is beyond me. When the Raccoons were in Tijuana the last time, he just barely managed to outrace a kid in a power wheelchair around the bases.

Carmona stole his 31st base in this game, accidentally one must assume. He’s been caught *23* times this year. With a semi-decent success rate he’d give BOS Mike Rivera (37 SB) a run for the title. Over in the FL, only RIC Danny Flores (33) has more than Carmona.

And now, ladies and gentleman, Erik McMahon, after all, presumably because “Doom” Rojas had to play first and can’t go right now. That’s why the Condors have not finished in the first division in five years, and not with a winning record in 11 years. Stupid decisions.

Game 2
POR: LF Sambrano – 3B Canning – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C Anderson – 1B Quebell – CF White – SS Whitehouse – P Santos
TIJ: SS Dasher – C Bedinghaus – RF Branch – CF Feldmann – 1B May – LF Newman – 2B Eroh – 3B Fish – P McMahon

Santos delivered a lead with a 2-out RBI single in the top 2nd, plating Quebell to further his own cause, which he didn’t do very often with his pitching. Both teams had something brewing with two on and one out in the third inning, and both hit into double plays (Bednarski the Coons’ goat), and Santos arrived in the unhappy spot after hitting Craig Dasher with a pitch. Bill Bedinghaus’ double plays bailed him out, but Ezra Branch romped a 2-2 pitch for a huge home run to start the bottom of the fourth, and the game was swiftly tied at one. The Coons had runners in scoring position with one out in the fifth, after Bednarski singled and Anderson doubled, but Quebell was an obvious fail with a pathetic groundout, and Pat White’s fly to center was easily caught by Ryan Feldmann, too. Top 7th, runners on the corners with one out. Both Canning and Nomura hit deep drives, and both were caught in jumping fashion at the track by Branch and Newman, respectively. Nobody scored, since the runner on third base was Santos, who had gotten Whitehouse and his leadoff walk killed with a ****ty bunt to begin this particular embarrassment. Resembling a fragmented mirror offensively anyway, the Raccoons’ pitching and fielding fell apart for good in the bottom 8th. Matt Keeler led off with a single before Quebell couldn’t dig out Craig Dasher’s bunt that put two on with nobody out. Bedinghaus failed, but then the left-handed Branch came up. Sugano was called on, but lost him in a full count to a bases-loading walk. Josh Gibson came in, struck out Feldmann, and May popped out to Yoshi to once again save the Raccoons from their own ineptness. The Raccoons had the go-ahead run (Sambrano) caught stealing in the top of the ninth, and when Constantino didn’t explode on contact in the bottom of the inning, that meant more horrible baseball for everybody involved, including the CONDORS having the winning run thrown out when Branch was caught stealing by Anderson to end the bottom 10th. Quebell homered off his new favorite pitcher Scott Vigil in the top 11th, and the poor sod allowed another run on a few singles to hand a 3-1 lead to … Pat Slayton, of all people. Watanabe was unavailable, feeling very tired after saving consecutive games. Slayton got two outs on two pitches before Vargas singled in a full count. Ron Eroh singled, too, and Matt Miller launched a shot into the gap on the first pitch he saw, where Pat White appeared out of nowhere and made a flying grab (including a hard landing) to end the game. 3-1 Raccoons. Sambrano 2-6; Quebell 3-5, HR, RBI; Santos 7.1 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 3 K; Constantino 2.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K, W (4-1);

Every starter in this game had at least one hit for the Critters, and after winning three straight we are now tied again with the fading Elks.

But for crying out loud, boys. Lose in regulation if you want, but not again extra innings on Sunday! We gotta play two on Monday!

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF White – C McNeela – 3B Canning – SS Rodgers – P Toner
TIJ: SS Dasher – 2B Eroh – RF Branch – CF Feldmann – 1B May – LF Newman – C Vargas – 3B Fish – P Rojas

A long outing from Toner was imperative, but Juan Gallegos, who had only faced one batter this week, was ready to piggy-back with him for long relief if Toner would be knocked out early or would leave after five or so and trailing.

The cocky Coons stole three bases in the first inning after Sandy singled, swiped second, Yoshi walked, then got the go sign trailing Sambrano, who went a second earlier to draw the throw to third base. We practiced that a lot – in my imagination. All the running netted only one run, though, on Quebell’s sac fly, making him the first Coon to 60 RBI this year (yaay…). The Raccoons would tack on in the third, Sambrano leading off with a double and scoring on Yoshi’s soft single to shallow right that took Branch forever to get to. Then, Quebell with the double play. Sandy also came up with two out and runners in scoring position after Carmona had just doubled ahead of him and sent a grounder deep to the right side, but Ron Eroh made the play of the month there, intercepting the ball in a tumble, bouncing up right onto his feet and delivering a perfect throw JUST in time to get Sandy at first base. A Canning error put Feldmann on to start the bottom 4th and Toner couldn’t get around that, conceding the unearned run on two singles to get the Condors back to 2-1. “Doom” Rojas made up for that Raccoons mess when he balked in Yoshi Nomura with two outs in the top 5th, after Pat White had just bounced into a double play, and Rodgers hit into a double play as well in the sixth. A LOT of misery between these two teams for sure…

The Condors appeared to come roaring back and poach Toner in the bottom 6th when Feldmann and May opened with consecutive doubles past Walt Canning, but then made three quick and poor outs to end the inning with the tying run in scoring position. The Coons had their own back-to-back doubles action with two outs in the top 7th, Yoshi and Quebell responsible for the tack-on run, and wasn’t Yoshi Nomura responsible for everything by now? Except double plays. Rodgers was a prime candidate for that, and hit into one in the eighth. Youngblood faced only one batter in the bottom 8th, issuing a leadoff double to Ezra Branch, before we had to bring in Gallegos. He had to pull through here, because the bullpen was pretty well worn right now after two extra inning affairs. Gallegos, another one of the insufferable relievers, promptly threw eight straight balls to load the bases, but the Condors would find a way to fudge themselves out of even three on, no outs, and GALLEGOS pitching. They got a run on Will Newman’s groundout to short, before Vargas whiffed and Jimmy Raupp popped out to third base, leaving the Raccoons hanging onto a 4-3 lead by the very tips of their claws. They faced their former teammate Kaz Kichida in the top 9th, getting two hits and two walks and yet still only a single insurance run on White’s sac fly. Gallegos remained in for the bottom 9th, he had to get the 5-3 lead over. Keeler and Dasher grounded out to Nomura before Gallegos whiffed Eroh to end the game. 5-3 Furballs. Sambrano 3-5, 2B; Nomura 3-4, BB, 2B, RBI; Quebell 1-2, 2 BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Toner 7.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 6 K, W (3-2) and 1-3; Gallegos 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 2 K, SV (1);

This was Yoshi Nomura’s third career stolen base. Also, this was the second consecutive game in which all our starters logged at least one hit.

In other news

August 19 – The Cyclones trail Washington 6-0 after six innings, but rally back for one in the seventh, three in the eighth, and five in the ninth to beat them 9-6. Marcos Bruno (3-6, 5.37 ERA, 12 SV) takes the loss.
August 20 – ATL LF Marty Reyes (.316, 8 HR, 67 RBI) will miss a month with a strained rib cage muscle.
August 20 – The Warriors make four errors in a game against the Gold Sox, including one by SS Jimmy Bayle that loses them the game in the 11th inning.
August 25 – Sioux Falls might be without LF Gil Gross (.293, 18 HR, 78 RBI) for the rest of the year after the 27-year old right-hander has suffered an oblique strain.
August 25 – The Gold Sox and Rebels go to extra innings tied 1-1, before both teams score three in the tenth inning. The Rebels eventually walk off in the 11th, 5-4.

Complaints and stuff

Sigh. Colin Baldwin left the team on July 30. Then, he led the crew with seven wins. He still leads the crew, in shared fashion, and it wasn’t until Friday that he was even TIED for the lead. Who tied him? ****ing Pat Slayton, who spent part of the year in AAA. A RELIEVER who spent part of the year in AAA.

Charlotte’s John Alexander hit .400 with a homer and 7 RBI to win CL Player of the Week honors. The sucker Yoshi Nomura batted merely 12-27 (.444) with five doubles. That loser!

Losing Yoshi a month from now makes me cry.

Due back dates as of right now. Thrasher might be back as early as Tuesday, and Berry should start rehab right around the first of September. D-Alex is still three weeks off. The other four DL dwellers (Dickerson, Casas, Castro, and … - sob - … Brownie) won’t be back until ’14, if ever. Actually, the only guy whom we are sure off to return in ’14 is Dickerson, but he looks like a real no-go for Opening Day right now.

Ralph Ford (6-15, 4.53 ERA) pitched a 4-hitter against the Wolves this week. Granted, it’s the Wolves, but I think Ford could use the excitement. His last two years have been rough, consecutive 15-loss campaigns, first with the Blue Sox, now with the Stars. I still like Ralph, although I never really liked him as a Raccoon (I liked Farley more, to stay within R.F.-initialed contemporaries), and this was his 150th big league win, less than half of which came with Portland (67). Randy on the other hand, 39 and three years older than Ralph, is still with the Capitals, and is four wins away from 200! He is fighting shoulder woes though. However, he has a contract for 2014, a guaranteed $2.24M salary for a 40-year old right-hander that has at best been mediocre for seven consecutive seasons. Farley also had less than half of his wins with the Critters, 77 to be precise.

[MarkCuban]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Squid. The Mexican Prick collects everything to spend it on helicopters, herbs, and hookers. The Raccoons have to make do with about $300k cash each year.

Sounds like a class act to me. Really, the man has no interest in seeing this team succeed at all.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (66-63) @ Thunder (74-54) – August 26-28, 2013

I’ve had avulsions in my not-so-good night’s sleep about this series for many weeks. I think it will not be pretty. The Thunder were almost at 700 runs scored for the season, which was mildly insane, over 5.4 runs per game and such, and while they had a terrible defense and mediocre starting pitching, they were capable of inflicting incredible hurt on opposing pitching as well. They also didn’t have meaningful injuries, although slugger Will Bailey (103 RBI) was DTD with a sore hammy. They were 3-2 against the Raccoons this season, with a rainout to be made up in this series.

Projected matchups:
Rich Hood (6-10, 4.83 ERA) vs. Art Cox (4-0, 2.91 ERA)
Sergio Vega (5-2, 1.59 ERA) vs. Edgar Amador (10-11, 6.05 ERA)
Ian Cumins (0-0) vs. Bob King (18-6, 3.18 ERA)
Bill Conway (5-9, 3.68 ERA) vs. Wes Yates (6-10, 4.98 ERA)

This series might see Wes Yates as the only southpaw to oppose the Raccoons, but starts with a much-dreaded double header. Ian Cumins will make a spot start on Tuesday (on regular rest). He has made two spot starts before, including one this year, and lost them both. In AAA this year, he’s 8-5 with a 3.92 ERA and almost even walks and strikeouts.

Game 1
POR: CF Carmona – SS Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – LF White – 3B Canning – C McNeela – P Hood
OCT: 2B O. Torres – 3B Farias – LF Blanc – RF Bailey – C J. Martinez – CF Reese – 1B A. Martinez – SS Kim – P Cox

The Coons had two on in the first, including Nomura with a single that extended a hitting streak to 12 games, but Quebell and Bednarski failed once again. The Thunder would put two runners on base in each of the first three innings and never got through against Rich Hood, who threw more balls than strikes. Top 4th, White got on with a single before the Thunder broke down a bit. Cox drilled Canning, who had doubled home White in the second inning for the so far only tally in the game, then balked. McNeela got an intentional walk and Conway struck out for the second out. Ricardo Carmona however reminded us all that he might be the best thing since the invention of donuts when he lashed a bases-clearing triple to centerfield that Tom Reese scampered after in total vain. Sambrano singled to plate Carmona and the Coons held a 5-0 lead, prompting the Thunder to dig into their bullpen early as they hit for Cox in the bottom 4th.

By that point they already had two on (Armando Martinez being drilled and Myeong-keun Kim singling) with nobody out again. Pedro Estrada grabbed a bat and popped out before Oliver Torres bounced into a double play to end another inning in futility for the Thunder. Bottom 5th, leadoff double from Emilio Farias, a walk drawn by Will Bailey, and – nothing, again. Hood was at almost 100 pitches though, the dork. The sixth was Hood’s last, and the first in which the Thunder had less than two base runners, with only reliever Mickey McGrath hitting a 2-out single. Hood somehow wobbled through, after which the Raccoons turned to George Youngblood in an attempt to wipe a 5-run lead, while offensively they left the bases loaded against McGrath in the top 7th, and White hit into a killing double play in the ninth. Youngblood had NOTHING, but somehow covered two innings on 26 pitches without blowing up and more dice were thrown to have him finish the game. Bottom 9th, leadoff 4-pitch walk to Torres (and not one ball was close). Farias then popped out, bringing up Mohammed Blanc, who sent a quick bouncer to Sambrano at short, who started another double play on the Thunder. 5-0 Raccoons. Sambrano 2-5, RBI; Nomura 2-5, 2B; Bednarski 2-4; White 2-4, BB; Canning 1-2, BB, 2B, RBI; Hood 6.0 IP, 7 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 3 K, W (7-10); Youngblood 3.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 0 K, SV (2);

Yoshi now has 30 doubles. I’m crying.

Game 2
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C Anderson – LF Pruitt – 3B Rodgers – SS Whitehouse – P Vega
OCT: CF Reese – 2B O. Torres – RF Bailey – 1B J. Roberts – LF Blanc – 3B Farias – C B. Campbell – SS Kim – P Amador

Vega didn’t allow runners in the first two innings while the Raccoons had already facepalmed over their alleged RBI guys again. Top 3rd, another chance for Quebell to do horrible things to his own team, finding the bases loaded with nobody out. Carmona and Bednarski had walked against the Fat Cat, while Yoshi was on two singles already. Quebell almost struck out before slapping a 1-2 pitch into center for an RBI single. Daryl Anderson picked up the slack and hit into the unavoidable double play and the Raccoons were held to two runs, though.

Vega would only allow one hit, a single by Blanc in the fifth, but also didn’t finish six innings, walking four batters and throwing in long counts regularly. Manobu Sugano inherited an unpleasant situation in the bottom 6th, with Reese and Torres on second and first, respectively, and Bailey at the plate. The top four in the lineup, including Jimmy Roberts, were all left-handed bats. Sugano fanned Bailey, and Roberts would fly out easily to Pruitt to keep Vega’s sheet clean AGAIN.

The Coons had Yoshi thrown out at home after sending him from second on Quebell’s 2-out single to right to end the top of the seventh, but in turn Blanc tried to make two out of his leadoff single off Constantino in the bottom 7th and was thrown out at second base by Carmona. Constantino was able to cover five more outs after that, but the hardest part was probably the bottom of the ninth inning, which pitted Hoshi Watanabe against the left-handed 2-3-4 brigade, and Bailey and Roberts both had 16+ homers (a.k.a. more than any living Coon), and the score was still 2-0 after the Raccoons had stranded a flurry of runners. Watanabe promptly walked the leadoff man Torres, and the Coons got only the lead runner on Bailey’s grounder to third. Roberts wrestled a full count walk from Watanabe, bringing up the winning run. Mohammed Blanc also grounded hard to third base, where Canning had appeared an inning earlier. Swift pick, lightning throw to second base, Yoshi with the turn to first – OUT! 2-0 Raccoons! Nomura 3-4; Bednarski 0-1, 3 BB; Quebell 4-4, RBI; White (PH) 1-1; Vega 5.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 4 BB, 3 K, W (6-2); Constantino 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K;

No-no, don’t hug Yoshi! He’ll burn you to death! He’s batting .510 for his last 12 games.

Here’s something I never expected to happen. Sergio Vega has thrown 25 scoreless innings now, allowing only 10 hits, 14 walks (twists), and whiffed 15 over his last four starts – all victories. What a seventh spring at age 33, especially for an endless gum with rhubarb flavor. (Mind that he also had 18 innings without an earned run (3 R) to start his 2013 major league assignment)

To get Cumins onto the roster for a day, George Youngblood, who had just thrown three innings and was not available anyway, was sent to the minors. At the same time, Ron Thrasher was sent for a rehab assignment to St. Petersburg, but we fully expect him to rejoin the team on the weekend in place of, oh, perhaps Youngblood / Cumins?

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – C McNeela – 3B Canning – SS Rodgers – P Cumins
OCT: CF Reese – 2B O. Torres – RF Bailey – 1B J. Roberts – LF Blanc – 3B Farias – C B. Campbell – SS Kim – P B. King

King started the game on short rest. Sandy reached on an error in the top 1st, but Yoshi hit into a double play, causing me to question my eyesight. Cumins had walked five in his other spot start this season, and that problem soon enough caught up with him as he walked Jimmy Roberts, Brian Campbell, and Myeong-keun Kim in the second inning to load the bases. Fortunately, King grounded out to Rodgers to end the inning, no Thunder tally through two. The Raccoons were up 1-0 after Quebell’s leadoff jack in the top of the second inning.

The Coons opened the score a bit in the top 5th. Canning singled, and was bunted to second base by Cumins. Carmona singled to right, scoring Canning, then got to third when he swiped his 32nd bag and Campbell’s throw went into center. Sandy scored him with a single, 3-0, but Yoshi grounded out for the third time on the day, ending the inning. Cumins was consistently erratic and ended up allowing six walks in 5 2/3 innings before Brian Campbell’s RBI triple got the Thunder onto the board after 23 innings of futility and ended Cumins’ suffering. Sandy Sambrano managed to intercept a rocket that Kim hit off Constantino to end the inning and stall Campbell at third base, keeping the score at 3-1.

Top 9th, still 3-1, Yoshi still hitless, and the fourth man up in the inning. Daryl Anderson hit for Slayton, who had gotten the last out in the eighth, and grounded slowly to Torres, who was also slow coming in and even the snail-paced Anderson managed to leg out an infield single. Carmona singled cleanly to left center, while Sandy struck out. C’mon Yoshi, show us how it’s done. Nope, his fly to deep left was caught by Blanc, and Quebell failed as usual. Watanabe went 1-2-3 on the Thunder in the bottom of the inning. 3-1 Coons. Carmona 3-5, RBI; Sambrano 2-5, RBI; McNeela 2-4; Canning 2-3, BB; Anderson (PH) 1-1; Sugano 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

After this 0-for-5, you may now hug Yoshi, if you still desire so.

Cumins won his first major league game. Congrats, Ian. Now pack your **** and go back to the swamps. Brett Gentry was flown in for the series finale to fill the roster spot – there were no healthy relievers left on the 40-man roster, which was full. Gentry had batted .308 in limited action with the Raccoons this year.

Game 4
POR: LF Carmona – 3B Canning – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C Anderson – CF White – SS Whitehouse – P Conway
OCT: CF Reese – 2B O. Torres – RF Bailey – 1B J. Roberts – LF Blanc – 3B Farias – C J. Martinez – SS Kim – P W. Yates

Carmona opened with a single, stole second, and eventually scored on Bednarski’s sac fly. Conway loaded the bases in the bottom of the first walking Bailey, allowing a double to Roberts, and walking Blanc, but Farias flew out softly to Pat White to leave all three runners on base. Yoshi had a single his second time up in the third inning, but then put the leadoff man Reese on second base for the Thunder in the bottom of the inning when he flung a slow roller in one fluid motion well over Quebell’s head. Reese scored on consecutive groundouts, and the game was tied at one.

The middle innings were marked by futility from either team (but, spoiler, it wouldn’t get much better) before in the top 7th it was none other than Bill Conway to break the 1-1 tie. Pat White had doubled and stood on third base. With a short pen, the Raccoons longed to have another inning from Conway, who promptly sent an 0-2 pitch into center for an RBI single, 2-1. Conway then came immediately too close for comfort to obliteration, and it was all his own fault. Farias singled in the bottom 7th before Conway threw a wild pitch, walked Jesus Martinez, threw ANOTHER wild pitch, and then somehow bailed out when his last man, PH Josh Thomas, flew out to Carmona to end the frame and strand runners in scoring position. Top 8th, Canning and Yoshi led off with singles against former starter Carlos Castro, now 36 and not fooling anybody anymore with a 89mph heater. They were on the corners with nobody out for Bednarski, who grounded out to Farias, with Canning remaining at third and Yoshi moving up. Quebell was walked intentionally with first base open, bringing up Anderson, who already had a double play grounder on his ledger in this game. Pruitt hit for him and at least managed a sac fly for a single insurance run.

Sugano in the bottom 8th was out for the third day in a row and didn’t have much. Reese hit an infield single, Torres walked, Bailey hacked out. Right-hander Manny Cruz hit for Roberts anyway, with Slayton replacing Sugano and whiffing Cruz. Blanc then singled to left, Reese (29 SB) scored easily, 3-2, Farias walked, but White managed to fish Martinez’ drive to center out of the skies to strand another full complement of runners. The Coons also got three on in the top 9th against recently-unrotationed Takeru Sato, who hit McNeela before Carmona and Canning singled. One out, Yoshi up, struck out, and the sucker Bednarski damn sure found a fielder to ground out to. Bottom 9th, Watanabe, also in for the third straight day and the left-handers would come up with Kim leading off the inning. Watanabe did all he could to blow the game, walked Kim on four pitches, then put on Armando Martinez with clumsy fielding that handed Martinez an infield single. Two on, no outs. Reese walked in a full count. In highest desperation the Raccoons went to Josh Gibson with the bases loaded and nobody out, with dubious results, as a grounder by Torres was turned for two by Yoshi, but the tying run scored, and after an intentional walk to Bailey Cruz grounded out, meaning extras were upon the Coons.

It was GIBSON with a single in the top 10th, the entire offensive output for the Raccoons in the inning, to get wasted, but then walked Blanc to start the bottom of the inning, and Farias reached on an infield single. Seriously, what’s with the ****ty fielding? Martinez hit a hard single to left, loading the bags with nobody out, and Kim walked off the Thunder with a roller between Nomura and Quebell. 4-3 Thunder. Carmona 2-5; Canning 3-5; Nomura 2-5; White 2-5, 2B; Conway 7.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 3 K and 1-3, RBI;

Bill Conway can’t buy a win, huh? All around ****ty game.

Raccoons (69-64) vs. Loggers (59-74) – August 30-September 1, 2013

The Raccoons had just ended a 7-game winning streak, while the Loggers had an active 3-game winning streak, and even worse a 6-game winning streak against the Raccoons, including a 4-game sweep at the beginning of the month, handling the Critters 8-3 overall on the season. All the while the Loggers were nothing special at all, eighth in runs scored, sixth in runs allowed, but with a healthy -46 run differential nevertheless. We hadn’t lost the season series to them in six years, but this might just be the year…

Projected matchups:
Hector Santos (6-10, 3.80 ERA) vs. Bruce Morrison (7-14, 4.65 ERA)
Jonathan Toner (3-2, 3.89 ERA) vs. Matt Crisler (4-5, 5.31 ERA)
Rich Hood (7-10, 4.64 ERA) vs. Gabriel Caro (11-12, 3.86 ERA)

Three right-handers in this series, which might not be a bad thing, as usual, giving that we barely top .400 against southpaws.

Ron Thrasher was back on the roster, with Brett Gentry demoted to St. Pete without getting into the Wednesday game.

Game 1
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – RF Dally – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – 2B O. Sandoval – CF MacNamara – 3B F. Cuevas – P B. Morrison
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – C Anderson – 3B Canning – SS Rodgers – P Santos

A pitching duel broke out despite a fair number of base runners for both teams, but the hitting display with runners on base were best summed up by one of the Raccoons offensive miscarriages. Sandy led off the bottom 4th with a single, then took second base. Yoshi walked, putting two on with no outs, but Quebell and Bednarski would both ground to Mike Rucker at first base, who was too slow to turn two on Quebell, but was in the groove by the time Bednarski showed up to log his personal 3-6-3 shame. A scary .210 hitter, Raúl Hernandez would break the scoreless tie in the seventh inning with a solo shot to dead center. Quebell hit a leadoff double in the bottom 7th and came around to score on deep fly outs to left by both Bednarski and Anderson to create a new tie, 1-1, that would presumably last forever. Except that it didn’t, and a solo shot by pinch-hitter Tim Pace off Ron Thrasher put the Loggers over the hump in the eighth inning.

Bottom 9th, Jose Ramos pitching with a 2-1 lead. Leadoff walk to Yoshi, another walk to Quebell, who was the winning run. GODDAMNIT BEDNARSKI I SWEAR – if you **** this up, I WILL TEAR ALL YOUR ****ING LIMBS OUT!! He struck out. Anderson struck out. Canning bounced back to Ramos, who fell over his own feet and hurt himself, but managed to get the out at first first. 2-1 Loggers. Santos 7.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 5 K;

(walks up and down the lockers in the locker room long after everybody else has long gone, wielding a meat cleaver) COME OUT BEDNARSKI!! I KNOW YOU’RE HIDING IN SOMEONE’S ****ING LOCKER!! TIME TO GET SLUGGED!! (slams meat cleaver against Quebell’s locker)

Can we trade for Ron Alston again? That was the last trade that worked out.

Game 2
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – RF Dallly – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – CF Gilmor – 2B O. Sandoval – 3B F. Cuevas – P Crisler
POR: LF Carmona – 1B Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C Anderson – CF White – 3B Canning – RF Ayers – SS Rodgers – P Toner

Sambrano avenged Carmona, who had been smacked by Crisler and was in some visible discomfort, and slugged a 2-run homer in the first inning. Yoshi walked and scored on Pat White’s double to make it 3-0 early on, and the Critters added a pair in the bottom 2nd on a swath of singles. Carmona led off the fourth with a single and stole two bases before coming home on Anderson’s single after Yoshi had walked. That was it for Crisler, who would be loaded with seven runs when the Coons kept hitting against Dave Crawford and reached an 8-0 lead after four. Anderson singled home another run in the fifth, 9-0. While Toner struggled with control quite badly once more and issued four walks in the game, he nevertheless soldiered on into the seventh despite the Loggers loading the bases in the sixth, but Fernando Cuevas grounded out to Yoshi to end that frame.

Yoshi and Carmona were removed after six innings to get them off their feet early. Toner struck out the side in the seventh, his final inning, and Sugano and Gallegos took care of the shutout from there. Quebell and Bednarski did not appear in this rout. 10-0 Raccoons. Sambrano 3-5, HR, 2B, 3 RBI; Nomura 2-2, 2 BB, RBI; Anderson 2-5, 2 RBI; Ayers 3-5, RBI; Rodgers 2-5; Toner 7.0 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 4 BB, 6 K, W (4-2) and 2-4;

With that, it became September (finally, the end of the season alighting on the horizon), and rosters expanded. The Raccoons did not add Matt Nunley or Jason Bergquist, trying to give them a chance at a rookie campaign in 2014, and for that they needed to not be called up until the latter half of September, for service time concerns.

Instead the following players were added: MR George Youngblood (…), MR Derrek Fredlund, who had not appeared in the Bigs since ’10 but had had a very fine year in St. Pete at age 27, C Pedro Torruellas, who had yet to make his major league debut despite accumulating two days of service time, 3B Jon Merritt of his second-try rehab assignment, plus Jason Seeley, slugging .500 in AAA. If Bednarski can’t be bothered to drive in runs, maybe Seeley can. Merritt had last worn the brown shirt on April 22…

Game 3
MIL: C R. Hernandez – SS Howell – RF Dally – 1B M. Rucker – CF Gilmor – 2B O. Sandoval – LF Hodgers – 3B Ito – P Caro
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – C Anderson – SS Canning – 3B Merritt – RF Seeley – P Hood

Jon Merritt returned with an inning-ending double play grounder in the bottom 2nd, and everybody was glad he had risen from the dead again… Neither team could overcome its own dead weight for a while, and Rich Hood even reached 100 K when he struck out Justin Dally in the fourth inning. 100 K while not being on the DL at all this year, mind you, and this is September.

Merritt grounded in the suspicious direction of short again when he came to the plate with the sacks full and one out in the bottom 4th. This time Rob Howell missed it, however, and the ball escaped to Victor Hodgers for an RBI single, the first run in the game, Yoshi scoring. Seeley then grounded into a force at home, nicely played by Gabriel Caro, and Hood lined out not too hard to right. Merritt had another double play opportunity in the bottom 6th, with Quebell and Canning on the corners after hitting singles, and one out. He jabbed Caro’s first pitch on a soft line into center, where it dinked in for another RBI single, 2-0. Seeley hit into the double play. Ricardo Carmona, who had been caught stealing in the fifth, then hit a solo homer in the seventh to extend the lead to 3-0, and that would almost be the last thing to happen in the game when a summer storm suddenly accumulated and discharged right over the park. Hood got one more out in the top 8th before we went into a rain delay, never to emerge again. 3-0 Raccoons. Carmona 2-4, HR, RBI; Nomura 3-4, 2B; Quebell 2-4; Canning 2-2, BB; Merritt 2-3, 2 RBI; Hood 7.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 5 K, W (8-10) and 1-3;

Maybe we should just take Jason Seeley behind the shed, though…

In other news

August 26 – WAS RF Victor Sarabia (.365, 7 HR, 64 RBI) is going to be out for three weeks with a sprained ankle.
August 27 – Five leads are blown in a see-saw battle in Milwaukee in which the Loggers ultimately top the Bayhawks, 11-10.
August 28 – Cincy’s ace Juan Garcia (17-6, 3.27 ERA) has badly torn his UCL and needs Tommy John surgery. He might miss all of next season.
August 30 – WAS SP Chris York (1-5, 5.97 ERA) keeps getting hurt. A torn flexor tendon will put him out for a full year.
August 30 – Also to the DL for the rest of the season at least: DAL SP Chris Domingue (7-8, 4.66 ERA), who has a tear in his rotator cuff.
August 31 – Season over also for BOS RF/LF Ricardo Garcia (.272, 17 HR, 78 RBI) who is felled by a torn back muscle. Garcia’s 3-year stint in Boston has been riddled with injuries and he only appeared in 261 games.
September 1 – OCT CL Robert Parsons (3-3, 2.30 ERA, 34 SV) is out for the year, needing to get a tear in his labrum fixed.

Complaints and stuff

Sergio Vega, at 33, will ACTUALLY and DEFINITELY reach salary arbitration this year – a great moment in the history of mankind without a doubt!

Also great: Rich Hood was the Player of the Week for the Continental League, going 2-0 with an ERA of nothing and 8 K*, plus (from a more personal standpoint) winning his eighth and removing their shares of the team lead from the departed Colin Baldwin and the part-time Raccoon reliever Pat Slayton. Especially Slayton is … I hate him, it’s that simple. Like Quebell. Quebell will happily hit nobody-on singles all day, but don’t bring him up with a man on first, or heck, at third and two outs. Quebell is as useless to a team as a doorknob on a pig’s back.

Temporarily ignoring the 3-6 disaster against the Aces, the Coons have handled the South this year, beating the Condors, Knights, and Thunder, and holding a 4-2 edge against the Bayhawks and Falcons. And who would have put ANY money on the Raccoons taking the season series against the Thunder? Especially after last year’s 1-8 debacle.

Jack Berry has started a rehab assignment in St. Pete. D-Alex is still one to two weeks off.

Next week, Titans, last stand with the Elks this year. I would LOVE to dump them under .500.

*Of course, OOTP gives him a shutout for the rain-shortened game which he doesn’t deserve and which I will soon forget about. It’s his first career “shutout” and “complete game”.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (71-65) vs. Titans (80-58) – September 2-4, 2013

If the Titans wanted to reel in the Crusaders, they had to up their game against the Raccoons, against whom they were only 6-6 on the season, with six yet to play. They had the best pitching for the least runs allowed, the rotation was ranked second by ERA, and they had the best bullpen, but the Titans were merely average in runs scored.

Projected matchups:
Sergio Vega (6-2, 1.48 ERA) vs. Tony Hamlyn (18-3, 1.82 ERA)
Bill Conway (5-9, 3.53 ERA) vs. Toshiro Uenohara (6-13, 4.15 ERA)
Hector Santos (6-10, 3.70 ERA) vs. Curtis Tobitt (12-5, 3.24 ERA)

Bill Conway has won three games since May 1, so perhaps the luck of the draw will help him out. I’m afraid not much will help out Sergio Vega in the opener, opposing the left-handed Pitcher-of-the-Year-to-be-formally-announced, Tony “Ratface” Hamlyn. Plus, Tobitt.

Game 1
BOS: SS M. Rivera – 3B Rentz – RF Hayashi – 1B Butler – LF Grindstaff – CF Baez – C Porter – 2B Moultrie – P Hamlyn
POR: LF Carmona – 1B Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C Anderson – RF Bednarski – SS Canning – 3B Merritt – CF White – P Vega

Vega’s scoreless innings streak ended with his own error that put Mike Rivera on base to start the game. Bob Butler scored him with a 2-out single, but the run would be unearned, so Vega was still running a streak without allowing an earned run, now at 26 innings. That streak eventually stretched to 30 before it was ended on Vega’s 99th pitch of the day – probably too much – which Randy Porter smashed for a 2-run homer with two outs in the sixth inning.

The Raccoons had been sat down in order the first time through by Hamlyn, but scratched out a run in the bottom 4th when Carmona hit a leadoff single, stole his 36th bag (he had ground to make up on Rivera!) and eventually came home on Daryl Anderson’s 2-out single, then tying the score, but after Porter’s shot, the Raccoons were on the short end of a 3-1 score. The Raccoons got only one more hit off Hamlyn, who hardly broke a sweat in eight innings, covered with 82 pitches. Tommy Wooldridge closed the game, walking Yoshi with one out before Quebell for the sake of his left-handed bat hit for Anderson and hit into a game-ending double play. 3-1 Titans.

Game 2
BOS: SS M. Rivera – CF R. Pena – C Suda – RF Hayashi – 1B Butler – 3B Rentz – LF Baez – 2B Moultrie – P Uenohara
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – SS Canning – C McNeela – RF Seeley – 3B Rodgers – P Conway

What a difference a day makes! The Raccoons were on base early, scored a run in the first when Nomura, Quebell, and Canning chained together 2-out singles, and then tacked on with Jason Seeley’s leadoff jack in the bottom 2nd, curving around the inside of the right pole. Uenohara quickly allowed three singles to load the bases for Yoshi with one out, his fly to left was caught by Marcos Baez, but was deep enough to allow Conway to dash home with the third run of the game. Quebell singled to plate Carmona from second, Sandy stole third base after that, but Canning grounded out. Still, 4-0 after two, life is good.

…until it wasn’t. Conway pitched three scoreless, but then allowed the Titans to bleed back into the game. They scored a run in the fourth, a run in the fifth, and in the sixth it started with a leadoff walk to Toki Hayashi, who was run for with Zachary Thurman, who swiftly stole second. Tommy Rentz hit an RBI triple, which put the tying run on third base, since unfortunately the Raccoons had stopped battering Uenohara after two innings. Conway then threw a wild pitch to Marcos Baez, and we were tied at four…

Bottom 6th, leadoff single by Rodgers, who was bunted to second by Conway. Bednarski hit for Carmona against left-hander Dan Parker, but got four wide ones, yet made himself useful still, drawing a throw to third base for a sure out on Sandy Sambrano’s horrible bloop into shallow left that dinked in right in front of Dylan Grindstaff. Rodgers scored the go-ahead run, but there were two out, and Grindstaff caught Yoshi’s liner to left to end the inning. The Coons got a run in the seventh, driven in by Seeley, but left the bases full in the eighth. Watanabe got a 2-run lead for the ninth, facing the nether regions of the order. He ran 3-ball counts to the first two batters, with Tommy Rentz popping out to Yoshi and Angel Solís drawing a walk, but then struck out Alexis Legendre and Grindstaff. 6-4 Raccoons. Carmona 2-3; Bednarski (PH) 1-1, BB, 2B; Sambrano 2-5, RBI; Quebell 2-4, BB, RBI; Canning 2-4, 3B, RBI; Seeley 2-4, HR, 2 RBI;

So Conway did win a game for once, but it was everything but pretty. The Titans are three back of New York, they can’t lose more to the Critters. Thankfully for them they have Curtis Tobitt in the wings.

Game 3
BOS: SS M. Rivera – CF R. Pena – C Suda – 1B Butler – LF Grindstaff – 3B Rentz – RF Thurman – 2B Moultrie – P Tobitt
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – C Anderson – 1B Quebell – SS Canning – RF Seeley – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – P Santos

Santos was routed early; Rivera opened the game with a single, and Santos balked before walking Roberto Pena, the ex-Crusader. Suda and Butler grounded consecutively to third base where Merritt made good plays, but Dylan Grindstaff bombed Santos with a massive 3-run homer. Amazingly, the Raccoons made up two runs against Curtis Tobitt before they even made an out: Carmona singled, stole second, scored on Yoshi’s single, and an Anderson single and Quebell’s RBI double kept the line moving, but with runners on second and third and nobody out the, bottom half of the order crapped out. Canning whiffed, Seeley grounded out in an unfortunate way, Pruitt walked, which was no big help, and Merritt grounded out to Rivera. So, 3-2 Titans after one. While Tobitt got better and shut the Coons down after that rampant, yet disappointing first inning, Santos really didn’t. He lingered into the sixth, but got nobody out and was knocked out after Bob Butler’s leadoff single and an RBI triple by Grindstaff, who seemed to hold a real grudge against Santos, and upped the score to 5-2, and Constantino conceded the run on Thurman’s RBI double, 6-2. The shallow end of the gene pool finished the game for the Coons, with Derrek Fredlund allowing a 2-run blast to “Quasimodo” Suda in the seventh inning, which didn’t greatly matter, since Tobitt after the 4-hit, 2-run onslaught in the first inning allowed only a single walk for the next SEVEN innings, and not a hit again until Quebell singled with one out in the ninth. Sambrano then pinch-hit and walked, which didn’t faze Tobitt or the Titans. Seeley then hit into an game-ending double play. 8-2 Titans. Quebell 2-4, 2B, RBI;

Raccoons (72-67) @ Canadiens (70-69) – September 6-8, 2013

The Canadiens had recently collapsed from contention and into fourth place, despite still ranking in the top half in the Federal League in both runs scored and runs allowed. They have still gone 21-31 after the All Star break, including 3-5 against the Critters. This was the last set with the Elks in ’13, and the Raccoons needed to win only one game to extend their 4-year streak of winning the season series – whether they won the games that mattered or not (sour look).

Projected matchups:
Jonathan Toner (4-2, 3.27 ERA) vs. Rod Taylor (10-8, 3.76 ERA)
Rich Hood (8-10, 4.42 ERA) vs. Juichi Fujita (12-14, 4.26 ERA)
Sergio Vega (6-3, 1.59 ERA) vs. Alfredo Rios (8-10, 3.73 ERA)

Well, no shortage of good pitchers this week, although neither Taylor nor Fujita had enjoyed good seasons. Taylor had basically been awful since the end of May, and Fujita had been booked for six or more earned runs in four of his last seven starts and at one point had lost ELEVEN straight decisions inside a dozen starts! Those two combined had lost five of their last six starts against Portland, with one no-decision for Taylor (in a 16-inning game the Elks won), with an ERA of around 4.43, with most damage done to Fujita.

All three are right-handers.

Game 1
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – C Anderson – SS Canning – 3B Rodgers – P Toner
VAN: 3B Suzuki – RF E. Garcia – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 2B C. Aguilar – CF Luxton – SS Lawrence – C Baca – P R. Taylor

Neither team put anybody on base the first time through, with Toner’s four strikeouts trailing Taylor’s five just barely. Neither developed a serious bid, though, as Enrique Garcia hit a single in the bottom 4th, and Quebell hit one to lead off the fifth. Daryl Anderson would reach on an error by Mitsuhide Suzuki, but the inning dissipated with a double play hit into by Canning. The Elks would then hit three singles for a run off Toner in the bottom 5th, and with the way Taylor was eradicating the Raccoons, you had to feel like this was it. Then Carmona hit a triple in the sixth, but it came with two outs and Sambrano didn’t get him in.

Taylor struck out 11 in eight shutout innings before being hit for in the bottom 8th with Chris Pali, a 26-year old that had signed out of independent ball two years ago and was a September call-up. There was Alonso Baca on first, nobody out, and Pali CRUSHED a Toner pitch for a massive 2-run homer, putting away the game (and Toner) for good. The Critters got the tying run to the plate in the top 9th against Pedro Alvarado with an infield single by PH Pat White, and a hard single by Quebell. Yet, that tying run was Bednarski, and there were two outs, and … oh well. 3-0 Canadiens. White (PH) 1-1; Quebell 2-4; Toner 7.0 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 8 K, L (4-3);

Game 2
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – 3B Merritt – SS Canning – RF Seeley – C Torruellas – P Hood
VAN: CF K. Evans – 3B Suzuki – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 2B Madison – SS Irvin – RF Luxton – C Hurtado – P Fujita

The waffling of Fujita continued, with the Raccoons shackling him for four runs in the first inning. Carmona doubled, Sambrano walked, Yoshi doubled them in, and Merritt and Seeley also came up with RBI singles. The Raccoons loaded them up in the second without scoring, and while Hood was laboring in decent fashion, putting on just enough batters to not let things get out of hand while keeping the Elks fans engaged enough to not call the Moose Police, Fujita was a house of cards waiting to collapse, and collapsing it did in the fifth. Jon Merritt hit a single, and Jason Seeley cracked a 2-run homer to run the score to 6-0. Pedro Torruellas, who made his major league debut – finally – and had struck out in his first two at-bats, singled to right center, which was the final nail for Fujita. Johnny Smith came on, allowed a single Rich Hood – his third single on the day! – and then an RBI single to Carmona to close Fujita’s ledger at seven runs. Hood would go seven innings instead, eventually surrendering a 2-run homer in line drive fashion to Ray Gilbert (whom else?). The Raccoons added a run in the top 9th on a pinch-hit RBI single by Daryl Anderson, scoring Yoshi, and Gallegos was tasked with the bottom 9th, yet hit the leadoff man Irvin and walked Robbie Luxton. Hurtado flew out before left-handed batters appeared, and we had to break out a left-handed pitcher. Sugano struck out Pali before Kurt Evans grounded out hard to first. 8-2 Furballs. Carmona 2-5, 2B, RBI; Nomura 2-4, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Merritt 2-4, BB, RBI; Seeley 2-4, HR, 3 RBI; Anderson (PH) 1-1, RBI; Hood 7.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 4 BB, 5 K, W (9-10) and 3-3;

Torruellas also threw out his first base stealer in his first chance, getting Jeremiah Irvin in the seventh inning.

And – yep – that’s the season series. More luck in ’14, Stinkers!

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Sambrano – 3B Merritt – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – C Anderson – LF Seeley – SS Canning – P Vega
VAN: SS Irvin – 3B Madison – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 2B C. Aguilar – RF K. Evans – CF Medina – C Hurtado – P A. Rios

The Coons loaded the bases in a hurry again in the rubber game. Carmona hit an infield single, Sandy walked on four straight, and Merritt hit a hard single to center that not even Carmona could score from second base on. And then the best they could get was a Bednarski sac fly. Jeremiah Irvin instantly negated the 1-run lead with a leadoff home run in the bottom 1st, and Vega, who had been so good for so long (or at least lucky) was set on fire in a blaze that kept being fed by the winds – and Vega’s own wildness. After Irvin’s shot he walked Steve Madison and Ray Gilbert, Don Cameron singled, and after César Aguilar popped out, Kurt Evans came up with a blast for a grand slam that made it 5-1 Elks. The Raccoons had Seeley thrown out at home in the second, and made only one run out of two Elks errors in the third. Vega kept walking people and was yanked in the third with two on and one out, with Thrasher and a good defensive play by Quebell keeping the runners from scoring.

Portland had two on in the fourth, but couldn’t score when Sambrano grounded out to Aguilar, and then Bednarski killed the fifth with a double play. The bottom 5th saw Fredlund and Youngblood, mainly the latter, exploded for three runs, with Youngblood conceding two triples among three hits as the Elks moved out to an 8-2 lead. The Raccoons looked beaten, but got there first three men on base in the top 8th when Merritt and Quebell singled and Bednarski held still and walked instead of pulling some ****. Granted, down 8-2 the tying run was still some way around the block, but it was a chance, and Daryl Anderson’s RBI single kept the line moving. But, Seeley struck out, the last batter Rios faced. Chris Spindler, a right-hander with deadly stuff but mortal control, appeared. Rodgers hit for Canning – and Spindler’s first pitch was wild! 8-4, and the count on Rodgers would run full eventually before the utility piece grounded to short, Irvin to first – it’s wild! It’s bounced into the seats! Incredible, two runs in, and the tying run DID come up in Pat White! He flew out to left, with Yoshi pinch-hitting for Slayton in the #1 slot earlier vacated by Carmona. Left-hander Aurelio Garcia came in for Spindler, and Nomura bounced out to first, ending the inning. Alvarado would snuff out an unlikely comeback attempt in the ninth, blitzing the Coons for two strikeouts and a sorry grounder by Quebell. 8-6 Canadiens. Carmona 3-4; Merritt 2-5; Quebell 3-5, RBI; Pruitt (PH) 1-1;

In other news

September 2 – Shoulder inflammation might keep DAL SP Jose Flores (11-7, 4.16 ERA) out for the rest of the month, but the Stars are not yet ruling him out from the postseason, should they make it.
September 3 – SFW SP Ken Harris (10-9, 3.21 ERA) 2-hits the Scorpions in a 12-0 rout.
September 3 – Despite being out-hit 14-5 by the Stars, the Gold Sox outlast them to win a 17-inning snoozer, 2-1, when two of their five hits are doubles off Fernando Hernandez jr. (4-3, 1.38 ERA) in that final inning.
September 4 – Shock in Oklahoma, where the Thunder lose RF Will Bailey (.307, 18 HR, 108 RBI) for the September stretch run with an oblique strain. He might be available for the playoffs.
September 4 – Another shutout rout, this time with LAP J.J. Wirth (13-8, 3.65 ERA) dealing only three hits to the Wolves in a 13-0 blowout.
September 4 – PIT CL Kevin Beaver (6-7, 3.65 ERA, 28 SV) is out for the year with a torn meniscus.
September 7 – The Capitals survive five walks from Dean Merritt (1-0, 5.88 ERA, 4 SV) between the 15th and 16th inning to beat the Rebels 7-5 in 17 innings on Salvador Orellana’s 2-out, 2-run single in the top 17th.
September 8 – Salem’s SP Jaden Joseph (4-2, 1.66 ERA), who missed four months with a torn triceps, sparkles with a 1-hit shutout over the Gold Sox. Denver’s lone hit is a J.R. Kinkade single in the seventh inning.

Complaints and stuff

Not much to say about this week. A bottom three offense faced a string of strong pitching. Stuff happens.

D-Alex will return to action in the middle of next week, maybe in time to get a rehab game or two in with the Alley Cats.

Our minor league teams finish in shambles once again. The AAA Alley Cats are a game under .500, the AA Panthers are 11 under .500, and the A Beagles … 49 under .500 …

A few of our top picks of this and former years, all in Aumsville:
Russ Greenwald .171/.221/.203
Dylan Thorne .228/.280/.294
Andy Bareford .169/.216/.222
Daniel Price .198/.281/.257

Thorne, a supplemental rounder from 2011, would be the worse. Complete bust, once more. More busts on the pitching side, but I feel the tears creeping up on me already. Why oh why are the Raccoons completely unable to draft ANYTHING worth bothering with?

[Westheim]

Raccoons (73-69) @ Loggers (65-78) – September 9-12, 2014

The Loggers had comprehensibly handled the Raccoons in 2014, leading the season series 9-5, and they also were awaiting us after having swept their weekend series with the Indians, regaining the coveted fifth spot in the cellar duel. A team that was less than the sum of its parts, the Loggers were still right around average in runs scored and runs allowed, but hadn’t been able to knot it all together in any meaningful way all year long – except against the Furballs.

Projected matchups:
Bill Conway (6-9, 3.61 ERA) vs. Bruce Morrison (8-14, 4.52 ERA)
Hector Santos (6-11, 3.89 ERA) vs. Matt Crisler (4-7, 5.76 ERA)
Jonathan Toner (4-3, 3.35 ERA) vs. Gabriel Caro (12-13, 4.02 ERA)
Rich Hood (9-10, 4.35 ERA) vs. Adam Euteneuer (6-11, 4.55 ERA)

Again a full set of right-hander, no southpaws available to them. They do have a bushel of them in the pen, though.

Game 1
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – C Anderson – SS Canning – 3B Rodgers – P Conway
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – RF Dally – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – CF Gilmor – 2B O. Sandoval – 3B F. Cuevas – P B. Morrison

Neither pitcher was a pleasure to watch in this game. The Loggers took a 1-0 lead in the first on some hard hit balls that fell in, but afterwards their hard hit balls wouldn’t fall in anymore. The Coons scored two in the top 2nd on groundouts, and Daryl Anderson drove in Quebell in the third with a single to up the score to 3-1. Sound, loud hits were supplemented by Morrison with a bunch of walks, two of which, along with a Walt Canning single, loaded the bases in the top of the fifth with nobody out for … Conway, who struck out quickly. Carmona found a hole to flick a single through for one run, but that was all the Coons got with poor outs being made by Sandy and Yoshi. While Morrison didn’t get out of the inning, Conway had his own struggles in the bottom of the inning, with the Loggers loading them up on a hard single by Zach Knowling, an infield single by Rob Howell, and then a 1-out walk to Mike Rucker. Raúl Hernandez brought home a run with a groundout, Nick Gilmor singled home another run, and then somehow Conway got out of the mess when Oscar Sandoval flew out to Carmona, 4-3 after five. While Anderson would find a way to hit into a double play later, Sandy and Yoshi came up with the bases loaded and initially one out in the top of the ninth, and again drove in nobody at all. The score remained 4-3 for Watanabe to work some magic. Tim Pace and Zach Knowling both ran full counts to start the inning, but both struck out looking, and Rob Howell, who had reached on infield singles twice in the game, popped out to Yoshi. 4-3 Raccoons. Quebell 2-5, 2B; Anderson 1-2, 2 BB, RBI; Canning 4-5, 2B; Ayers (PH) 1-1; Thrasher 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 5 K;

That single of Thrasher – Howell’s second infield doodle. Also, Carmona, with that RBI single in the fifth inning, has manufactured a 12-game hitting streak. Kid turned 22 on August 31 and is hitting .314 in the Bigs!

Game 2
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – C Anderson – SS Canning – 3B Rodgers – P Santos
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – CF Gilmor – 2B O. Sandoval – RF Hodgers – 3B F. Cuevas – P Crisler

Sandy tripled and scored on Yoshi’s single in the first inning, giving Santos an early lead, but Santos, whose entire season had been somewhat of a tire fire, gave it right back with a solo homer to Mike Rucker, the first-sacker’s 23rd on the season. Anderson and Rodgers got on ahead of Santos in the top 2nd, and Santos plated Anderson with the go-ahead run via a sac fly to center, and the Raccoons also brought home Rodgers, but by the end of the third inning the Loggers had tied the score again, constantly clanging away at Santos, who had absolutely nothing and would be knocked out after five-plus following a leadoff single by Gilmor and then a most depressing Sandoval double in the bottom 6th. That put runners in scoring position for the Loggers in a 3-3 tie. Sugano was sent to the rescue, struck out Victor Hodgers, was lucky with Fernando Cuevas’ hard grounder finding Quebell, but then inexplicably lost Crisler to a bases-loading walk, and then Knowling hoppled one softly up the third base line with Rodgers too fat and tardy to make any play, and Knowling had an RBI infield single.

Quebell would spare Santos the well-deserved loss with his monthly home run, a solo job off Crisler in the eighth that tied the game again at four, and Jason Seeley, replacing Bednarski in right in a double switch, spared Slayton the loss in the bottom 9th. Rucker had just hit a 2-out double into the right corner, and then Hernandez sent a drive to true right that got close to the wall, but Seeley made a leaping grab and forced extra innings. Top 10th, Seeley and Carmona reached base to start the inning before the 2-3-4 brigade collectively refused to plate anybody with a grounder, a pop, and a whiff, in order. The Loggers again had a 2-out double in the bottom 10th, Edgar Alires driving one against Josh Gibson, but couldn’t cash in once more. When Ayers hit for Gibson in the top 11th, he cracked a homer to center off Orlando Valdez, putting the Coons up by a run. The Raccoons had their own 2-out double (Rodgers) in the inning, but Seeley struck out, and Watanabe had again no cushion in the bottom of the inning, and again faced the 9-1-2 guys, and AGAIN struck out the first two and AGAIN Howell then popped out to end the game. 5-4 Raccoons. Carmona 2-5; Sambrano 2-5, 3B, RBI; Ayers (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; Slayton 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Dylan Alexander was sent on rehab just in time for the Alley Cats’ last series of the year, a 3-game set with the Warriors-affiliated Buffalo Odyssey.

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – 3B Merritt – RF White – SS Canning – C McNeela – P Toner
MIL: LF Knowling – 2B O. Sandoval – RF Dally – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – CF Gilmor – SS V. Mata – 3B F. Cuevas – P Caro

Pat White did not fill in well for Bednarski at all, hitting a home run in the fifth inning that pulled the Raccoons even at one, the Loggers’ run being scored in the second inning after a Rucker double and Gilmor’s sac fly. Toner fell apart in the bottom of the inning, with Hernandez hitting a leadoff double, Gilmor working a walk, and Vinny Mata bunting, with McNeela trying to get the lead runner with a ****ty throw that hadn’t gotten a confused centenarian. Bases loaded thus, and nobody out, but the Loggers had arrived at the bottom of the order and couldn’t buy another base hit, scoring only one run on Cuevas’ groundout. Toner disappeared after three consecutive full counts in the sixth inning, in which Rucker added a run for a 3-1 Loggers lead with another homer. Caro handled the Coons comfortably over eight innings, but when Kevin Cummings appeared in the ninth, Jon Merritt’s 1-out double at least brought up the tying run. White singled, Merritt to third, but Canning hacked out gruesomely, as did the pinch-hitter for McNeela, Keith Ayers. 3-1 Loggers. Merritt 2-4, 2 2B; White 3-4, HR, RBI; Fredlund 1.2 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K;

This ucky game not only sealed the season series being lost to the Loggers for the first time since ’06 (a.k.a. The Tenth Year of Sadness), but also ended Carmona’s hitting streak at 13 games.

Game 4
POR: LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C Anderson – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – CF White – 3B Merritt – SS Canning – P Hood
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – RF Dally – 1B M. Rucker – C R. Hernandez – CF Gilmor – 2B J. Valdez – 3B F. Cuevas – P Euteneuer

Bednarski hit an infield single in the second, got doubled off when White lined out to Jose Valdez, then misplayed Rucker’s fly leading off the bottom 2nd into a double. Always a pleasure to have him in the lineup.

The Loggers brought in Rucker, but Yoshi doubled home the tying run in the third to restore a tie. Neither pitcher was very good, and both were lucky not to get blown up early. Hood, for example, twice brought up Euteneuer with two on and two out and the opposing pitcher hit a ball to a fielder for the third out. Inept pitching AND inept situational hitting on both sides would most likely see the game decided with a homer, and Knowling hit one for the Loggers in the fifth. For the second time in the series, Quebell dug out his starting pitcher with a homer in the eighth, tying the game off Euteneuer. Bednarski walked afterwards (better than feebly poking with the sticklet), moved up on White’s groundout and scored on Jon Merritt’s single to left center. Carmona would add a pinch-hit single, before Ayers pinch-hit and stranded two runners. Bottom 8th, Sugano came on, walked Justin Dally, then fell to a pinch-hit homer by Corey Martin that flipped the score right back in favor of the home team. Top 9th, closer Jose Ramos at work, allowing a leadoff single to Sandy right away. Sandy was obviously sent, but Hernandez’ throw beat him, except that Howell couldn’t come up with it and it bounced into centerfield. Sambrano went to third with nobody out, and scored on Yoshi’s single to right.

That was all in the inning, the game went to extras, and the Raccoons couldn’t buy a hit real hard, and almost lost in the 11th when Sambrano made a clumsy error in left. Seeley ran for Yoshi after the latter drew a leadoff walk in the 12th, Anderson singled, and ****ing Adrian Quebell hit into a double play, and the Raccoons got nothing in the inning, Seeley being left on third base. The Loggers left the winning run on third in the bottom 12th, and Whitehouse hit into a double play and Pruitt starved White on third base in the top 13th. The Loggers had the winning run on third with ONE out, and Fredlund(!) struck out Mata and Silvestro Roncero. Seeley hit into a double play in the 14th. Victor Hodgers finally walked off the Loggers with a 2-out single, plating Suketsune Ito, who had tripled, in the bottom of the 14th. 5-4 Loggers. Sambrano 2-5, 2 BB; Nomura 2-5, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Merritt 2-5, BB, RBI;

Raccoons (75-71) @ Bayhawks (81-65) – September 13-15, 2014

The Bayhawks were just two games behind the Thunder and couldn’t allow to have another lapse against the Raccoons, against whom they had only won two of their six games this season. The third-best offense in the league was trying to overcome the outright worst rotation, and wouldn’t that be something, if the worst rotation would go to the playoffs?

Projected matchups:
Sergio Vega (6-4, 2.07 ERA) vs. Jared D’Attilo (11-10, 4.23 ERA)
Bill Conway (7-9, 3.66 ERA) vs. Reynaldo Rendon (14-6, 3.89 ERA)
Hector Santos (6-11, 3.98 ERA) vs. Milt Beauchamp (12-11, 4.43 ERA)

We miss their left-handed rookie Carlos Michel (1-1, 4.74 ERA), who pitched Thursday, and also their usual left-hander, former Coons farmhand G.G. Williams (4-1, 3.53 ERA), who’s been on the DL for a while. So, three more right-handers to try and beat.

Game 1
POR: LF Carmona – 2B Sambrano – C Anderson – RF Bednarski – 1B Pruitt – CF White – 3B Merritt – SS Rodgers – P Vega
SFB: LF J. Gomez – 3B J. Rodriguez – RF Alston – 1B A. Young – CF Holt – SS Ingraham – C Ishikawa – 2B Brazeal – P D’Attilo

Sergio Vega had clearly passed his expiration date which had read “Best before August 2013”, and was set on fire instantly by the Bayhawks. Jose Gomez walked on four pitches, Javy Rodriguez doubled, Ron Alston walked, and then Adam Young crushed a slam to set the Raccoons down 4-0 in a blink. That 3-4 punch of the Bayhawks? 50 homers and 213 RBI combined. Suck it up, Quebell and Bednarski.

Vega lasted only four outs, issuing walks to the pitcher and Rodriguez in the bottom 2nd before being blasted by “Monte” Alston. That put the Raccoons down by seven, and they didn’t make the faintest attempt to rally from that. Carmona hit a pair of doubles off D’Attilo, and that was largely it. The Baybirds would be hard hit by injuries however, losing Jose Gomez and D’Attilo in the sixth inning. The Coons got long relief from Gallegos, who covered 3.1 innings, and left after an infield single by reliever Manny Silva that was on Merritt’s ledger. The outrageously incompetent Youngblood entered, faced four left-handers at the top of the order, and issued two walks, a double, and a wild pitch. The Bayhawks opened the gap to 9-0 before the Raccoons had the bases loaded in the top of the seventh, with Daryl Anderson popping out to short to end the inning. Slayton joined the **** parade in the bottom 7th, walking people and allowing a 2-run double to Omarion Thompson. Against Cris Pena in the top 8th the Raccoons would have a walk, an error, and a wild pitch going their way, and still didn’t score. Pretty normal day at the office… 11-0 Bayhawks. Carmona 2-4, 2 2B; Gallegos 3.1 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 0 K;

With the AAA season over, Jack Berry and Dylan Alexander rejoined the Raccoons for the Saturday game. Berry had pitched on Wednesday, but would take over Vega’s spot in the rotation.

Game 2
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – RF White – SS Canning – 3B Merritt – P Conway
SFB: LF O. Thompson – 3B J. Rodriguez – RF Alston – 1B A. Young – CF Holt – SS Ingraham – C Lefebure – 2B Richter – P Rendon

Conway picked up the **** where Vega had left it, walked Rodriguez and Alston in the first before allowing a catapult shot to Adam Young that gave the home team a 3-0 lead, which they didn’t hesitate extending in the second inning. Zachary Richter walked, Thompson and Rodriguez hit back-to-back doubles, 5-0. The Raccoons would actually get a run this time, although they owed that to a wild pitch by Reynaldo Rendon in the fifth inning. Quebell hit into a double play in the sixth, because that was what he did best, and Conway finally allowed a sixth run in the sixth inning (while not pitching well in between getting smacked), when Zach Ingraham cracked a shot to left. The Raccoons appeared to have SOMETHING going against reliever Mike Tharp in the top 7th, with Merritt walking with two outs and Bednarski hitting a single to left, but Carmona’s hard bouncer to first was right into Adam Young’s glove and he easily ended the inning. Tharp got really close to a 3-inning save, but was removed with two outs in the ninth after walking Keith Ayers and Jon Merritt in full counts. Damon Barnett came in, a right-hander, with Matt Pruitt now hitting for Josh Gibson in the #9 hole, and actually hitting a single. That brought on closer Valentim Innocentes with the bases loaded, and he couldn’t contain Carmona, who hit an RBI single, which brought up Sandy as the tying run, but he flew out to Jasper Holt. 6-2 Bayhawks. Carmona 2-5, RBI; Merritt 1-1, 2 BB; Bednarski (PH) 1-1; Pruitt (PH) 1-1; Thrasher 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K;

This particular sad loss also meant mathematical elimination from postseason contention for the Raccoons, who had in fact been actually eliminated from contention on May 19.

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – SS Canning – 3B Merritt – RF Seeley – P Santos
SFB: LF O. Thompson – 3B J. Rodriguez – RF Alston – 1B A. Young – CF Holt – SS Ingraham – C Ishikawa – 2B Richter – P Beauchamp

For once, the Raccoons got started early. Carmona singled, Sandy doubled to right past Alston, and both came in on Yoshi’s single and D-Alex’ groundout. With a runner on second and one out, Quebell obviously couldn’t find a double play, but he struck out anyway. It didn’t take long for the hopeless Santos to be dismembered, however, as Thompson doubled in the bottom 1st and Adam Young soon enough hit another rocket to Mars, tying the game at two. Doubles were flying everywhere off the Bayhawks’ bats, and they had an extra-base hit in each of the first four innings, but couldn’t grab a lead. Ingraham opened the bottom 4th with a double, moved up on Sadaharu Ishikawa’s groundout, and when Zach Richter flew out to left, Ingraham tagged and went, but was thrown out by Sambrano at home plate.

So the Raccoons took another swing. Sandy opened the sixth with a single and stole second base. While Yoshi fouled out, D-Alex hit a ball into the gap that went past Alston and allowed Sandy to jog home in no particular hurry. The Bayhawks wasted an intentional walk on Quebell before Beauchamp struck out Canning and got an inning-ending grounder from Jon Merritt, but it was 3-2 Raccoons now. But for how long? Well, the bottom 6th was opened by Alston with a double… Santos claimed to still have something, but maybe that related to still having a right arm dangling from his useless body in general. Adam Young took a 2-1 pitch and CRUSHED it to deep right, a no-doubter, and a score-flipper, too. It was Young’s fourth homer in the series, and his sixth (among 27 total) this season against the Critters, while only playing in eight games. Santos walked Holt and was purged, and Fredlund was kind enough to walk a few more (including Beauchamp…!) and by the time Sugano restored order, the Bayhawks were up 5-3.

Top 7th, Whitehouse hit a 1-out single, followed by a double by Carmona and Sandy walking onto the open base. Holt made a nice play on Yoshi’s drive to center, holding him to a sac fly, but D-Alex singled to right, plating the speedy Carmona easily to tie the score. The Birds made an odd choice now and sent right-hander (and nothing special) Cris Pena to face Quebell, and even QUEBELL couldn’t turn down a fat 3-1 invitation and blew a double into the left center gap, plating two runs to take the lead. Top 8th, Whitehouse drew a 2-out walk, stole second base, and was singled home by Carmona, 8-5, who then stole second base himself, but got cocky and thrown out trying to nip third base as well.

The Bayhawks had yet to write off this game, though. Jasper Holt opened the bottom 8th with a blast against Constantino, 8-6, who continued to be no help in particular. Ishikawa doubled and scored on Richter’s single, 8-7, and when Thrasher came on, he walked Andrew Simmons before finally coming through against Micah Brazeal and Javy Rodriguez and whiffing both to end the inning. The Raccoons stranded runners on the corners in the ninth against Barnett, leaving Watanabe to his own devices in the bottom 9th which was to be opened by Alston. Both Alston and Young made tame outs before Holt jolted a single to left. Ingraham flew to right, White tracking it, and catching. 8-7 Blighters. Carmona 3-5, 2B, RBI; Sambrano 2-4, BB, 2B; Nomura 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI; D. Alexander 2-5, 2B, 3 RBI; Quebell 2-4, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Whitehouse 1-1, BB; Sugano 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K, W (5-1);

Eight of the Baybirds’ 12 hits went for extra bases. For the Raccoons it was 5-for-13.

In other news

September 9 – In the year of dropping pitchers, WAS CL Marcos Bruno (3-6, 4.87 ERA, 18 SV) will be no exception, ending on the DL with a torn flexor tendon in his elbow. He is questionable for Opening Day in 2014.
September 10 – NAS SP Alfredo Collazo (13-10, 3.24 ERA) concedes only two hits to the Miners in a 6-0 shutout. Pittsburgh’s Dave McCormick (.305, 14 HR, 58 RBI) has both hits for his team.
September 11 – LVA SP William Hinkley (12-15, 4.92 ERA) 3-hits the Falcons in a 3-0 shutout.
September 11 – The Scorpions and Wolves engage in a 20-inning orgy of futility, with no runs scored at all for 17 innings, before BOTH teams score a run in the 18th. A Gerardo Callahan double and Dan McWhirr single walk off the Stingers in the bottom of the 20th against Rick Gillespie.
September 13 – Odd late trade in the ABL, as the Crusaders send 2B/SS Julio Hernandez (.280, 0 HR, 24 RBI) and a meager prospect to the Capitals to acquire 3B Miguel Salinas (.288, 7 HR, 55 RBI).
September 13 – The Miners out-hit the Wolves 16-3, but it takes them ten innings to beat them 3-2 … on César Fuentes’ wild pitch.

Complaints and stuff

I herewith announce the first major league hit of Jimmy Oatmeal, at age 25, a pinch-hit single off Las Vegas’ Mike Daniels in the eighth inning of the Condors’ 7-6 loss. Daniels, a good rookie reliever, will probably start cutting himself over this. Oatmeal is now about 2,499 hits short of me regretting the Ron Alston trade.

Falcons, Indians, Crusaders, Titans left. Then finally the end of the horrible, horrible, horrible season.

I hope we sweep the Indians and help the Loggers to stay out of the cellar. They shouldn’t be last every year…

[Westheim]

I must admit, this terribly sad season has left me a bit dry right now, almost drenched. Not in the mood at all right now, but things have to be done by somebody, huh? Time for this season to end and an opportunity for restructuring.

Raccoons (76-73) vs. Falcons (72-76) – September 16-18, 2013

The Raccoons had gone 4-2 over the Falcons so far this season. The Falcons were in the bottom 3 in runs scored (I wonder who else is in there……) in the Continental League. They were average in preventing runs, with a mediocre rotation (and some injuries to that), but had a top 3 bullpen.

Projected matchups:
Jonathan Toner (4-4, 3.47 ERA) vs. Roberto Ramirez (8-14, 5.23 ERA)
Rich Hood (9-10, 4.30 ERA) vs. Pablo Sanchez (9-8, 3.76 ERA)
Jack Berry (6-6, 4.90 ERA) vs. John Key (5-0, 3.39 ERA)

Once again we get a set of right-hander, missing Charlotte’s southpaw Adrian Valencia. Berry’s season ERA may be almost five, but his ERA with Portland is 5.60 actually.

Game 1
CHA: 1B Ibarra – SS R. Miller – 2B C. Martinez – LF J. Alexander – 3B Ladd – RF Puckett – CF DeBoer – C T. Avila – P R. Ramirez
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – SS Rodgers – 3B Merritt – P Toner

The Raccoons took the early lead on Sandy’s first-inning triple, with Yoshi scoring him on a sac fly. Three hits, a walk, and two wild pitches by Ramirez plated … one run for the Raccoons in the bottom 3rd, somehow, with Rodgers grounding into an inning-ending double play to strand a full set of runners, and while Toner drew a 1-out walk and Carmona singled in the bottom 4th, a K by Sandy and an F7 by Yoshi let two more hang out to dry. Through four innings, only Ryan Miller managed to land a hit for the Falcons, in both plate appearances, but Tony Avila singled and Rich Ibarra got plunked in the fifth inning to create a tight spot with Miller (who has been on a mission ever since the Alston trade in 2008 that sent him to Indianapolis) coming up, but now he grounded out limply and Rodgers made an easy play to end the frame, still 2-0 Coons. Not for much longer, however. John Alexander hit a 1-out single in the sixth, and Wes Ladd quickly added a double to put the tying runs in scoring position. Toner was no help to himself, and both runs scored on a single and a sac fly before Ramirez was allowed to bat with the go-ahead run on third base begging to be driven in, and struck out.

Bottom 6th. Toner was not hit for with nobody on and one out, and snatched another walk from Ramirez. Carmona swiftly doubled into the corner in rightfield, but while Toner was no slouch, we didn’t dare sending him against Chris Puckett’s strong arm. The Falcons came apart right here, as Sandy hit Ramirez’ first offering to him hard up the middle for a 2-run single, 4-2, stole second, Yoshi was walked intentionally before Ramirez also faced D-Alex, who hit a double in the track of Carmona’s. 5-2, and with no chance for a double play Quebell crashed a 3-run homer to blow open the score. Bednarski also homered off Bruno Mack, running the score to 9-2. Toner didn’t get through the seventh after Miller and Carlos Martinez started the inning with hits, but Sugano got a key out to bail him out and close his line with runners in scoring position. Youngblood surrendered a run in the ninth, but who cares about Youngblood and a Tony Avila homer more or less on his ledger? 9-3 Raccoons. Carmona 2-4, 2B; Sambrano 2-5, 3B, 2 RBI; D. Alexander 4-5, 2B, RBI; Quebell 2-4, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Bednarski 4-5, HR, RBI; Seeley (PH) 1-1; Toner 6.2 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 7 K, W (5-4) and 0-1, 2 BB;

I can’t remember whether we EVER had a pitcher draw two walks in a game.

Game 2
CHA: CF Goldstein – 1B Myers – RF Nieves – 2B C. Martinez – SS R. Miller – LF Winstead – 3B Ibarra – C Hopkins – P P. Sanchez
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – SS Canning – C McNeela – 3B Merritt – P Hood

Hood didn’t give up a hit until the fourth inning, when Ralph Myers (a former Raccoons September toy) singled into centerfield, but nothing came of that, and the Raccoons held on to an early 1-0 lead that Sanchez had more or less donated to them on two leadoff walks in the second inning. Tyler Winstead hit a single in the fifth before Ibarra grounded out, after which the Raccoons walked Geoff Hopkins, a September toy of the Falcons with 8 AB, intentionally to bring up Sanchez, who struck out to end the frame. The pitchers faced another again in the bottom of the inning, roles reversed, with Hood clobbering a Sanchez pitch for his second home run of the season, opening the lead slightly to 2-0.

Bottom 7th. Canning hit a leadoff single, but got forced by Tom McNeela, who had over 60 AB now and no RBI. Merritt singled, two on, one out, and Hood was asked to swing away against Sanchez, hoping for more good stuff to happen. Indeed, more happened, as Hood reached on an error by Myers and the bases were loaded, but the Coons got only one more run on Carmona’s groundout. Hood got stuck in the top 8th, drilling Myers with two outs before allowing a single to Domingo Nieves. Watanabe came out for a 4-out save with the tying run at the plate, struck out Carlos Martinez to quell the imminent threat, and ended the game with a 1-2-3 ninth. 3-0 Raccoons. Canning 2-3, RBI; Hood 7.2 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 7 K, W (10-10) and 1-3, HR, RBI; Watanabe 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, SV (29);

I know that RBI aren’t everything, and the team doesn’t score much as a whole, but if you don’t have an RBI after 60 AB, that’s not a good advertisement on your resume. There will be a backup spot available on the 2014 Raccoons, but McNeela isn’t going to be it. (Not even getting into how both him and D-Alex are left-handed hitters right now)

This might also have been Hoshi Watanabe’s last save for the Raccoons. He felt sore that night, and even worse the next morning and had to be evaluated in one of these death ray tubes.

Game 3
CHA: SS Ibarra – CF DeBoer – 2B C. Martinez – 3B Ladd – 1B Goldstein – LF Nieves – RF Winstead – C T. Avila – P Key
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – RF Bednarski – LF Pruitt – SS Canning – 3B Merritt – P Berry

The Coons made hard contact early on against John Key, who was undefeated but quickly got waffled for four runs on Dylan Alexander’s second-inning home run, and then with two outs in the third a 3-piece by Quebell, his second in the series. D-Alex hit a really hard single and Bednarski missed a homer by not much at all, being caught by Domingo Nieves right against the wall in left. The Falcons had a triple by Jimmy DeBoer to mount a minor threat in the top of the fifth, but he was stranded when Pruitt caught a hissing liner by Maxime Da Silva, an injury replacement for Martinez. Bottom 5th, D-Alex was smacked by Key. Bednarski didn’t like that and doubled, before Pruitt got four wide ones (!!??) to load the bases with one out for Canning, but he struck out and Merritt flew out to right center to miss the chance for the death blow. In fact, Berry was out of the game before Key despite holding on to the 4-0 lead, but four walks and some more 3-ball counts had shot up his pitch count and he was removed in the seventh with a man on first and left-handers coming up. Thrasher took care of that, handing the lead to Slayton with one out in the eighth. Slayton quickly handed a double to Wes Ladd and a single to Domingo Nieves before Yoshi made a one-handed flick-but-don’t-dare-to-look-where-it’s-actually-going on Tyler Winstead’s grounder, which was corralled by Quebell to end the inning. Sergio Vega pitched a scoreless, yet not pretty, ninth inning to seal the sweep. 4-0 Furballs. D. Alexander 2-3, HR, RBI; Bednarski 2-3, 2B; Berry 6.1 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 4 BB, 2 K, W (7-6);

Hoshi Watanabe was diagnosed on Thursday. Torn flexor tendon. Where did I hear that about another pitcher in the latter half of his 30s this year? Hummmmm…

I hate losing, but I think we can forget about a protected pick in the 2014 draft. Then again, we might not have money for a big name signing in the first place, and maybe we want to lie low for a year. Much depends on how certain people handle their player options… When play concluded this Wednesday, the Raccoons had the ninth-best record in the league, and were six-and-a-half games ahead of 13th place – the Falcons.

But then again, here come the bloody Indians…

Raccoons (79-73) vs. Indians (70-82) – September 20-22, 2013

The same bloody Indians that were 9-6 against Portland this season while not playing very sound baseball at all (similar to the Loggers, I guess, whom they had leap-frogged for fifth place earlier this week again). The Indians were in the bottom three in offense as well, but had allowed the fourth-fewest runs – and it STILL hadn’t helped them one bit. By contrast with the Falcons, the Indians’ pen was quite a bit worse than the rotation. Their starters were third by ERA, but the pen was ninth. The Indians had a few injuries, with C Jose Paraz (.296, 9 HR, 58 RBI) just recently going down with a strained hamstring.

Projected matchups:
Bill Conway (7-10, 3.83 ERA) vs. Alejandro Mendez (0-2, 3.98 ERA)
Hector Santos (6-11, 4.11 ERA) vs. Tristan Broun (13-11, 2.92 ERA)
Jonathan Toner (5-4, 3.39 ERA) vs. Aaron Walsh (13-12, 4.00 ERA)

“Ant” Mendez is a 22-year old rookie right-hander, while Broun is a southpaw. We miss their other southpaw, Sam McMullen, once more. Mendez got his nickname from his long, thin limbs, although to be fair, “Praying Mantis” might be a better nickname.

The Raccoons called up Matt Nunley (.190 so far) with only ten days left, which would not get him over 45 days of service time anymore, and the Coons will close by committee for the final ten games of the season (during which I guess they won’t need much of a closer anyway, looking at NY + Boston in the last week of the season), with Gibson and Sugano perhaps the first guys to go to, but you can just as well make a case for Thrasher, who if he doesn’t walk people senselessly is quite the beast with 13.6 K/9.

Game 1
IND: CF J. Wilson – C Padilla – RF J. Ortíz – 2B Kym – 1B S. Guerra – LF J. Gonzalez – SS Bowers – 3B G. Rice – P A. Mendez
POR: CF Carmona – 1B Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C D. Alexander – RF Bednarski – SS Canning – 3B Nunley – LF Seeley – P Conway

There was scarcely any offense in the early innings. Once the Indians had a runner on second with two out and Jong-beom Kym drove a ball to deep left, but Seeley got there quite comfortably. Seeley was also the first guy to drive home a run, which took all the way to the bottom of the fifth, and was only the Coons’ second knock on the day. Matt Nunley had drawn a 2-out walk and just so scored on Seeley’s double into the rightfield corner. Conway hit a bloop single, but the Raccoons didn’t add on when Carmona grounded out to Gary Rice. Bottom 6th, Sandy singled, Yoshi singled, D-Alex singled and Sandy scored, 2-0. “Ant” drilled Bednarski, for a brief moment twitched and seemed to attempt to bite a befuddled Bednarski’s head off, then went back to work on Canning, who struck out in a big spot once more, but Nunley didn’t. Taking a 2-1 pitch into the gap, the drive split Jose Gonzalez and John Wilson and went all the way to the wall and emptied the bases for a 5-0 lead! That was it for the mantis. Tim Crouch struck out Seeley and Conway to end the inning, but the Critters would pour on three more runs against the porous pen in the next two innings, with Sandy contributing a 2-out, 2-run double in the eighth. Conway started the top of the ninth in a mild rout on 106 pitches, retired the Indians in order and struck out Santiago Guerra to end it. 8-0 Coons. Carmona 3-5, 2B; Sambrano 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Bednarski 1-2, BB, RBI; Nunley 1-3, BB, 2B, 3 RBI; Conway 9.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 7 K, W (8-10) and 2-4;

This was the second career complete game and shutout for Conway. The other was a 3-hitter against the Bayhawks in 2011. And the Raccoons have not conceded a run in 27 innings.

Game 2
IND: CF J. Wilson – C Padilla – RF J. Ortíz – 2B Kym – 1B S. Guerra – SS Mathews – LF J. Gonzalez – 3B G. Rice – P Broun
POR: LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C Anderson – 1B Quebell – CF White – 3B Merritt – SS Canning – P Santos

The usually challenged Raccoons threw up three runs against Broun in the first inning. Sambrano singled, Yoshi walked, Bednarski tripled them in and scored on Anderson’s groundout. John Wilson ended the Coons’ scoreless innings streak at 29 with a 2-out homer in the third inning that got the Indians back to 3-1 against a so far hardly touched Santos (if you were willing to ignore his double play bunt in the bottom 2nd). Joey Mathews’ error on Sandy’s grounder to short gave the Raccoons a free runner to start their half of the third, Yoshi doubled him in, and soon enough came around as well to make it 5-1. Broun’s misery would end with a bases-loaded walk to Yoshi Nomura in the bottom of the fourth (another inning in which Santos couldn’t get a bunt down and got Jon Merritt killed off at third base). Josh Hatfield made his first appearance of 2013 to run up the score with a 2-run single hit by Bednarski on the first pitch and then an RBI double by Quebell, 9-1 after four. Quebell would homer off Hatfield in the sixth, Guerra would homer off Santos in the seventh, his last inning. The Indians appeared to have a minor rally going in the top of the eighth when Gallegos faced two batters, retired none, but Sugano ended the inning quickly with a grounder and a strike-em-out-throw-em-out. No, the rout got worse for the Indians, who even conceded a 2-run double to Pat Whitehouse – with most regulars removed – in the bottom of the eighth. 12-2 Coons! Nomura 2-3, 2 BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Bednarski 2-4, 3B, 4 RBI; Nunley (PH) 1-1; Quebell 3-5, HR, 2B, 3 RBI; Merritt 2-3, BB; Whitehouse 1-1, 2B, 2 RBI; Santos 7.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 6 K, W (7-11) and 1-3;

… and only with this rout did the Raccoons manage to turn a positive run differential, 629-621, despite having been seven games over .500 already.

Game 3
IND: CF J. Wilson – C Padilla – RF J. Ortíz – 2B Kym – 1B S. Guerra – SS Mathews – LF J. Gonzalez – 3B G. Rice – P Walsh
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – SS Canning – 3B Nunley – P Toner

Walsh didn’t even finish one inning before leaving with an injury and 21-year old Joel Davis was left to make his major league debut in adverse circumstances. Toner struggled with control early on, conceding a single to Kym and then walked Mathews in the second inning, but a great catch by Nunley held his chances together and he got out of the inning. The Critters would score first – as usual by now – when Davis walked Alexander to start the bottom of the fourth, and the rest of the team managed to shove him around enough for Canning to plate him with a sac fly. The Arrowheads would also get a leadoff walk, drawn by Mathews, in the top 5th, but he was stranded at third base when both Gary Rice and Clint Phillip struck out, but the Raccoons couldn’t get moving against the opposing long relievers this time, and Toner came apart in the sixth. John Wilson and Dave Padilla both hit singles to get started and then Jong-beom Kym clobbered his 12th homer of the year to put the Indians 3-1 ahead.

Toner went seven and his spot was up at the beginning of the Coons’ half of the same inning. The Indians felt the urge to use Cal Holbrook, a broken image of a pitcher, with a 3-1 lead. Jason Seeley promptly opened the inning with a pinch-hit single, and the tying run came up against a righty reliever who was never great, and merely decent many years ago. Carmona also singled, but after grounders by Sambrano and Nomura the Coons managed only one run and remained 3-2 behind. The bottom 8th saw both teams mindlessly empty their bench (Coons) and pen (Arrowlobbers), but despite the Coons always moving first they managed to load the bases on a couple of scattered singles and a walk, bringing up Carmona against lefty Pat Kling (who had just conceded the bases-loading single to Tom McNeela) with one out. The count ran full and Kling lost Carmona on a pitch two feet outside that Padilla had to throw himself into, but it was still a bases-loaded walk and the game was tied. Sandy then walked as well to shove home Keith Ayers with the go-ahead run, and Yoshi dished a single to center for two runs before D-Alex lined out to Mathews. Quebell turned up, Kling was still in for matchup reasons, and Quebell clobbered his third 3-run homer of the week! The Indians would get a run back against Fredlund in the ninth, but that was not nearly enough to overturn the 7-run onslaught against the collapsing pen in the eighth. 9-4 Furballs! Nomura 2-4, BB, 3 RBI; Quebell 2-5, HR, 3 RBI; Canning 1-2, RBI; Ayers (PH) 0-0, BB; Seeley (PH) 1-1; McNeela (PH) 1-1;

In other news

September 17 – The Loggers and Aces play two games’ worth before Silvestro Roncero (.231, 0 HR, 5 RBI) walks off the Loggers in the 18th with a 2-out RBI triple, 3-2.
September 18 – The Cyclones overcome the Wolves, 5-4, to clinch the FL East. This will be their ninth playoff participation and the first since their 5-year run from 2006-2010.
September 20 – Bayhawks and Falcons go 16 innings in Charlotte before doubles by Michael Lefebure (.280, 3 HR, 21 RBI) and Zachary Richter (.249, 6 HR, 50 RBI) procure a 5-4 win for the Bayhawks.
September 21 – 37-year old OCT LF/RF Mohammed Blanc (.312, 6 HR, 52 RBI) has broken his elbow and is done for this year. Blanc is also a free agent and the broken elbow might seriously hamper his chances to catch on with another team, never mind that he might not even be ready for Opening Day in 2014.
September 22 – LVA SP John Hinkley (13-15, 4.53 ERA) 3-hits the Thunder in a 6-0 shutout.
September 22 – Even better: LAP SP Ernest Green (16-11, 2.95 ERA) spills only two hits in a 4-0 shutout of the Scorpions.

Complaints and stuff

Seven wins in a row, seven winning seasons in a row – achieved simultaneously on Sunday. That’s a lot of S’es, like in Spectacular Sandy Sambrano.

Yes, I’m drunk, just a little bit.

Quebell has always homered in bunches, but this was an extreme week. He hit four dingers and drove in 12. Before that, you had to go back all the way to August 24 to count his last 12 RBI. He added 30 points of OPS, and when you do that in late September it’s been quite the week (and you haven’t been THAT good for five months plus). He was named Player of the Week in any case, despite batting “only” .409.

Yoshi Nomura’s strong August and September have led to his asking price rising to 10-yr, $32M. The Raccoons COULD afford that … if they hadn’t blown that money on Daniel Dickerson, whom you might vaguely remember as a pitcher in general and from eight innings in April in a brown shirt. You don’t remember that? I assure you it has happened.

$3.2M for eight innings, I could just barf a river… Or drink more. Drinking more is always advisable.

Jason Bergquist will not be called up (and he could not have been on the roster for more than nine days with rookie considerations and such*). He’s hit .200, and I want to see a bit more of Yoshi before he will probably join the Crusaders and kill us for the next ten years.

Santos and Conway are still not agreeing on who gets the team strikeout crown, but in any case it’s a change atop the leaderboard. The last pitcher not named Nick Brown to top the leaderboard for the team? Well, technically Kel Yates in 2008, when they tied with 228 K, but the last time Nick Brown didn’t even hold a share of the title was literally the last year he was not on the Opening Day roster. 2001! Then, Ralph Ford whiffed 167, ahead of Carl Bean with 153.

Bean was also the last Coon hurler to hit multiple home runs in a season, two bombs in 2002. Rich Hood has now joined that party. It’s a small party, really, four people. Aside from Hood and Bean the only other pitchers to hit two home runs for the Raccoons in one season (and nobody has ever hit more than that) are Carlos Gonzalez (1986) and Bob Joly (2000).

Joly does pop up in all the oddest places, huh?

Crusaders and Titans left. We play New York first at their place, then come home to host Boston. If we get dominated by the Crusaders, they will celebrate on our dead bodies and I’d hate that. Split four and they clinch the division because the Titans fail to win enough – okay. Get blown out 35-9 over four games and they win the division. Bah!

*Assuming a day of safety for a tie breaker extension to the season, which I guess adds a day of service time if your year isn’t already “full”.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (82-73) @ Crusaders (94-61) – September 23-26, 2013

Can the Raccoons be a stepping stone to the Crusaders on the way to their fifth playoff appearances in the last seven years? Not much is hinting at it… In any case, we have gone 4-10 (after 15-3 last year) against the second best team in both runs scored and runs allowed. Their rotation and their bullpen are equally awesome. They are last in stolen bases, but they don’t give a ****, because they lead in batting average AND home runs AND defense.

Projected matchups:
Rich Hood (10-10, 4.12 ERA) vs. Paul Miller (13-11, 3.86 ERA)
Jack Berry (7-6, 4.58 ERA) vs. Pancho Trevino (24-3, 2.64 ERA)
Bill Conway (8-10, 3.65 ERA) vs. Kelvin Yates (2-4, 4.82 ERA)
Hector Santos (7-11, 4.06 ERA) vs. A.J. Bartels (11-12, 4.91 ERA)

Paul Miller’s parents must have thought “Let’s give him a real boring name, so that he appears as interesting as kale when pitching between “Midnight” Martin and Pancho Trevino” … But, eh, he doesn’t care. He’s wearing a ring already and he might wear two five weeks from here. All their starters are right-handers.

Game 1
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – SS Canning – 3B Nunley – P Hood
NYC: CF Brissett – 2B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – C G. Ortíz – SS G. Turner – 3B Salinas – P P. Miller

Rich Hood didn’t explode on contact, but neither did the offense. After scoring 56 runs in their last seven games, they had a few singles early, with Yoshi Nomura for once playing the role of offense’s death with an inning-ending double play in the first and grounding out to Miguel Salinas to strand Sambrano on third base in the third inning. Hood dipped his ERA below four for one batter by reaching the sixth inning in a scoreless game, but then Martin Ortíz, who had singled, stole second and scored on B.J. Manfull’s single to center. That was Manfull’s 119th RBI and he led the Martin Brothers just by a few; both of them had just under 110. That was literally the only offense in the game. Hood went six before being pinch-hit for with the faintest of chances, Matt Nunley on first and two outs, but Pruitt struck out just standing there, and Miller went into the ninth before Robbie Wills got the last two outs when his pitch count approached 120. 1-0 Crusaders. D. Alexander 2-4; Hood 6.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, L (10-11);

The Raccoons are going to jockey for position for next year’s draft. As of Monday night, they continued to have the #16 pick, could still happen into the #21 pick (boo!), but would not do better than the #14 pick in any case.

The only guy still fighting for something tangible was Ricardo Carmona. His 41 steals trailed Mike Rivera of the Titans by one,

Game 2
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – C Anderson – SS Canning – 3B Merritt – RF Seeley – P Berry
NYC: CF Brissett – 2B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – 3B Sharp – C Case – SS Salinas – P Trevino

Carmona was thrown out trying to nip second base in the first inning, so that was not going well. He didn’t get a chance the next time, leading off the third inning with a triple and then scoring on Sandy Sambrano’s single, which made it 2-0 for the Coons, who had already plated a run the previous inning when Canning came home from first base on Jason Seeley’s double past Stanton Martin. That early lead didn’t make it, however, mostly because Jack Berry was horrible and threw balls and balls to everybody. The Crusaders scored two runs in the bottom 3rd, with one coming home when Berry balked with runners on the corners. Somebody yelled – audible even on the TV feed – “Berry! Your pitching makes your mother cry!” during that inning; it might have been me.

Amari Brissett homered in the fifth to give the Crusaders a 3-2 edge. Berry barely made it out of the inning, ending his penultimate start of the season on over 100 pitches through five. He wouldn’t pick up the loss, however, as Daryl Anderson came to haunt his former teammates with a bloop single with two outs in the eighth that scored Sambrano with the tying run. Bottom 8th, Daniel Sharp (batting .249) was denied a chance to haunt HIS former team, as the Crusaders pinch-hit for him with lefty Jesus Flores against Slayton. Ron Thrasher replaced Slayton with two on and two out (including an intentional walk to B.J. Manfull), walked Flores, then barely played a soft grounder from Aaron Case for the third out. The Crusaders still won, clobbering Josh Gibson in the ninth. Bob Morris had a pinch-hit single, Gibson walked PH Tommie Petersen, and then Francisco Caraballo unloaded a tremendous shot to deep left that wasn’t coming back. 6-3 Crusaders. Carmona 2-4, 3B; Sambrano 1-2, 2 BB, RBI;

Sergio Vega pitched one inning in this game, crossing the 90 innings mark for this season. Heading into 2013, he sat in St. Petersburg, not being called up once the previous year, and had 115 major league innings to his credit.

Out of context admission: Whenever that Stanton guy is up and around, I want to type Giancarlo Stanton. I can’t help it. He’s been in the league for years and years and I can’t wrap my head around - … I suck.

Well, a Crusaders win or a Titans loss on Wednesday will seal the division. In the South, the Thunder are one ahead of the Baybirds, while the Warriors hold the same advantage over the Pacifics. All other teams are eliminated and the Cyclones clinched their division last week.

Game 3
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C D. Alexander – RF Bednarski – SS Canning – 1B Merritt – 3B Nunley – P Conway
NYC: CF Brissett – 2B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – 3B Sharp – C Case – SS Salinas – P K. Yates

Kel didn’t get out of the gates at all. Despite retiring two of the first three Coons in the first inning, he eventually spilled three hits and two walks to incur a 3-0 deficit after the top of the first was over. Fortunately for him, Bill Conway was cut from the same piece of wood and was ravaged for two runs on three hits and a walk in the bottom 1st, including a big 2-run double by B.J. Manfull before Sharp and Case struck out all too eagerly with two runners still looking on in scoring position. Sharpie would tie the game his next time up, however, plating Caraballo with a single before Conway walked the sacks full and was then lucky to have a centerfielder with some range when Carmona caught Salinas’ drive to deep center on the warning track out there. That ended the third, three aside.

Carmona singled and stole #42 to establish a tie with Mike Rivera (who would have Thursday off) in the fourth inning, but was stranded. The Coons would get a new lead in the sixth, but then it was unearned, Jon Merritt scoring on an error by Salinas on what should have been the third out of the inning. At that point, the Titans were losing in Milwaukee (in the fourth inning, since they started an hour later), so perhaps none of this mattered, but Conway got stuck in the bottom 7th after a leadoff single by Brissett and a groundout by Caraballo. With the tying run on second, Sugano was bothered to face the middle of the order. He struck out Martin Ortíz. Stanton Martin got four wide ones (he’s the right-hander in that death row middle of the order), but Manfull singled, loading the bases for Sharpie, who got to face Gibson, who in turn got to face Flores, who hit an 0-2 pitch to right past Nomura and two runs scored.

The Coons had an answer, though, in the top 8th, in which they faced four relievers in a constant parade of counter-hitters and counter-pitchers. The end result was Quebell on third, Ayers on second, Carmona on first, two outs, and Sandy Sambrano chopping a 3-2 marble off Rodrigo Moreno into shallow center. Quebell scored, Ayers was sent around against Amari Brissett, Ayers coming home, the throw, Ortíz, the tag, Keith Ayers was – SAFE!! SAFE!! KEITH AYERS SAFE AT HOME!! UN-BE-LIE-VA-BLE!!!!!

When everybody had found their voice again, Yoshi singled home Carmona to make it 7-5 before D-Alex whiffed himself out. Vega pitched a scoreless bottom 8th, Pruitt hit for him with two on and two out in the ninth and failed once more (not much more often, though), and Thrasher was assigned the ninth with the 2-3-4 guys up and started with an uneasy walk to Caraballo. And one to Ortíz. Stanton Martin popped out to Quebell, Jose Correa fouled out, and then it was right-handed PH Ken Wood to try and save the Crusaders, but he grounded out to Ken Rodgers at short. 7-5 Raccoons. Carmona 2-5; Canning 2-4, BB, RBI; Merritt 2-3, 2B, 2 RBI; Ayers (PH) 1-2;

Four years later, something of a comeback and a kind “**** you” to the dear Crusaders.

In the end, none of this mattered. The Titans lost, 7-3, and the Crusaders clinched the North for the seventh time. But they did NOT do it over our dead bodies! We WON this ****ing game, and Keith Ayers scored the winning run, HAH!!!

What a sad, disturbing kind of revenge.

Game 4
POR: LF Carmona – 2B Sambrano – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – RF Bednarski – SS Canning – CF White – 3B Merritt – P Santos
NYC: CF Brissett – 2B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – C Case – SS Correa – 3B Salinas – P Bartels

Bill Conway had claimed the team ERA title by not getting gangbanged in that third contest, and had moved into the lead in strikeouts, besting Santos by three. 3 K sounds doable for Santos, right? Well, his average from the last six games is actually not even 4 K…

By the fourth inning, both teams had scored on a homer apiece. Stanton Martin had hit #34, a solo bomb to center, while Bednarski had cheated one just inside the right foul pole, his meager 13th, but it counted for two and the Coons were up 2-1 with Santos only getting one K early on. Hector did manage to victimize Salinas and Bartels in the bottom 5th, however, tying Conway, and took the crown when he struck out Caraballo in the sixth. By then the Coons’ lead was 3-1, achieved partly on messy defense when Bartels tried to pick Quebell off first with two outs, threw it away, Quebell went to second and scored on D-Alex doubling on the next pitch. There wouldn’t be a win for Santos, however, who allowed a leadoff single to Stanton Martin in the seventh, then served a real moonshot to Manfull that tied the game at three. Pruitt doubled in Santos’ spot in the top 8th, but was left on base. The Coons would lose this one. Youngblood allowed a leadoff double to Aaron Case in the bottom 9th, and was replaced by Fredlund. While Fredlund would get a force out of Case at third base in the inning, he also issued enough walks to walk off the Crusaders, the last one drawn by Masaaki Arakaki. 4-3 Crusaders. D. Alexander 2-4, 2B, RBI; Pruitt (PH) 1-1, 2B;

The Coons still have the #15 pick, might drop behind the Miners to get the #14 pick, but could also still end up with the #18 pick.

Raccoons (83-76) @ Titans (92-67) – September 27-29, 2013

The best pitching in the league didn’t help the Titans, who scored only on an average pace in the Continental League. The Titans have not made it back to the playoffs since dominating the league from 1997 through 2005, when they eight out of nine North titles and four rings. The Raccoons were 7-8 against them in 2013, and had not lost the season series since ’06.

Projected matchups:
Jonathan Toner (5-4, 3.44 ERA) vs. Curtis Tobitt (14-5, 3.11 ERA)
Rich Hood (10-11, 4.03 ERA) vs. Ian Rutter (11-12, 4.13 ERA)
Jack Berry (7-6, 4.62 ERA) vs. Tony Hamlyn (21-5, 1.98 ERA)

Hamlyn would be a lefty to end the season, but they had Thursday off and might skip Rutter, which would move up Hamlyn and give us Chester Graham (6-6, 4.65 ERA), another lefty, on Sunday.

Game 1
BOS: SS M. Rivera – CF R. Pena – C Suda – LF J. Gusmán – 3B Butler – 1B Hayashi – RF Grindstaff – 2B A. Gomez – P Tobitt
POR: CF Carmona – LF Sambrano – 2B Nomura – C D. Alexander – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – SS Whitehouse – 3B Nunley – P Toner

Six innings in, Toner whiffed eight and allowed only three hits, but unfortunately two of those had been solo home runs for Bob Butler in the second and Aurelio Gomez in the fifth inning. The Raccoons had been completely absent so far, but in that bottom 6th loaded the bases with nobody out when Tobitt spilled a few walks and a single to them. Quebell came up with the bases loaded, having already hit into two double plays on the day, setting a new season high for himself with 21 two-jobs. Here he simply popped out before Whitehouse singled home Yoshi, but Nunley and PH Pat White struck out to waste a perfectly good scoring opportunity. The Titans grabbed the run right back off Constantino, and the Raccoons lost Yoshi Nomura in the bottom of the inning when he came up lame after a double to left – in all likelihood his final breath as a Raccoon. Gallegos got clobbered for two runs in the top of the ninth, while the Raccoons had nothing in them. 5-1 Titans. Carmona 2-5; Nomura 1-2, 2 BB, 2B; D. Alexander 2-4; Whitehouse 3-4, RBI; Toner 6.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 8 K, L (5-5);

Carmona was caught stealing by “Quasimodo” Suda and now trails Mike Rivera by one taken bag.

Yoshi was diagnosed with knee tendinitis and is indeed done as a Critter. Sad days, sad days.

Game 2
BOS: SS Grindstaff – 1B Legendre – 2B Butler – LF Hayashi – C Suda – 3B A. Gomez – RF Thurman – CF R. Pena – P Rutter
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Sambrano – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – RF Bednarski – LF Pruitt – SS Canning – 3B Merritt – P Hood

While Hood had a chance to get that old ERA under four with a good outing, Rivera was sitting and Carmona wanted that bags title. Hitting a single and then swiping second base on a bad throw by Suda was a good start, pulling him even with Rivera right in the bottom of the first inning. Sandy struck out, bringing up Quebell with no chance to hit into a – and Carmona goes to third on an 0-1 in the dirt, and Suda can’t get him! Ricardo Carmona – 44 steals! And then Quebell walked and D-Alex hit into that double play. (sigh)

D-Alex would hit a 2-run homer his next time up (#20), but by then everybody and their mother had shackled Hood, who had seven hits beaten out of him between the second and fourth innings, with a Toki Hayashi homer in the second and two more runs in the third going on the board for the Titans, who nursed a 3-2 lead through four, and Hood barely finished the fifth, but conceded two runs (unearned after a Merritt throwing error) in the inning and now was rolled up in a 5-2 hole. While Carmona kicked some more but and took his third bag of the day in a double steal with Pedro Torruellas in the bottom 5th, the Raccoons left them in scoring position. Carmona continued to dig for a comeback, though. He hit a single in the bottom 7th off Dusty Balzer, loading the bases with the tying runs, then took out Dylan Grindstaff when Sandy sent a lame grounder to Bob Butler. The double play broken up, the Coons got a run, 5-3, but Quebell struck out in his universal uselessness. The Coons went down without a squeal in the last two innings. 6-3 Titans. Carmona 3-5; Quebell 2-3, BB, 2B; Seeley (PH) 1-2; Torruellas (PH) 1-1; McNeela (PH) 1-1; Whitehouse 1-1; Vega 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

I love Ricardo Carmona! Not the Neil Reece type centerfielder I was looking for originally, but the kid can wreak real havoc! I love … we need a real stupid nickname for him. Quick!

With one game left, the Pacifics and Warriors were even in the FL West, and both were playing a 74-87 team, while in the CL South, the Thunder were one game up on the Baybirds, and were playing another, so the Thunder had to avoid losing twice now.

We had nothing else to play for, so the season finale was specifically structured around winning Carmona the stolen base title. He would bat leadoff, and we’d send the most murderous arm we had in our catching conundrum, which was Anderson, which *happened* to mix well with Tony Hamlyn pitching when it comes to batting handedness, but this was really about how hard our backstop can drill any base stealer in the noggin’ at second.

Game 3
BOS: SS M. Rivera – CF R. Pena – C Suda – 3B Butler – 1B Hayashi – RF Grindstaff – LF Baez – 2B Moultrie – P Hamlyn
POR: LF Carmona – 2B Sambrano – C Anderson – 1B Quebell – RF Ayers – CF White – SS Canning – 3B Merritt – P Berry

Rivera grounded out to Walt Canning in the first inning, so that was already a plus. Bob Butler then dug his guy a hole right in the first inning, too, making an errant throw to first with Anderson and Quebell in scoring position that allowed Ayers to be safe at first, a run to score, and then Pat White singled home Quebell for an early 2-0 edge. Carmona helped himself in the fourth, hustling to catch a Rivera liner to left center, and it also helped Berry to remain perfect. That didn’t last much longer, though, as Suda hit a single after 11 straight outs had been logged, but Suda remained on and the Coons remained 2-0 ahead … buuuut … well, it was still Berry, and Berry had blown ever since he had arrived. Hayashi led off the fifth with a triple, Grindstaff singled, Berry balked, and the whole thing went down for two runs and a tied game. Berry would up with a no-decision. He left two runners to Josh Gibson in the seventh, who was only able to log the third out thanks to a running play by Ayers in right, who retired Alexis Legendre.

Carmona wasn’t able to solve Hamlyn until the seventh, hitting a looper to left that dinked in for a single, and once again loaded the bases with one out for Sambrano. Hamlyn was staying in there, having already handed singles to Merritt and Bednarski, but conceded the go-ahead run on a sac fly to Roberto Pena. Carmona retired Rivera, who dropped to 0-4, once more in the eighth on a soft line to left, in the middle of K’s that Thrasher hung on Hamlyn and Pena. Bottom 8th, Quebell and Ayers went down quickly against Hamlyn before Torruellas came out once more and snuck a single past Rivera into left. Canning ran a full count before crashing a 2-run shot to right, which soiled Hamlyn’s sub-2 ERA. Slayton got the save opportunity, made a mess, and Sugano came out with two on and one out in the 5-2 game. Randy Porter, a right-hander, hit for Grindstaff, drilled the first pitch to deep left, but there was Carmona’s glove again! Tim Austin pinch-hit, ANOTHER deep drive to left, Carmona zoomed out again, and made the catch at the track, and that was it. 5-2 Carmonas Famosas. Anderson 2-4; Torruellas (PH) 1-1; Bednarski (PH) 1-1; Berry 6.2 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 1 K;

In other news

September 23 – DAL CL Salvadaro Soure (5-2, 1.41 ERA, 41 SV) secures his 300th career save by shutting the door on the Pacifics in a 6-3 Stars win. Originally signed by the Raccoons, Soure spent most of his career in the Bayhawks organization before signing a big 3-year deal with the Stars before the 2012 season.
September 29 – The Thunder blow a 5-0 lead against the Bayhawks but come back with two runs in the eighth inning to win the game, 7-5, making their 13th postseason, and their fourth straight.
September 29 – While the Pacifics get routed by the Wolves, 11-2, the Warriors come back from a 4-0 deficit to beat the Scorpions, 6-4, and clinch the FL West. Their seventh playoff appearance ends an 11-year drought.
September 30 – One more: PIT SP Micah McIntyre (13-11, 3.56 ERA) will have Tommy John surgery and miss the 2014 season.

Complaints and stuff

Jaylen Martin late on Wednesday, after the result from Milwaukee was in, said that none of this mattered and he wouldn’t be happy until he lifted that World Series trophy. I do believe him, totally. The poor pup pitched for the Condors all those years, and outside of “Best of the Mexican teams in the ABL” they didn’t win anything, ever.

For the first time in team history, the Raccoons have dropped ten games against a division opponent when compared to the previous season, going from 15-3 to 5-13 against the Crusaders. The previous record was eight, achieved only once, against the Indians from 1989 (14-4) to 1990 (6-12).

Also, we got only 22 left-handed starters this year. While that is about the very low end of the spectrum in the ABL, left-handers *are* scarce. It’s been a trend that has developed for a few years, and this year maybe shouldn’t count because there were SO MANY INJURIES everywhere, but the most left-handers anybody faced were a few teams in the Federal League who faced southpaws 40-ish times.

The Coons close their 37th regular season at 3,039-2,956 (.507), ninth-best of all teams, and trailing the Thunder (.535), Stars (.525), Capitals (.521), Titans (.520), Warriors (.520), Blue Sox (.517), Cyclones (.514), and the Bloody Elks (.511).

[Questdog]

You want stupid? How 'bout 'CarCar"? I think that's about as stupid as I can get.....

[Westheim]

2013 PLAYOFFS

The 101-61 Cyclones entered the 2013 playoffs as the top-seeded team, their first appearance since 2010, which was the last of a 5-year run of winning the FL East, which they then crowned with a World Series ring won over the Raccoons. This team was built around defense, big lumber (first in homers, 11th in stolen bases), and stud pitching. In addition to ranking second in runs scored, they had also allowed the least runs. There was only a slight problem: both their best starters were out of commission, Nathan O’Herlihy (9-2, 2.69 ERA) to fix a torn labrum, and Juan Garcia (17-6, 3.27 ERA) had undergone Tommy John surgery in August and was probably out for all of 2014. Sophomore Brian Doumas (10-6, 2.20 ERA) and surprise pickup Shunyo Yano (16-6, 3.50 ERA) were expected to lead the pitching staff. They had an amazing (and healthy) bullpen, and they also had a lineup anchored by amazing raw slugger R.J. DeWeese (.260, 40 HR, 117 RBI). Pat Morrison’s eight homers were the least in their starting lineup, just as well as his 62 RBI. Both their pitching and hitting were well balanced in terms of handedness.

They faced the 87-75 Warriors, who made the playoffs on the final day of the regular season, ending a decade-long drought. They were the only team with less stolen bases than the Cyclones, but were suffocating opposing teams with the most walks drawn and highest OBP in the Federal League. They didn’t have a particularly high average and weren’t hitting for power, either, and their bottom of the order was decidedly pale compared to the Cyclones’. They were hoping on Jose “Dingus” Morales (.332, 24 HR, 115 RBI) to stay hot and carry them. One big bat, C Jose Paraz (.296, 9 HR, 58 RBI) had suffered through an injury-riddled season and was out for the playoffs, as was SS Joe Hart and SP Jimmy Boswell, but Boswell would at best have been the Warriors’ #4 guy behind three virtually identical efforts by Jorge Gine, Billy Bengston, and Fernando Cruz, who all more or less went 15-11 with a 3.50 ERA. Their pen was clearly inferior to the Cyclones and barely cut the Federal League average.

In the Continental League, it was the Crusaders once more with a 99-63 season, and for once they were healthy except for SS Jorge Ortega (.311, 0 HR, 30 RBI), and they had covered for that. The Crusaders had led the CL in batting average, homers, starters’ ERA, and defense, pairing a murderous middle of the order with Martin Ortíz (.292, 19 HR, 107 RBI), Stanton Martin (.316, 34 HR, 109 RBI), and B.J. Manfull (.306, 29 HR, 125 RBI) – and the supporting cast was no piece of cake, either – with strong starting pitching, even if all it was right-handed. Pancho Trevino (24-3, 2.65 ERA) still claimed a chance in the Pitcher of the Year voting, and the midseason adquisition of Jaylen “Midnight” Martin (16-9, 2.83 ERA) had been a great move. They also had a good bullpen, although closer Robbie Wills had run an ERA of almost four.

The Thunder made their record 13th playoff appearance, once against outlasting the South, even if just barely at 89-73, beating the Bayhawks by two games. They had scored the most runs and had the highest OBP in the Continental League, but their pitching had been average at best, and that was a generous call. Outside of Bob King (20-10, 3.35 ERA) they had no really efficient starter, and their bullpen was an assortment of 4 ERA guys with CL Robert Parsons (3-3, 2.30 ERA, 34 SV) out on the DL, as was outfielder Mohammed Blanc (.312, 6 HR, 52 RBI). The top of their lineup was mostly left-handed and dangerous, countering the Crusaders’ right-handed rotation well, but the bottom of the Thunder’s order was not very inspiring. Nobody on the team had topped 20 home runs, and only Will Bailey (19) and Tom Reese (15) had reached double digits.

Every series between the Crusaders and Thunder this year had resulted in a sweep, with the Crusaders coming out on top 6-3, and sweeping them in a 3-game set in September. The Cyclones had beaten the Warriors 5-4 during the season, with no series sweeps.

How the Warriors wanted to overcome the Cyclones, and how the Thunder expected to get past the Crusaders remained to be seen. But everything else than a quick Cyclones-Crusaders World Series pairing would be a surprise.

+++

2013 ABL CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES

Warriors @ Cyclones … 0-7 … (Cyclones lead 1-0) … CIN Jesus Amador 2-3, 2 BB, 2B, RBI; CIN Brian Doumas 9.0 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 6 K, W and 2-3;

Warriors @ Cyclones … 9-12 … (Cyclones lead 2-0) … SFW Jose Morales 3-4, BB, 2B, RBI; CIN Jesus Amador 3-4, BB; CIN R.J. DeWeese 2-4, BB, HR, 3 RBI; CIN Pat Morrison 2-5, 3B, 2B, 3 RBI; Warriors attempted to rally with five unearned runs in the eighth inning, but fell short after getting clobbered for a dozen early
Thunder @ Crusaders … 2-3 … (Crusaders lead 1-0) … OCT Emilio Farias 3-5, 2B, RBI; NYC Amari Brissett 3-4, 2 RBI;

Thunder @ Crusaders … 1-4 … (Crusaders lead 2-0) … NYC Paul Miller 8.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, W;

The Crusaders lost their second baseman, Francisco Caraballo, in this second game when Bob King broke Caraballo’s thumb with a pitch.

Cyclones @ Warriors … 5-6 … (Cyclones lead 2-1) … CIN R.J. DeWeese 2-4, HR, 3 RBI; SFW D.J. Fullerton 3-5, 2 HR, 2B, 4 RBI; SFW Jamie Wilson 3-4, 2B, RBI; the Warriors blow a 3-2 lead in the eighth, but the Cyclones blow a 5-3 lead in the ninth, with Fullerton hitting a walkoff homer against Ian Johnson

Cyclones @ Warriors … 10-3 … (Cyclones lead 3-1) … CIN R.J. DeWeese 2-5, 2 HR, 2 RBI; CIN Pat Morrison 4-4, BB, 2B; CIN Jose Silva 4-5, 2B, 2 RBI; SFW Jamie Wilson 3-4, 2B, RBI;
Crusaders @ Thunder … 1-3 … (Crusaders lead 2-1) … OCT Ramón Jimenez 8.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 7 K, W;

Cyclones @ Warriors … 2-1 … (Cyclones win 4-1) … SFW Jamie Wilson 3-4; SFW Bill Thomas 3-4;
Crusaders @ Thunder … 5-2 … (Crusaders lead 3-1) … NYC Jesus Flores (PH) 1-1, 2B, 2 RBI;

Crusaders @ Thunder … 5-8 … (Crusaders lead 3-2) … NYC Daniel Sharp 3-5, 3B, 2B, 3 RBI; OCT Jesus Martinez 3-4, 2B, RBI;

Thunder @ Crusaders … 9-6 … (series tied 3-3) … OCT Myeong-keun Kim 1-2, 3 BB, 2 RBI; NYC B.J. Manfull 3-4, 2B; NYC Gerald Turner 2-4, 2 2B, 2 RBI;

After getting Jaylen Martin and Paul Miller blown up in consecutive games, the Crusaders anxiously turn to 24-game winner Pancho Trevino … who lost game three.

Thunder @ Crusaders … 3-5 … (Crusaders win 4-3) … NYC Martin Ortíz 2-5, HR, 2 RBI; Ortíz also scores the winning run in the bottom 7th, singled home by B.J. Manfull after Stanton Martin got an intentional walk from Vinny Diaz

+++

2013 WORLD SERIES

A rematch of the 2009 World Series, which the Crusaders won as the final piece in their 2007-09 trifecta, this is the second “double” World Series pairing in the 21st century after the 2007 and 2008 Stars vs. Crusaders editions. The 2009 Crusaders are also the most recent Continental League team to win the championship. The 2010 Raccoons, 2011 Crusaders, and 2012 Thunder all lost.

The Crusaders arrive in the World Series diminished after losing 2B Caraballo, whose replacement Gerald Turner had a good game in the CLCS, but hit only .160 in the regular season. They are not disadvantaged by their all right-handed rotation, since the Cyclones had lost Gerardo Rios (.268, 11 HR, 62 RBI) in the FLCS with a sprained ankle, taking one left-handed bat out of the lineup. His replacement was 37-year-old bouncer Chris Parker, and they had only one dangerous left-handed batter remaining in slugger R.J. DeWeese, who hit four dingers in the FLCS. The Cyclones had plenty of left-handed pitching to answer to the Crusaders’ left-handed numerous threats.

This is a very close call, but the fact that they are missing their best starters should bite the Cyclones hard and they will come up short in no more than six games.

Crusaders @ Cyclones … 2-1 … (Crusaders lead 1-0) … NYC Stanton Martin 3-4, HR, RBI; NYC Jaylen Martin 8.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 4 BB, 4 K, W; CIN Brian Doumas 7.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, L;

Crusaders @ Cyclones … 1-9 … (series tied 1-1) … CIN R.J. DeWeese 2-4, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; CIN Pat Morrison 2-3, 2B, 2 RBI; CIN Jose Silva 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI; CIN Shunyo Yano 9.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 9 K, W;

Cyclones @ Crusaders … 4-5 … (Crusaders lead 2-1) … NYC Stanton Martin 2-3, BB, HR, 2B, RBI;

Cyclones @ Crusaders … 4-11 … (Crusaders lead 3-1) … CIN R.J. DeWeese 1-3, BB, HR, 3 RBI; NYC Amari Brissett 2-3, 2 BB, 3B; B.J. Manfull 2-4, BB, HR, 4 RBI; NYC Aaron Case 2-5, 3 RBI;

Cyclones @ Crusaders … 3-0 … (Crusaders lead 3-2) … CIN Brian Doumas 8.0 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 7 K, W; NYC Gerald Turner 2-2, BB, 2B;

Crusaders @ Cyclones … 3-4 (11) … (series tied 3-3) … CIN Robbie Harris 3-5, HR, RBI; CIN Gabriel Munoz (PH) 1-1, RBI;

Munoz saves the Cyclones who are down to their last out in the bottom of the ninth, plating Robbie Harris with a single off Robbie Wills. Harris had singled with one out, moved up on Chris Parker’s (so, Gerardo Rios’ replacement) 2-out double and his run led to extra innings. Stanton Martin doubles home Jesus Flores in the top 11th against Ron Sakellaris, but the Cyclones get Jose Silva to hit a 1-out triple against Micah Steele in the bottom of the inning. Steele walks Parker, then plates Silva with a wild pitch. In a complete meltdown [and that’s nothing I haven’t seen from him] he goes on to walk Tomas Cardenas, Jesus Amador, AND Jayden Jolley to walk off the Cyclones and force game seven. All walks occur in full counts.

The Crusaders look to Pancho Trevino, 24-game winner, again. He WON game three.

Crusaders @ Cyclones … 1-0 … (Crusaders win 4-3) … NYC Bob Morris (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; CIN R.J. DeWeese 2-3; NYC Pancho Trevino 8.0 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 5 BB, 7 K, W; CIN Luis Guerrero 9.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 5 BB, 3 K, L;

And so, a 35-year old journeyman AAA player with 327 major league AB, the majority of which came in the last two years, and only five career homers, wins game 7 of the World Series. A nuts game this is.

2013 WORLD CHAMPIONS
New York Crusaders
(5th title)

[Westheim]

(crashing sound)

...

Started the offseason, look for compensation picks.
Angel Casas - no compensation
Yoshi Nomura - no compensation
anybody else - no compensation
Matt Pruitt - type B

That already makes no sense.

Then, other guys. Rob Howell is a type B free agent despite batting .268 and for a 91 OPS+. Jerry Dobson batted .178 for a 56 OPS+ and is a type B free agent.

Yoshi - no compensation. 16 WAR the last three years and no compensation. He had the seventh-highest batting average in '13. He's listed as the fourth-best free-agent-to-be on BNN. No compensation.

Ron Carter has a career ERA over five and is compensation-eligible, but neither Angel, nor Hoshi Watanabe are?

Okay, Angel was injured. But so was Tyler Sullivan, who threw one third of an inning. And he is compensation eligible. Kevin Wanless is a nobody, threw 30 innings and is compensation eligible. Angel Casas - no!

Yoshi was listed as type A until the end of the season. What's that supposed to mean? Fine, OOTP, I get it. You hate my guts. Fine, I give up. Shall it screw someone else...

[Westheim]

After a few days of foaming and despairing, things will continue here in due time.

For a few in-game years now, OOTP is progressively getting worse at handling the huge save file, with stuff continuing to break down at some point, like now free agent compensation on a player base. Thanks to a complete backup I made before progressing to the offseason I still have the free agent list how it appeared the day after the World Series ended, and it looks nothing like the thing afterwards. Dennis Berman is another type A free agent that is left with no compensation, f.e., just like the Titans' top 2 starters, Tony Hamlyn and Curtis Tobitt, go from 2x type A to 1x type B and 1x squid.

Looking at the Raccoons' compensation last year (type B for Spears, but nothing f.e. for Castro) makes me think it could have been going on for up to two years already. '11 looks fine for the Coons, when Ron Alston was a type A, just as he should have been.

Actual compensation has been broken for a few years already, with the wrong picks being compensated and crap like that.

And just like that, another layer of external accounting has been added to the Raccoons to manually fix free agent compensation as soon as the option is available during the offseason. Yay. I’m an accountant by day, I’m not digging being one by night…

The offseason-opening post should appear here either today or tomorrow. Until then, another big thanks to Questdog, who showed me that I was (again) doing it wrong the whole time and has kept the Raccoons in one piece about 629 times now.

[Westheim]

To start the offseason, there were no real surprises. Nick Brown picked up his option. Jon Merritt picked up his option. Since neither managed to get more than a quarter of a normal year’s production in due to injuries, neither could have hoped for a significant contract. Well, Merritt would have had no chance at all. Brownie maybe. He’ll be 36 next year. Merritt will be 38.

Also, while Portland and Oregon in general were on the upswing and the economy was great, and everybody was eating healthy things and painted their faces and rode their bike naked in the city, the Mexican Prick took the first hint of a bump in the road to cut the budget. The Coons’ 2013 budget had been $27.8M, the biggest ever, but one million was sliced off for 2014, with the budget reduced to $26.8M. While that left the Critters 10th in the league in terms of budget size, the gap towards the top teams in the division exploded.

The Crusaders became the first team with a budget to top $40M, getting a raise to $41M, almost $5M more than last year. The top 5 remained the same, albeit shuffled a bit. The Thunder and Cyclones both had $35.5M available, the Titans $34.5M, and the Pacifics $34M. The Elks dropped from $31M (6th) to $29.8M (t-7th). The Indians with $20.4M and the Loggers with $16.8M remained paupers in the bottom 5th, joined by the Condors ($19.4M), Falcons ($18M), and Wolves ($17.8M).

The median budget was $23.7M (+$0.7M), the average budget was $26M (+$0.6M).

In short words, the deck just got stacked even more in the Crusaders’ favor. And the Raccoons were in a terrible spot, bound to lose a few of their best players (Angel, Yoshi), most beloved players (Angel, Yoshi), plus a few others that had bitched and moaned all year (Rodgers, Anderson), or had soldiered on through great adversity (Pruitt, Hoshi). At first glance we had about $2M of free money, and that was already not enough to pay Yoshi Nomura. Sob.

That was after also shedding our hitting coach. Glenn Williams, 61, chose retirement, which was probably for the better, since he wouldn’t have gotten a new contract anyway. The Raccoons were hot on the heels of some Chinese guy with a name that sounded like a dying chicken who had engineered the Pacifics’ powerhouse offense that had hacked FL pitching to pieces the last few years. He wasn’t going to come cheap.

… and of course all that money will lead us swiftly to the salary arbitration proceedings. The Raccoons will have 11 arbitration cases coming up as well as six impending free agents. Please refer to the table at the bottom of the post. I don’t even KNOW why I’m always typing all that stuff like an idiot.

Most of the free agents are quickly dealt with. Pruitt, Anderson, Rodgers, and Watanabe are not required for 2014. Rodgers was hired as a backup and moaned all the time about being a backup, despite getting over 300 AB due to the plague coming over the roster. Hoshi did decently, but he’s 39, and how long is it gonna take?

Angel and Yoshi break my heart. It would be great to keep them both around, but it’s not gonna happen. Well, Yoshi wants $3.2M a year, which can’t happen at all, but we’ll at least get compensation. Note how I manually fudged the table. In my youth I majored in Arts, and you sure can tell! Angel Casas is a terribly sad case. Actually, nobody has consulted him yet on his opinion on a new deal.

Among the arbitration cases are a few that will get dumped (which will also free up a good bit of salary). Mauro Castro was the first to get stricken. Pitching one third of an inning between being claimed off waivers and blowing out his elbow, Castro – still an arbitration case at 33 – had not exactly endeared himself to the fanbase, and had tried hard to break Raúl Castillo’s record for brittleness. We will have a good competition for the rotation anyway by May, when we expect Dickerson back, because Brownie, Santos, Hood, Toner, and Conway will probably make up the Opening Day Five, but there’s also Jack Berry still around, who’s promised $880k in 2014, so there’s gonna be a squeeze play on anyway. No need to spend an estimated $630k on Castro, who is probably not even available for Opening Day as well.

Almost the entire bullpen was up for arbitration, including first-time eligible Sergio Vega – also at 33 – and while I can’t stand Pat Slayton’s sagging shoulders seen whenever some semi-slugger swatted a subpar serving skywards, he might still hold some meager value as a trade chip. He is out of options, however. Also eligible for the first time was Dylan Alexander, and the $780k estimate was a bit of a pain to see. We’d try a medium-term deal, perhaps. Yes, he was up for arbitration for the first time, but he’s also already 28, and he might be inclined to sign a deal somewhere along the lines of what Yoshi inked before the 2010 season, submitting to the coonskin cap for another four years for what turned out to be an immorally cheap $2.4M *total*.

Pat White had no options, but rebuilt his value from zero to a potential fifth outfielder, especially with his ability to play a decent defensive centerfield. But we did not need more of Keith Ayers. Age 32, five years a Coon, and never managed more than 262 AB, because he never performed well (but we also got him for next to nothing in a deal with a Thunder team that lost 89 games that year and has taken off ever since dumping him). He was, in my head five years ago, potentially something like a reborn Bobby Quinn, who also only managed to grapple a qualifying number of at-bats in one season (1991, when Daniel Hall missed virtually all of the year with a really bad concussion), but he was always a threat to do damage, and while his career ended early (he retired at 33), he was always a piece that would contribute when needed, with only one OPS mark under .700 (1992), and several in the mid-to-high .700s. Keith Ayers was at best simply meh, and at worst out at home.

+++

Very odd note: 30-year old ex-Critter SP Cássio Boda went 17-5 with a 2.67 ERA for the Capitals’ AAA team to win Pitcher of the Year honors in the AAA league before being promoted to the Bigs in August and then blowing out his shoulder.

[Westheim]

There was one pickle the Raccoons had to sort out as the offseason truly began. They had still four players on the 60-day DL (Brownie, Dickerson, Angel, Castro), and they all needed to be crammed onto the 40-man roster now … somehow.

Well, not all of them needed to. There was no need for Castro to get onto the 40-man, since he was not going to be tendered anyway. He was instead waived and designated for assignment. One spot was open on the 40-man, which went to Brownie, but we still had to shove in Casas and Dickerson. One might be tempted to say that Angel Casas very much didn’t need a spot on the 40-man roster, but I had rung up his agent (he hadn’t been in Portland for a few months, instead rehabbing in St. Petersburg) and between us three there were a lot of people who shared the same view over a few things, and let’s just say that Angel Casas did need a spot on the 40-man roster. So did Dickerson.

One spot was cleared by exposing outfielder Jimmy Fucito to waivers. He had struggled for three months in AAA, then had been demoted to Ham Lake as a 25-year old and had batted .216 there for the rest of the season. Maybe this was all for the better, Jimmy, and now you can see that you should have taken that community college course on basic accounting, just like your dear mother had begged you to do.

For the last spot I tried to spare someone the indignity of getting released in October (not even the fate I had in mind for Keith Ayers), instead exposing them to waivers, but for that to work in late October they also needed options, because they weren’t going to make it to mid-November in ten days. In the end it was Hoshi Watanabe who was waived and DFA’ed, because he technically had options, and if he would invoke his 10/5 rights (which would make no sense for a pitcher that was not expected to make it to Opening Day) we could still release him.

While I did account for player’s stupidity, I didn’t account for other GM’s. Two days after putting Watanabe on waivers, both the Falcons and Indians, seemingly both in dire need of a broken almost-40-year-old, put in claims for Hoshi. The Indians were eventually awarded the rights to him on October 25, which technically still left enough time to extend a pitcher who might miss a good chunk of 2014 and was ALMOST FORTY YEARS OLD.

Meanwhile I spent the last week of October merrily negotiating 1-year deals with most of the arbitration-eligible players that we longed to retain, with a few exceptions. One of those was Dylan Alexander, who had just batted .301 with 20 homers, one of only two Raccoons to hit .300+ with at least 20 dingers in the last ten years (Ron Alston, 2009; before that, Al Martin, 2003).

I mentioned before that D-Alex was already 28 years old and arbitration eligible for the first time now. Since he wouldn’t reach free agency until his 30s, he badly longed for a long-term deal, very long-term in fact. His offer was for an 8-year deal worth $14.3M, and he was that desperate that he actually granted the last two years to be team options. The contract would increase steeply during his arbitration years from $660k in 2014 to $1.54M in 2016 before reaching and remaining at $2.2M annually from 2017 to 2021.

You gotta leave it to him, he knows what’s best for him, but the Raccoons just couldn’t commit to that. For his career, his catching has been decent, but not overwhelming. His batting is the main problem, however. While he undeniably has power, I fear that that .301 average was a massive upwards fluke, and he will never be able to reproduce that (also, he was almost 100 PA short ‘qualifying’). Calderón agrees with me, and expects him to hit more in the .240 region and slugging .400, not .533. This was a very dangerous playground. He was more similar to Craig Bowen than you might think at first glance, and we had just sunk north of $6M for overall barely above replacement level batting from him since reacquiring him from the Blue Sox in that cavalcade of catastrophical contracts before the 2010 season. Thankfully the Stars were now responsible for the last two years of his deal after taking him in the Graham Wasserman trade.

No, I did feel weak in the stomach at the thought of spending $14.3M ($10.5M guaranteed) on Alexander. He would have to cheapen up significantly to get a long-term deal.

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October 25 – The Indians claim 39-year old MR Hoshi Watanabe (44-31, 3.81 ERA, 41 SV) off waivers by the Raccoons.
October 26 – The Raccoons announce a 1-yr, $1M contract extension with CL Angel Casas (17-19, 1.65 ERA, 368 SV).

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Rebuilding value is the key word for Angel Casas. He spun only five innings in 2013, and he will have to come back from major elbow surgery. He’s also on the wrong side of 30, so that’s a lot of factors hinting at his inability to haul in a huge long-term deal at this point. By agreeing to a 1-year deal at a 30% pay cut with the Raccoons, he takes the secure road and can re-enter the market 12 months from now, hopefully with another sub-2 ERA campaign and the most saves in the CL (well, that might be hard for other reasons) under his belt. The Raccoons also win in three ways with this deal, signing a proven closer at a favorable rate, retaining a fan favorite (Coon City was ecstatic when the message board things lit up with the news on those internets), and getting the chance on receiving free agent compensation for him next season.

By the end of the month, most of the remaining pitchers on the arbitraton list (at least those that had received offers so far) had signed new contracts for 2014. Sergio Vega and Josh Gibson both signed for $250k. Tom Constantino signed for $255k. Hector Santos signed for $468k. Ron Thrasher was an outlier, since he agreed to a 4-year deal at a modest rate for somebody striking out 13 per nine innings (never mind the flaws), agreeing to $1.6M, slightly increasing over the length of the contract.

Also, D-Alex. Negotiations were hard and were close to being broken off by one party or the other at times, but in the end we agreed on a 5-year extension, the final year a team option. The contract starts at $800k and will rise to $1.8M in the last year. $5.55M are guaranteed, if the option is picked up it will be worth $6.75M, and there are incentives in the deal that could bring the total value to almost $8M.

There is still a faint chance for the Raccoons to at least play in the same ballpark as the Crusaders next season. Everybody will be healthier (it can’t POSSIBLY get worse than ’13!), and by keeping their closer around they are one affordable setup guy away from shoring up that wonky bullpen. The rotation will be better with Brownie and Dickerson (most likely by May for the latter) around, and now the Raccoons just have to fix their offense, which was already bad (9th in runs scored in the CL) and will get infinitely worse with the departure of the King of Yoshis.

There’s a gaping hole at second base, without a doubt. There will be a 38-year old man at third base. I don’t know what the heck to do with Walt Canning other than plug him at short and hope for wonders. D-Alex could pull a Bowen in ’14, and I have lamented the inadequacies of Adrian Quebell and Mike Bednarski (a raging disappointment if there ever was one) endlessly for the last six months, or in Quebell’s case, six years.

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Jong-hoo Umberger retired at the end of the season, not the energetic South Korean strike thrower the Raccoons signed from overseas six years earlier. He had fattened up, he had elbow troubles, and after signing that dirt cheap 2-year contract with the Crusaders prior to the 2012 season, he managed to get into ONE game with them over those two years, spending the rest of his time with AAA Lexington. He retires with a 58-32 record and a 3.09 ERA in 127 appearances, all but one with the Raccoons, and all but one starts.

Also retired, outfielder Bakile Hiwalani. The second-to-last of the golden Loggers crew around 2000 to still remain nominally in the sport (Bartolo Hernandez is the last holdout now), Hiwalani last appeared for the 2012 Cycloens. Of course, most of his career was spent with the Loggers. He won a Gold Glove and was an All Star four times, but that doesn’t really tell much about his true qualities as a hitter, leading the Continental League in slugging three times, in RBI six times, and in home runs and doubles once (both in 2006). He had a .271/.358/.459 career with 312 HR (10th all time) and 1,592 RBI (career leader!), amassing 2,464 hits and 158 stolen bases.

Also retiring are a few more notables, including Mark Austin, and also Chris Parker, the first and probably most futile to retire among the three prospects the Raccoons hauled in when giving up and trading David Brewer to the Condors in 1997. Still, Parker managed to have a long career, but managed only meager 1,157 hits. Clyde Brady, the second position player in the deal, made it to 1,435 and currently has no team. Randy Farley has another year on his contract with the Capitals and sits one W away from 200.