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Old 09-30-2019, 02:06 AM   #2981
Westheim
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Maud, we have to put out a statement that we condemn the reports in the Agitator that half the roster has been drunk for most of the season are wholly and entirely false! - Well, yeah, but that was that one time they emptied the truck with fermented apples that had overturned on I-405 …! - I didn't find them chubbier than usual, unfortunately… - Yeah, a few of them had trouble reaching the ground with the paws, especially after Matt Nunley doled out the barbecue grills...
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1983 * 1989 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1995 * 1996 * 2010 * 2017 * 2018 * 2019 * 2026 * 2028 * 2035 * 2037 * 2044 * 2045 * 2046 * 2047 * 2048 * 2051 * 2054 * 2055
1 OSANAI : 2 POWELL : 7 NOMURA | RAMOS : 8 REECE : 10 BROWN : 15 HALL : 27 FERNANDEZ : 28 CASAS : 31 CARMONA : 32 WEST : 39 TONER : 46 SAITO

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Old 09-30-2019, 01:35 PM   #2982
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I am somewhat disturbed nobody noticed the entirely wrong stats table at the end of the season. Nah I'm sure what I'm doing here ain't all for naught. Totally sure.
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Portland Raccoons, 83 years of excell-.... of baseball: Furballs here!
1983 * 1989 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1995 * 1996 * 2010 * 2017 * 2018 * 2019 * 2026 * 2028 * 2035 * 2037 * 2044 * 2045 * 2046 * 2047 * 2048 * 2051 * 2054 * 2055
1 OSANAI : 2 POWELL : 7 NOMURA | RAMOS : 8 REECE : 10 BROWN : 15 HALL : 27 FERNANDEZ : 28 CASAS : 31 CARMONA : 32 WEST : 39 TONER : 46 SAITO

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Old 09-30-2019, 05:16 PM   #2983
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Was out of town for a few days but caught up this afternoon on the closing of a forgettable season. All the silver linings I searched for after last season ended up in the outhouse. Hopefully with some of those contracts that fell off it will start to get better and the #4 pick doesn’t hurt. But another season of Rico is still ahead right, or maybe your owner will get him to take up poetry (or take him to fill in for him in Central America and he will retire.

Good luck in the off-season.
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Old 09-30-2019, 06:38 PM   #2984
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Laptop is already shut down but I am fairly certain that Rico has one more guaranteed season and then two MORE seasons for which we have team options. But remember we also pay Shumway for nothing next year, and that Adam Braun only went to the DL and not out of our lives.

The current projection for 2033 budget room is zilch. But we will get into more detail on this after the postseason.
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Portland Raccoons, 83 years of excell-.... of baseball: Furballs here!
1983 * 1989 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1995 * 1996 * 2010 * 2017 * 2018 * 2019 * 2026 * 2028 * 2035 * 2037 * 2044 * 2045 * 2046 * 2047 * 2048 * 2051 * 2054 * 2055
1 OSANAI : 2 POWELL : 7 NOMURA | RAMOS : 8 REECE : 10 BROWN : 15 HALL : 27 FERNANDEZ : 28 CASAS : 31 CARMONA : 32 WEST : 39 TONER : 46 SAITO

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Old 10-01-2019, 06:31 PM   #2985
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2032 PLAYOFFS

Three quarters of last year’s playoff field returned, the exception being the Miners, who crashed to last place in the FL East, which was taken by the 87-75 Buffaloes, who were not only the bottom seed in the ’32 postseason, but also the only team that didn’t win triple digits. The East had been pretty weak, and the Buffaloes had not exactly romped the competition either. While they had a fine rotation with the second-best ERA led by David Elliott (18-6, 3.09 ERA), the bullpen had lost one of its most critical pieces in Jonathan Snyder (3-3, 2.31 ERA, 23 SV) and hadn’t been that good to begin with. Their offense was so-so, too. Nobody topped 20 homers or 90 RBI for them, although 38-year-old Pablo Sanchez whipped up another .346 season while reaching base at a .453 clip. That he was batting third spoke about how the Buffos had nobody to actually rake in the middle of the order. They were also without trusty shortstop Alex Majano (.307, 1 HR, 26 RBI), out with a ruptured UCL. They were largely average in most offensive categories, and had only amounted to a +44 run differential.

They were facing the 105-57 Pacifics, who won the West by 12 games. They had the fewest runs allowed, with the third-best rotation and the best pen, but injuries had ravaged that sterling rotation. Only Dave Christiansen (23-9, 2.92 ERA) and Abramo Archibugi (14-6, 2.95 ERA) were still standing, with Jorge Beltran, Gavin Lee, and Bobby Morris all on the shelf for the year and sometimes beyond. Apart from not being able to steal bases at any appealing rate, the Pacifics had led the FL in most key offensive categories, including in runs scored with a +162 run differential. Justin Fowler had hit 35 homers and plated 113, and J.J. “Hopalong” Henley wasn’t far behind with 26 HR and 97 RBI. Terry Kopp had gone deep 27 times. That was some *serious* oomph to have in the middle of the lineup. And finally, the second-highest strikeout total on the team? That would be Chun-yeong Chah, who threw 85 innings to save 48 games while winning ten, and struck out 115.

Over in the Continental League, the 102-60 Titans were the ones leading on offense. They had scored a nifty 817 runs for a +273 run differential, truly staggering, leading the league in both runs scored and runs allowed and winning the division handily by 13 games. They had no injuries and could cart up a full playoff rotation of 3-or-so ERA pitchers, a solid bullpen although Jermaine Campbell (3-5, 3.14 ERA, 40 SV) wasn’t exactly automatic, and a dense lineup that nevertheless did have a few mild spots at the bottom. But Justin Uliasz had homered 31 times and had plated 121, while Willie Vega was doing the lord’s work with a .298 clip and 25 dingers and 76 RBI. Most of all, their starters were durable and their roster was very balanced, which might come in handy as the bottom seed against the opposition, who was not as versatile…

The 108-54 Condors had won the CL South by 18 games to become the top seed in the postseason, but they had only (“only”) put up a +179 run differential, coming fourth in runs scored and second in runs allowed. There wasn’t much fault to find with the pitching staff, except that Jeff Little (14-4, 1.93 ERA!) and Joe Perry (10-10, 3.86 ERA) both made at least 30 starts and neither reached even 185 innings; that pair with little stamina was a consistent burden on a bullpen, and while it hadn’t exactly derailed the Condors on the way to a 108-win season, these things could be crucial in the postseason. On the offensive side, two-time Player of the Year Shane Sanks (.297, 37 HR, 115 RBI) had recovered from a down year, and Kevin McGrath had also hit 24 homers. They had only ranked eighth in batting average, but sixth in OBP, fifth in dingers, and second in stolen bases, but the lineup was almost all right-handed with the exception of Chris Murphy and Yeong-ha Sung, and those two weren’t scaring anybody batting about .250 with four homers each.

This was the 16th playoff appearance for the Titans, most of all ABL teams. The Pacifics were in the show for the 15th time, the Condors for the 14th time, tying for third place with two other teams. The Buffaloes made their tenth playoffs, tying for 10th overall. The Titans also had the most championships with nine. The Pacifics were second with five, while the Condors had only one, and the Buffaloes were one of three teams to never hoist the trophy (Knights, Miners). The teams involved had won eight of the last ten championships (five for Boston, two for L.A., and one for Tijuana), the odd ones out being the Raccoon’s two trophies.

The CLCS featured the fifth pairing between the Titans and Condors. The latter had won only once, in 2029 on the way to the title. The Titans had prevailed three times, including last year.

The FLCS was the fourth time the Pacifics and Buffaloes met up, with the Buffos actually having a 2-1 record in these encounters. But the winner of these pairings, the most recent one coming in 2028, has never won the championship. The 1981 Buffaloes lost to the Indians. The Raccoons knocked off both the ’26 Pacifics and ’28 Buffaloes in the World Series.

Predictions? Pacifics in few games. The CLCS appears a toss-up. Slight edge to the Titans.

+++

2032 LEAGUE CHAMPIONSHIP SERIES

BOS @ TIJ … 3-1 … (Titans lead 1-0) … BOS Adam Potter 8.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, W (1-0);

TOP @ LAP … 1-2 … (Pacifics lead 1-0) … LAP Dave Christiansen 8.0 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 7 K, W (1-0);
BOS @ TIJ … 2-4 … (series tied 1-1) … BOS Keith Spataro 2-4, 3B, 2 RBI; TIJ Shane Sanks 2-3, BB, HR, RBI;

TOP @ LAP … 4-6 … (Pacifics lead 2-0) … TOP Miguel Reyna 3-4, 3B; LAP Andy Schmit 4-4, RBI; LAP Kevin Fagan (PH) 1-1, RBI;

TIJ @ BOS … 1-6 … (Titans lead 2-1) … BOS Willie Vega 1-5, HR, 4 RBI; BOS Dustin Wingo 8.0 IP, 7 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 7 K, W (1-0);

Vega hits a grand slam off Jeff Little (0-1, 10.80 ERA) in the second inning to put the Titans well ahead early.

LAP @ TOP … 4-1 … (Pacifics lead 3-0) … LAP Oscar Mendoza 4-4, BB, RBI; LAP Justin Fowler 1-3, BB, HR, 3 RBI; LAP Greg Gannon 8.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 5 BB, 2 K, W (1-0);
TIJ @ BOS … 0-4 … (Titans lead 3-1) … TIJ Shane Sanks 2-3, BB; BOS Keith Spataro 2-3, BB, RBI; BOS Rhett West 2-3, BB; BOS Todd Johnson 3-4; BOS Jordan Caldwell 9.0 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K, W (1-0);

LAP @ TOP … 0-11 … (Pacifics lead 3-1) … TOP Miguel Reyna 4-5, 2B, 2 RBI; TOP Matt Barber 2-3, BB, 2B, RBI; TOP Pablo Sanchez 2-3, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; TOP Zheng-ze Ts’ai 3-5, 3B, RBI; TOP David Elliott 9.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 9 K, W (1-1);
TIJ @ BOS … 8-4 … (Titans lead 3-2) … TIJ Andy Hughes 3-4; TIJ Danny Zarate 3-5, 2B, RBI; BOS Moises Avila 2-4, BB, 3B; BOS Adrian Reichardt (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI;

LAP @ TOP … 5-0 … (Pacifics win 4-1) … LAP Oscar Mendoza 3-5, 3B, RBI; LAP Abramo Archibugi 8.2 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 7 K, W (2-0);

Three hits is all the Buffaloes get in a rather swift elimination despite the breakout in Game 4.

BOS @ TIJ … 5-4 … (Titans win 4-2) … BOS Keith Spataro 2-5, 2 RBI; TIJ Chris Miller 2-4, BB; TIJ Ken Hess (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI;

Led by starter George Griffin the Condors pitchers walk eight Titans, causing countless traffic jams that even mediocre RISP hitting and nine men stranded couldn’t stop from unravelling into a bushel of runs. Boston’s Mario Gonzalez (7 IP, 3 ER) also unravels late, but the pen keeps the game together.

+++

2032 WORLD SERIES

For the third time in the last six years, the World Series would pit the Pacifics and Titans against each other. Both had won a previous pairing, the Titans coming out on top in the previous World Series, while the Pacifics had beaten them in the 2027 edition.

Both teams had a balanced lineup, a balanced rotation, and sort of options in the pen. But the Pacifics pen, while carrying more left-handers, still hadn’t been that great even in the CLCS. The Titans’ pen had only two left-handers, and they had lost shallow-end reliever Juan Muniz to injury, but these two teams were just so evenly matched that this didn’t seem like a tie-breaker either. On the other side the Pacifics had pried Gavin Lee off the stretcher to shore up their rotation.

The Titans still had the more impressive regular season going for them, despite fewer wins and not holding homefield advantage. Nod to the Titans?

+++

BOS @ LAP … 1-5 … (Pacifics lead 1-0) … LAP Mike Martin 3-5, RBI; LAP Joel Denzler 3-3, BB; LAP Jeremy Houghtaling (PH 1-1, 2B, 2 RBI; LAP Dave Christiansen 8.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 8 K, W (2-1);

Only three hits for the Titans in the series opener against Christiansen, who got romped by the Buffos in Game 4 but couldn’t be tied down in the freezer.

BOS @ LAP … 5-7 … (Pacifics lead 2-0) … BOS Adrian Reichardt (PH) 1-1, 3B, RBI; LAP J.J. Henley 2-4, HR, RBI; LAP Hiroaki Ryu 3-3, BB, 2 RBI;

LAP @ BOS … 3-1 … (Pacifics lead 3-0) … LAP Abramo Archibugi 7.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 8 K, W (3-0);

LAP @ BOS … 4-2 … (Pacifics win 4-0) … LAP Justin Fowler 1-3, 2 BB, HR, RBI; LAP Dave Christiansen 7.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, W (3-1); BOS Mark Walker 1-4, HR, 2 RBI;

Christiansen comes back on short rest and outduels Jordan Caldwell to get his team an early edge. The Titans pin will pitch four innings of hitless relief, but the lineup can’t break through either Christiansen or the relievers Gabriel Recio and Chun-yeong Chah (2.57 ERA, 6 SV).

2032 WORLD SERIES CHAMPIONS
Los Angeles Pacifics

(6th title)
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1983 * 1989 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1995 * 1996 * 2010 * 2017 * 2018 * 2019 * 2026 * 2028 * 2035 * 2037 * 2044 * 2045 * 2046 * 2047 * 2048 * 2051 * 2054 * 2055
1 OSANAI : 2 POWELL : 7 NOMURA | RAMOS : 8 REECE : 10 BROWN : 15 HALL : 27 FERNANDEZ : 28 CASAS : 31 CARMONA : 32 WEST : 39 TONER : 46 SAITO

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Old 10-02-2019, 06:39 AM   #2986
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Every season, no matter how sweet, must come to an end. This season had been no sweet at all, but it had still come to an end. All things, good or bad, must end.

One of those things ending was Ivan “Druid” Mena’s tenure as the Raccoons’ medical professional. For this a little “accident” was responsible when he experimented with a strange concoction of poisonous plant extracts in his ramshackle lab. Well, nobody knows what happened *exactly*, but I can say that he is physically FINE… and very, very happy. He is on long-term detox in Wyoming now, but I don’t think he’ll ever come back and practice as a physician.

Add that to our pile of problems.

Since a key goal with a evaporating budget (and since Nick Valdes had said how bad an investment the Raccoons were about a zillion times this year, I was pretty sure of further evaporation) was to skim individual dollars off the edges of the salary pile, the Raccoons made sure to divest some minimum contracts before the start of the new fiscal years for baseball teams. Placed on waivers and designated for assignment were Nick Derks, Juan Barzaga, Sean Catella, Brendan Day, saving over $800k in the initial budget.

As expected, Valdes went to work once he was rescued from the jungle by his personal SWAT team. The Coons’ budget, which had been $31M (15th in ABL) in 2032, was further slashed to $27.2M, which equaled a death spiral drop into the bottom five in the league into 20th place.

The top 5 in terms of buying power were the Pacifics ($58M!), Titans ($45.5M), Condors ($45M), Buffaloes ($41.5M), and Warriors ($39M). Below the Coons were only the Loggers ($27M), Aces ($26.6M), Rebels ($24.4M), and Falcons ($20.6M).

The remaining CL North teams ranked 7th (NYC, $36.5M), t-10th (IND, $34.5M), and 14th (VAN, $33M).

The average budget was $34.31M, up $170k from the previous season. The median budget was $33.75M, up $500k from last season.

So, there they are. The jagged shards of any hope to compete. Because after getting strafed like that by ownership (although at least Valdes didn’t loot all the contents of the cash register, which his deceased father had always done; we had some $900k in cash on top of our non-existent budget), we had to delve right into the major issues with our current salary and roster structure, and the two were indeed party intertwined.

Going back to the start of the 2032 season, the Raccoons’ rotation was comprised of Tom Shumway, Rico Gutierrez, Bernie Chavez, Raffaello Sabre, and Jason Gurney, a bunch that cost $6M despite three guys making the minimum. Bernie went on the DL in April, Gutierrez did so in July, and Sabre in August. By then it had already been six weeks that Tom Scumbag had been released on June 21. Only Gurney made it through the season, but sucked the cover off the baseballs, and would have become the Raccoons worst-ever qualifying pitcher by far if he had not fallen short of 162 innings by a single out* thanks to being benched in September; he made only two starts and pitched only 8.1 innings in September, still enough to post two losses and allow 13 runs. He had two separate 6-game losing streaks.

Sometimes pitchers should just have the common decency to get injured…

The Raccoons still had the rights to all of those pitchers, minus Shumway, who was nevertheless due another $3.3M for the 2033 season.**

Also due roughly $3.3M was Adam Braun, who had batted a dismal .226 with four homers before tearing his labrum in July, a.k.a. a typical season for a former Player of the Year in his age 33 season in Portland. The Titans had footed half the bill on him in ’32. They would not do so in ’33. This was all ours.

The other big bucks were Berto ($2.5M) as well as Rico Gutierrez ($2.1M) and Tim Stalker ($2.8M), the latter two in their final guaranteed seasons. Stalker had a player option for ’34, while Rico had two team options worth $550k each and not a dime more.

And that was IT. That was ALL our meaningful contracts, at least prior to arbitration. The next-highest contract was that of Toby Ross, $660k in ’33, and Garavito was due $450k each of the next two years. This exhausts already ALL guaranteed contracts currently on the books. Seven players (six actually employed) – done. We do however have a score of minimum contracts and a few arbitration cases.

We have seven arbitration cases [full unaltered table at the bottom of the post], one of which was already dealt with when Nick Derks was waived and DFA’ed. The others are our pair of first baseman (which will be worth separate dissection) that had mostly had beneficial platoon advantages for an entire season and somehow managed to hit .237 with 24 homers (albeit in almost 700 at-bats). The other players were Justin Perkins, who did not hit a lot (but still led the team in homers) with a .248 clip, but played some high-caliber D at least, coming second in WAR on the team behind … TIM ****ING STALKER. Stalker was another defensive specialist. Berto, who was a *fine* shortstop but not a great one and would never win a Gold Glove, AND had an offensive off year (and missed 34 games once more…) only came third.

In fact there were three more position players in part-time rolls that were next in the team WAR table in Giovanni James, Preston Pinkerton, and Nate Hall, before a pair of pitchers tied for seventh on the chart: Ignacio del Rio and Chris Wise with 1.3 WAR each. But that was just a footnote here, because WAR is a useless stat.

Besides Perkins and the pair of first base clowns, the other arbitration eligible players were Wilson Rodriguez, Chris Baldwin, and Jonathan Fleischer, all of them being in the “meh” bucket. Baldwin’s key qualification, versatility, had been taken over by Preston Pinkerton and he was largely redundant even at the cheap price of $320k for an estimate. Fleischer had completely lost it. In 80 innings between AAA and the majors he had walked 59 batters, which would have been outlandish for a left-hander, and he was a ****ing right-hander! He had always walked a lot (his *best* BB/9 in the majors was 4.8 in both ’28 and ’31). It was probably time to axe him. Rodriguez was a strong defensive outfielder, but had not hit a baseball in ages. After batting .340 with three homers in May he had posted clips of .146, .224, .170, and .111 in the months after. He was also 30 years old, and not the sort of player you’d expect to recover.

Then there were the free agents, of which there were only there, and only one of those might be compensation eligible, that being Giovanni James. He made over a million in ’32, wasn’t entirely worth it, but we’d offer him arbitration for the draft pick. The other two free agents were Nate Hall and Jared Stone. Hall was a bit of an allround talent being able to hit for extra bases, run for 14 stolen bags, and played snug defense all over the outfield. He was however also a “me first” person and staff had singled him out as one of the centers of malcontent in the clubhouse. He had to go. Jared Stone had been a damn fine setup man (not that there had been much to set up), but wanted to play for a winning team, and we’d probably not get him to resign even if we could pony up another $550k for him.

Judging the Opening Day roster from here was difficult, but we surely had no shortage of dismal starting pitchers. In the pen we would still have a solid core with Wise, Garavito, Hennessy, and Anaya and could fudge something together around those. Bates and Fernandez were solid bets for a spot in April, too, although Bates was also a right-hander that walked people left and right.

We would be left with two catchers in Thompson and Ross (they could even platoon with purpose), but the outfield was in a state of flux. Braun, Wallace, Pinkerton, and Hooge were the only players under contract after the subtraction of Hall and Rodriguez. On the infield we first had to make up our mind whether to continue with the first base platoon or not. Jarod Howden had batted .216 with 12 homers, the dumb pig.

Welcome to the land of devastation. I would offer you a seat for the ride, but I’m afraid Steve from Accounting makes me charge you $2.50 for it.

*This was at least partly intentional because I couldn’t bear the shame of having a qualified pitcher with a 6.xx ERA.

**This salary does not appear in our salary page or on Shumway’s salary page. I assume it has somehow bugged itself away?This is the only reason we are not overbudget by several million at this stage.
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Portland Raccoons, 83 years of excell-.... of baseball: Furballs here!
1983 * 1989 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1995 * 1996 * 2010 * 2017 * 2018 * 2019 * 2026 * 2028 * 2035 * 2037 * 2044 * 2045 * 2046 * 2047 * 2048 * 2051 * 2054 * 2055
1 OSANAI : 2 POWELL : 7 NOMURA | RAMOS : 8 REECE : 10 BROWN : 15 HALL : 27 FERNANDEZ : 28 CASAS : 31 CARMONA : 32 WEST : 39 TONER : 46 SAITO

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Old 10-03-2019, 12:26 PM   #2987
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Alright, something has gone terribly wrong here… From time to time I like a shot of coffee in my booze, but this concoction tastes just terrible. It’s not the Capt’n Coma, that one is totally fine, and it’s also not the splash of wheel rim cleanse or half the Tide pod drifting in the mug. All of those taste like usual. Something’s up with the coffee, and for once I don’t even mean Travis Coffee! – Maud! – Maud! – The coffee taste like stale butt! – What do you mean Steve from Accounting has slashed the budget for refreshments and we can only afford the basic ground coffee anymore??

Things are terrible!! – “Terrible” is also one of those words that loses all meaning after you cry it twenty times every day.

By the second day of the offseason Maud informed me that we had already sold over 200 season tickets for 2033, which caused me even more frustration. Now we had to pay for ushers, too! Great!

As far as issues with playing personnel were concerned, the Raccoons quickly signed 1-year extensions with Justin Perkins ($350k) and Travis Zitzner ($450k) for 2033.

All other players were non-tendered and let go without offering arbitration (except for Giovanni James because of draft pick compensation); this included the dumb pig, Jarod Howden, who was offered a $300k contract for 2033, refused the offer, then was offered $310k and refused that too with the addendum that if we didn’t want to make a proper bid we should not make any bid and he’d seek his luck with the arbitrator. But if the Raccoons are good at one thing, then it’s knowing their way around garbage, and Jarod Howden had played like it for sure for the last two years – the following day we notified the arbitrator that Howden would be non-tendered, adding him to the free agency pool by the time mid-November will arrive.

This followed shopping Howden three times between the World Series and him and the team falling out, with no interest from any team. So if we had resigned him we would have been stuck with him and after one year I was already plenty tired of the platoon at first base. Zitzner had thus won the job by virtue of Howden being obstinate… and a DUMB PIG.

+++

October 21 – The Rebels trade INF Elijah Williams (.272, 3 HR, 142 RBI) to the Cyclones for 3B/RF/2B Steve Sierra (.249, 5 HR, 64 RBI) and #95 prospect INF/RF Josh Troxel.

+++

The Raccoons also welcome a new team trainer, who emerged as the most convincing candidate from a final round of three applicants for the job, beating out a 42-year-old insanely smart guy with nimble fingers and degrees in medicine from three Ivy League schools as well as a professional witch of undetermined age with a shiny pendulum.

Although he has never worked with a professional baseball team before, he has 20 years of experience as a medical professional as certified by former employers, without exception state agencies. He fluently speaks English, Spanish, German, Russian, Chinese, and Korean, and has a reputation of possessing great people skills. Please let’s hand a warm welcome to new Raccoons head trainer Dr. Hyung-gook Chung!

Wait a minute… (looks from Slappy on the brown couch to Chad in the full costume to Cristiano in his wheelchair to Honeypaws on a fluffy silk pillow) … why are all these state agencies listed with addresses in Pyongyang, PRK??

Okay, who ****ed this one up!?

(Chad starts to show off his dance moves)

+++

2032 ABL AWARDS

Players of the Year: PIT 1B Danny Santillano (.347, 30 HR, 87 RBI) and TIJ 3B Shane Sanks (.297, 37 HR, 115 RBI)
Pitchers of the Year: SAL SP Phil Harrington (16-7, 2.14 ERA) and TIJ Jeff Little (14-4, 1.93 ERA)
Rookies of the Year: CIN OF/1B Dick Oshiita (.315, 20 HR, 72 RBI) and CHA C Ernesto Huichapa (.256, 19 HR, 68 RBI)
Relievers of the Year: LAP CL Chun-yeong Chah (10-6, 2.64 ERA, 48 SV) and TIJ CL Ray Andrews (9-2, 2.23 ERA, 47 SV)
Platinum Sticks (FL): P LAP Dave Christiansen – C LAP J.J. Henley – 1B PIT Danny Santillano – 2B PIT Jim McKenzie – 3B NAS Jim Allen – SS SAL Jose Castro – LF SAL Kyle Weinstein – CF LAP Justin Fowler – RF CIN Dick Oshiita
Platinum Sticks (CL): P VAN Joe Martin – C TIJ Danny Zarate – 1B OCT Danny Cruz – 2B IND Dan Schneller – 3B TIJ Shane Sanks – SS BOS Keith Spataro – LF BOS Willie Vega – CF NYC Tony Coca – RF IND Mike Plunkett
Gold Gloves (FL): P CIN Geoff Whitehouse – C SAL Taylor Canody – 1B TOP Matt Barber – 2B NAS Billy Bouldin – 3B NAS Jim Allen – SS SAL Jose Castro – LF RIC Kevin Clark – CF SFW Pedro Cisneros – RF LAP Oscar Mendoza
Gold Gloves (CL): P VAN Victor Govea – C OCT Mike Burgess – 1B ATL Kevin Harenberg – 2B POR Tim Stalker3B POR Justin Perkins – SS VAN T.J. Bennett – LF BOS Willie Vega – CF MIL Gabe Creech – RF MIL Josh Stephenson

For Tim Stalker this is his sixth Gold Glove, three at short and three at second base. He will turn 35 in July, so there’s that, and I would juts love to see him actually put up an offensive season of any sort once again… Perkins won his first Glove in his age 31 season, which is not surprising given that he was never a starter with the Titans. He came to Portland, posted a mediocre offensive season, and still somehow was one of the “best” players on the team.

+++

Note that the FL Rookie of the Year is only written with one I actually, but the forum censorship bots will not allow me to post the name unless written with two. Please spell [oh-sheeda] regardless of presentation.

And now excuse me, I have to go barfing for the CL MVP …
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Old 10-05-2019, 07:25 AM   #2988
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The free agency deadline did not bring nasty surprises; Giovanni James refused arbitration and the Raccoons thus released eight free agents into the wild, including the dumb pig Jarod Howden. Non-tendering five players that would have drawn over $1M in salary actually freed up some resources in the budget, which could be cautiously applied to a free agent or two, if our heart so desired, provided they’d play for cheap and had no expectations, and would also not contribute to the general lawlessness in the clubhouse. I get complaints daily that this and that guy ate this and that guy’s lunch.

And the lunchbox too.

Dr. Chung announced that he found no detailed medical files left behind by the Druid and had to examine all players individually in the coming weeks, which required calling them back from vacation, which contributed to even more unhappiness among the players. But I had known all along that the Druid hadn’t kept records on paper. He had kept them all in his head… and in his peyote-induced dreams.

Before we could divest ourselves of players with peg legs that had so far gone unnoticed, we had to take some sort of stock though. It didn’t really look like the Raccoons would need a pitcher. I mean, yeah, we could certainly use an ace, but we had kind of subscribed to the theory that Chavez, Sabre, and del Rio would be the next Toner, Santos, and Abe. Not-so-early indicators hinted at a potential shortfall compared to expectations here, because the three young pitchers, 23 years of age on average, so far had career ERA’s of, in order, 4.43, 4.56, and 4.91. Their combined record was 27-35.

That was without giving much currency to Rico Gutierrez, who annoyingly was still here and would have to take residence in the rotation. That left only one spot open and there was no reason to go out and blow coin on an ace or horse or a guy with two arms, because we still had lots of guys with two arms (Martinez, Russell, Gurney, Coffee …….). The pen could use a righty with stamina, although now we were back at Martinez, Gurney, Coffee……. We had lots of options in that regard.

The position player department of the extended roster however soon revealed a certain barrenness (not: baroness, the Baroness of Hundelschweif-Apfelgarten, a well-known N.Y. socialite, being a close acquaintance to Raccoons owner Nick Valdes). For starters, there were only two catchers left, including Toby Ross as well as Elliott Thompson, who we had waited years for to arrive only to see him bat a withering .200 and then the rumored top-notch defense and handling of pitchers didn’t materialize either.

Travis Zitzner was now the king of first base. There were five other infielders left on the extended roster, including starters Tim Stalker, Alberto Ramos, and Justin Perkins as well as the season-long reserve Justin Marsingill and 2005 Ugliest Baby Boy Sam Cass, who was really just NOTHING. The outfield was even thinner – Adam Braun (still recovering from the labrum thing), Ed Hooge, Preston Pinkerton, and Jimmy Wallace.

There was little to no hope in AAA in most of these categories. Of course there was Manny Fernandez, #5 pick in 2031, but he had only gotten 347 at-bats between Ham Lake and St. Petersburg in ’32 and was not considered ready for prime time, although a strong April could go a long way for a team as destitute as the Critters… He hit .254 with three homers and a .797 OPS in 17 games for the Alley Cats in late August and September.

No other prospects of renown to speak off, at least as far as production was concerned. We had a pair of second basemen in Danny Duenas and Rich Vickers that had put up some numbers. Neither of them had the arm strength to move to the left side of the infield, and neither of them looked like much use in the outfield. Duenas had switch-hitting going for him; Vickers was a right-hander.

And Maud is insisting on us adding at least one free agent of some profile. She claims she has no idea what promotions she is supposed to put up with the current roster. Berto has had a bobblehead two years in a row. There is only so much fame-horning off the 1993 championship team’s 40th anniversary you can do. Vern Kinnear and Jason Turner will get retro bobbleheads, f.e., you know, the sort where the head falls off when you bobble them too hard.

FINE. I’ll see what I can do with a free agent signing…!

+++

November 14 – Veteran 1B Jon Gonzalez (.281, 203 HR, 807 RBI) is traded from the Aces to the Warriors for two prospects.
November 14 – The Falcons send outfielder Barend Kok (.270, 144 HR, 549 RBI) to the Capitals for 1B Roberto Morales (.252, 70 HR, 396 RBI) and a prospect.
November 17 – The Raccoons acquire 26-year-old OF/1B/SS Noel Ferrero (.252, 24 HR, 209 RBI) from the Blue Sox in exchange for 26-yr old SP/MR Steve Russell (3-6, 5.70 ERA, 1 SV), 25-yr old AAA C Rich Olmos, 22-yr old AAA 2B Danny Duenas, and 19-yr old A SP Jerry Hodges.
November 24 – Incumbent Continental League stolen bases champ 3B/SS Guillermo Obando (.296, 26 HR, 656 RBI) joins the Rebels for 4-yr, $14.36M. The 32-year-old Obando spent the last two and a half years with the Crusaders.
November 24 – The Crusader pick up 1B/SS Jose Pulido (.259, 25 HR, 255 RBI) and cash from the Bayhawks in exchange for MR Dan Lyke (2-1, 3.74 ERA) and a prospect.
November 25 – The Rebels ink ex-POR C Giovanni James (.261, 55 HR, 307 RBI) to a 1-yr, $530k contract. The Raccoons receive a supplemental round pick.
November 25 – The Warriors sign 35-year-old ex-ATL 1B Kevin Harenberg (.298, 240 HR, 1,081 RBI) to a 3-yr, $8.72M contract.
November 25 – 30-year-old LF/RF Kelvin Winborn (.281, 112 HR, 513 RBI), who played for both the Cyclones and Miners in 2032, continues his FL East tour by signing a 6-yr, $11.54M contract with the Capitals.
November 26 – The Bayhawks add ex-SFW C Mike Thompson (.267, 172 HR, 802 RBI) on a 2-yr, $8.28M contract.
November 27 – In-his-prime ex-TIJ C Danny Zarate (.254, 72 HR, 430 RBI) signs a 6-yr, $22.2M contract with the Gold Sox.
November 28 – Vancouver trades SS/2B T.J. Bennett (.287, 7 HR, 195 RBI) to the Pacifics for a prospect.
November 29 – The Buffales sign veteran outfielder Tony Coca (.259, 221 HR, 912 RBI) to a 4-yr, $12.48M contract. Coca was with the Crusaders for the last few years.
November 30 – As one star signing per day continues, the Crusaders add ex-SFB SP Gilberto Rendon (57-54, 3.94 ERA) on a 4-yr, $10.68M contract.
December 1 – Rule 5 draft: 11 players are selected in one round. The Raccoons draft 22-yr old MR Jesse Erickson from the Titans; they lose 22-yr old OF Chad Reinhardt to the Crusaders and 22-yr old LF Steve Florence to the Blue Sox.

+++

FINALLY. Tony Coca is out of the division (and league)! He seemed to hit ten homers against Portland every year… probably because he did. No I didn’t count them. But I know it in my liver.

Also, the Coca signing gave the Crusaders control of the #17 pick, forfeited to them by the Buffaloes. They held it for one day before moving it on to the Bayhawks for the signing of Rendon.

Both outfielders we lost in the rule 5 draft had become hopelessly stuck in Ham Lake. It was not that the 40-man roster was full – wildly not – but they were just not deemed worth the $203k for protecting them.

Lots to unpack in the Ferrero trade. First, he’s not the slugger that will blast us towards a .500 record or – lo, slow down! – beyond. We’d be merry if he hits ten homers. But he offers – maybe – a solid league-average-or-better bat with top notch defense in right, allowing us to shift Jimmy Wallace, that black hole in the field, to left, where he can do less damage, permanently. And yes, it’s gross; Wallace piled up -1.5 wins in the field last season, and for his career sits at -2.7 wins in just under 300 career games, although Cristiano says that on a per-inning basis, his stats in left are actually worse. Fine, y’know what – they can play either way round!

The bounty hauled in by Nashville includes one of a pile of sucky starting pitchers, a no-good catcher that played only one season in the organization, one of the aforementioned second basemen with nowhere else to go, and our 2031 third-rounder, who had gone 13-24 with an ERA near five in one and a half seasons in Aumsville. I could have gotten away trading fewer players, f.e. the Sox had been sort of hot on Julian Ponce’s heels, which always makes my ears stretch upwards and my whiskers twitch. Ponce – also a 19-year-old hurler in single-A – had been signed for cheap ($23k) in the 2029 July IFA period. He had debuted in Aumsville during this season but had gone 2-10 with a 4.23 ERA for the Beagles. His steadfast refusal to learn a third pitch will relegate him to the pen before long, but as a reliever he should have quite the potential, and while he was unranked, and one of my undeclared, but intended goals of this offseason was to not trade away any ranked prospect, which ruled out a few other players the Blue Sox would have accepted instead of the actual minor league basket they got, including but not limited to Manny Fernandez (no!), Jason Lucas (eh, but no!), and Jonathan Dykstra (hum, but still no). Darren Brown and Ignacio del Rio had also been on the list.

…and even if we think nothing of our own players, I always take note of when other teams do…

What else? Ex-Coon Nick Derks landed a 2-yr, $504k contract from the Loggers. Bless them. Also: Terry Kopp rejoined the Pacifics for 2-yr, $5.5M;
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Old 10-06-2019, 04:02 PM   #2989
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The other day me and our scout… Hernandez… Martinez… Ramirez something… watched Jimmy Wallace in the cafeteria as he chased a meatball that had rolled off the top of his food bowl all over the room, underneath three tables, knocked over a few chairs, including one that Ed Hooge was sitting on while he deposited a lasagna in his snout, leading to hissing, and finally Wallace galloped into the kitchen counter and had to be taken to Dr. Chung with a nosebleed while Gurney, Zitzner, and Pinkerton began to pose, hiss, and claw over the meatball in the middle of the room before Hooge came back, dashed in, and stole the unclaimed foodstuff before being chased out of the room by the other three.

I turned to the scout and asked him whether he thought Jimmy Wallace had any position on the field at all. He bluntly replied “nope”. We are probably going to have him field some balls at first base, but I have a hunch that that’s not gonna be the solution to the problem of our soon-to-be-26-year-old Black Glover with a career .739 OPS in some 1,100 at-bats…

And with that the winter meetings had arrived. Not that we had much business there. I doubted that I could get an ace either from the bargain bin or from another team that didn’t know what it was doing. Neither of those two quite materialized

+++

December 2 – The Warriors add veteran pitching in 38-year-old ex-DAL SP Mark Roberts (168-115, 3.14 ERA), who signs a 2-yr, $4.16M contract.
December 3 – The Crusaders add 35-yr old ex-PIT C Keith Leonard (.285, 48 HR, 515 RBI) for two years and $2.64M.
December 3 – Two years and $2.64M also lands the Buffaloes a new infielder in ex-RIC INF Dan Cobb (.288, 49 HR, 439 RBI).
December 5 – The Crusaders sign ex-LAP SP Gavin Lee (106-57, 3.35 ERA) to a 2-yr, $4.48M contract.
December 5 – The Scorpions continue their rebuilding project by signing ex-RIC SP Guillermo Regalado (88-81, 3.85 ERA) to a 1-yr, $1.38M contract.
December 5 – The Knights send 35-yr old SP Tim Wells (139-144, 4.02 ERA) to the Cyclones for 1B Adam Avakian (.283, 2 HR, 13 RBI) after half a debut season, plus a prospect.
December 6 – The Condors grab C Jimmy Wood (.250, 41 HR, 214 RBI) from the Bayhawks for MR Mike Simcoe (7-8, 3.47 ERA, 6 SV) and #100 prospect CL Austin Holt.
December 6 – In an intra-division trade, SP Victor Govea (49-58, 3.62 ERA) is sent from Vancouver to Indianapolis for three prospects. The package includes #54 prospect CF/INF Rich Arvizu, who is traded for the second time this year.
December 7 – The Canadiens send OF Danny Tessmann (.254, 20 HR, 171 RBI) to the Crusaders for another prospect.
December 8 – The Raccoons acquire 28-yr old OF Billy Jennings (.256, 44 HR, 241 RBI) from the Cyclones in exchange for 27-yr old SP Dave Martinez (27-26, 4.16 ERA).
December 10 – In another trade, the Raccoons pick up 30-yr old C Fernando Garcia (.266, 63 HR, 294 RBI) from the Canadiens for 29-yr old C Toby Ross (.235, 43 HR, 175 RBI) and 22-yr old AA 1B Jakobe Lambeth.


+++

Here we traded from a position of glut at the end of the winter meetings. The Cyclones didn’t really know what to do with Jennings, who had not been extremely effective as a full-time player, while the Raccoons had plenty of starting pitchers of Martinez’ stature. I just hope he will take all the little Odilon idols with him when he packs up his ****…!

This trade probably sends Ed Hooge back to the minors to begin the season, but it’s not like his bat was much of a revelation in his age 23 campaign. I can get a player for a .610 OPS almost anywhere…

The deal with the disgusting Elks upgrades our catcher, and Lambeth wasn’t a prime prospect either. Garcia makes just over $1M this year and will be under team control for 2034, so that’s something to keep in mind. He was worth 4.5 WAR in ’32, but then again WAR is a useless stat.

I also feel like we need another guy to sort out the clubhouse.

There is also a Hall of Fame ballot out, and the moment of truth has arrived – this is the year Jonny Toner makes his debut on the ballot. For those needing a refresher, he was nothing more than the greatest pitcher in the game during a 7-year span from 2014 through 2020. He won two triple crowns, four Pitcher of the Year flower pots, led the CL in ERA and strikeouts five times each, and in K/9 six times. Then injuries gradually took him apart. His last three years in Portland were decent, but pedestrian, and then he trundled through four different teams in the next four years with no discernible success. If he is elected, which I am championing for, then it is on the first half of his 15-year career, which was *outstanding*. It wasn’t his fault that he never wound up in a World Series game. The Raccoons made the postseason three times during his stint, and lost in the CLCS every time while he went 4-2 with a 3.20 ERA. None of the other teams he played for made the postseason, although two finished second in their division.
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Old 10-08-2019, 03:32 AM   #2990
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Dr. Chung has begun to make subtle changes to the Raccoons’ diet, for example there will no longer be triple-fudge brownies in the dispenser in the clubhouse, and with dispenser I mean an industrial-size mixing bowl for bread dough with ladders leading up to the edge. Also – rigorous exercise! Turns out we had some weight lifting thing and some horrendous machine where you can walk in place … nobody knows what these things are actually called, and it looks like they’ve caught dust since the 1990s … Slappy! Slappy! Why is everything dirty and sticky in here??

Then we tried to work on Jimmy Wallace’s fielding in either corner of the outfield. During December there were several sessions of flyball shagging in order before snow would overcome us all. Wallace did his very best, and then our scout guy (Melendez? Papayez? What the **** do I know…) needed some comparison and so Maud, Chad, and Cristiano Carmona were recruited to also catch fly balls.

Turns out that while Wallace’s range is adjudged to be an 8 by our scout, he gave Cristiano, who complained that the wheels of his wheelchair kept getting stuck in ruts in the badly kempt outfield, a mere 5, and Chad got a 1 after being hit in the head by several balls shot from a pitching machine – at least the mascot head cushioned the impact. Maud turned out the winner, being rated 10, not too shabby for a no-longer-quite-middle-aged woman with an old lady skirt and shoes, bun, and mainly engaged in schmoozing up to sponsors rather than physical activity. Interesting, interesting.

Adam Braun returned to work in the middle of December, which in his case meant coming in, rummaging through everybody’s locker for edibles, and then sleep in somebody else’s favorite hammock. You knew he was here just from the way the bickering increased around the ballpark and the clubhouse in particular.

The Critters really wanted to get rid of him and his $3.28M contract (plus a worthless team option for ’34). We had picked him up in a retrospectively rather pointless transaction with the Titans exactly a year ago, leaving them with Matt Jamieson (who didn’t get much spotlight in Boston) for Braun, Justin Perkins and a truckload of cash. Perkins won a Gold Glove, the cash was gone, but Braun was still here and festering on the roster. The Critters had just added on Noel Ferrero and Billy Jennings in the outfield and since Jimmy Wallace was a given – the glove with the giant hole in it be damned – Braun really had to go. All we had to do was to find a team that was dumb enough (and had enough dosh) to take him on.

I know you thought “Loggers” at the first part, but then went “aww” on the second part.

+++

December 14 – Former Gold Sock Vinny Chavira (.268, 123 HR, 567 RBI) signs a 4-yr, $6.5M deal with the Stars.
December 14 – The Crusaders ink ex-RIC CL David Gerow (42-50, 4.19 ERA, 95 SV). The 31-year-old signs a 1-yr, $710k contract.
December 16 – The Tom Dunlap sweepstakes end with the 30-yr old outfielder signing with the Pacifics for 6 years and $26.52M. Dunlap is a .305 hitter with 76 homers and 387 RBI.
December 20 – The Raccoons announce the addition of 31-year-old former Crusader INF Tom Hawkins (.281, 35 HR, 319 RBI) on a 2-yr, $1M deal.
December 21 – In the second deal of the winter between the two teams, the Raccoons trade 34-yr old OF Adam Braun (.272, 115 HR, 623 RBI) and 27-yr old AAA MR Matt Stonecipher (4-3, 3.94 ERA) to the Canadiens for 30-yr old LF/RF Ivan Vega (.286, 34 HR, 279 RBI).


+++

Without a doubt, Braun will take out on us for the rest of his career, if not life. Good thing is, time’s in our favor, and he’ll be 35 in May. You know, unless he catches frostbite in the barren wastelands of Elkland and keels over.

There is zero intention to have Ivan Vega ever appear in a Raccoons uniform. He might be even worse on D than Wallace, and we can’t put up with two of the lot… He makes $890k this season; if nothing else he’ll get the door treatment, and at that point we still will have saved about $2.4M on the deal.

Stupid Elks!

Of course Hawkins is mostly remembered as a member of the Bayhawks, but has since tingled through most of the CL’s basement, but no tour of duty there would be complete without a trip to the ****ty Critters. Hawkins is a league-average hitter that is mostly here to replace one between Marsingill and Cass – and for team leadership. He’s a hard-nosed no-nonsense guy that knows how to be listened to.

Other Critters finding a safe hole in a tree: Lance Legleiter signed for $1.68M with the Indians; Jarod Howden, the dumb pig, got a 2-yr, $554k deal with the Pacifics;
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Old 10-08-2019, 06:36 PM   #2991
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December 22 – Ex-NYC CL Casey Moore (20-22, 2.78 ERA, 87 SV) signs a 2-yr, $3.64M contract with the Stars.
December 26 – The Raccoons ink ex-SAC SP Andy Palomares (95-110, 4.30 ERA, 1 SV) to a 1-yr, $600k contract.

+++

Palomares will be the #5 starter to begin the season behind the three young guns and Gutierrez. That sends Coffee and Gurney to AAA to begin the year. Now, I know he’s nothing special. But he is also here to restore order to the clubhouse. We needed a few leader figures, and we have now gotten them.

Not much else happened over the holidays, to be honest.

Except…

+++

2033 HALL OF FAME VOTING RESULTS

The Hall of Fame welcomes three new members in 2033, including two first basemen and a starting pitcher.

Longtime Pacifics stalwart Stanley Murphy not only swept all the awards in the 2011 season and took home rings in that season and the next, he also entered the Hall of Fame with the highest vote total in the newest election cycle. A 20-year veteran after being taken 7th overall in the 2001 draft, Murphy technically played through his age 43 season (he had one at-bat with the Capitals that year), but was a frequent power threat early in his career while becoming more of a steady average hitter later, producing consistently high OPS+ values, never finishing a qualifying season under 106. He was an All Star seven times, won a Gold Glove and four Platinum Sticks in addition to the major accolades in 2011 and 2012. He led the FL in home runs twice, and in RBI once, but never won a batting title. He finished his career batting .288/.374/.452 with 371 HR and 1,533 RBI and amassed 2,867 hits.

A tale of two pitchers ends with a second place and Hall of Fame induction on the 2033 ballot for the Raccoons’ Jonathan Toner. The #53 pick in the 2009 draft ended up in Portland in a trade for Shunyo Yano after the 2012 season and made his debut the following year as a late-season injury replacement, pitching just enough to lose ROTY eligibility in 2014 when he handily bagged the first of his five ERA titles in a span of eight years that also saw him pile up two wins titles, five strikeout crowns, two triple crowns, and four Pitcher of the Year awards (2015, 2017, 2018, 2020). He was the dominant pitcher of the second half of the 2010s, although dark clouds were on the horizon as injuries began to mount that took him apart in his early 30s. After rebuilding Raccoons had to let him go after the ’23 season, Toner tingled through four different teams in four years, but never regained his former excellence, and amounted to a qualifying amount of innings only once in his final six seasons with the ’25 Loggers. The strikeouts were down, walks were up, and he retired at 36 with a 183-98 record, 2.89 ERA, and 2,549 strikeouts. He was an All Star nine times, won a Gold Glove, and also bagged four Platinum Sticks as one of the best-hitting pitchers on top of anything else, hitting .237/.325/.281 with 2 HR and 70 RBI for his career. In addition, he stole 11 bases.

Spending his entire 19-year career in the Federal League after being selected 8th in the 2003 draft, Alberto Rodriguez tingled through a total of seven stops of the 12 organizations in the FL and was inducted with the Wolves, the team he made his debut with in 2006, although his greatest moments came elsewhere as he took home championship rings with the 2017 Rebels and 2020 Scorpions. He was the FLCS MVP in the 2017 playoffs, but also won Rookie of the Year honors in ’06 and a total of three Platinum Sticks. Rodriguez’ game was endurance, resilience, and gap power. He hit 15 homers in his rookie year, and never hit as many again, but led the FL in doubles five times with a career high of 61 in ’16. He was an almost safe bet to hit 300 and usually drew more walks than he struck out, but never threatened for a batting title. His endurance is the stuff of legends though: for the first *17* seasons of his career, he played in at least 155 regular season games, and in 2014 achieved the unique feat of playing in 166 regular season games after a trade from the Capitals to the Rebels mid-season that allowed him to join a team with four games in hand – he appeared in all of them, and did so a total of four times in his career, going as far as to *start* 162 games twice, and also a whopping 165 in that 2014 season. For his career he hit .291/.373/.432 with 191 HR and 1,466 RBI, also hit 820 doubles (2nd all time behind HOF Victorino Sanchez), and stole 115 bases.

Full results:

LAP 1B Stanley Murphy – 5th – 93.1 – INDUCTED
POR SP Jonathan Toner – 1st – 90.7 – INDUCTED
SAL 1B Alberto Rodriguez – 4th – 76.9 – INDUCTED
SFW SP Samuel McMullen – 1st – 74.5
??? SP Ian Van Meter – 1st – 28.3
ATL LF Gil Rockwell – 6th – 27.1
??? CL Jarrod Morrison – 1st – 23.5
LAP C Errol Spears – 1st – 22.7
NAS C Pat Walston – 2nd – 15.4
VAN 1B Ray Gilbert – 8th – 10.9
??? SP Bob King – 7th – 7.3
CHA C Ryan Holliman – 1st – 6.9
??? RF Justin Dally – 3rd – 6.5
IND SP Dan Lambert – 1st – 3.2 – DROPPED
SAC SP Ian Rutter – 3rd – 3.2 – DROPPED
LAP CL Dusty Balzer – 1st – 1.6 – DROPPED
??? SP Juan Ortega – 1st – 0.8 – DROPPED

Maud! … Maud! … Who’s cutting onions out there?? – Stop it immediately, lest I must weep! … (is handed a Kleenex by Cristiano, and a bottle of booze by Slappy)
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Old 10-08-2019, 08:22 PM   #2992
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Can we see McMullens career and if he deserved to miss a first ballot induction by .5%?
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Old 10-09-2019, 03:13 AM   #2993
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Sure! McMullen snuck one of the Pitcher of the Year awards that Toner missed during his streak of dominance due to injury in 2016, and missed the triple crown by the strikeout crown that season - he came second behind teammate and HOF Rod Taylor by 15 K; Toner was fourth despite missing about ten games.

That aside, McMullen's claim to fame was longevity; he didn't miss a beat or a call to the mound for the first 14 seasons of his career. He had a handful of brief day-to-day issues, but was unable to play only twice during his career, and then for a total of seven days.

Of course the numbers aren't as flashy for him despite him having more wins and more strikeouts, but his ERA is half a run higher and the WHIP is nowhere near Jonny either. I don't think he's a first-ballot case, but I did vote for him anyway because I'm not some "nobody goes in first ballot!" jerk.
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Old 10-09-2019, 04:18 AM   #2994
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By early January, the Raccoons’ 2033 roster had largely but not fully taken shape. The rotation was in place and the only competition in the pen would be between Bryan Rabbitt and rule 5er Jesse Erickson over that final, long man spot. The decision was not trivial given that Rabbitt was out of options and it wasn’t sure that he’d clear waivers.

We’d try our luck with the catching tandem of Fernando Garcia and Elliott Thompson, but the rest of the batting personnel still had *some* wiggle room. While it was unlikely that any of the infield starters (Zitzner, Stalker, Ramos, Perkins) were going to be displaced, there was competition between Tom Hawkins, Justin Marsingill, and Sam Cass for the last two spots. Well, it was really between the latter two for the last spot. Neither were doing any roster they were on much good, and maybe a last-minute addition would fall from the sky there. In the outfield we were rather sure of our starting three with Billy Jennings in the middle and Wallace and Ferrero on either flank. Pinkerton remained as Swiss Army knife. There were no intentions for Ed Hooge to start the season in Portland, nor for Ivan Vega to be retained at all, so adding a pinch-hitter was entirely possible. Handedness didn’t really matter for the tack-on outfielder; between the four guys who were sure of their roster spots we had two right-handed and two left-handed batters.

Throughout the month I nibbled on other teams for their players because there wasn’t anything really exciting on the free agent market anymore. The Crusaders wouldn’t give up either Danny Tessmann (a detoxed former Elk) nor Chris Reardon for whatever scraps we were willing to send, which would surely include Ivan Vega.

I came across the broken Titans, too. Why are the Titans broken? They have ALL THE MONEY IN THE WORLD. Yes, but they were also weighed down by numerous multi-million dollar contracts to players 35 and up that were no longer productive, including pitchers Eric Williams, Alex Contreras, Jordan Caldwell and a few others. They had a $47M payroll on a $45M budget, which doesn’t quite ****ing tally out.

You probably also noticed that Adrian Reichardt – scourge of the Critters for more than a decade – had lost his starting spot in ’32 to a up-and-coming Moises Avila – scourge of the Critters for the next decade or so. Reichardt also had a sizable contract, but we sniffed an opening here. Our scout was sure that he was still productive if given a chance. Unfortunately, the 35-year-old former #1 pick (2018) Reichardt had gotten only about 200 at-bats in ’32 while succumbing to the Youth of a Nation. He had hit .273 with two homers, but he had never been about the power. Reichardt was a high-OBP guy with gap power and a splendid defender. His fielding stats (just over 200 innings in center and under 100 in left in ’32) looked *alright*, especially for a 35-year-old. Surely this wouldn’t be another Adam Braun-sized disaster, right?

Right?

+++

January 8 – The Blue Sox snatch ex-OCT SP Mark Morrison (94-92, 4.06 ERA) for 3-yr, $7.08M.
January 11 – Denver announces the addition of ex-TOP/IND MR Adam Rosenwald (35-32, 2.81 ERA, 68 SV) in a 3-yr, $4.8M scoop.
January 15 – The Dallas Stars sign 32-year-old ex-RIC C Elias Tovias (.252, 116 HR, 531 RBI) to a 4-yr, $4.9M contract.
January 17 – SFW SP Mike Ibarra (21-16, 4.09 ERA), who went 14-8 with a 4.23 ERA in 2033, is expected to miss most of the 2033 season after injuring his shoulder when he throws his controller in anger over losing in a baseball video game.
January 22 – The Raccoons pick up 35-year-old CF/LF Adrian Reichardt (.276, 112 HR, 810 RBI) from the overbudget Titans for 30-yr old LF/RF Ivan Vega (.286, 34 HR, 279 RBI), 26-yr old MR Bryan Rabbitt (0-2, 4.63 ERA, 1 SV), and 27-yr old AAA SP/MR Trevor Draper (5-7, 5.58 ERA).

+++

No, I will never learn.

Reichardt brings five rings, five Gold Gloves, a ROTY belt, a World Series MVP title, and somehow only three All Star nominations with him. Also a contract over $2.56M for this and next year (per year, in case you weren’t sure), with a $2.24M vesting option (135 games played) for ’35.

But hey, at least Maud is happy. The Reichardt bobblehead is already ordered. And fan interest was poked in the middle of winter, and the season ticket sale picked up some pace.

Elsewhere, former Raccoons made their way through chimneys into warm places, too: Rafael Gomez signed with the Aces for $336k; Jonathan Fleischer got 2-yr, $888k from the Gold Sox; Jared Stone inked in Oklahoma City for $660k; Matt Jamieson would hit a fourth CL North team after joining the Crusaders for $740k;

And that’s January done! I can already smell the new season drawing up! Can you smell it too?

Oh sorry, that’s actually somebody burning their steak on a Matt Nunley-supplied BBQ grill while they got their head stuck licking out the tub of Queen Creamy mayonnaise. – Raffaello! Your tongue isn’t gonna reach so far down! – Goddamnit, Maud, the fire extinguisher…!!
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Old 10-10-2019, 03:42 PM   #2995
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Westheim View Post
You probably also noticed that Adrian Reichardt – scourge of the Critters for more than a decade – had lost his starting spot in ’32 to a up-and-coming Moises Avila – scourge of the Critters for the next decade or so.

Don't do it man.


Quote:
Originally Posted by Westheim View Post
Reichardt also had a sizable contract, but we sniffed an opening here.

No...!


Quote:
Originally Posted by Westheim View Post
Our scout was sure that he was still productive if given a chance. Unfortunately, the 35-year-old former #1 pick (2018) Reichardt had gotten only about 200 at-bats in ’32 while succumbing to the Youth of a Nation.


NO OH LORD NO


Quote:
Originally Posted by Westheim View Post
He had hit .273 with two homers, but he had never been about the power. Reichardt was a high-OBP guy with gap power and a splendid defender. His fielding stats (just over 200 innings in center and under 100 in left in ’32) looked *alright*, especially for a 35-year-old. Surely this wouldn’t be another Adam Braun-sized disaster, right?

Right?

...


I believe he'll be a fine addition... he has to be a fine addition... please...
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Old 10-12-2019, 08:00 AM   #2996
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I was befallen by plague for the last 24 hours or so, but now I feel like I can continue the baseball gods’ good work without keeling ov- (thump! clang!)

+++

As the preseason approached, the Coons found themselves with a bottom 5 payroll (even after adding on Adrian Reichardt) and still only five players that made seven figures, two of which were the new arrivals Reichardt and Fernando Garcia, who made $2.56M and $1.04M respectively. The other big earners remained Tim Stalker ($2.8M), Alberto Ramos ($2.5M), and Rico Gutierrez ($2.09M). Those three added up to a whisker under $11M… which was 61.5% of the payroll.

…which made sense, because I fully expected those five to also pile up 60% or more of our DL time this season…

Then we got a message from a curious fan, Thorvald-Joe, age 9, from Clackamas, Oregon, who followed our offseason with interest but concern, and who wondered out loud where Manny Fernandez, age 22, fits in our current outfield plans with the addition of Reichardt, because once Manny Fernandez makes the major leagues, he is totally going to be Thorvald-Joe’s favorite player ever. (looks over the edge of the screen) Well, he’s nine, you can’t hold his age against his naivete, or whatever.

Well, Fernandez still has a spot of course. He actually has three because he can play all outfield positions very well. Since Reichardt is probably the starting centerfielder, that would leave him to share the corners with Jimmy Wallace, at least until #5 is struck by a sharply hit fly ball and out for the season. But Fernandez would start in AAA anyway, and for the time being we’d be kept company by Noel Ferrero (probably not a ****ty player in his own right), who could also find employ at first base if he hits whilst Zitz isn’t, and Billy Jennings. And you never know when you need Pinkerton to pitch with this staff…….. I hope this would answer little Thorvald-Joe’s question.

Was there a possibility to improve the team further with a backup infielder that would trump Justin Marsingill and Sam Cass? That was about the last disputed spot on the Opening Day roster, and it looked like the answer would be NO. The free agent market was picked thin, and we really didn’t have anything else to offer.

As the season neared, Cristiano Carmona informed me that Ignacio del Rio was posting in Spanish on Fudgebook about how his team sucked and how he wanted outta here.

That was nothing new of course; del Rio was the last main clubhouse distraction remaining on the roster, and it was on accounts of hope for him to be the third leg of the new Toner-Santos-Abe three-pronged assault on opposing lineups. Yeah, his 4.60 ERA last year (and 4.91 ERA for his career) was nothing to write home about, but he had just turned 23 in the new year. See, if a player is any good at all, you take the toxicity, hoping it will turn into hubris instead and then he’s fighting more himself than his teammates. Getting rid of del Rio would not have been a problem, several teams asked for him in trades, but the Raccoons’ chose not to, even though his scouting report literally reads that he is a cancer to his teammates. The Raccoons still clung on.

We’ll see what it gets them…

+++

February 13 – The Crusaders sign the final type A free agent of the season, ex-WAS CL Erik David (47-51, 3.57 ERA, 85 SV), who gets a 3-yr, $9.9M contract. The 32-year-old’s ERA looks worse than it is because he was a part-time starter for most of his career, especially with the Miners from 2026 to 2030. 62 of his 470 career games have been starts.
March 14 – The Raccoons sign 29-yr old ex-SFB C Tyler Turner (.261, 1 HR, 5 RBI) to a minor league contract with a $320k major league option.
March 17 – The Falcons ship C Matt Cooper (.247, 23 HR, 169 RBI) to the Scorpions for 2B/3B Gavin Westmoreland (.284, 10 HR, 94 RBI) and a second-rate prospect.
March 20 – The Raccoons announce the late addition of ex-SFW MR Ed Blair (34-25, 3.37 ERA, 36 SV) on a 1-yr, $450k contract.

+++

Other than almost anybody else, Blair was not added for his good conduct on and off the field, but because we saw a genuinely worthwhile reliever and told ourselves to hold on and consider. This led to Jesse Erickson being sent back to the Titans after we had taken him in the rule 5 draft in December. That Blair was rather cheap didn’t exactly hurt our interest.

Turner is certainly nothing you plan with; he got his old without compiling even 70 major league at-bats, and none in the last two seasons. And no, this sorry scrub did not hit his lone major league dinger off Mark Roberts or some other hapless Critter. It was Zhuo-cheng Li, who – shamed and disgraced – promptly retired. In fact he has one at-bat against an active current or former Critter, and that is Cory Dew.

Further former Furballs finding fruitful … employment – there’s no damn word with F that fits here!! Eh, yeah, Nate Hall jumped to the Cyclones for $432k; Mike Pizzo got on board with the Warriors for $346k; the Scorpions snatched Eddie Krumm for $312k; Billy Brotman was whirled into Oklahoma City by some nasty weather and would make $334k; the Rebels reserved a meager $302k for Dan McLin;
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Old 10-13-2019, 05:53 PM   #2997
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2033 PORTLAND RACCOONS – Opening Day Roster (first set in parenthesis shows 2032 stats, second set career stats; players with an * are off season acquisitions):

SP Bernie Chavez, 24, B:R, T:R (3-8, 4.67 ERA | 6-9, 4.43 ERA) – the first of three youngsters the Raccoons are waiting on to break out; with three main pitches including a 94mph heater, he could use some more movement on the fastball, which comes rather straight and can be tattered, but at least he doesn’t walk everything with legs.
SP Ignacio del Rio, 23, B:R, T:R (12-14, 4.60 ERA | 13-16, 4.91 ERA) – more young talent in the rotation, pretty decent stuff, but unfortunately with a rotten character that had him pretty soon stamped as clubhouse cancer. The Raccoons are willing to wait for him to turn into a star before they sent him to reeducation camp.
SP Raffaello Sabre, 24, B:L, T:R (5-8, 4.49 ERA | 8-10, 4.56 ERA) – and the third young pitcher which we still put great hopes in! All he has to do is to somehow double his strikeouts and half his walks, and get the defense to help him out, and then he can become a star!
SP Rico Gutierrez, 33, B:L, T:L (4-7, 4.97 ERA | 107-95, 3.69 ERA) – the baseball equivalent of a dying pet, Rico Gutierrez keeps swinging the pendulum back and forth between injuries and getting blown up and clobbered by opposing teams. He has lost all the stuff, and regularly gets taken deep… or to the DL. This is the final guaranteed year of the ill-advised 8-year contract Gutierrez got on the heels of some strong production in the mid-20s.
SP Andy Palomares *, 33, B:R, T:R (7-15, 4.46 ERA | 95-110, 4.30 ERA, 1 SV) – journeyman right-hander that at least has a record of durability, pitching to 200+ innings in eight out of the last nine years. His stuff is average, but he has strong command, but is homer-prone.

MR Victor Anaya, 30, B:R, T:R (6-4, 3.28 ERA | 8-7, 3.41 ERA) – pretty solid and reliable middle reliever that doesn’t get a lot of strikeouts, but also doesn’t make too many mistakes.
MR Nick Bates, 27, B:R, T:R (3-0, 2.78 ERA | 3-0, 3.42 ERA) – extremely erratic right-hander with short stamina, who walked six per nine innings over his brief career; has pitched for the Coons in each of the last three seasons, but also spent ample time in St. Pete every time and is thus out of options, which was about the only thing that protected his hairy bum at the start of the season.
MR John Hennessy, 25, B:L, T:L (7-2, 2.66 ERA, 1 SV | 9-2, 2.43 ERA, 1 SV) – was very impressive in his first full season that was not spent primarily on the DL, whiffing a whisker more than nine batters per nine innings while walking less than two. Almost looks like he is recommending himself for higher duties than mixed seventh-inning, long-man assignments.
MR David Fernandez, 26, B:L, T:L (2-3, 2.83 ERA | 3-4, 2.53 ERA) – this 2027 fifth-rounder flummoxed batters with a vicious slider, even though the fastball didn’t always arrive in the correct zip code, but which young lefty ever gets it over precisely where the catcher points at…?
SU Ed Blair *, 30, B:R, T:R (5-3, 3.18 ERA, 2 SV | 34-25, 3.37 ERA, 36 SV) – right-handed veteran that signed late in March after being a leftover on the free agent market. Not very high strikeout numbers, but he has had pretty good control and movement and keeps walks and homers down.
SU Mauricio Garavito, 31, B:L, T:L (4-3, 3.12 ERA, 2 SV | 15-15, 2.76 ERA, 9 SV) – left-hander with balanced splits that was claimed off waivers by the Bayhawks early in the 2029 season when Jeremy Moesker turned out to be a turd. Has since been really reliable, and in major news has yet to make us regret having given him a 4-year contract prior to the 2032 season.
CL Chris Wise, 26, B:R, T:R (5-2, 2.51 ERA, 33 SV | 10-7, 2.66 ERA, 59 SV) – the Tennesseeian groundballer Wise has become the first reliever to hold down the closer assignment for more than five minutes in recent memory and we generally don’t have too many complaints about what he does, although 8.5 K/9 is not exactly outrageous for a closer.

C Fernando Garcia *, 30, B:R, T:R (.282, 12 HR, 65 RBI | .266, 63 HR, 294 RBI) – All Star catcher acquired via trade from the dastardly devious Elks, who should Thompson continue to not work out is probably going to be our primary catcher for the next two years. Consistent above-average batter with over-the-fence power (career high 18 homers in 2030), and also a solid body of defensive work as he works well with pitchers and can throw out runners trying to commit robbery.
C Elliott Thompson, 23, B:L, T:R (.200, 4 HR, 12 RBI | .200, 4 HR, 12 RBI) – sixth-rounder (2028) that ranked as high as #32 in the prospect tables at one point, with stellar defense and game-calling, but unfortunately he couldn’t hit a damn lick in extended time in the majors in ‘32.

1B Travis Zitzner, 29, B:R, T:L (.256, 12 HR, 47 RBI | .278, 33 HR, 153 RBI) – acquired from the Stars for none other than Mark Roberts, Zitzner did hit the ball hard and far and sometimes outta there, but ultimately was inconsistent and merely won the full time job for this year because his platoon mate Jarod Howden was even worse and a constant and colossal annoyance.
2B/SS Tim Stalker, 34, B:R, T:R (.261, 6 HR, 61 RBI | .260, 95 HR, 616 RBI) – very good defensive middle infielder, more than just token speed, and most of the time also a good batter, at least until he hit a snag right after signing that big extension. Since then, Stalker has four seasons with OPS+ under 100, but at least he keeps collecting Gold Gloves (six total now) in his mid-30s...
SS Alberto Ramos, 27, B:L, T:R (.293, 0 HR, 36 RBI | .316, 14 HR, 291 RBI) – The Excitement missed 34 games as injuries returned to him after keeping him out of only five games in the last two seasons. He also failed to bat .300 for the first time since ’27, didn’t hit a homer, and failed to win the stolen base crown. This all sounds negative, but he is still about the perfect leadoff man, whenever he is healthy, with a .408 career on-base percentage and 374 nipped bags through his age 26 season.
3B/SS Justin Perkins, 32, B:R, T:R (.248, 14 HR, 89 RBI | .259, 21 HR, 139 RBI) – freed from oppression by the numerous star infielders on the Titans’ roster, this good defensive third baseman didn’t turn out to be an offensive terror, but at least won a Gold Glove the first time he got even a chance at playing regularly. Despite a .664 OPS he managed to lead the team in home runs and RBI, which says a thing or two about the 2032 offense.
3B/SS/2B Tom Hawkins *, 31, B:R, T:R (.294, 2 HR, 25 RBI | .281, 35 HR, 319 RBI) – free agent that used to be on the Bayhawks as a regular, but bounced around quite a bit in the last years, spending 2032 with the Crusaders as a backup, a function he will continue to perform for the ’33 Critters.
3B/2B/SS/RF Justin Marsingill, 26, B:R, T:R (.254, 1 HR, 24 RBI | .245, 1 HR, 24 RBI) – played his first substantial chunk of major league ball in ’32 and was a pretty poor hitter, but at least is defensively versatile and thus beat out Sam Cass for the final roster spot.

RF/LF Jimmy Wallace, 26, B:L, T:L (.281, 10 HR, 64 RBI | .281, 27 HR, 155 RBI) – 44 extra base hits ’32, although we would like a few more homers from Wallace, who is nothing short of a disaster on defense, and has yet to post a season where he’s worth at least one win more than a token replacement. He really has to start showing things of…
CF/LF Adrian Reichardt *, 35, B:R, T:R (.273, 2 HR, 23 RBI | .276, 112 HR, 810 RBI) – Reichard had won everything there was to win with the Titans, but then lost the fight against Moises Avila who was more than a decade his junior and waived his 10/5 rights to join the Critters and to get back into the starting lineup. He was by no means bad with the stick, and he remains a solid defender, even though he had quite a few injuries for the last few years. Undisputed centerfield starter to begin the season. Hey, maybe the second highly-paid Titans outfielder in two years will hit something other than the DL!
RF/LF/CF Billy Jennings *, 29, B:L, T:L (.268, 13 HR, 64 RBI | .256, 44 HR, 241 RBI) – acquired in a trade with the Cyclones, Jennings figured to be a full time regular until we somehow stumbled into the services of Adrian Reichardt, and will now platoon with Ferrero in a corner spot, most likely rightfield. He is a bit of a strikeout-prone hacker, while not hitting too many homers, which keeps his stats down.
LF/RF/1B/CF/SS Noel Ferrero *, 26, B:R, T:R (.247, 11 HR, 75 RBI | .252, 24 HR, 209 RBI) – very versatile backup outfielder that could be All Star material in a corner spot, but will have to be content with the short end of a platoon with Jennings after coming over from the Blue Sox in a trade. It’s not like he’s an amazing hitter, with a career 86 OPS+.
RF/CF/3B/2B Preston Pinkerton, 27, B:R, T:R (.268, 1 HR, 19 RBI | .268, 1 HR, 19 RBI) – a man of many talents, this pale-faced rookie not only showed of good defense and strong and agile hindpaws, but also became the Raccoons’ garbage pitcher of choice in 2032, pitching in 16 games and to an 8.10 ERA, which I want to point out was a better run rate than Tom Shumway’s, and for $3M less...

On disabled list: Nobody.

Otherwise unavailable: Nobody.

Other roster movement:
SP Travis Coffee, 25, B:R, T:R (5-7, 4.31 ERA | 5-7, 4.31 ERA) – run-of-the-mill righty with a distinct lack of stuff and mediocre control that might still have snuck into the rotation if not for the Palomares signing, but was optioned to St Pete to begin the season.
SP Jason Gurney, 27, B:R, T:L (6-13, 6.29 ERA | 18-24, 4.89 ERA) – came out of nowhere (well, St. Pete) early in 2031 after injuries and misery had already decimated the rotation, plugged right in and made 26 starts down the road with pretty nice overall stats, but our scout threw up all the red flags he had – and not for no reason. Gurney’s 2032 was a disaster top to bottom, and the poor sod is reassigned to AAA to get his **** together.
2B Sam Cass, 27, B:S, T:R (.313, 0 HR, 2 RBI | .237, 1 HR, 10 RBI) – waived and DFA’ed; 2005 Ugliest Baby Boy Sam Cass’ lack of versatility or defensive prowess or hitting acumen (his .313 clip came about in just 32 at-bats…) made him redundant no matter how pleasant his nature might be.
CF/RF/LF Ed Hooge, 23, B:L, T:L (.240, 2 HR, 27 RBI | .240, 2 HR, 27 RBI) – reassigned to AAA after not hitting anything at all despite getting ample chance to do so after the Adam Braun injury in ‘32.

Everybody not mentioned by now has already been waived or reassigned during the offseason.

OPENING DAY LINEUP:

Vs. RHP: SS Ramos – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – C Garcia – RF Jennings – 3B Perkins – 2B Stalker – P
(Vs. LHP: SS Ramos – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – C Garcia – 3B Perkins – RF Ferrero – 2B Stalker – P )

To be honest, they aren’t easy to line up, and it starts in the #2 spot. You want a guy that puts the ball in play and not where it hurts, and in the past Tim Stalker has been that guy, but I think we can get more from Reichardt at this point. Elliott Thompson will get regular starts against right-handers to begin the season, but not Opening Day against Adam Potter.

The bench is mostly right-handed but we will not regularly leave out either Ramos or Wallace against southpaws.

OFF SEASON CHANGES:

For the second year in a row the Raccoons divested themselves of more than 20 players and wouldn’t miss many of them. We only brought on a handful and change, not counting the odd minor league signing. Shrewd trading for veterans however saw the Raccoons finish TOPS of the offseason WAR gains table on BNN!

Too bad WAR is a useless stat…

Top 5: Raccoons (+9.1), Cyclones (+7.7), Gold Sox (+7.1), Pacifics (+6.4), Warriors (+5.7)
Bottom 5: Miners (-5.9), Knights (-6.3), Rebels (-7.4), Canadiens (-11.6), Thunder (-12.9)

Two of the departures returned on Opening Day, as rule 5 picks Chad Reinhardt and Steve Florence were returned to the Raccoons.

PREDICTION TIME:

Last year I laid an egg stating that maybe a .500 season wasn’t out of the question. Then the starting pitching collectively crapped out, the offense was a deserted ruin in the middle of nowhere, and we ended up losing a crisp 94 games.

This time everything will be better, though. The pitching (at least the part of the pitching that is not inherently terrible) will not end up on the DL, will not suck like a funnel, and the additions to the lineup will make an impact, and maybe Jimmy Wallace will catch a ball hit right at him from time to time and hit 30 homers himself. If all that comes together, we might actually win 85 games.

But knowing our luck… well, at least the top 3 starters have a decent chance to get better. We must not forget that they are still very young and can reasonably be expected to get better every year.

At least until their arms come off.

The Raccoons should be good enough for 76 wins, and maybe we can actually get a positive surprise or two.

PLAYER DEVELOPMENT:

During their years of dominance and two titles in the late 20s, the Coons completely burned down their farm to find more bits and pieces and ranked last in young material for the meat mincer several times before starting a slow rally that began to accelerate with a 17th place among all teams in 2031, 8th place last year, and all the way up to SECOND PLACE this season!

This rise continues despite us burning up some of our prospects in 2032, when our top prospect, ranked #15, was Raffaello Sabre, who of course spent all of the year in the majors… or on the DL. For the same reason (exceeded rookie limits), we also lost #78 Elliott Thompson, #120 Ignacio del Rio, #149 Justin Marsingill, #156 Ed Hooge, #185 Bernie Chavez, and #194 Travis Coffee, which amounts to six of our 16 ranked prospects from last season. And we still got better??

3rd (new) – A OF/3B/1B Jesus Maldonado, 19 – 2032 international free agent signed by Raccoons
7th (+145) – A SP Julian Ponce, 20 – 2029 international free agent signed by Raccoons
13th (new) – AA SP Brandon Williams, 20 – 2032 first-round pick by Raccoons
34th (new) – INT SS Juan Cerezo, 19 – 2029 scouting discovery by Raccoons
52nd (0) – AA SP Jonathan Dykstra, 23 – 2031 supplemental round pick by Raccoons

64th (-5) – AAA OF Manny Fernandez, 23 – 2031 first-round pick by Raccoons
66th (+46) – A SP Jonathan Galvan, 21 – 2028 international free agent signed by Raccoons
74th (+3) – AAA SP Darren Brown, 23 – 2028 first-round pick by Raccoons
107th (new) – A SS/2B Jose Agosto, 19 – 2030 international free agent signed by Raccoons
130th (-3) – AAA SP Jason Lucas, 23 – 2030 second-round pick by Raccoons

142nd (new) – A INF Vincent Zesati, 20 – 2029 international free agent signed by Raccoons
153rd (new) – AA 3B/2B Dusty Mahaney, 21 – 2032 supplemental round pick by Raccoons
175th (new) – A OF Dave Mendoza, 18 – 2031 international free agent signed by Raccoons

That is 13 players in the top 200, with a few more that were in last year having dropped out: #58 Will Luna, #129 Kyle Green, and #200 Barry Schuster are no longer ranked. All three are still in the organization however – we notably stayed away from trading any ranked prospect in a deal this winter!

The top 5 overall prospects this year are:

#1 PIT AA INF Sergio Barcia (was #1)
#2 LVA AA SP Chris Crowell (was #2)
#3 POR A OF/3B/1B Jesus Maldonado (newly signed)
#4 SAC AA OF/SS Jesus Banuelas (was unranked)
#5 WAS AAA SP Jerry Banda (was #9)

Last year’s #3 prospect, CHA A SP Chris Turner, missed all of 2031 and much of 2032 after Tommy John surgery and had a slow return, dropping to #26, but will be in AA to begin the season. The Scorpions’ RF Troy Greenway moved from A to AA, and dropped from #4 to #9, while his teammate, OF/1B Chris Sandstrom, also moved along with him, but dropped from #5 to #14.

Next: first pitch.
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Portland Raccoons, 83 years of excell-.... of baseball: Furballs here!
1983 * 1989 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1995 * 1996 * 2010 * 2017 * 2018 * 2019 * 2026 * 2028 * 2035 * 2037 * 2044 * 2045 * 2046 * 2047 * 2048 * 2051 * 2054 * 2055
1 OSANAI : 2 POWELL : 7 NOMURA | RAMOS : 8 REECE : 10 BROWN : 15 HALL : 27 FERNANDEZ : 28 CASAS : 31 CARMONA : 32 WEST : 39 TONER : 46 SAITO

Resident Mets Cynic - The Mets from 1962 onwards, here.
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Old 10-13-2019, 07:24 PM   #2998
DD Martin
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I don’t know this team could be a solid choice to get to 500+ this year. If the young pitchers continue to improve, if the bullpen stays solid enough, if Rico realizes he is in a contract year and finds his magic pills again, if Zitner can avoid the fallout of former dumb pig Howden being sent packing, and if the new medical examiner can develop a new tonic for the front office, then yes it can be done
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Old 10-15-2019, 11:03 AM   #2999
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Raccoons (0-0) vs. Titans (0-0) – April 4-6, 2033

Another season is here, and somehow the Titans are, too. Last year, the Coons won the first two games of the season from the Titans, but by the end of the year the teams were still separated by a good 40 games, just in the other direction. The Raccoons had won the season series from Boston only one in the last 11 years, and ’32 was no exception, with the Titans taking 11 of the 18 contests.

Projected matchups:
Bernie Chavez (0-0) vs. Adam Potter (0-0)
Ignacio del Rio (0-0) vs. Mario Gonzalez (0-0)
Raffaello Sabre (0-0) vs. Dustin Wingo (0-0)

We will get a right-hander on Opening Day, but then two southpaws right after that.

Game 1
BOS: CF M. Avila – SS Spataro – LF W. Vega – 1B Uliasz – C Lessman – 3B E. Gonzalez – RF M. Walker – 2B R. West – P Potter
POR: SS Ramos – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – C Garcia – RF Jennings – 3B Perkins – 2B Stalker – P Chavez

It took only two innings for Opening Day man Bernie Chavez to get taken apart by the Titans. Edgar Gonzalez homered to right, he walked the next two batters in Mark Walker and Rhett West, Potter bunted them over, and Moises Avila cashed them with a 2-out, 2-run double. In another sign that yearlong desolation wasn’t far from us, nobody got a hit the first time through for the Critters. Jimmy Wallace drew a 2-out walk in the first, Alberto Ramos drew a 2-out walk in the third. Berto stole second, but was stranded anyway when detitanized Adrian Reichardt grounded out to West. Through five, the Coons still had no base hits, and while Bernie Chavez held the Titans to the three knockers he had given up in the second, he also walked five while striking out seven, exploding his pitch count before long. His free passes to Justin Uliasz and David Lessman in the sixth put him near 100 pitches. He got Gonzalez on a liner to Staker (or rather Stalker got Gonzalez on that liner…), then was replaced with two outs. David Fernandez faced the lefty Walker and rung him up, keeping it 3-0 through the middle of the sixth. Noel Ferrero hit for Fernandez to begin the bottom 6th, but hit a comebacker, and two soft flies by Ramos and Reichardt had Potter on no-hit pace through six.

Then it got REALLY ugly. I mean, getting no-hit on Opening Day in your own sparsely attended park is one thing, but in the top of the seventh the Coons’ pen collectively crapped out. Nick Bates walked Moises Avila and Keith Spataro after getting two outs, then was yanked for John Hennessy, our lone 2032 All Star, who walked all three batters he faced before getting the old hook. Victor Anaya nailed Gonzalez to force in another run before Walker grounded out by accident. Three runs on no hits, or in other words, three runs and no hits more than the Coons had in the game as a whole. The no-hitter went away when Travis Zitzner hit a 1-out triple in the bottom 7th, but then was stranded on a Garcia K and Jennings lifting out softly to Willie Vega. Great – now we couldn’t even be special by getting NOPE’d on Opening Day! All that was left for the Critters now was a bewilderingly pathetic loss, and probably one of many this year… The Titans tacked on a run in the ninth on Garavito, who was betrayed by Tom Hawkins’ stupid error at second base after allowing a single to Lessman… and then allowed a couple more. Berto Ramos opened the bottom 9th with a double to left, but injured himself on the slide into second base, which was the point where I broke out the hard liquor. Wallace plated the pinch-running Justin Marsingill with a sac fly, but … ugh. UGH! … 7-1 Titans.

Alright. Buried deep in the debris of this colossal stinker of an opener, we sure can find some positives.

(takes another big gulp from the Capt’n Coma bottle)

Nope, got nothin’. Dr. Chung reports that Ramos has a strained rib cage muscle and will be day-to-day for the rest of the week. He can play, Dr. Chung declares, and should stop the whining before he will be forced to remove a rib manually. Berto, you better comply, I hear he does not think much of anesthetics. It’s the Pyongyang School of Medicine after all.

Game 2
BOS: CF M. Avila – SS Spataro – LF W. Vega – 1B Uliasz – C Lessman – 3B E. Gonzalez – RF M. Walker – 2B R. West – P M. Gonzalez
POR: RF Ferrero – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – C Garcia – 3B Perkins – SS Stalker – 2B Marsingill – P del Rio

DCC (Designated Clubhouse Cancer) Ignacio del Rio was determined to leave a mark this season, and started by leaving a mark in Moises Avila’s upper arm, nailing him with a 2-2 pitch to begin the game. Avila was then caught stealing by Fernando Garcia, which was surely ONE way to get outs. Del Rio went on to walk Spataro, Uliasz singled, Lessman walked, and with the bags full, Edgar Gonzalez grounded out to Stalker at short, with the iffy Berto not in the lineup, especially against a left-hander, and we expected the same for the third game. Yet, before we could go *there*, we had to complete this one. Reichardt got his 1,799th career hit – and the first not for Boston – with a first-inning single, Zitzner singled, too – a Coon with multiple hits on the season, and we are only in game TWO! – but Garcia grounded out to keep the Critters off the board.

After 30 pitches in the first, del Rio needed only a bit more than that for the next three while the game remained scoreless. Then he nailed Avila again in the fifth inning. On the 2-2 to Spataro, Avila went again – and Garcia killed him AGAIN! Spataro would work the walk, but be stranded on Vega’s grounder to Perkins. Mark Walker would be caught stealing in the sixth… but only after he singled home David Lessman, who himself had hit a double to right, breaking the scoreless tie. The Coons had three hits through five innings, a marked improvement from Monday, but could not get remotely into a position to threaten Mario Gonzalez. Del Rio lasted seven innings on 108 pitches, but nevertheless left the game on the hook. They didn’t get on base at all through the middle innings and into the eighth, in which first Garcia threw out another hopeful base stealer (Vega), and then Gonzalez leaked his first walk to Marsingill to lead off the bottom 8th. To considerable cheers, Alberto Ramos appeared as pinch-hitter for Ed Blair, who made his Coons debut in scoreless fashion, then flew out to Vega. Ferrero and Reichardt fared little better, and Marsingill was stranded. Hennessy held the Titans away in the ninth, actually retiring somebody in the process to get rid of the infinite ERA for ’33, and then it would be Jermaine Campbell against the “meat” of the Coons’ so-far-3-hit order. Wallace hit a ball well, but into Avila’s glove. Zitzner whiffed. Jennings was sent for Garcia, and grounded out to short. 1-0 Titans. Zitzner 2-4; del Rio 7.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 4 K, L (0-1);

(looks like it has rained for 78 consecutive days)

Game 3
BOS: CF M. Avila – SS Spataro – LF W. Vega – 1B Uliasz – C Lessman – RF M. Walker – 3B T. Johnson – 2B R. West – P Wingo
POR: RF Ferrero – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – C Garcia – 3B Perkins – 2B Stalker – SS Hawkins – P Sabre

The Critters had the leadoff man on a couple of times in the early going. Noel Ferrero landed his first base knock as a Furball with a single in the bottom 1st, but was doubled up by Reichardt. Zitzner and Garcia drew leadoff walks in the second, but Perkins hit into a double play and Stalker flew out to center, and nobody scored as per usual. Meanwhile Sabre coolly and calmly retired the first 11 Titans he faced before walking Vega in the fourth. Vega stole second, but was left on when Uliasz flew out to center. Not a lot of hitting going on here! Well, Mark Walker hit a single in the fifth, but that was also it again for the offense.

To say that offense was at a premium for either team was maybe an understatement. Spataro’s soft 2-out single between Perkins and Hawkins was only the third base hit of the game in total, and it came in the top of the sixth. Vega grounded out to the mound to end that inning. Reichardt hit a 2-out single in our half of the sixth, but Wallace fell asleep in a hit-and-run and Reichardt was thrown out at second base to end the frame. Wallace led off the following inning with a leadoff single, and the Coons immediately sprung a pinch-runner from the dugout, Pinkerton. Zitzner grounded out, Garcia was walked intentionally, and Perkins and Stalker… both grounded out. Scoreless through seven, Sabre pissed the game away in the eighth. Edgar Gonzalez hit a leadoff single from the #7 spot, and he took Rhett West’s comebacker to second base, but not in time. Two on, no outs, Sabre was sent packing for Anaya once the right-handed pinch-hitter Roberto Avila was announced. He WALKED him, loading the bases, causing me the greatest pains, especially in my throat, from all the screaming, and in my forehead, from banging it against the wall so hard and so often that Maud looked in on me with great concern a couple of times. Then Moises Avila popped out in foul ground, Spataro popped out to Pinkerton in the very shallow outfield regions, and suddenly we had a chance. With Vega up, Garavito replaced Anaya, gave up an RBI single to the leftfielder, and a 2-run single to Uliasz, and with that I slumped face down into a pillow on the brown couch, or maybe it was Slappy’s crotch, I can’t remember, but it was soft and comforting and I didn’t have to see this on-field embarrassment anymore. 3-0 Titans. Ferrero 2-4, 2B; Sabre 7.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, L (0-1);

(calmly reads from the stats on the display competently held by Cristiano Carmona) That would be Perkins 0-for-10. Stalker 0-for-8. Garcia 0-for-9. Ferrero 1-for-9. Wallace 1-for-9. In short, we have TWO hitters with clips better than .200; that would be Ferrero (2-for-9) and Zitzner (3-for-11).

(hollers at the mascot balancing a baseball on his nose in the corner) Chad, stop it!! – No! Wait! Come back! – Can you hold a bat? – (Chad makes an “alright, let’s get on it” fist bump)

Raccoons (0-3) vs. Condors (2-2) – April 8-10, 2033

There was nothing good to report about the Raccoons. The Condors had scored 20 runs in their split with the Baybirds, but had also given up 21, so maybe we could find an opening for our first marker on the board since Jimmy Wallace’s sac fly on Monday… The Condors are probably not in the mood for games; we memorably won the season series from them last year, 6-3, which was really against all odds.

Projected matchups:
Rico Gutierrez (0-0) vs. Steve Gowan (0-0)
Andy Palomares (0-0) vs. Jeff Little (0-0, 9.00 ERA)
Bernie Chavez (0-1, 4.76 ERA) vs. Josh Irwin (0-1, 3.86 ERA)

With Gowan and Little we will face four left-handers in our first five games.

Game 1
TIJ: CF C. Murphy – SS C. Miller – RF Willie Ojeda – 3B Sanks – 1B McGrath – C J. Wood – LF Sung – 2B Hansen – P Gowan
POR: RF Ferrero – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – 3B Perkins – SS Stalker – C Thompson – 2B Marsingill – P Gutierrez

The Condors scored three before Rico Gutierrez logged an out. Sending me to dissolving a few anti-diarrhea and wonder hair-growth pills in my booze was the nice sequence of walk, stolen base, RBI single, single, wild pitch, 2-run single, before Kevin McGrath hit into a double play to erase the insufferable Shane Sanks, too. John Hansen clanked a homer off the left foul pole in the second to run the tally to 4-0, but then the Coons loaded the bases in the bottom of the inning. Tim Stalker shook off the season-long oh-fer with a single to left, Thompson got nailed, and Marsingill dropped a soft one to Yeong-ha Sung’s feet. That brought up … Rico Gutierrez with one out. A terrible pitcher that was also a terrible hitter. And the Raccoons didn’t make a move right here, because it was Opening Week and not exactly Game 7 of the World Series… Everybody moved up a base on Gutierrez’ groundout, which gave him an RBI and allowed him to tie for the team lead in ribbies… (looks like he’s definitely ready to cry if Ferrero doesn’t plate two instantly here) …and then Ferrero grounded out to the skunk weasel at third base. Lo and behold, Portland got a second run in the bottom 3rd, Perkins doubling home Zitzner in a 2-out rally, at least until Stalker fanned on three pitches. It was 4-2 after three.

The tying runs were on with nobody down in the fourth after Gowan walked the 7-8 hitters on base. Gutierrez bunted terribly, getting Thompson forced out and keeping the tying run – now himself – at first base. Ferrero reached on Gowan’s clumsy error on what would have been at least one out on a pathetic grounder, loading the sacks for Reichardt, who owned a couple o’ hundred RBI against the Raccoons and should now please start to make it up to us. He got to 3-1 against the wavering Gowan, then poked the ball to left, but JUST past the lunging Sanks for an RBI single, inching the Critters closer, 4-3. Wallace laid off ball four in the dirt to push in the tying run and to become the first Critter with multiple RBI on the season. And then the remainder of the stupid first base platoon from last year zitzed a grounder into a 6-4-3 inning-ender…

But they took the lead the next inning. Gowan disintegrated for straight singles to by the 5-6-7 hitters to begin the bottom 5th, with Elliott Thompson singling home Perkins to take the lead. Marsingill beat Chris Murphy for an RBI double in center, and with Gowan gone, the Critters got one more run on a Ferrero groundout to establish a 7-4 edge. Gutierrez was still in the game, but the pe was stirring as the sixth began, ready to enter at the slightest provocation, and he was on 89 pitches anyway. Singles by Kevin McGrath and Sung brought on Ed Blair, who got a fly to deep right from Hansen that Ferrero thankfully caught. A lefty pinch-hitter in Bobby Fernandez in the #9 hole brought in Garavito after only one batter. Fernandez struck out in a full count, stranding the runners. Garavito was good for another inning, and Anaya handled the eighth, which also saw Jennings double in Ferrero’s spot before scoring on a Reichardt single. David Fernandez got the ninth, but put Hansen and Murphy on base; the Critters could not wait for good times to occur naturally, they had to go to Chris Wise. Their closer had pitched a garbage inning in the Titans series, but now got the final out from Chris Miller in groundout fashion for his first save of the year. 8-4 Furballs. Jennings (PH) 1-1, 2B; Reichardt 3-5, 2 RBI; Perkins 2-4, 2B, RBI; Stalker 2-4; Thompson 1-2, BB, RBI; Marsingill 2-3, BB, 2B, RBI;

A win…! A win…! Yaaay …!! (runs around the offices, screaming)

Game 2
TIJ: LF C. Murphy – SS C. Miller – RF Willie Ojeda – 3B Sanks – 1B McGrath – C J. Wood – CF Sung – 2B Hughes – P Little
POR: SS Ramos – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – C Garcia – 3B Perkins – RF Ferrero – 2B Stalker – P Palomares

Three pitches by Palomares yielded two singles by the Chrises atop the Condors’ order, and Ojeda’s sac fly gave them their only first-inning run before the skunk weasel popped out and McGrath fanned. Portland flipped the score in the bottom 1st; Ramos drew a leadoff walk, but was forced out by Reichardt. After a K to Jimmy Wallace, both Zitzner and Garcia hit RBI doubles off the fence to put the Coons up 2-1 before Perkins grounded out to short. Before long, though, the Condors found extra-base heaven in leftfield. Little (!) and Miller hit extra-base hits around Wallace’s pointed hairy ears in the top 3rd, which tied the game, and Palomares gave them the lead back when he balked Miller across with two outs. And that was not the only leadoff double that Jeff Little hit in this game – he did it AGAIN in the fifth, then was scored by Willie Ojeda’s 2-out single, 4-2 Condors…!

The Condors kept riffing off extra-base hits; in the seventh a Chris Miller double knocked out Palomares after six and a third of nothing great at all, and while Bates rung up Ojeda, Sanks extended the lead to 5-2 with an RBI double past Wallace (where else?). The Raccoons had not done anything of value in the meantime, twice putting a pair on only to immediately hit into a double play, Ferrero and Perkins being the culprits. Preston Pinkerton ripped a pinch-hit double to knock out Little in the bottom 7th, but Ramos and Reichardt couldn’t get him across against Ethan Jordan. Bottom 8th, Jose Ornelas walked both Zitzner and Garcia… and then got a double play from Perkins to end the inning. Nope, this was not our game. 5-2 Condors. Zitzner 1-2, 2 BB, 2B; Garcia 3-3, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; Stalker 1-2, BB; Pinkerton (PH) 1-1, BB, 2B;

It will remain good tradition on this team that everybody gets at least one start during the first week of the season, if at all possible. The only position player that didn’t get the nod into the lineup so far was Preston Pinkerton, so we’d give Reichardt a day off on Sunday. Stalker and Zitzner would also not be in the lineup, leaving only Perkins and Wallace with six lineup assignments to begin the season.

Game 3
TIJ: LF C. Murphy – SS C. Miller – RF Willie Ojeda – 3B Sanks – 1B McGrath – C J. Wood – CF Camps – 2B Hughes – P Irwin
POR: SS Ramos – RF Jennings – LF Wallace – 1B Ferrero – 3B Perkins – 2B Hawkins – C Thompson – CF Pinkerton – P Chavez

Pinkerton’s sac fly plated Hawkins from third base for the first run of the game, the first time all year (…) that the Coons had gone up 1-0 in a game! Hawkins and Thompson had parked on the corners with a pair of hits with one down; Chavez flew out easily to Ojeda to end the inning, but at that point at least had rung up four Condors already, including everybody in the top of the first. That didn’t keep the disgusting skunk weasel from homering the game tied in the fourth though…

Leadoff singles put Perkins and Hawkins on the corners with nobody out in the bottom 4th, but also brought up the weak bottom of the order… although, frankly, none in the top 5 was hitting better than .200 at this stage, either. It took two attempts at outfield flies to get Perkins home from third, so Pinkerton was now oh-fer-zip with 2 RBI in a 2-1 game, and Chavez again made the final out. On to the fifth, the singles continued to fall in. Jennings and Wallace went to the corners with a pair of them, and with one down Noel Ferrero hit a sac fly to center. Whatever works, boys! A crucial spot in the 3-1 game arrived in the sixth inning. Miller had singled with one out, but had been forced out on an Ojeda grounder (in a 3-0 count). Chavez nailed Sanks with two outs (better than a bomb, I say!) then carved up McGrath with breaking pitches to get to 1-2 before blowing him away up high. THAT’S WHERE I LIKE IT!!

Bernie lasted seven innings on 100 pitches sharp, walking Andy Hughes with two outs in the last frame before getting a pop to himself from PH Ken Hess, maintaining a 3-1 lead throughout. His spot was also leading off in the bottom 7th, with Tim Stalker grabbing a stick on his behalf and drawing a leadoff walk against Josh Heckman. Ramos and Jennings made poor outs before Heckman left with an injury, and when the Condors replaced him with another lefty in Juan Garcia, the Critters sent Zitzner to bat for Wallace… but Stalker was picked off to end the inning. Stalker and Zitzner remained in the game (with Ferrero to left) to shore up the old D while Fernandez entered to face the top of the order. He faced three, walked them all, and I consigned myself to more drinking while Ed Blair jogged in from the pen. But Blair battled through; Ferrero made a catch in deep left on Sanks for a sac fly (but Wallace doesn’t get that one at all…), Blair rung up a lost-looking McGrath, and Pinkerton casually handled Jimmy Wood’s fly, keeping Portland 3-2 ahead. Back at the plate, Zitzner led off the bottom 8th with a jack to right, the Coons’ first homer of the season (moans), and at least Wise would see the bottom of the order in the ninth. Juan Camps grounded right into Wise’s pocket, and Hughes popped out to Jennings in shallow right. Sung pinch-hit in the #9 hole, grounded out to Stalker, and the Condors had dropped their fourth straight set to the Coons. 4-2 Furballs! Wallace 2-2, BB; Zitzner (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; Hawkins 2-3, 2B; Pinkerton 0-1, 2 BB; Chavez 7.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 9 K, W (1-1);

In other news

April 4 – Warriors SP Pat Okrasinski (1-0, 0.00 ERA) enters the record books by no-hitting the Wolves on Opening Day, and with 12 strikeouts to boot. The only Wolves baserunner is OF/1B Rai Higashi (.000, 0 HR, 0 RBI), who is hit by an Okrasinski pitch. This is the 62nd no-hitter in ABL history and only the second for the Warriors after Juan Muniz no-hit the Blue Sox in ’29.
April 6 – IND SP David Saccoccio (0-1, 7.71 ERA) will miss a month with elbow soreness.
April 10 – Recurring elbow soreness will cost SFW CL Gilberto Castillo (0-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 SV) the first half of the 2033 season.

Complaints and stuff

Speaking of Opening Day no-hitters…

The Coons were the only team to go 0-3. The Titans, who held them to one hit in the opening series, then were also slaughtered to the tune of TWENTY-SEVEN by the Knights, so they were by no means impossible to score upon… On the other hand we keep owning the Condors, a 100-win team for several recent seasons, so that’s that.

Our offense has of course been nothing short of … there is probably no word Maud will let me say without making me wash my mouth with soap. This much – among qualifying batters (which is a wonky stat this early), Zitzner leads all Critters with a .278 mark, followed by Reichardt’s .227, and that’s that for non-Interstate batting averages. Nobody has even 3 RBI. On the other hand, each of our three young pitchers had a good outing already. Yes, they all three have a loss already, but it wasn’t all their own fault, either…

Oh and by the way, we’ll be in Atlanta to begin the next week, y’know, that team that scored TWENTY-SEVEN times as many runs against the Titans as we did…

Fun Fact: Pat Okrasinski’s no-hitter is the first to occur on Opening Day, but not the earliest in a calendar year that a pitcher has no-hit the opposition. Dan George no-hit the Crusaders on April 3, 1996.

George was a 23-year-old third-year player then. He had a very decent career, lasting 18 seasons for the Indians and Buffaloes, and piling up 218 wins against 186 losses and a 3.71 ERA, also 2,516 strikeouts. He was a 3-time All Star, but only twice led a triple crown category (leading the FL in wins in 2002 and 2004), and never won a bigger award. He got no Hall of Fame consideration in 2016, dropping off the first ballot.

…but if you add in that 1996 was a leap year, it was actually the same number of day in the year, just by another name…! We (points to the crew with Chad wearing the costume with a red-and-yellow “thinker cap” with a propeller, Cristiano typing eagerly on the laptop, Maud knitting a sweater with a big orange “?” on the front, and Slappy tending to a beer) will be puzzling about this one for a while.
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Portland Raccoons, 83 years of excell-.... of baseball: Furballs here!
1983 * 1989 * 1991 * 1992 * 1993 * 1995 * 1996 * 2010 * 2017 * 2018 * 2019 * 2026 * 2028 * 2035 * 2037 * 2044 * 2045 * 2046 * 2047 * 2048 * 2051 * 2054 * 2055
1 OSANAI : 2 POWELL : 7 NOMURA | RAMOS : 8 REECE : 10 BROWN : 15 HALL : 27 FERNANDEZ : 28 CASAS : 31 CARMONA : 32 WEST : 39 TONER : 46 SAITO

Resident Mets Cynic - The Mets from 1962 onwards, here.
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Old 10-16-2019, 02:18 PM   #3000
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Raccoons (2-4) @ Knights (3-3) – April 11-13, 2033

The first road series of the year would take the Critters almost all the way across the continent to see the Knights in Atlanta. As indicated they had just slapped off the Titans for 27 runs and had 41 total in their six games, which was not something you liked to go up against with questionable pitching and hitting. Despite their 3-3 record, they had a +14 run differential early on. Last season we had lost six of nine games against Atlanta, but that was still better than the 1-8 outcome in ’31…

Projected matchups:
Ignacio del Rio (0-1, 1.29 ERA) vs. Justin Osterloh (0-1, 3.86 ERA)
Raffaello Sabre (0-1, 2.57 ERA) vs. Gabriel Lara (1-0, 1.13 ERA)
Rico Gutierrez (1-0, 6.75 ERA) vs. Chris Inderrieden (0-1, 14.73 ERA)

Three right-handers to take swings at after we saw four lefties in the first week.

Game 1
POR: SS Ramos – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – C F. Garcia – 3B Perkins – RF Jennings – 2B Stalker – P del Rio
ATL: LF Inoa – C S. Garcia – 1B Avakian – RF Pincus – 3B Maneke – 2B J. Johnson – SS Thomson – CF McAllester – P Osterloh

Portland got on the board first, loading the bags with Reichardt and Wallace singles as well as a 4-pitch walk to Travis Zitzner in the first inning, but then only managed two groundouts by Fernando Garcia (scoring Reichardt) and Perkins. The bags would be full again in the third inning, and again with one out. Wallace walked, Zitzner singled, and Garcia took one in the bum to present Justin Perkins, last year’s team RBI king, with a fat chance as well as plenty of double play candidates on the bases. Perkins slapped a 1-2 pitch over Keith Thomson for an RBI single, though, before Billy Jennings hit a fly to center that Justin McAllester caught. Zitzner was sent from third base – and thrown out, keeping the score 2-0, at least until del Rio got turned inside-out in the bottom of the inning. A Steve Garcia single in the first and Chris Maneke getting drilled in the second had already seen traffic for Atlanta, but they had both times hit into a double play. No such luck in the third, which began with a Thomson double to right, and continued through a McAllester-drawn walk, a good bunt, Luis Inoa’s sac fly, and Steve Garcia’s single to tie the game, and because that was not enough, Adam Avakian rammed a ball over the fence in right to put the Knights 4-2 up.

That wasn’t the end of it all, though. Come the fifth, the Raccoons would first see disappointment that a Jimmy Wallace fly to deep right was caught by Roy Pincus while standings right against the fence, but then went to work on Osterloh with two outs. Fernando Garcia’s 2-out single started a string of four straight base hits for the Critters, Perkins singling, Jennings chipping in an RBI single, and Stalker plating two and putting Portland back in front, 5-4, with a double to the base of the leftfield wall. Del Rio retired the Knights in order in the bottom of the inning, becoming eligible for a potential W. He would retire the next four batters, then yield for Hennessy with left-handers Thomson and McAllester up. Both reached, requiring a second rescue party headed by Ed Blair, who navigated the Coons out of the inning against pinch-hitters Cesar Martinez and Stephen Williams. Blair entered in a double switch that saw Hawkins replace Perkins at third base; when Julio San Pedro nicked Jennings to begin the top 8th, Stalker’s groundout moved the runner to second, from where Hawkins doubled him home with a gapper to right-center. That brought up Berto, 0-for-4 in the game and slightly worrisomely 1-for-18 on the season. He still struck fear in the hearts of the Knights, who reasoned that a turnaround was nigh, and was walked intentionally so they could rather mess with the right-handed Reichardt, who promptly hit into a double play to end the inning. Blair and Wise, respectively, in the bottom 8th and 9th each allowed a leadoff single then. While Blair got a double play, Wise didn’t bloody quite; following Maneke’s single, John Johnson popped to shallow center, and Reichardt hustled in and reached for it, but had the ball clonk off the tip of his glove for a harshly charged error. That put the tying run at the plate with nobody out; Thomsen bunted the tying runs into scoring position, but McAllester weakly fanned against Wise, bringing up PH Eric Martins, right-hander and 0-for-2 this season. The backup catcher walloped a 3-1 pitch to deep center, but this time Reichardt was there comfortably and closed the leather firmly to end the game. 6-4 Critters! Perkins 3-4, RBI; Jennings 1-2, BB, RBI; Hawkins 1-1, 2B, RBI;

Game 2
POR: SS Ramos – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – C F. Garcia – 3B Perkins – RF Jennings – 2B Stalker – P Sabre
ATL: LF Inoa – SS Thomson – 1B Avakian – RF Pincus – 3B Maneke – 2B J. Johnson – C Martins – CF McAllester – P Lara

Both pitchers faced the minimum the first time through the order; the Coons were held to a Jennings walk to lead off the third, which bled nicely into Stalker’s 6-4-3 double play, while Luis Inoa had hit a leadoff single in the first, but had been nipped trying to steal second base. We didn’t get a base hit of our own until the fifth, when Zitzner snuck a single past Maneke, only to get the 6-4-3 treatment from Fernando Garcia. The Coons remained being held to 18 plate appearances through six innings, but the neat and tidy line serviced by Sabre received a blip in the bottom 6th when of all people the pitcher Lara singled with two outs. Sabre shrugged it off – and nipped a dreamy Lara with a pickoff throw to first, ending the inning anyway!

Top 7th, Ramos hit a liner to center that fell and ran away from McAllester for a leadoff double. Alright, here it comes! This was also Ramos’ second hit of the year, all doubles, and the first one on which he didn’t tweak his brittle body… Reichardt grounded out, moving him to third, after which the Knights set up a double play with an intentional walk to Wallace. And they got their double play – but from Garcia, after Zitzner hit slapped an RBI single to center for the first marker to be put up on the scoreboard. Sabre’s minimum game also ended in the seventh as he walked Thomson and allowed a single to Pincus, but escaped the jam unharmed when Maneke flew out to Reichardt. Top 8th, Lara came apart with great noise: Perkins hit a leadoff jack, Jennings ripped a triple into the corner, Stalker walked, and Sabre and Ramos both hit RBI singles to get to 4-0. Two more runs scored against reliever Drew Johnson, Wallace landing an RBI single and Zitzner plating a run with a sac fly. This gave Sabre a sizable cushion, although a shutout was dubious given that he entered the bottom 8th up by six, but also only 13 pitches shy of 100. Running two full counts in the eighth and walking McAllester didn’t help. He still entered the ninth, albeit on 103 pitches. He struck out Inoa to get going, but in another full count. Thomson’s single ended his day, with David Fernandez securing the last two outs. 6-0 Coons! Ramos 2-4, 2B, RBI; Zitzner 2-3, 2 RBI; Jennings 1-2, BB, 3B; Sabre 8.1 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 3 K, W (1-1) and 1-4, RBI;

The inspiring pitching displays by the youth movement continue. The three kits are now 3-3, but with a 2.40 ERA.

Now to the roster fillers at the end of the rotation…

Game 3
POR: SS Ramos – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – RF Jennings – 3B Perkins – 2B Marsingill – C Thompson – P Gutierrez
ATL: LF Inoa – C S. Garcia – 1B Avakian – RF Pincus – 3B Maneke – 2B J. Johnson – SS Thomson – CF Seago – P Inderrieden

…and with Rico Gutierrez came the cringe. The Knights had three on and nobody out in the bottom 2nd, courtesy of a leadoff single by Pincus and then two clueless walks offered by Gutierrez. Thomson popped out and Nate Seago hit into a fielder’s choice to hold them to one run before Inderrieden flew out to Jennings in worryingly-deep rightfield, and that was about as well as Rico Gutierrez managed the opposing lineup in this game. Avakian hit a double in the third, Pincus got nailed, and somehow the Knights were robbed when Marsingill leapt to rob Maneke of a sure line drive RBI single, instead ending the inning. The Critters didn’t have much going the first time through, but Wallace hit a leadoff single in the top 4th to get the tying run on base. Inderrieden lost both Zitzner and Jennings on balls, loading the sacks with nobody out. Alright, boys, you have to score now! For the second time in the series, Perkins was in a crucial spot, fell to 1-2, and then slapped an RBI single over the shortstop Thomson, tying the game. Another Justin to the plate, another run-scoring single: Marsingill’s bouncer up the leftfield line score two, with the remaining runners advancing on Luis Inoa’s throw to home plate. Thompson was walked intentionally in the 3-1 game to get the pitcher to the plate. Rico struck out, but Berto squeezed out a walk to push in another run. Reichardt hit into a 5-4-3 double play to end the inning.

Up 4-1, the game became about dragging Gutierrez through five somehow and then reevaluating where we were. While the Coons’ hurler issued a walk in both the fourth and fifth innings, those runners didn’t go anywhere and the score remained the same through five indeed, but with Gutierrez already near 90 messy pitches. The Critters tacked on a run in the top 6th then, which Marsingill opened with a triple to the fence in right-center before being singled home by Elliott Thompson, which was key for Rico, who now was retained to bunt with a 4-run lead and no outs. The Knights walked Ramos intentionally, then got another double play grounder from Reichardt to end the inning. Gutierrez faced two batters in the bottom 6th, both Maneke and Johnson singled, and there came the old hook! Garavito replaced him in a lefty-for-lefty move that spoke of confidence in a pitcher that had been eroded to the bare base rock. Garavito faced three batters, retired none, with a Thomson single, bases-loaded walk to Nate Seago, and an RBI single by Williams getting the Knights to 5-3. Ed Blair replaced him and ALMOST salvaged the game… but after two outs Avakian slapped a 1-2 pitch for a game-tying single to right. Pincus struck out, too little, too late.

Wallace opened the seventh with a single off Arturo Arellano, but was doubled off by Zitzner, which was one of those ****ty tricks by third-rate birthday clowns dabbling in magic when not stoned to the gills. Let’s make all the runners disappear – wheee!! Jennings reached on an Avakian error, which suddenly opened up another 2-out rally. Perkins singled. Marsingill hit an RBI single. Thompson hit an RBI single. Ferrero hit for Blair, but flew out to left, keeping the score at 7-5. Wallace and Zitzner reached with two outs in the eight, but Jennings grounded out to short, while the Coons to their own surprise picked six outs from John Hennessy with no Knight getting on in the seventh or eighth. Wise kept the hindpaw on the Knights’ necks – he retired Garcia, Avakian, and Pincus in order in the ninth, sealing the sweep. 7-5 Coons! Wallace 3-5; Perkins 2-5, RBI; Marsingill 4-5, 3B, 2B, 3 RBI; Thompson 2-4, BB, 2 RBI; Hennessy 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Raccoons (5-4) @ Indians (4-4) – April 14-17, 2033

Now for four in Indy, where the Arrowheads ranked eighth in runs scored and ninth runs allowed early in the season. We had lost the season series, 8-10, last season, with winners in the contest alternating each of the last four seasons. Our turn, Indians, move over already!

Projected matchups:
Andy Palomares (0-1, 7.11 ERA) vs. Victor Govea (1-0, 1.29 ERA)
Bernie Chavez (1-1, 2.84 ERA) vs. Sal Bedoya (1-0, 1.13 ERA)
Ignacio del Rio (1-1, 3.38 ERA) vs. Andy Bressner (0-1, 4.05 ERA)
Raffaello Sabre (1-1, 1.17 ERA) vs. Lance Legleiter (0-1, 9.00 ERA)

All their four starters were righties; we’d miss sole southpaw John McInerney (0-1, 5.56 ERA).

Game 1
POR: SS Ramos – RF Marsingill – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – C Garcia – 3B Perkins – CF Jennings – 2B Stalker – P Palomares
IND: LF Acor – 2B Schneller – C J. Herrera – RF Plunkett – 1B Barber – 3B Czachor – CF Ryu – SS DiGiacomo – P Govea

The Furballs took an early lead in the second, with Perkins and Jennings reaching base to start the inning. They were still looking towards home plate in eager anticipation, then in scoring position, when still-well-below-.200 Alberto Ramos stepped in and knocked a 2-run double to right. Marsingill singled him home, becoming the team RBI leader with five in one of those quirky developments hard to explain in less than a thousand words. On the other end of the box score, however, Andy Palomares was being singled to death. The Indians had two hits in the first, and three more in the second, with the opposing pitcher Govea plating Ryan Czachor with a 2-out RBI single to make it a 3-1 game through two innings. This was with Palomares facing an entirely right-handed lineup. The offending Govea wasn’t around much longer, though. He got zero more outs after his run-scoring knock, putting on Zitzner and Garcia to start the top 3rd, serving up an RBI double to Perkins, and then a booming homer to Billy Jennings – 7-1 and exit stage right. But Palomares threatened to follow him soon; in the bottom 3rd he allowed a jack to Juan Herrera, a double to Mike Plunkett, and then another homer to Czachor, cutting the lead in half. Jimmy Wallace responded with a home run off Matt Beckstrom in the fourth, 8-4, but Palomares kept being rattled, walked Czachor in the fifth, and then served up another bomb to Hiroaki Ryu. He barely dragged himself through five innings, still ahead 8-6, but was hit for to begin the Critters’ half of the sixth. Reichardt singled off Beckstrom in his spot, then hustled to third base when Berto singled to right. The advance drew a throw by Mike Plunkett, which Berto used to scurry to second, so we had two in scoring position with no outs. Marsingill hit a sac fly, 9-6, before Wallace was walked intentionally by Beckstrom, who yielded for Juan Melendrez, who in turn lost Zitzner on balls. Three on, one out for Fernando Garcia, who hit the second sac fly of the inning and was the only out Melendrez got for a while. Perkins hit an RBI single, Jennings singled, too, and Stalker walked with the bases loaded, at which point it was a 12-6 game and pinch-hitter Adrian Reichardt, who had begun the inning, was back at the plate and squeezed out a walk in a full count, 13-6. Ramos grounded out to Dan Schneller to bring an end to the 5-run sixth. Nick Bates gave the Coons two scoreless innings in the sixth and seventh, after which some regulars were removed from a game that seemed thoroughly out of hand and remained so. Anaya and Fernandez collected the final six outs for the Coons, who won their fifth straight. 13-6 Furballs!! Ramos 2-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Pinkerton 1-1; Wallace 2-4, BB, HR, RBI; Perkins 3-5, 2B, 2 RBI; Jennings 4-5, HR, 3 RBI; Reichardt (PH) 1-1, BB, RBI; Bates 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K;

What a rush of success. I hardly know what to do with myself!

(runs around his hotel room with his underpants pulled over his head)

Game 2
POR: SS Ramos – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – RF Jennings – C Garcia – 2B Stalker – 1B Ferrero – 3B Hawkins – P Chavez
IND: LF Acor – 2B Schneller – C J. Herrera – RF Plunkett – 1B Barber – 3B Czachor – CF Raynor – SS DiGiacomo – P Bedoya

Come Friday, the Arrowheads were first on the board. Dustin Acor doubled off the fence to begin the bottom 1st and while Chavez got two outs after that, Plunkett slipped a single between Ramos and Hawkins to get the run across after all. The following inning Joe DiGiacomo cashed in Czachor’s leadoff walk to get to 2-0, a deficit the Coons made up in the third inning despite Ramos hitting into a double play after Bernie opened the frame with a single. Reichardt singled, Wallace hit an RBI triple, and Jennings hit an RBI single over the second base bag to get the Critters back even. Unfortunately Chavez couldn’t get on top of the Indians. Dan Schneller became the third leadoff man in three innings to reach with a single, advanced on a grounder and scored on Plunkett’s single to put Indy back on top, 3-2 after three. He struck out the side in the fourth, then allowed a 1-out single to Schneller in the fifth. Schneller took off on the 3-2 to Herrera, who fanned, and Garcia lasered out Schneller to end the inning. He got another double play in the seventh after a leadoff walk to Ron Raynor, but unfortunately no run support from the rest of his team, and was knocked out in the eighth when Acor and Schneller led off with a pair of scratch singles signaling the end of the winning streak. Garavito replaced Chavez, nearly served up a 3-piece on the first pitch to Herrera, but struck out Tom Schorsch and got a pop from Matt Barber after that scary deep drive, stranding the runners and leaving the Coons still just one run short for the ninth inning.

They faced right-hander Tim Thweatt, whose second pitch was buried in the gap by Tim Stalker for a leadoff triple! Thompson batted for Ferrero to get a left-handed bat in the box and hit the first pitch he got narrowly past Matt Barber for the game-tying RBI single! When Hawkins singled to center, Travis Zitzner hit for the pitcher while Marsingill was tabbed to run for Thompson, who was in scoring position at second base. The plot failed; Zitzner popped out and both Ramos and Reichardt were denied by Raynor in center, keeping the game tied. When Anaya retired the 6-7-8 batters in order, the Coons had their first overtime affair of the year on their paws. Jennings and Garcia reached the corners with 1-out singles off Thweatt, but both Stalker and Marsingill grounded out to third baseman Czachor, and nobody scored. Well, at least until the bottom of the inning. John Hennessy walked three and retired nobody with free passes to Edgar Paiz and Dan Schneller sandwiching a Dustin Acor single before Herrera held still long enough to draw another ball four. 4-3 Indians. Wallace 2-5, 3B, RBI; Jennings 2-5, RBI; Stalker 2-4, BB, 3B; Thompson (PH) 1-1, RBI;

Just when I thought we’d win forever…!

Seven walks for Hennessy in 4.1 innings, and five for Fernandez in 2.2 innings. Huuuge red flags.

Saturday would have brought us del Rio being a pest to virtually everyone in attendance, but bad weather curtailed proceedings from the get go. It rained all day, and the game was postponed well in advance. A double header was scheduled for Sunday, when the 6-5 Coons and 5-5 Arrowheads would be the only CL North teams not in an all-in, 4-way, 7-4 tie for the division lead.

Game 3 (1)
POR: SS Ramos – CF Reichardt – LF Wallace – 1B Zitzner – RF Jennings – 2B Stalker – 3B Perkins – C Thompson – P del Rio
IND: LF Acor – 2B Schneller – C J. Herrera – RF Plunkett – 1B Barber – 3B Czachor – CF Raynor – SS DiGiacomo – P Bressner

Both teams had two hits in the first three innings and no runs, but arrived there in different ways. Del Rio struck out five and allowed no other base runners, while the Coons also drew two walks and Reichardt was nicked in the top of the third. Everybody was stranded, five Critters being left on base in total in the early innings. The second time through the Indians started to get better aim at del Rio and hit three deep fly outs that were all quite disturbingly loud off the bat, but all three were caught; only DiGiacomo reached with a soft 2-out single in the fifth. The middle innings were entirely desolate for Portland, while del Rio gave up a leadoff single to Dustin Acor in the bottom 6th. Acor was bunted over by Schneller, stole third base off Thompson, but was left on base when Herrera hit a comebacker to the mound and Plunkett went down looking, del Rio’s seventh K in the game. Into the seventh, a slight drizzle started to annoy everybody in attendance, and just as that nuisance began, Tim Stalker ripped a home run to left to break the scoreless tie leading off the top 7th. There was a brief rain delay in the middle of the seventh. Del Rio returned right afterwards, but two pitches into the bottom 7th gave up a bomb to Matt Barber, and was lifted from the game after all. Bates held the Indians away for the rest of the inning before the Indians went into their pen with Juan Melendrez. He struck out the struggling Ramos, but then allowed singles to Reichardt and Wallace, who went to the corners with one down. That brought up Zitzner, who ran a full count before he CRUSHED a baseball, a 440-footer to slightly-left-of-center, well, well outta the park! 4-1 Coons was the score after that, and while Jennings and Stalker were retired, Nick Bates continued to pitch after tossing only six times in the bottom 7th. He got through the eighth, too, walking only Schneller with two outs. Portland didn’t tack on in the ninth, and so the second and hopefully final reliever to be used in this first leg of the double-header was the closer, Chris Wise. Plunkett, Barber, and Alfredo Quintana struck out in order! 4-1 Furballs! Reichardt 2-3; Stalker 2-4, HR, 2B, RBI; Garcia (PH) 1-1; del Rio 6.0 IP, 5 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 7 K; Bates 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K, W (1-0);

…and the final game of the set followed right up while I was still marveling at the standings, which would see the Raccoons end the week with a winning record no matter what happened from here! We would cycle in all the bench players we had to avoid having more players than necessary play two games in one day, even if sandwiched by off days.

Game 4 (2)
POR: RF Jennings – 2B Marsingill – C Garcia – 1B Zitzner – SS Stalker – 3B Hawkins – LF Ferrero – CF Pinkerton – P Sabre
IND: LF Acor – 2B Schneller – RF Plunkett – 1B Barber – 3B Czachor – CF Raynor – C Paiz – SS DiGiacomo – P Legleiter

Three hits in the second plated two runs for the Indians, both driven in by Edgar Paiz with a 1-out single to right on a 1-2 pitch. Previously, Ron Raynor had popped out with the runners already in scoring position following a Barber single and Czachor double to left. Those were the only base hits that Sabre allowed through five, but they were also enough to keep him hurried for the time being while the Critters hit a steady trickle of singles, but couldn’t get a run across. They arrived at a must-pounce situation in the sixth inning; Garcia led off with a single, and after Zitzner flew out to deep right Stalker rammed a double through Czachor, putting the tying runs in scoring position with one out for Tom Hawkins. C’mon boys, pounce! Imagine Legleiter’s a leftover lasagna! – that worked: Hawkins ran a full count before bouncing one over the second base bag for an RBI single, and Ferrero hit a 1-1 the same direction for another RBI single, knotting the score. The ex-Coon Legleiter continued to melt, walking Preston Pinkerton, which brought up Sabre with the bags stacked and one out. He struck out in a full count, and Jennings grounded out to Schneller, keeping the game tied.

The Raccoons had two leadoff singles, Marsingill and Garcia, in the seventh, but couldn’t get the runners across. Sabre also put two on with a Barber single and a walk to PH Tom Schorsch, but Paiz hit into a double play this time. The game remained tied at two through seven, but with the Critters out-hitting the Indians by a tad, 11-4. The Coons had nothing in the top 8th, but Sabre allowed a double to Juan Herrera, pinch-hitting for DiGiacomo to begin the bottom 8th. That looked glum – at least until he got two pops and a fly to Jennings to starve the runner at second. Wonderful! Now get him a run, boys! Nope – no run came together until the bottom of the ninth inning, where Ed Blair struck out two before giving up back-to-back doubles to Quintana and Elias Sosa to end the game. 3-2 Indians. Jennings 2-5, 2B; Garcia 2-5; Stalker 3-4, 2B; Sabre 8.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 2 K;

In other news

April 12 – WAS SP Colt Willes (0-1, 7.71 ERA) will miss four months with a torn back muscle.
April 16 – TIJ RF/LF/1B Willie Ojeda (.278, 1 HR, 9 RBI) is out with knee inflammation, but could be back as soon as one week from now.
April 16 – The Canadiens beat the Loggers, 1-0, solely on VAN OF Brian Wojnarowski (.429, 2 HR, 5 RBI) going deep in the second inning.
April 16 – ATL SS Keith Thomson (.405, 2 HR, 10 RBI) drives in five runs on three hits in the Knights’ 14-5 rout of the Condors.
April 17 – OCT LF/RF Luis Sagredo (.225, 3 HR, 7 RBI) will have to spend three to four weeks on the DL with shoulder soreness.
April 17 – Coming off the bench, CHA 2B/3B Gavin Westmoreland (.286, 1 HR, 4 RBI) caps a rally from a 4-1 deficit to a 6-4 win over the Bayhawks with his walkoff grand slam against SFB CL Jay Schimek (0-1, 0.00 ERA, 2 SV) – all five runs in the inning are unearned thanks to an error by SFB 1B/2B Ricky Tello (.545, 0 HR, 2 RBI).

Complaints and stuff

The double header does not ruin our rotation right away – we have Monday off and will keep everybody pitching in order. Tuesday we’re hosting the Crusaders in Coon City.

The Kit Brigade now has nine starts under their belt, and while the 3-3 record is nothing to write home about (although, better than .420…), their combined ERA was 2.45 with 18 walks and 48 strikeouts in 62.1 innings. That ain’t too ****ty!

Ramos is getting totally hosed by the baseball gods. His BABIP is .158. Of his six base hits, four have been doubles. Everything on the infield gets gobbled up mercilessly; unless he’s hitting it over the outfielder, he’s not getting on base. I am very confid- … I am very hopeful that this will shake itself out at some point.

Fun Fact: The last time the Raccoons held a winning record at the end of the season’s second week, they went on to win the World Series.

Maybe getting a bit ahead of myself here.

Maybe.

Service announcement: This is the 3,000th post in this thread…!

Oh, boy!
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Portland Raccoons, 83 years of excell-.... of baseball: Furballs here!
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