Portland Raccoons (ABL)

[Westheim]

I continued to try and trade surplus outfielders (Pruitt, Ayers, heck, if it gets us anywhere even Seeley or D-Alex), but other teams were not into the group really hard.

Matt Pruitt, while not a dazzling dinger-dasher, had at least a pleasant .745 OPS for his career, and had hit 33 doubles in ’12, a career high. You’d think some team would be into that, at least for a platoon role. Nope. Absolutely nope.

Well, I see where Keith Ayers has no value. Seeley drew *a bit* of interest, but the returns were laughable. Like Ming Kui, a career utility player, whose utility wasn’t even close to what Sandy Sambrano brought in terms of a bag full of gloves. The Crusaders were offering Drew Lowe, a middling catching prospect, who was in AA at 23, for Seeley, but that was not a desirable deal, either.

All of this is bad. I thought I could dispatch Pruitt’s contract rather easily and after adding Mike Bednarski and Daniel Dickerson we’d still have coinage to keep mingling in the market, with there still being relievers to sign, backup infielders, and also perhaps a well-hitting backup outfielder. Bednarski and Dickerson came us almost four of our five million available, and with contract offers out there to reliever (see below) and a versatile infielder, I was a bit on the short end until I could free up some other money. And that didn’t happen until January. By then an interesting player or two were off the market already.

+++

December 18 – The Raccoons present another new addition to the ballclub, having signed 38-yr old MR Hoshi Watanabe (41-28, 3.88 ERA, 12 SV) to a 1-yr, $330k contract.
December 20 – Grizzled veteran RF/LF Josh Thomas (.273, 266 HR, 1,211 RBI) signs a 2-year contract for $3.04M with the Thunder. Thomas, 39, spent his last two years with the Pacifics, taking home two more rings for his collection that started with being part of the Titans’ championship teams in 1998 and 2001.
December 21 – Ex-OCT OF Jeffrey Matthews (.276, 38 HR, 339 RBI) gets a 3-yr, $2.08M deal from the Scorpions.
December 26 – The Indians pick up ex-LAP SP Jack Berry (100-83, 3.75 ERA) for two years and $1.76M total.
December 27 – Former Star CF César Morán (.287, 124 HR, 664 RBI), who spent his entire career so far in Dallas, signs up with the Knights. Atlanta will pay him $4M over four years.
December 28 – Another addition is made by the Knights, who sign ex-OCT SP William Raven (73-55, 3.87 ERA) to a 3-yr, $4.52M contract.
January 3 – The Canadiens sign ex-PIT INF Steve Madison (.270, 38 HR, 366 RBI). The 28-year old receives a 3-yr, $5.12M contract.
January 3 – 28-year old MR Micah Steele (31-37, 3.02 ERA, 146 SV), who spent the last season with the Raccoons, signs a 3-yr, $1.72M contract with the Crusaders.
January 6 – Ex-WAS LF/RF/1B Gerardo Rios (.266, 297 HR, 1,109 RBI) manages to secure another big contract with the Cyclones at age 36, signing for three years and $7.8M.

+++

Bad things have happened!! The Canadiens … signed Daniel Sharp. I am devastated. Sharpie! How can you …!? Nooooooo!!! Sharpie, 35, will make $386k in 2013.

Sharpie….!!!

For the first time, Jack Berry will pitch in the Continental League. We faced him the odd time in the last decade since dealing him to the Buffaloes because he would get lit up by major league pitching. Well, yeah, he led the league in home runs allowed once, but ultimately, it hasn’t been that bad. Nice K/BB of almost 3.2 as well, 1.29 career WHIP. What did we get for him from the Buffaloes again? The deal included Juan Diaz (ARGH!!!) and Chris Roberson, and was for Pablo Ledesma and Dale Moore.

Ah for crying out loud…

Not quite as bad as the Dennis Fried deal, though, which was for three games of Raúl Castillo and done. Castillo was out of baseball two years later, and Fried – if there’s any justice – will be in the Hall of Fame by summer.

(sound of gnashing teeth)

Portland will be Watanabe’s ninth stop in nine years – every year a new team, although technically he had two distinct stints with both the Rebels and the Cyclones. He’s one of those pitchers who got better with age. Nothing special in his 20s, he has maintained friendly ERA and WHIP values in his mid-30s, including 1.05 WHIP and 2.81 ERA marks or better in three of the last four seasons, though he was not really a go-to guy for high leverage situations for any of the teams he was on and in some years appeared only selectively at all. Well, that’ll change. He’s the type of seventh/eighth inning reliever who can be expected to get out of somebody else’s jam, too, something we totally lacked last year. He has four pitches, all efficient, with a changeup that’s outright nasty. He will have to throw that one a lot, since the fastball gets jumpy movement off the bat.

What else? I really hope we hit some dingers off Steele this year. Game-winners would be perfect. Law Rockburn signed a deal with the Aces, $322k for one year.

+++

2013 HALL OF FAME VOTING

The 2013 HOF voting is significant as this was the last year in which players that were pre-2004 snubbed by the Secret Ninja Committee had another chance to be elected to the Hall. Only two such players were left, and neither was elected.

There are two new Hall of Famers in raw slugger Raúl Vázquez, who goes in as a Rebel (joining Lawson Steward from that team), and small ball tool Vonne Calzado, who was joining the shrines as a Thunder (joining Alfonso Aranda and Dave Browne). Vázquez is only the third Dominican player in the Hall (along with Juan Correa and Gabriel Rivera), with the Mexican faction still the largest behind the U.S. players with four inhabitants.

Detailed voting results:

RIC RF Raúl Vázquez – 1st year – 97.2% - INDUCTED
OCT RF Vonne Calzado – 1st year – 76.4% - INDUCTED
TOP SP Arnold McCray – 8th year – 73.6%
NAS SP Dennis Fried – 1st year – 73.2%
SAC CF Aaron Jenkins – 1st year – 72.0%
MIL SP Neil Stewart – 6th year – 72.0%
IND CL Jim Durden – 10th year – 53.2% - DROPPED
POR CF Neil Reece – 3rd year – 52.0%
IND CF Forest Hartley – 1st year – 34.0%
BOS LF Jose Martinez – 6th year – 22.8%
WAS CL Domingo Rivera – 10th year – 21.2% - DROPPED
SFB CL William Henderson – 2nd year – 17.2%
DAL 2B Rodrigo Morales – 2nd year – 10.0%
??? CF John Hensley – 3rd year – 4.4% - DROPPED
POR 3B Ben O’Morrissey – 2nd year – 4.4% - DROPPED
BOS SP Doug Morrow – 4th year – 4.4% - DROPPED
LVA 1B Javier Vargas – 1st year – 2.0% - DROPPED
WAS SP Ramón Ortíz – 3rd year – 2.0% - DROPPED
SFB SP Ricardo Sanchez – 2nd year – 1.6% - DROPPED
IND 3B Matt Brown – 2nd year – 1.6% - DROPPED
OCT CF Joey Humphrey – 2nd year – 0.8% - DROPPED

Next year, SP Carlos Castro, who had to retire at 35, might be a shoe-in, but nobody else has many credentials. With only nine players (including Neil Reece) surviving on this ballot, there will be 19 players available next year. More interesting players will come up in ’15, like Aaron Anderson and Anibal Sandoval, also a few closers who are always hard to judge. In 2016, there’s currently a HUGE rookie class up for the ballot, 20 players in total, something we haven’t seen so far. The frontrunner there will be Martin Garcia, a 100% Hall of Famer if there ever was one.

It looks like only two former Raccoons are up for election in the next years, none of them eligible as a Raccoon. Juan Barrón we liked quite well, Angel Romero not so much.

[Westheim]

January 9 – The Raccoons add 31-yr old ex-ATL INF Ken Rodgers (.252, 60 HR, 386 RBI) on a 1-yr, $300k deal.
January 13 – Ex-MIL SP Ramón Jimenez (111-121, 4.51 ERA) settles on a 1-yr, $1.38M contract offer by the Thunder.
January 16 – The Capitals ink ex-ATL CL Patrick Mercier (26-19, 3.32 ERA, 133 SV) to a 2-yr, $3.4M contract.
January 24 – Ex-POR LF/CF Tomas Castro (.298, 74 HR, 418 RBI), who at 29 also has 183 stolen bases for his career, signs a 1-yr, $630k contract with the Scorpions.
January 26 – Ex-POR SP Scott Spears (93-105, 4.50 ERA) signs on with the Indians, $242k for one year. The Raccoons receive a supplemental round pick.
January 30 – The Thunder pick up 37-yr old ex-PIT LF/RF Mohammed Blanc (.323, 119 HR, 908 RBI) for 1-yr, $1.98M. The 37-year old Canadian spent his entire career with the Pittsburgh Miners.
February 7 – The Loggers deal SP Fernando Cruz (60-82, 4.19 ERA) to the Warriors, receiving 1B Mike Rucker (.208, 2 HR, 15 RBI), who still has rookie eligibility, and a decent prospect.

+++

Rodgers plays all four infield positions well. He bats left-handed, and at least has a serviceable bat. No base-stealer, though. With money a bit short at that point, the stock of players like Dave Roudabush and Walt Canning, right-handed batters filling both spots on the left side of the infield, was rising slightly. Ever so slightly.

Fan interest crashed after Tomas Castro signed elsewhere, incited by the Agitator, who railed on about the inept front office that allowed an exciting and electric player like Tomas Castro to sign elsewhere while still having a dud like Keith Ayers on the payroll.

DUDE, I’VE BEEN TRYING TO TRADE AYERS FOR MONTHS!!

But everybody still has that framed of Keith Ayers being out at home in mind. I do, too. It has been playing on continuous replay for three years and three months now. And what exactly has been electric about Tomas Castro being laid up in a cast year in, year out?

January continued to roll past and still no takers for any of the surplus players. They would probably all end up on waivers (well, not Pruitt, who would most likely end up on the bench) at the start of the season. Which is horrendous, because I would have loved to do some wheeling and dealing, but nobody was biting really. [On a personal note, I hate OOTP 16’s trade AI, which is bull**** broken]

I threatened with this before, but the second Saturday home game (facing the Knights) will now be Rich Hood Hoodie Night. Maud couldn’t come up with anything else. Just like I can't come up with any meaningful trade...

[Westheim]

February 20 – The Thunder will pay $3.02M over three years for the services of 31-yr old LF/RF Johnny Crum (.293, 52 HR, 374 RBI), who spent his entire career with the Condors so far.
February 21 – The Titans add ex-NYC CL Scott Hood (65-55, 2.05 ERA, 427 SV) on a 2-yr, $1.13M deal.
February 28 – 35-year old ex-TOP LF/RF Jim Brulhart (.258, 126 HR, 573 RBI) signs a 1-yr, $486k contract with the Stars.

+++

The Raccoons’ offseason ended in frustration. After the addition of Daniel Dickerson – and we’ll have to see how much we’ll get out of him – the Raccoons got some more bits and pieces, but nothing substantial, and – worse – failed to free up the mess they had in the outfield, because absolutely nobody wanted to make a trade for Matt Pruitt.

Or Craig Bowen.

****ty offseason.

[Westheim]

2013 PORTLAND RACCOONS – Opening Day Roster (first set shows 2012 numbers, second set overall; players with an * are off season acquisitions):

SP Nick Brown, 35, B:L, T:L (16-8, 2.36 ERA | 166-97, 2.85 ERA) – the league has the book on Nick Brown by now, which means avoiding him in April and from August onwards, and pouncing on him in the early summer, where he’s historically bad, with his “bad” still being around major league average, however; Brownie claimed the franchise strikeout record, 2,500+ K total, and a spot in the top 20 of all time strikeout artistes (2,545 K and 18th actually) all in 2012, while putting up his best ever single season ERA at age 34. In worrying news he has a player option for 2014 and much to ask for in additional money if he gets even remotely close to his ’11 season.
SP Daniel Dickerson *, 35, B:R, T:R (17-9, 3.98 ERA | 146-124, 3.35 ERA, 1 SV) – grizzled veteran on a huge contract that can turn sour at any minute giving his injury history; if he ever shakes his arm twice after delivering a pitch, we’ve just burned a million bucks – or three. Dickerson was never much of a strikeout pitcher but has marvelous control and generates insane amounts of groundballs, being taken deep ten times in a season only twice – including 2012.
SP Colin Baldwin, 30, B:L, T:L (5-4, 4.09 ERA | 48-46, 3.55 ERA) – Baldwin is looking forward to bouncing back to his normal steady self after missing more than half of the 2012 season to a ruptured finger tendon.
SP Hector Santos, 24, B:S, T:R (12-11, 3.52 ERA | 19-17, 3.74 ERA) – did quite well most of the time in his first full season in the majors, including a 5 K/BB and holding opposing batters to less than a hit per inning despite merely middling defense behind him. The biggest obstacle between him and greatness could be his total lack of longevity, holding him to five innings in numerous occasions in 2012.
SP Rich Hood, 26, B:L, T:L (7-8, 3.94 ERA | 7-8, 3.94 ERA) – debuted midseason after injuries and ineffectiveness decimated the Raccoons’ rotation and never was demoted again, although his performance was not without spots here and there. Has to pick up on the meager 1.8 K/BB, and should have the stuff to do that in his sophomore year.

MU Bill Conway, 27, B:R, T:R (2-5, 6.71 ERA | 27-35, 4.28 ERA, 2 SV) – turned into a total dud in ’12, getting kicked from the rotation in May and occasionally recalled for a spot start or long relief work, none of which worked out in any way as he allowed a home run every five innings while walking everything that held still long enough.
MU Pat Slayton, 27, B:R, T:R (2-2, 1.93 ERA, 1 SV | 6-4, 2.45 ERA, 1 SV) – some people never shake off that rule 5 smell, and Slayton is one of those; don’t get fooled by the ERA, he is in no way a reliable pitcher and should be held away from situations with runners on base or tender leads in late innings at all costs.
MR Josh Gibson, 27, B:R, T:R (5-0, 1.91 ERA | 6-2, 3.40 ERA) – drafted originally as a position player, Gibson made his debut in ’10 and was on the roster for most of the ’11 and ’12 seasons, but will be on the Opening Day roster for the first time after handling late-inning assignments with care in the second half of last season and not allowing an earned run in his last 26 appearances.
MR Ron Thrasher, 25, B:L, T:L (8-4, 2.76 ERA, 1 SV | 9-9, 2.26 ERA, 4 SV) – superficially, most numbers about Ron Thrasher look good, but he walks a batter every other inning, which is a major sore for a wannabe-setup man; oh look, he’s not a setup man anymore!
SU Manobu Sugano, 28, B:L, T:L (4-2, 1.78 ERA, 2 SV | 4-2, 1.78 ERA, 2 SV) – the only of the two Japanese international additions last winter that is still with the team, Sugano did a great job in relief and pushed Thrasher out of the setup role.
SU Hoshi Watanabe *, 38, B:R, T:R (3-2, 2.81 ERA | 39-18, 3.88 ERA, 12 SV) – free agent addition that has been much better in his 30s than in his 20s and that is supposed to get us bridged to a better time and a long-term solution for the right-handed setup role that was a nightmare in 2012 with Micah Steele having his dirty paws in play.
CL Angel Casas, 30, B:S, T:R (1-3, 1.87 ERA, 49 SV | 17-19, 1.67 ERA, 363 SV) – mostly infallible killer of opposing batters; unfortunately he knows it and is in a contract year.

C Dylan Alexander, 28, B:L, T:R (.245, 22 HR, 76 RBI | .265, 47 HR, 186 RBI) – had a bad first half that saw Craig Bowen – who didn’t have much of a good first half either – get a lot of at-bats and more than one third of starting assignments in 2012, but D-Alex had a better second half and finally picked up the power then, finishing with 22 homers. More of that please.
C Craig Bowen, 32, B:S, T:R (.234, 8 HR, 30 RBI | .233, 109 HR, 432 RBI) – three more years until Bowen’s untradable contract will be up; he will occasionally whack one, but pays for that with 8 K on average, and hasn’t batted .250 since his FIRST stint in Portland.

1B Adrian Quebell, 30, B:L, T:L (.293, 22 HR, 99 RBI | .294, 103 HR, 549 RBI) – rebounded nicely from a .728 OPS in 2011 to post a .845 OPS mark in ’12, and still shows the finest defense, but that extra-power potential we once hoped for hasn’t materialized; those 22 homers he hit in 2012 were a career high, and he bought it with millions of double plays, some of those fatal to the Raccoons’ fate last year.
2B Ieyoshi Nomura, 29, B:L, T:R (.308, 8 HR, 82 RBI | .286, 27 HR, 384 RBI) – another irreplaceable player in a contract year in ’13 (and hideously cheap at $750k!), Yoshi has been close to .400 OBP rates the last two seasons and posted .829 OPS marks both times. He also put up a new career-high in extra-base hits with 53. I have a bad feeling that trying to maintain him will break the bank come fall.
2B/SS/1B Michael Palmer, 30, B:R, T:R (.286, 3 HR, 58 RBI | .288, 23 HR, 275 RBI) – as steady as he goes, you tend to not even notice him until he’s gone missing with an injury, like he did for 34 games in ’12, leading the Raccoons to patch around the hole in the lineup with the most ridiculous outcasts they can find, including on the fatal final weekend of the season.
1B/3B/2B Jon Merritt, 36, B:R, T:R (.264, 8 HR, 53 RBI | .268, 60 HR, 753 RBI) – playing out the string of his career, Jon Merritt had a perfectly decent 2012, but the blinding triples power (18 triples in ’10 and 149 in his career) is gone now as those old legs have gone heavy. He has a player option for 2014.
1B/2B/3B/SS Ken Rodgers *, 32, B:L, T:R (.251, 1 HR, 17 RBI | .252, 60 HR, 386 RBI) – signed as free agent, taking the spot occupied by Manuel Gutierrez, El Salvador’s finest, for years. Plays sound defense all around, and has a bat that even aspires to league average.
3B/SS Walt Canning, 27, B:R, T:R (.050, 0 HR, 1 RBI | .238, 2 HR, 23 RBI) – hasn’t much going for him than being a late-inning defensive replacement for Jon Merritt, since the bats has gotten worse with every cup of coffee.

1B/LF/2B/CF/RF/SS Sandy Sambrano, 25, B:S, T:R (.276, 0 HR, 24 RBI | .283, 3 HR, 97 RBI) – the super utility that spent half the season on the DL in ’12 has been promoted to starting leftfielder, but can really sub anywhere except behind the dish if the going gets tough; on-base wonder with speed (24 SB in just 90 G, 62 GS last year!), should make for the ideal leadoff man.
LF/CF/RF Ricardo Carmona, 21, B:L, T:R (.288, 0 HR, 19 RBI | .288, 0 HR, 19 RBI) – … while the future leadoff man is going to be huddled in the #2 slot and starting in centerfield to start the year. Carmona was the big piece in the Jose Morales trade with the Capitals in 2011, and everything points to him being a future star, even though he won’t hit for power all that much. He’s 1,926 hits off the franchise mark held by Neil Reece.
RF/LF Mike Bednarski *, 26, B:R, T:R (.277, 22 HR, 75 RBI | .278, 56 HR, 244 RBI) – acquired from the Aces, Bednarski hit 48 homers the last two years combined, so naturally great things are expected of him. He’s the new starting rightfielder. A murderer’s arm aside, defense is not his strong suit.
LF/1B Matt Pruitt, 29, B:L, T:R (.294, 6 HR, 65 RBI | .286, 51 HR, 368 RBI) – silently got struck off the list of potential power sources last year and now has merely ten homers per year if averaged out to 162 games, which he even got close to even once: in ’12. Also loses his starting job to the younger guys.
LF/RF/CF John Alexander, 33, B:L, T:L (.264, 13 HR, 68 RBI | .287, 176 HR, 846 RBI) – totally not the second coming of Luke Black, John Alexander was decent, but not great, and not even good, really, but he remains cheap in the second year of his contract that was supposed to rebuild value for him, which it probably hasn’t and won’t, since he’s on the bench to start the year.

On disabled list: Nobody.

Otherwise unavailable: Nobody.

Other roster movement:
SP/MR Richard Williams, 33, B:S, T:R (4-1, 4.48 ERA, 2 SV | 81-79, 4.80 ERA, 3 SV) – waived and DFA’ed; was a desperate trade addition with the Loggers last July and didn’t do too well overall.
C Tom McNeela, 24, B:L, T:R (.000, 0 HR, 0 RBI | .263, 0 HR, 12 RBI) – waived and DFA’ed; middling defensively, not a real game changer offensively, not that we could get rid of Craig Bowen anyway…
SS/3B Dave Roudabush, 27, B:R, T:R (.333, 0 HR, 1 RBI | .232, 2 HR, 9 RBI) – waived and DFA’ed (like last year); not many skills to rave about, not even defensively.
RF/LF Keith Ayers, 30, B:R, T:R (.185, 6 HR, 21 RBI | .241, 30 HR, 143 RBI) – waived and DFA’ed; had a real nightmare season with complete uselessness at the plate.

Opening day lineup:
Vs. RHP: LF Sambrano – CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – 3B Merritt – P Brown
(Vs. LHP: LF Sambrano – SS Palmer – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – 3B Merritt – CF Carmona – C D. Alexander – P Brown)

The mess starts here, as the Raccoons have not managed to get another right-handed outfielder to balance the lineup against left-handed pitching. And they have been horrible against left-handed pitching…

OFF SEASON CHANGES:

This offseason went just like the last one and almost like the one before that. The Raccoons were active early, added a few big names in Dickerson and Bednarski, and then just stopped at all at the winter meetings. Like mentioned above, the roster is still unbalanced when it comes to the handedness of batters, and that was a major problem against left-handed pitching in 2012 and even before that. Despite the months of inactivity at the end of the winter, the Raccoons were declared by BNN to have “won” the offseason by WAR gains.

Top 5: Raccoons (+6.9), Capitals (+6.6), Titans (+6.0), Stars (+5.7), Warriors (+4.9)
Bottom 5: Miners (-4.6), Bayhawks (-5.5), Loggers (-6.0), Aces (-8.9), Blue Sox (-10.0)

PREDICTION TIME:

So the Raccoons were markedly better than I gave them credit for, but a big part in 2012 was the way they OWNED the Crusaders, beating them 15-3, which completely crippled them and helped the Raccoons lift up to a 93-69 finish, eight games better than anticipated.

The team had obvious shortcomings. The rotation was in a state of flux for much of the season if you ignore Brown and Santos, who just quietly trudged along, and the bullpen couldn’t cover the gap between all the middle relievers and Angel Casas, while injures decimated a lineup that couldn’t bring home a runner on third with no outs in the first place. Plus, their cleanup hitter was the master of double plays. Somehow a 21-7 August catapulted the Raccoons to the front, but they extinguished in unfortunate fashion in the final week, falling short to the vile beasts of the North.

This year, the only major addition with a stick is Bednarski, the newest hope of rekindling the Luke Black production we got in the late 2000s, but Bednarski is a lot younger and might have space to grow. But the friendly confines of Portland haven’t been friendly to their own team for a few years now and several ordinary power positions are played by people without much power at all. Two starting outfielders have not hit a home run as a Raccoon.

We expect a lot of Ricardo Carmona, and it might be a bit much for those small shoulders. Remember how Yoshi Nomura debuted at 20 and struggled endlessly. This also brings us to the topic of free agency. Once more the Raccoons are acting in a sense of urgency, since so many of their key players will be or might be free agents seven months from now. We have a million dollars plus change in the coffers to make a move in the season to address issues, but I fear there could be too many issues to cover with a million and change.

Best guess: the Raccoons continue to fail against left-handed pitching and will drop games against weak southpaws all the time, contributing to them coming up short in the North to whomever, finishing 88-74 and seven games out. Crusaders, Titans, Elks could all be in the mix again.

PLAYER DEVELOPMENT:

The Raccoons’ farm was ranked 11th last season with some artificial inflation by the signing of international free agent Shunyo Yano. Well, that has deflated by now, and most of their seven ranked prospects from last year have also dropped off the list: #10 Shunyo Yano (service time), #24 Ricardo Carmona (service time), #79 David Tingley (not ranked anymore), #146 Rich Hood (service time), #156 Mike Cook (traded), and #181 Dan Moon (not ranked anymore);

The Raccoons again have seven ranked players, but have dropped from 11th to 18th among all teams.

17th (new) – AAA SP Jonathan Toner, 22 – 2009 supplemental round pick by Cyclones, acquired in trade for Shunyo Yano
40th (+108) – AAA SP Gary Dupes, 23 – 2008 fourth round pick by Cyclones, acquired in trade with Ricardo Carmona, Mike Cook, Jason Bergquist, and Joe O’Brian for Jose Morales and Luis Beltran
128th (new) – A OF Edgar Hernandez, 20 – international discovery by Whitebread
137th (new) – AAA SP Jeff Magnotta, 19 – 2012 first round pick by the Raccoons
141st (new) – INT 2B/SS/LF Tony Viera, 18 – international discovery by Juan Calderón
187th (new) – AA SP Andy Hackney, 24 – 2009 eleventh round pick by the Raccoons
189th (new) – AAA 2B Jason Bergquist, 23 – 2008 supplemental round pick by Cyclones, acquired in trade with Ricardo Carmona, Mike Cook, Gary Dupes, and Joe O’Brian for Jose Morales and Luis Beltran

The farm top 10 are completed by INT SP Ricky Martinez, INT SP Vic Mercado, AAA MR Francisquo Bocanegra.

The top overall prospect in the league is last year’s #3, NAS SS Andrew Showalter, who made his debut late in 2012 and is on their Opening Day roster. The top 5 are completed by BOS A RF Michael Matos, SAL SP Jaden Joseph (#2 last year), TOP AAA LF/RF/3B Saverio Piepoli (#1 last year), and DEN AAA SP Willis Sanguino.

Next: first pitch.

[MarkCuban]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Best guess: the Raccoons continue to fail against left-handed pitching and will drop games against weak southpaws all the time, contributing to them coming up short in the North to whomever, finishing 88-74 and seven games out. Crusaders, Titans, Elks could all be in the mix again.

I have a gut feeling the Raccoons will be just enough out at the All-Star Break that you're dealing Brownie and Casas -- and by that, around .500. You just don't recover from two straight final day eliminations and win the championship. One... motivational. Two? Heartbreaking.

No doubt you chose "go all in" this year -- if it doesn't happen now, it may never again. Brownie's arm has to go bad sooner or later, no matter how much shrink wrap the trainer uses to keep him fresh.

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by MarkCuban

I have a gut feeling the Raccoons will be just enough out at the All-Star Break that you're dealing Brownie

You must surely be new here. Please take a seat and I will have Maud brief you on how things run 'round here.

---

Raccoons (0-0) vs. Titans (0-0) – April 2-4, 2013

The Titans had shed some batting over the winter, including a host of outfielders, but had appeared to shore up their pitching. Unfortunately it hadn’t appeared in 2012 that pitching had been their bigger issue. The Raccoons had beaten them 10-8 in 2012, and had beaten them for five straight seasons.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (0-0) vs. Curtis Tobitt (0-0)
Daniel Dickerson (0-0) vs. Tony Hamlyn (0-0)
Colin Baldwin (0-0) vs. Ian Rutter (0-0)

Opposite-handed pitchers are going to face each other in every game of this series, with the Raccoons seeing their only southpaw, Tony Hamlyn, on Wednesday in the middle game.

Game 1
BOS: SS M. Rivera – 1B Legendre – 3B B. Butler – RF R. Garcia – C Suda – 2B J. Ramirez – LF T. Austin – CF Grindstaff – P Tobitt
POR: LF Sambrano – CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – 3B Merritt – P Brown

Ricardo Garcia procured the first tally in a Raccoons game in 2013, hitting a leadoff jack off Nick Brown in the second inning. Brown, annoyed, angrily struck out “Quasimodo” Suda, Jesus Ramirez, and Tim Austin to end the inning. Brownie struck out six the first time through the order (everybody except for Garcia and the top two in the lineup, Mike Rivera and Alexis Legendre), and also had the Raccoons’ first base hit in 2013, a 1-out single to right in the bottom 3rd that didn’t lead to anything. That wasn’t all yet – things got better the second time through. Yoshi Nomura drew his second walk to start the bottom 4th, followed by a Quebell single. Mike Bednarski had given a ball a ride to left his first time up – only to have it snatched by Tim Austin – but this time was not denied, catapulting a huge 3-run homer. There was never much guessing whether it was out of here – it was outta here right off the bat. Curtis Tobitt now suffered rapid decomposition: D-Alex doubled, Palmer singled, and while he got two outs from Merritt and Brown, the top three of the Coons’ order then all hit 2-out singles, driving in two more, before Tobitt plated the sixth run himself with a wild pitch to Quebell, who ended up walking to reload the bases – and that was ALL for Curtis Tobitt, totally stuck in the fourth inning! Scott Hood appeared to definitely get out Bednarski, who had brought out the hurt in the first place, but Bednarski battled Hood for nine pitches before singling up the middle to bring in two more runs, AND D-Alex singled home Quebell after that before Palmer finally grounded out. NINE RUNS in the inning!

After that rousing experience, the Raccoons quickly were dealt a blow to the knee, when Sandy Sambrano got entangled with Mike Rivera in an on-base collision in the fifth inning. Sambrano had to be helped off the field and was replaced by Matt Pruitt, while the Critters tacked on a run against Hood to make it 10-1, a score that Nick Brown maintained through seven innings, casually striking out a dozen in the season-opening rout. With a 9-run lead, Bill Conway was tasked with the final two innings, but started his outing by surrendering a really long home run – the first of his career – to Dylan Grindstaff. That was only a third of the runs that Conway would cock up in the inning, while the Raccoons then took it to Dan Parker in the bottom 8th, where Bednarski cracked his second 3-run homer of the game, letting the Titans run the gauntlet for 8 RBI in his Raccoons debut. 13-4 Brownies!!! Sambrano 2-4, RBI; Nomura 2-3, 2 BB; Quebell 2-4, BB; Bednarski 3-5, 2 HR, 8 RBI; D. Alexander 2-4, BB, 2B, RBI; Canning (PH) 1-1; Brown 7.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 12 K, W (1-0) and 1-2;

Only three players (Neil Reece, Vern Kinnear, Craig Bowen) have ever had more than Bednarski’s 8 RBI in a game for the Coons, and none of them did it in their debut. That was some nice debut. Now let’s hope he improves from there.

Meanwhile we’re worried about Sandy Sambrano for multiple reasons.

Game 2
BOS: SS M. Rivera – CF J. Gusmán – RF R. Garcia – C Suda – 2B J. Ramirez – LF J. Flores – 3B B. Butler – 1B Grindstaff – P Hamlyn
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – CF Carmona – C D. Alexander – P Dickerson

Bednarski hit another deep drive his first time up, but was denied of an RBI double by Jesus Flores. Instead, the Titans took a 1-0 lead in the top 3rd when Dylan Grindstaff, signed out of independent ball in 2012, hit a leadoff single, stole second, made third on Alexander’s throwing error, and scored on Rivera’s groundout. Dickerson was easily hittable in his Raccoons debut, and the Titans moved to strangulate him in the top of the fourth with three straight singles to get going between Suda, Ramirez, and Flores, before the next three, which included 38-year old veteran Bob Butler, the already annoying Grindstaff, and pitcher Tony Hamlyn, struck out, struck out, aaaand … struck out. Things didn’t go better for the Raccoons, either, as they got Bednarski on with a leadoff walk and Quebell with an infield single (rare enough) in the bottom 4th, but were then extinguished by Hamlyn with two strikeouts to Pruitt and Carmona and a sorry pop by Jon Merritt.

The Titans also missed another chance to vanquish Dickerson, who followed up Rivera’s leadoff single in the fifth with walks to Suda and Ramirez before Flores struck out to leave the bases stocked for the second consecutive inning. While Dickerson was no good at all for six innings, the bullpen immediately fell apart when tested in the top 7th. Thrasher got two outs before walking Ricardo Garcia, and believe it or not, the crew would manage to make a 5-spot out of that. Gibson appeared to face Suda, who hit an RBI double, before things moved on to Manobu Sugano, who allowed a single to Ramirez, then threw eight straight balls and ultimately fell to a bases-clearing triple by Todd Moultrie. Slayton walked two more needlessly in the top of the ninth, while the Coons scored a pair of irrelevant runs on groundouts late in the game. 6-2 Titans. Palmer 2-4; Rodgers 1-1;

I have a hunch that we will have A LOT of fun with that bullpen…

Game 3
BOS: SS M. Rivera – 1B Legendre – 3B B. Butler – RF R. Garcia – C Suda – 2B J. Ramirez – LF T. Austin – CF Grindstaff – P Rutter
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – LF Pruitt – SS Palmer – 3B Merritt – P Baldwin

The Raccoons got on the board first for the first time in 2013 in this rubber game when Michael Palmer tripled home D-Alex in the bottom 2nd, but then was left there with one out. That lead didn’t hold up for long; Colin Baldwin was running lots of deep counts, with the Titans drawing a couple of walks early, but it was a Jesus Ramirez double that got them going in the top 4th. Tim Austin singled home the runner, then tried to score himself on Grindstaff’s double, but was thrown out by Pruitt at home. Grindstaff moved to third, but was left there when Rutter flew out to Carmona. Walking people AND allowing doubles really doesn’t mix well, Colin!

The mostly inefficient Baldwin fell 2-1 behind in the fifth on three more singles by the Titans, Rivera hitting one to start the inning, and Ricardo Garcia hitting one to get home the go-ahead run. While the Raccoons never got a good grasp of Rutter and failed to threaten at all after their second inning run, the Raccoons’ bullpen soon was again creating unbearable situations. Baldwin left after Rivera’s 1-out single in the seventh and Josh Gibson, whose scoreless appearances streak had been snapped the previous day, got out of the inning, but then put the first two batters on base with singles in the eighth. Sugano replaced him inefficiently, mainly because Jon Merritt played Ramirez’ bunt into a single to load the bases with nobody out. Hoshi Watanabe made his Raccoons debut in a really sticky spot and coughed up two runs on a grounder by Angel Solís and a hard single by Jesus Flores. Ricardo Garcia homered off Bill Conway in the ninth. The Raccoons trailed 5-1 into the ninth, got Iemitsu Rin into the game after D-Alex and Pruitt reached base, but Pruitt was thrown out at home on Palmer’s RBI single. Jon Merritt’s should-have-been-game-ending grounder was mishandled by Butler to bring up PH John Alexander as the tying run, but he grounded out to Moultrie on Iemitsu Rin’s first pitch. 5-2 Titans. D. Alexander 2-4; Palmer 3-4, 3B, 2 RBI; Rodgers (PH) 1-1;

Interlude: trade

All four players that had been waived and designated for assignment at the start of the season cleared waivers, and three were assigned to the Alley Cats (McNeela, Ayers, Roudabush). Richard Williams refused the assignment and was traded off for another meaningless player, as we sent him to the Crusaders for 26-yr old RF/LF Jeff Bowden, who hit for a .653 OPS in ten games in 2012. He makes the minimum, which is well.

Now wait for Williams to throw a shutout against the Raccoons in May.

Raccoons (1-2) vs. Aces (2-2) – April 5-7, 2013

The Raccoons had taken six of nine from the Aces in 2012, plus their best outfielder during the winter, and were looking for some more offense against a team that had allowed only 14 runs in its first 4-game set against the Condors, but also had scored only 12 runs, of which Josh Downing had driven in five.

Projected matchups:
Hector Santos (0-0) vs. Nehemiah Jones (0-0)
Rich Hood (0-0) vs. Jaquan Wagoner (1-0, 2.70 ERA)
Nick Brown (1-0, 1.29 ERA) vs. Juan Valdevez (0-0, 4.50 ERA)

Three right-handers on tap for the weekend.

Game 1
LVA: 1B McDermott – 2B H. Jones – C Durango – RF Richards – LF Zackery – SS F. Soto – 3B Dahlke – CF Struck – P N. Jones
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – SS Palmer – 3B Rodgers – C Bowen – P Santos

Santos came out and walked Sean McDermott to start the game, but quickly settled in and began to click off the next six batters, including three strikeouts in the second inning. In fact, the only player to get a base hit off Santos the first times through the order would be Geoff Struck, who hit two singles, and those weren’t enough to score runs. Just as inept: the Raccoons. They had nothing going at all through five, except for that one time in the fourth inning when Bednarski and Quebell got on base with nobody on and Matt Pruitt swiftly hit into a double play. Top 6th then, Santos smacked Howard Jones with a 2-2 pitch, Jones moved up on a passed ball charged to Bowen on the 0-1 to Eduardo Durango, and Durango became the first Ace to strike a hit other than Struck, doubling to center to score Jones with the first run of the game. Santos was still trying to shake that off when Rusty Zackery fired a 2-run homer off him that put the Aces up 3-0 and sent Santos showering after five and two thirds. The Aces were close to upping the score significantly in the eighth in which neither Slayton nor Thrasher appeared to be willing to get an out, but Watanabe went in and cleaned up, with only one run added to the Aces tally of now four counters to the Coons’ squid. Jones was spilling singles here and there at times but wasn’t in danger until the bottom 8th, which the Raccoons opened with three straight singles by Merritt, Nomura, and Carmona, bringing up the middle of the order as tying runs with nobody out in the inning. Jones faced two more batters, walking in a run against Bednarski before leaving after Quebell’s 2-run single, but Zack Entwistle didn’t fare much better, walking Pruitt to reload the bases. Palmer hit a sharp grounder to third, with Tom Dahlke coming home for the force, but Ken Rodgers sneaked a grounder past Ricky Avila at short to plate Quebell, and Pruitt was sent home with the go-ahead run and scored well ahead of the throw by Struck. Bowen, who had been once before denied when Rusty Zackery scraped a would-be double out of the sky in leftfield, lined out hard to McDermott, bringing up Merritt again, who just plain beat Dahlke with a rocket up the leftfield line, completing the Critters’ 7-run onslaught in the bottom 8th. Angel Casas, who had warmed up anyway before the comeback, walked his first batter of 2013 – Struck – before retiring the next three, including two strikeouts. 7-4 Raccoons. Nomura 2-5; Rodgers 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Merritt (PH) 2-2, 2B, 2 RBI;

Still no news on Sandy Sambrano, by the way. I am starting to think that our new trainer spends his days smoking herbs rather than getting players fixed.

Game 2
LVA: 2B H. Jones – SS Dahlke – LF Zackery – C Durango – RF Richards – 1B F. Soto – 3B Avila – CF Trovillion – P Wagoner
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF J. Alexander – 3B Merritt – P Hood

The Aces got only a Rusty Zackery single off Hood the first time through, striking out three times, while the Raccoons took a 1-0 lead in the second inning on John Alexander’s RBI triple that drove home Palmer. The Critters thereafter failed to even attempt to tack on another run (or even two) and eventually the Aces had to knock something against Hood. Back-to-back doubles by Ron Richards and Francisco Soto at the start of the fifth inning did the trick well enough to tie the game, and Soto came home on Dave Trovillion’s single to give the a 2-1 lead. Merritt opened the bottom 5th with a single, but was forced out by a poor bunt by Hood on which Avila made a strong play. Yoshi then singled and Carmona walked to fill the bags for Bednarski, who raked and K’ed, while Quebell grounded out to his significant other. The Aces got 2-out hits by Zackery and Durango in the sixth to add a run to their lead, which was in danger in the bottom 8th. Law Rockburn had already registered five outs for his new team in this game before walking Palmer with two outs. Mike Daniels replaced him, J-Alex singled, Merritt walked, and the Aces moved on to Rémy Lucas, a southpaw and former Raccoon whom I’d never put in with a 3-1 lead and three men on base. Bowen grabbed a bat and struck out. The Raccoons would get the tying run to the plate in the bottom 9th after Ricardo Carmona’s 1-out triple off Ryosei Kato. Carmona ran as soon as Mike Bednarski made contact on a 1-0 pitch … too bad that he lined out to Howard Jones, and that Carmona was well over halfway to home plate from where there was no way back to the sanctuary of third base. 3-1 Aces. Nomura 3-5, 2B; Palmer 2-2, 2 BB; J. Alexander 2-4, 3B, RBI; Hood 8.0 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 6 K, L (0-1);

****ing dimwit Carmona.

Meanwhile we finally put Sandy Sambrano on the DL with a strained rib cage muscle. He should not be back before the start of May. Brett Gentry was called up for the sakeness of a right-handed bat.

Game 3
LVA: 2B H. Jones – 1B McDermott – LF Zackery – C Durango – RF Richards – SS Dahlke – 3B F. Soto – CF Trovillion – P Valdevez
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – LF J. Alexander – SS Rodgers – 3B Merritt – P Brown

Nick Brown, who had killed everything once to two strikes on Opening Day, had Howard Jones at 2-2 before allowing a leadoff single, then was 0-2 on Sean McDermott before throwing a wild pitch and conceding a 2-run homer on the 1-2. That 337-footer just barely coughed over the fence at the shallowest bit of the park, right inside the right foul pole. That hittability never went away for Brown in this game, with Zackery adding a double to the pile right after the homer, although the Aces didn’t score again until the third inning, then on two singles and a sac fly. While Brown failed to go six and chased by a combination of too many extra base hits, a brief rain delay, and his own throwing error that put Dahlke on second base in the top 6th, and STILL somehow struck out ten batters in this muddled appearance, Valdevez faced the minimum through four innings (including a John Alexander double play) and only surrendered a run in the fifth inning on a sac fly, leaving the Raccoons then 3-1 behind. Josh Gibson retired Francisco Soto to strand Dahlke and at least keep the Raccoons close, but they had an unnerving habit of getting the leadoff man on in these middle innings and then fudging their way out of it. Walt Canning drew a leadoff walk after entering along with Gibson in the double play that removed Brownie and promptly was forced out by Nomura’s grounder before the sub-.200 batters Carmona and Bednarski continued their race towards a squid batting average. That was already their final twitch. Quebell flew out to left against Law Rockburn in the bottom 7th before the rain came back and doused Coon City pretty bad. After another lengthy rain delay the game was eventually called. 3-1 Aces. Quebell 2-3;

In other news

April 3 – ATL RF/1B Pat Arnette (.273, 0 HR, 1 RBI) gets a double in the Knights’ 10-8 win over the Falcons to extend a hitting streak carried forward from 2012 to 25 games.
April 6 – The Loggers cool off Atlanta’s Pat Arnette (.250, 0 HR, 1 RBI), who goes empty in the Knights’ 7-6 win over Milwaukee to end his hitting streak at 26 games.
April 7 – TIJ SP Zach Boyer (1-0, 3.68 ERA) is placed on the DL with radial nerve compression and might miss four to five months.

Complaints and stuff

Last place in the North, worst defense, worst bullpen, leadoff man on the DL, no stolen bases, and no home runs since Wednesday – the definition of “cluster****”, I guess.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (2-4) vs. Falcons (2-4) – April 8-10, 2013

Most numbers put up by the Falcons so far were quite similar to the Raccoons, give or take a run here or there. They were eighth in runs scored and ninth in runs allowed a week in, while the Raccoons were t-6th and t-5th, respectively. But the Falcons had already stolen four bases, and the Raccoons had lost Sandy Sambrano for the month. The Raccoons had lost the season series in 2012, dropping five of nine games.

Projected matchups:
Daniel Dickerson (0-1, 1.50 ERA) vs. Brian Patrick (0-0, 0.00 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (0-1, 2.84 ERA) vs. Steve Kreider (0-1, 15.75 ERA)
Hector Santos (0-0, 4.76 ERA) vs. Adrian Valencia (0-0, 3.60 ERA)

Valencia is a southpaw on Wednesday, and we will have Thursday off before hitting the road for the first time. Would be nice to go to New York not being down 2-7.

Game 1
CHA: CF DeBoer – SS Kester – 1B J. Diaz – 3B C. Martinez – C F. Chavez – RF Puckett – LF Nieves – 2B Da Silva – P Patrick
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – P Dickerson

The Coons got into the SB column in this one, and real early, Ricardo Carmona taking care of it. Truth be told, he grounded to second to get Yoshi Nomura forced out ahead of him, and the Raccoons wouldn’t score in the inning. Dickerson had two men on in the first inning, one man on in the second inning, and made me crash through yet another glass table in the third inning when he struck out Brian Patrick, then shook his arm, then shook his head. I fainted instantly and saw a pile of dollar notes burning to ashes while I drifted in and out of consciousness until Maud revived me about an hour later. The first thing I saw consciously was Bill Conway crossing home plate and the fans cheering, so either things were going really good or really bad.

Actually, things were really good after six innings. Conway had taken over when Dickerson had left with the injury and the Falcons weren’t on the board, but the Raccoons were, with a 2-run homer by Quebell in the fifth and Yoshi singling home Conway in the sixth. The Falcons got a run in the top 7th as Conway ran out of juice. Chris Puckett hit a leadoff double before being driven in by Maxime Da Silva, and Conway departed after striking out Brian Patrick with the last ounce of ooze in his arm. Sugano got out of the seventh, but before long the Raccoons were flicking through relievers at a frantic pace again. While I was spitting out the last little shards of glass from my bleeding mouth, Hoshi Watanabe allowed two singles with one out in the eighth, putting Juan Diaz and Carlos Martinez on base. Slayton replaced him, and Bednarski got him out of the inning with a good grab on a drive by Fernando Chavez. Angel Casas in the ninth didn’t need any help: he struck out Domingo Nieves, Maxime Da Silva, and Armando Chavez in order. 3-1 Critters. Nomura 2-3, BB, RBI; Carmona 2-4; Pruitt 2-4, 2B; Conway 4.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, W (1-0) and 1-2, 2B;

Dickerson was not diagnosed immediately. Here comes the insomnia.

Game 2
CHA: CF DeBoer – SS Kester – 1B J. Diaz – 3B C. Martinez – RF Nieves – LF A. Chavez – C T. Avila – 2B Da Silva – P Kreider
POR: CF Carmona – SS Palmer – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – 2B Rodgers – 3B Merritt – C Bowen – P Baldwin

The Coons had their first three batters in the game on base when Carmona singled, Palmer doubled, and Bednarski walked to load the bases for Quebell, who started dissolving the situation unfavorably despite a sac fly to left. Matt Pruitt hit into the double play to get the Coons out well short at 1-0, which was doubly unfortunate given Colin Baldwin allowing two walks and two hits in the second inning, as well as two runs. Things appeared to get much worse in the third with Jaime Kester and Juan Diaz opening with singles, but a couple of foul outs got Baldwin through the inning. Baldwin would tie the game with a 1-out single off Kreider later on, in the fifth. Jon Merritt had drawn a walk to get the Coons going and had made for third on Bowen’s single to right, the backup backstop’s first hit of the year. Baldwin then dropped a floater into shallow right to get Merritt home. Nothing more came to be in this inning, but half a frame later, Baldwin cocked up a new lead for the Falcons, who had runners in scoring position with two outs after Tony Avila’s groundout. Da Silva was walked intentionally to bring up Kreider, but Baldwin threw a wild pitch – 3-2 Falcons – before Kreider had even a chance to do something stupid.

The Coons had them loaded with no outs in the bottom 6th again, the result of Bednarski singling to left – and Armando Chavez making an error picking up the ball – Quebell walking and Pruitt singling. Ken Rodgers hit the most miserable duck snort off Kreider’s 0-1 pitch but it nevertheless fell in for a game-tying RBI single between Da Silva and Nieves. Had Baldwin crumbled before, Kreider was vaporating right now. While Merritt flew out to right to no great effect, Kreider then walked Bowen to force home the go-ahead run, then balked with Baldwin at the plate, 5-3. While Baldwin struck out, Kreider then threw a wild pitch to Carmona, plating yet another run! Carmona chomped a three-footer into the ground in front of home plate before dashing up the line. With Bowen holding, Tony Avila sprung out to unleash a terrible rocket far up the first base line and nowhere near Juan Diaz. The ball bounced into the stands halfway up the rightfield line, awarding Carmona second base and Bowen home, sweet home. The Falcons got the idea that a replacement pitcher might make sense by now, but Pablo Sanchez allowed another run to Bednarski before the inning was out. A 6-spot gave Baldwin an 8-3 lead, but he didn’t get through the seventh, leaving with runners on the corners. Josh Gibson allowed the lead runner to score on Domingo Nieves’ searing liner to right, but that was the only damage in the inning. The Raccoons were far from being out of the woods, though. Slayton was handed the ninth with an 8-4 lead and immediately failed. Diaz and Martinez singled, and Nieves drove in both with a 1-out, 2-run double. Angel!! Stop munching! I need a paw over here! Casas struck out Armando Chavez, but allowed an RBI single to Fernando Chavez. He came back with another K to Da Silva to end the game. 8-7 Raccoons. Carmona 2-5; Bednarski 2-3, BB, 2B, RBI; Gentry (PH) 1-1;

Of the six runs scored in the sixth inning, five were earned, and all were deserved.

The Raccoons had won two now and were back to .500, but were still (tied for) last in the North, with no losing teams in the division as the South got a right creaming early on in the season.

Game 3
CHA: CF DeBoer – SS Kester – 1B J. Diaz – LF J. Jimenez – C F. Chavez – RF Puckett – 3B Ladd – 2B Da Silva – P Valencia
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – C D. Alexander – RF Bednarski – CF Carmona – 1B Merritt – LF J. Alexander – 3B Canning – P Santos

Santos retired the first ten Falcons before walking Jaime Kester on four pitches. Juan Diaz would pop out on the next 3-0 pitch and Jose Jimenez struck out to end the inning. Chris Puckett’s double and Wes Ladd’s single still gave the Falcons a 1-0 lead in the fifth inning while the remarkable actions by the Raccoons were so far limited to breadless endeavors like Carmona getting caught stealing and D-Alex being robbed of a homer by Puckett. The amount of inaction by them was remarkable, and when Gentry hit for Santos in the bottom 6th and singled, Yoshi swiftly hit into a double play to erase the tying run from the bases. D-Alex opened the bottom 7th with a double into the rightfield corner the pesky Puckett had no chance of getting to, with Bednarski walking and Carmona singling to load the bases with nobody out. Merritt fouled out behind home plate, and when Quebell hit for John Alexander, a double play was the only possible outcome of that plate appearance. Pruitt’s single off Pat Kling in the eighth was also well not enough to score a run (and he got forced by Nomura), and the Raccoons remained 1-0 behind into the bottom of the ninth, coming up against lefty Matt Collins, who issued a leadoff walk to Dylan Alexander. There was no speed left on the bench, so D-Alex would have to come around himself to – oh, look, Bednarski hit into a double play. 1-0 Falcons. Carmona 2-4; Gentry (PH) 1-1; Pruitt 1-1; Santos 6.0 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, L (0-1);

By our off day on Thursday we got the splendid news that Daniel Dickerson had completely shredded his rotator cuff and was out for a year – if that was even enough.

WHAT AN INVESTMENT.

Oh well, dump him on the DL, I guess?

With the off day on Thursday, we made an early rotation adjustment, putting Rich Hood behind Brownie in Dickerson’s slot. Brown and everybody else outside of Hood would go on regular rest, while we could delay promoting another starter (or swallowing Conway) until early next week. For now we called up an additional long option in Marco Gomez, who had made a start (and only one) for the Coons last year.

Raccoons (4-5) @ Crusaders (7-2) – April 12-14, 2013

The Crusaders, who had been drummed a record 15-3 by the Raccoons in 2012, had a thing or two to put right with them, and had opened the season scoring the most runs and conceding the least runs in the Continental League. All outfielders sensitive to their cause were perfectly healthy.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (1-1, 2.84 ERA) vs. Rodrigo Moreno (1-0, 1.29 ERA)
Rich Hood (0-1, 3.38 ERA) vs. Paul Miller (1-1, 2.45 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (1-1, 4.15 ERA) vs. Kelvin Yates (1-0, 4.91 ERA)

That’s three right-handers, thank goodness.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – P Brown
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – C G. Ortíz – 3B J. Ortega – SS J. Hernandez – P R. Moreno

The Raccoons had Yoshi Nomura thrown out at home by Martin Ortíz to end the first inning, and Nick Brown came out and walked people. Roberto Pena on four pitches, Francisco Caraballo on six. Martin Ortíz struck out, but then Stanton Martin and B.J. Manfull hit back-to-back bombs, putting the Raccoons in a 4-0 hole they certainly weren’t going to emerge from again. Between his appearances in the first and second innings, Nick Brown smashed a chair in the tunnel to the clubhouse into lots of tiny pieces, but a profound positive effect on his pitching was not to be gathered from mindless destruction, either. Another wicked inning unfolded in the bottom 3rd, in which Martin Ortíz opened with a double to right, but was then called out when the Raccoons appealed that he hadn’t touched first base – and he hadn’t. Stanton Martin shrugged, bombed a shot to dead center, his seventh homer of the year, and the Crusaders were up 5-0 anyway. Bottom 4th, Pena was on with a walk and Caraballo with a single when Brown made a bad step in hurrying over to first on Martin Ortíz’ grounder and dropped Quebell’s throw. That would have ended the inning if the play would have been made. Instead, Stanton Martin came up with the bases loaded and salivating. The count ran full and Brown struck him out, but what a miserable outing! While the Raccoons did absolutely nothing with the bats that would have lightened the mood at least a little bit, Brown fell to an RBI single by the opposing pitcher in the bottom 5th and left this game in shame after having allowed six runs. Stanton Martin would come pretty dang close to the third homer against Conway later in the game, but was denied by the depth of centerfield and Carmona’s glove. 6-0 Crusaders. Nomura 2-4, 2B; Palmer 2-3; Conway 3.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 4 K;

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF Pruitt – 3B Merritt – P Hood
NYC: CF R. Pena – 2B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – C G. Ortíz – 3B J. Ortega – SS J. Hernandez – P P. Miller

The Coons jumped onto Miller for a 2-spot in the first inning. Yoshi walked, Carmona tripled and scored on an error by Julio Hernandez. They had the chance to add on in the third inning when Carmona got Yoshi forced, but moved to third on Bednarski’s double to left, but the best that Quebell and D-Alex could come up with was a pair of strikeouts to end the game. Hood didn’t allow a hit through three innings, but a walk, and issued another walk to Caraballo to start the fourth inning. Ortíz grounded out, but Stanton Martin chipped a 3-0 pitch into play and reached on an infield single, just before B.J. Manfull got the Crusaders on the board with a proper single to left that scored Caraballo from third base. Hood issued another 4-pitch walk to Gabe Ortíz before Jorge Ortega drummed in a pair with a liner to left center, and another run scored on Hernandez’ groundout. Just like that, the Crusaders were up 4-2 and the Raccoons were looking as lost and beaten as ever, except that Miller continued to give them free baserunners as well and they had the bases loaded with no outs in the top 5th. Quebell could control the urge and stayed out of the double play and between his RBI single and D-Alex’ sac fly they tied the score, then took a 6-4 lead in the top 6th when Carmona singled into center with Hood and Nomura in scoring position and two outs. Too soon to nickname him Captain Clutch, but it was surely a nice gesture. Rich Hood in turn was a dork, and was ever going to be a dork. He would make it to the seventh inning, where he threw eight pitches, none in the strike zone, and when Hoshi Watanabe replaced him, Caraballo and the Martins were eagerly waving their bats, unable to wait to get a turn in the comeback. The Crusaders loaded the bases when Nomura misfielded Caraballo’s grounder, and Watanabe walked in a run against Ortíz before Stanton Martin struck out and Manfull grounded into a double play.

The Coons had a chance at rebuilding value in the eighth. John Alexander led of batting for Hoshi and tripled to right. Johnny Smith was instructed to walk Yoshi intentionally, bringing up Carmona, who hit one into the other corner for an RBI double (and he might have had a triple if he hadn’t been slowed by Yoshi Nomura on the bases). After Bednarski’s RBI single Carmona was still left on third base with nobody out, but catastrophic RISP batting took over again and he remained there to the conclusion of the inning, but the Critters were up by three now. Gibson got through the eighth inning on three hard balls hit right at somebody, and Angel put leadoff man Aaron Case on base in the bottom 9th, but then got two grounders and a fly to Bednarski to end the game. 8-5 Critters. Nomura 3-4, 2 BB; Carmona 4-5, BB, 3B, 2B, 4 RBI; Bednarski 2-5, BB, 2B, 2 RBI; J. Alexander (PH) 1-2, 3B;

Rich Hood walked six and stunk and still got the win.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – SS Palmer – LF J. Alexander – 3B Rodgers – C Bowen – P Baldwin
NYC: CF R. Pena – 3B Caraballo – LF M. Ortíz – RF S. Martin – 1B Manfull – C G. Ortíz – SS J. Ortega – 2B J. Hernandez – P Yates

Both teams had two hits in the first inning without scoring. The top 2nd saw J-Alex and Rodgers both hit singles before Bowen struck out, but Kel then fatally walked Baldwin … and Yoshi. Carmona singled in a run with a liner to center, 2-0, but Bednarski then found the shortstop and a double play. In a perfect world, Baldwin would have run through seven or eight innings with that lead… or even three. Well, he actually made it through three, even if that required a heroic leaping catch by Palmer on Stanton Martin’s glove-singing rocket after Baldwin had put Yates (YATES!!) on with a double and had walked Martin Ortíz.

The Coons added two runs with some top-of-the-order, 2-out terror in the fourth inning. Yoshi singled, Carmona doubled to center, and Bednarski drove both in with a liner to left. Gabe Ortíz’ homer off Baldwin pulled the Crusaders back to 4-1 in the bottom of the inning, and both starting pitchers were done in the sixth. Kel Yates left with some sort of discomfort, while Baldwin was plainly flattened by a steamroller. Martin Ortíz led off with a double, the other Martin singled, Manfull singled, he walked the other Ortíz, and after Ortega’s run-scoring groundout, a hard shot to Ken Rodgers, it was well enough. Hoshi Watanabe fell to a 2-out, 2-run triple by Bartolo Román, who had his first plate appearance of the season.

Not all was lost, however. The Crusaders had Micah Steele in the pen and weren’t afraid enough to not use him, and while he walked Quebell and picked him off right away in the seventh, he served up a game-tying homer to Ken Rodgers in the eighth. Neither Steele (no! I don’t know this man! Don’t you dare returning him to us!) nor Slayton managed to **** up the 5-5 tie in the eighth, but Carmona hit a leadoff double off Robbie Wills in the ninth. Bednarski singled to right, but Carmona got not only a stop sign from the third base coach, but was also signaled to slow down with the foghorn and some vintage 19th century railway detonators thrown in his path. Do not run against Stanton Martin with the go-ahead run! Instead, Quebell chopped an 0-2 pitch to shallow right for the go-ahead RBI single (also livening up Quebell’s average enough to get over .200). Palmer brought in a run with a sac fly, scoring Bednarski, who had run aggro right away on Quebell’s single. J-Alex hit a soft single to center, and Wills didn’t look like he was going to get out of that one alive. Ken Rodgers closed the curtains for him in spectacular fashion, bombing a mammoth 3-run homer to left center! Ken Rodgers!! 10-5 Raccoons!! Nomura 2-4, BB, RBI; Carmona 3-5, 2 2B, RBI; Bednarski 3-5, 2 RBI; J. Alexander 2-5; Rodgers 4-5, 2 HR, 4 RBI; Slayton 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 0 K, W (1-0);

In other news

April 8 – WAS SP Tyler Sullivan (0-0, 0.00 ERA) is out for the season with a damaged elbow ligament. He will be out of action for at least 12 months, possibly more.
April 8 – The game is also over early for SFB SP Alex Maldonado (0-0, 0.00 ERA), who is lost for the year with a torn rotator cuff.
April 9 – Another pitcher down for the year! PIT SP Barney Manning (0-0, 0.00 ERA) has a partially torn UCL and is also done with the 2013 season.
April 14 – In a strange move, the Thunder flip 1B/3B Dave McCormick (.327, 4 HR, 10 RBI) to the Miners for 40-year old SP Takeru Sato (0-2, 10.97 ERA).

Complaints and stuff

Ever seen someone going all-in, including a wager of grandfather’s wristwatch and his last pair of pants, with three jacks only to realize that the ****ing asshole opposite him has four ****ing aces going? And then the asshole shoots him anyway.

I can’t remember any year outside of perhaps 1979 when the Raccoons were done so ****ing hard in April. Oh, and I gotta show you the expletive-laden mail I got from the Mexican prick when he learned of things. If I can - … wait a sec - … Maud! Maud!! – Maud, I want to print that on paper again and it won’t… – No, I did not pay attention when you showed me which button this was, I had crying to do!

Jonathan Toner is VERY much an unfinished product when it comes to walks and stuff and only turned 22 on the eve of the season, and I am really unwilling to bring him up. That means we can pick between Conway, Marco Gomez (one of the 2+ innings disaster from last May when Baldwin went down), Kevin Denton (ditto!), Ian Cumins (they’re everywhere!!), Gary Dupes (talking about unfinished products…), and Chris Brown, the 2011 second-rounder who walked EIGHT in his first AAA start of the year.

One of the chumps or Conway. Hum.

THANKFULLY… the Raccoons have a trainer that can’t diagnose a running nose, but has a wonderful … let me phrase this right… “collection of exotic herb samples”. If you’d excuse me now, I gotta tune myself out, else my head is going to explode.

[edtheguy]

I love April in P-town.

[Trebro]

Maybe he'll retire and you'll be able to use that money next year?

Cold comfort, I know.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (6-6) @ Indians (5-8) – April 16-18, 2013

The Indians had been ravaged for the second-most runs in the early going (5.4 R/A), while scoring merely at league average rate. Their bullpen was giving the Coons’ shoddy assembly of no-good no-goods a damn good race for the thorned crown of futility. We had gone 12-6 against them in 2012.

Projected matchups:
Hector Santos (0-1, 3.09 ERA) vs. Jack Berry (1-1, 3.86 ERA)
Nick Brown (1-2, 5.09 ERA) vs. Aaron Walsh (2-0, 1.13 ERA)
Rich Hood (1-1, 5.14 ERA) vs. Tom Weise (0-2, 3.43 ERA)

The Raccoons can scrape past without another starter for another few days thanks to the off day on Monday, and there will be another conveniently placed off day next Thursday, but some mook will have to start a game against the Knights on Saturday. Looks like Conway after all. The Raccoons could meanwhile miss the Indians’ pair of left-handers. I’m torn on this one, since they both have ERA’s over seven.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF J. Alexander – 1B Rodgers – 3B J. Merritt – P Santos
IND: CF J. Wilson – C Padilla – RF J. Ortíz – 2B Kym – 1B Tsung – LF Kui – 3B Mathews – SS R. Miller – P Berry

Juan Ortíz put the Indians ahead with a first inning homer; thankfully Dylan Alexander had caught John Wilson stealing, so the damage was limited to a single run. The Raccoons required an error by Joey Mathews that put Bednarski on as the go-ahead run in the fourth to tie the game, and then only did it on two groundouts, but John Alexander cracked his first home run of the season to actually put up a 2-1 lead. That, however, was before Hector Santos allowed singles to Ortíz and Jong-beom Kym, walked Mun-wah Tsung, and then surrendered – in the truest sense of the word! – a grand slam to ****ing Ming Kui, the career replacement of career replacements.

That gave the Raccoons one Opening Day starting pitcher on the DL and four with ERA’s over five, at least momentarily.

Top 6th, Bednarski reached again, and again it was somebody else’s fault, with Jack Berry brushing him with a pitch. No outs, one on, D-Alex and Palmer came up with singles, scoring Bednarski and putting the tying runs on base for the bottom of the order, and J-Alex and Merritt came up with singles, bringing the score to 5-4, and bringing up Santos with the sacks full. Uh-uh! Quebell hit for Santos, tied the game with a sac fly, but that was the last run in the inning as Yoshi flew out to Wilson in center. After that rousing 3-run sixth the Raccoons’ pen damn sure found a way to bungle the reclaimed tie, with Marco Gomez making his season debut in the bottom 7th against the bottom of the order. It didn’t go too well, two hits right away, then another one, and Manobu Sugano failed to stem the tide in his relief and three runs scored for the Indians. Sugano started the bottom 8th, allowed a leadoff single to Tsung and was immediately replaced by Gibson, who’s best plan it was to throw a wild pitch to Kui, then to walk the little Korean pest anyway, and Shane Larsen singled home another run we didn’t need to concede. Top 9th, Bowen opened against Helio Maggessi by striking out. Then Yoshi singled, Carmona singled, and Bednarski singled – his fourth time on base and the first time he had actually earned it. The bags were full with one out and the tying run to bat would be Matt Pruitt, who singled to plate a run, and Palmer scored another one on a sac fly, but steam was running out, and John Alexander’s grounder to Tsung ended the game. 9-7 Indians. Nomura 2-5, 2B; Pruitt (PH) 1-1, RBI; Palmer 2-4, 3 RBI; J. Alexander 2-5, HR, RBI;

Say, can any of you first class ***holes keep runners off base, or at least on base??

Doc, I’ve got a headache. What you got for that? – Really? – Funny. That totally looks like a cigarette.

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF J. Alexander – 3B Canning – P Brown
IND: CF J. Wilson – C Padilla – RF J. Ortíz – 2B Kym – 1B Tsung – SS R. Miller – LF Tanner – 3B Mathews – P Walsh

The Coons had their first two batters in the first inning on with singles before the middle of the order just plain failed, but this was made up by the Indians in the bottom 2nd. Kym and Tsung had singles off Brownie before Ryan Miller flew out to shallow right, Rowan Tanner popped out, and Joey Mathews whiffed, Brown’s first victim of the game. After that early non-onslaught (nonslaught?) both teams went into hiding for a few innings while both pitchers engaged in a pitcher’s duel. This was not with the strikeout Brownie, but a Brownie that couldn’t remove batters with two strikes on them for most of the night, and ultimately one of those non-strikeouts came to hurt when Dave Padilla hit a leadoff jack in the bottom 6th to put the Indians into the lead. Joey Mathews hit another one in the seventh and Brown brought home the Coons’ first run, scoring Canning after the latter’s leadoff triple when he grounded out in the eighth. He finished eight, leaving it to the middle of the order to find a run to tie, and two to take a lead against Helio Maggessi in the top 9th. Bednarski lined a 1-2 pitch RIGHT BACK to Maggessi for the first out, Quebell struck out, and Pruitt – in Dylan Alexander’s spot – popped out to short. 2-1 Indians. Carmona 2-4; Canning 2-3, 3B; Brown 8.0 IP, 8 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 7 K, L (1-3);

That was Nick Brown’s 100th career loss. It also dropped the Raccoons into last place, five games out after having played 14. But with all that I am to-tal-ly fine. To-tal-ly fine.

(giggles while pulling the stuffing out of a pillow)

Life is so good to me…!

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – SS Rodgers – C Bowen – 3B Merritt – P Hood
IND: CF J. Wilson – C Padilla – RF J. Ortíz – 2B Kym – 1B Tsung – SS R. Miller – LF Kui – 3B Mathews – P Weise

The Coons scored a run in the first when Carmona reached on an error, stole second base, and came home on Quebell’s single to left. Too bad only that Rich Hood was charged a run by default as soon as he touched the rubber in the bottom 1st. John Wilson singled, stole second, and scored on Ortíz single – tied game. Both orders failed for a while after that, with the Raccoons hitting scores of singles, as well as a handful of double plays. The top of the sixth inning, still in a 1-1 game, however saw fortunes for Tom Weise take a turn for the worse as Quebell opened the frame with a double. Pruitt singled and Rodgers walked to load the bases with nobody out. Too bad that the bottom three coming up were batting a combined .147, and that included a 2-for-8 contribution by Rich Hood… Craig Bowen closed his little black eyes and smashed at the first pitch he got, hitting a fly deep enough to left that Quebell scored from third on the sac fly, bringing home the go-ahead run. At the same time, that was all the Coons got – Merritt hit straight into a double play afterwards.

Better yet, the Indians had their own three on, no outs chance in the bottom 6th after Dave Padilla’s leadoff single and two hapless walks issued by Ditch Hood. Tsung brought home the tying run with a groundout, after which Hoshi Watanabe replaced Hood, got a pop in foul ground hauled in by Quebell to retire Ryan Miller, and after an intentional walk to Kui got out of the inning when Mathews flew out to right.

Top 8th, Bednarski’s deep drive to center was only an F8 to lead off the inning, but Quebell drew a walk off Weise, who just now approached 100 pitches against mostly inept Raccoons. For ****’s sake the Coons called a hit-and-run with Quebell the latter part, and Pruitt indeed singled to send Quebell and the go-ahead run to third base. The following grounder by Ken Rodgers was just by a hair not **** enough to be turned into a double play by Tsung, and the Coons went up 3-2 while Pruitt got axed at second, a lead that Manobu Sugano immediately aspired to blow by walking Kym and Tsung in the bottom of the inning. Angel Casas appeared only to surrender a howling liner to rightfield to PH Jalen Parks, but Bednarski made a hero’s play on it to retire the switch-hitter. Kui struck out to end the inning, the Coons had two runners on base in the top 9th thanks to a Parks error and a Palmer single, but Yoshi lined into a double play, and the bottom 9th saw Angel in more of a predicament with PH Clint Philip singling and Padilla rocking a double to right with two outs. Philip was not a good runner and held at third base, but the Indians were a single away from walking off and giving the Raccoons a broom treatment. Perhaps the Indians’ earlier decision to pinch-run for Jong-beom Kym could be turned around against them. With Shane Larsen batting behind Ortíz there was no reason to bother with the big left-handed bat, especially with first base open. Larsen was struck out so hard by Angel Casas, you almost had to feel sorry for the kid. Almost. 3-2 Coons. Carmona 2-5; Quebell 2-3, BB, 2B, RBI; Pruitt 4-4; Palmer 1-1; Casas 1.2 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K, SV (5);

Just back in Portland that evening, Angel Casas went to see trainer Ivan Mena for some discomfort, but couldn’t find him. Our new witch doctor was eventually found lodged behind a bench in the trainer’s room, stoned harder than a block of marble.

Oh well, we’re in Oregon. We have excellent public health institutions, right? Slappy had to drive Angel there, though, since I had been … “treated” by Ivan the same day, and was not really fazed.

Raccoons (7-8) vs. Knights (7-8) – April 19-21, 2013

The Knights had the same record, but were only half a game out in the suffering South. They had also rallied from 3-8 with four straight wins. They were sixth in runs scored despite the worst batting average in the league thanks to second places in both homers and stolen bases, while allowing the fourth-least runs. Don’t ask about any ranks by the Raccoons, please, I’m begging you. Last year we had lost the season series to the Knights, 4-5.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (1-1, 5.40 ERA) vs. Harry Wentz (0-2, 2.02 ERA)
Bill Conway (1-0, 4.50 ERA) vs. Ted McKenzie (0-1, 4.80 ERA)
Hector Santos (0-1, 4.86 ERA) vs. Shaun Yoder (2-1, 5.14 ERA)

Three more right-handers, as their southpaw Dave Butler started on Wednesday already.

Game 1
ATL: 3B Fish – SS Hibbard – LF M. Reyes – 1B Rockwell – RF J. Garcia – CF Kelsey – 2B Ybarra – C I. Gutierrez – P Wentz
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – 3B Merritt – P Baldwin

Neither pitcher had much of a clue about the location of the strike zone, with Wentz walking a pair and throwing a wild pitch in the first inning, which combined with Carmona’s double was enough to plate two early runs for the Raccoons. While Baldwin also had three walks put away on his ledger after three innings, it was Wentz to allow all the runs early on. In the third inning it was a Bednarski double and a Quebell single to add a run, and the Raccoons loaded the bases on three singles with nobody out in the bottom 4th, but it was Baldwin’s turn to bat. His run-scoring groundout was good enough, and Yoshi hit another one of those for a 5-0 lead. The following inning, reliever Jorge Cortez was torn wide open for four runs on six hits, except for the last one, a Nomura double that plated two, all singles. Bednarski’s leadoff jack off Lawrence Rivers in the bottom 6th got the Coons into double digits, 10-0. Baldwin’s wildness subsided after the fourth inning and he actually made it into the eighth inning after that, mostly with pitching to contact, but was successful, maintaining a shutout until leaving after 100 pitches and a 2-out single by Devin Hibbard. Marco Gomez got the last four outs. 11-0 Raccoons. Bednarski 3-4, HR, 2B, RBI; Quebell 2-4, BB, RBI; D. Alexander 2-5; Merritt 3-4; Baldwin 7.2 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 4 BB, 4 K, W (2-1);

The Coons, for a change, scored in every inning except for the second and eighth.

Game 2
ATL: CF Arnette – SS Hibbard – LF M. Reyes – 1B Rockwell – C W. Jones – 2B Kelsey – RF Shearing – 3B Tolwith – P McKenzie
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – 3B Merritt – P Conway

The early onslaught from the first game didn’t copy and waste (did I do that right, Maud? Maud? Why are you crying?) over into the second game, as when Nomura and Carmona opened with singles in the bottom 1st, Bednarski struck out, Quebell grounded out, Pruitt walked, and Dylan Alexander grounded out to leave three men stranded. Merritt was left in scoring position in the second, but in the bottom 3rd Ricardo Carmona hit a leadoff single, then stole his way around the bags to third and scored from there on Quebell’s sac fly, 1-0. While Conway wasn’t exactly no-hitting the Knights, he still managed to hold them off the board (including runners on the corners in the fifth and a hard grounder hit by the pitcher McKenzie that nevertheless became the third out). The Coons had a big chance in the bottom 6th when McKenzie walked Palmer to load the bases with one out for Merritt. Reliever Dave Shannon was tasked with Merritt, and Shannon had walked 49 batters in 2012. The count ran full and I would really appreciate a bases-loaded walk here, but then Merritt densely grounded into a double play.

Walking William Jones with one out in the top 7th was enough of an excuse to hand the ball to a reliever as far as Conway’s fate was concerned. There were two left-handed bats coming up anyway, and this was a job for the Thrashman, protecting a 1-0 lead. Predictably, the Knights hit righty Tom Fish for John Kelsey, Fish singled, sending Jones to third, and the Thrashman was excused from further presence. Hoshi Watanabe inherited a mess with another right-handed pinch-hitter, Pancho Ybarra, in the box, and Ybarra’s sac fly tied the game. Sugano appeared for the eighth, brushed PH César Morán with his very first pitch, then put on Arnette with a single. Josh Gibson inherited THAT mess, struck out Devin Hibbard, got a grounder to short from Marty Reyes with Arnette breaking up a double play by bowling over Palmer (also breaking his own leg in the process), and Gil Rockwell singled home Morán with the go-ahead run. Bottom 8th, the Knights also lost reliever Andrew Wills to injury after throwing only three pitches (resulting in Quebell’s leadoff single). Pruitt singled off Steve Arritt, prompting the next pitching change for lefty Jorge Cortez, with Brett Gentry hitting for D-Alex to counter him, but grounded out to first. The runners moved up, with the next reliever in, Law Rivers, to face Palmer, who flew out to Israel Gutierrez in center (really not a centerfielder!), and when Quebell tagged to score, Gutierrez unleashed the wildest throw ever seen. Tied game, Pruitt at third, where he remained when Merritt lined out to left. In turn, Jorge Garcia homered off Gibson in the ninth. Down 3-2, the Coons faced Ed Bryan (uh, the unpleasant memories!) in the bottom 9th, which meant they had a damn fine chance. PH Walt Canning promptly singled, and so did Yoshi to put the winning runs on base, which soon moved up on a full count single hit by Carmona. Three on, no outs. Bednarski flew to left, deep, but not deep enough, yet the sac fly tied the game. Quebell – double play, extras, with bullpens already thoroughly depleted.

Well, actually we still had Slayton and Gomez available. Slayton might be the minor annoyance in this situation. He allowed two hits but bailed out when Rockwell hit into a double play, with Craig Bowen’s 1-out double in the bottom 10th giving the Coons the next chance they didn’t deserve. Palmer grounded to Hibbard, who threw wildly to first and pulled Rockwell off the bag, and Bowen moved to third. Jon Merritt then walked off the Coons with a single to right. 4-3 Blighters. Nomura 2-4, BB; Carmona 3-5; Quebell 2-4, RBI; Bowen 1-1, 2B; Merritt 3-5, RBI; Canning (PH) 1-1; Conway 6.1 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 5 K;

Game 3
ATL: SS Hibbard – 3B Fish – LF M. Reyes – 1B Rockwell – C W. Jones – RF Goff – CF C. Morán – 2B Ybarra – P Yoder
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Pruitt – LF J. Alexander – SS Rodgers – C D. Alexander – 3B Merritt – P Santos

Santos got lit up real quick, issuing a leadoff walk to Devin Hibbard, a single to Marty Reyes, and then a 3-run homer to Gil Rockwell in the first. The Coons went down in order the first time through their lineup, and Santos had eight strikeouts on his ledger for no good reason after the early whammy before Yoshi Nomura hit a leadoff single in the bottom 4th. Carmona fouled out and Bednarski found his way into a 4-6-3 and that was that, and in the fifth Pruitt walked and was caught stealing. The Coons only got out of minimum-batters territory when D-Alex homered to start the sixth. Merritt also got on, but was left on, 3-1. Santos went seven innings, killing a swath of Knights in the process. He struck out Keshawn Goff to start the top 7th, his 12th strikeout in the game, and also whiffed Morán, but ultimately the effort was fruitless, especially with Pruitt killing the bottom of the inning with another double play, and the Knights booked Gomez for a fourth run in the top 8th. 4-1 Knights.

Carmona went 0-for-4 to end an 11-game hitting streak.

In other news

April 15 – Bad news for the Crusaders, as the early-season mass-culling of starting pitchers continues, as their starter Kelvin Yates (1-0, 5.40 ERA) needs to have bone spurs removed from his elbow and is out for four months.
April 16 – Just keep ‘em coming: SAC SP William Kay (1-1, 2.45 ERA) is out for a month with a sore elbow.
April 20 – In a baffling trade, the Crusaders break up their dream outfield by sending routine Gold Glover CF Roberto Pena (.191, 0 HR, 4 RBI) and a meager prospect to the Titans for 36-year old LF/RF Jesus Flores (.392, 0 HR, 12 RBI).

Complaints and stuff

Should have traded Hector Santos for a lighter this winter.

I just have no words for the Crusaders/Titans deal. No words.

I also have no words for Pat “****ing ****tard” Slayton leading the team in wins.

Nick Brown might have other things on his mind at the moment, but he made it into 17th place on the all-time strikeout table despite incurring the loss against the Indians this week. He matched Hall of Famer Craig Hansen with a K to Jong-beom Kym in the fourth, and took sole possession of the rank when he whiffed pitcher Aaron Walsh in the fifth.

ABL CAREER STRIKEOUTS (excerpt, 10 guys ahead of Nick Brown, plus now with all active pitchers)

1st – Martin Garcia – 3,783
2nd – Tony Hamlyn – 3,533 (active)
…
7th – Chris York – 3,068 (active)
8th – Carlos Asquabal – 2,995 (HOF)
9th – Arnold McCray – 2,900
10th – Bastyao Caixinha – 2,844 (HOF)
11th – Kisho Saito – 2,800 (HOF)
12th – Robbie Campbell – 2,763
13th – Kelvin Yates – 2,676 (active)
14th – Leland Lewis – 2,664 (HOF)
15th – Manuel Movonda – 2,663
16th – Kiyohira Sasaki – 2,640
17th – Nick Brown – 2,581 (active)

What else? Ah right. Ivan the Druid told me that he had lit a few black candles and had read in a bowl of molten cat fat that Angel Casas was out for the season with radial nerve compression. That’s what the dead cat’s spirits told him, apparently. And because I didn’t trade ****ing Santos I don’t have a ****ing lighter to light my ****ING JOINT!!

[Westheim]

Less than three weeks into the season, the Raccoons had placed two of their five most expensive players (and certainly at least one of those was also a top 5 performer, something that couldn’t be said for all top earners, right, Craig?) on the disabled list for the year. Plus Sandy Sambrano, who was still over a week away from coming off the DL himself, having spent time there since day TWO of the season.

First of all, who the **** is gonna close for this team? You know, whenever they have a lead in the ninth? The best bet right now might be the journeyman that had been plugged into the eighth for cheap money. Hoshi, you’re old as heck, certainly you’ve got some closing experience. – What do you mean you have 12 career saves and none since 2008!?

This also moves Josh Gibson up to a setup role. Boy… we’re so ****ed.

Raccoons (9-9) vs. Thunder (9-10) – April 22-24, 2013

The Thunder were not yet back to their stomping ways, but they were already in rally mode, having won their last four games. They were fifth in runs scored, and tied for seventh in runs allowed, with a +2 run differential. Their rotation had been shoved around quite a bit, with a 4.91 ERA that sat in the bottom three of the Continental League, but their bullpen had been spectacular, the second-best in the league.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (1-3, 4.21 ERA) vs. Bob King (2-2, 3.98 ERA)
Rich Hood (1-1, 4.66 ERA) vs. Ramon Jimenez (1-1, 6.14 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (2-1, 3.81 ERA) vs. Edgar Amador (2-2, 8.71 ERA)

Yet again we will miss a team’s two southpaws. Not that I am too sad. But the way things have been going I don’t particularly crave Monday’s duel between second and first place in last year’s CL Pitcher of the Year race.

With Angel Casas placed on the DL for the rest of his Raccoons contract, Chris Mathis, who had made a cameo late in 2012, was called up.

Game 1
OCT: 3B Reese – SS Farias – 2B O. Torres – RF Bailey – LF Blanc – 1B J. Roberts – C J. Martinez – CF P. Estrada – P King
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – SS Palmer – 3B Rodgers – C Bowen – P Brown

This particularly special game started with Tom Reese drawing a walk off Brownie before Emilio Farias tripled and scored on an uncaught third strike against Oliver Torres, who also reached first base against the fool Craig Bowen. Fairness requires me to point out that Bowen would erase Torres trying to steal second base, but COME ON!! Brown also walked Mohammed Blanc in an excruciating first inning, and yet it would get worse. Nick Brown needed SEVENTY-TWO pitches through two innings, the latter of those a 4-spot that opened with a walk to Jesus Martinez (batting a beefy .169), a single to Bob King, and a 3-run crasher by Tom Reese. A Palmer error and a Will Bailey double added an unearned run for good measure. Reese ended Brown’s day in the third inning with another RBI single (Pedro Estrada had double before that), then had the XXL-sized balls to steal second base in a total rout, and I wasn’t going to take that one lightly. He certainly got one into the ribs in his next plate appearance, leading off the fifth. Despite the Raccoons lucking into a 3-spot in the bottom of the third inning, the Thunder had already opened the lead again at that point, being up 9-3 after solo shots by Bailey and Jimmy Roberts off the completely incompetent Marco Gomez, who also got the sign to smack Reese in the nipples. The Thunder answered in their own way, with singles by Farias and Torres, 10-3, before Bailey hit a 3-run moonshot. That was also the end of Gomez’ stint on the roster.

The Thunder kept pounding the Raccoons with everything they had. Tom Reese hit another 2-shot off Slayton in the sixth, a Blanc triple led to a run in the seventh, and in the eighth the Raccoons FINALLY managed to not concede a run – wow! Thrasher smacked Reese in his fat, black ass, though. Since we were kinda outta arms, JON MERRITT pitched the ninth inning. Well, at least he tried. He walked Oliver Torres, and then something was hurting him. Chris Mathis, who had pitched three of the last four days, had to take over, walked Bailey, and surrendered a run on an RBI hit to Blanc. 17-5 Thunder. Nomura 2-5, 2B, RBI; Bednarski 2-5, 2B, RBI;

Gomez’ season ERA: 23.55; his career ERA: 24.16; he was not only sent to AAA, he was waived outright.

Sergio Vega, the endless chewing gum with rhubarb flavor, was added to the roster. Yep, everything is that bad. For those that lost track during this game, the ****coons allowed five homers. They have allowed 20 for the season, and have hit only eight. As usual, ****ing Pruitt hasn’t hit any despite playing all the ****ing time.

Game 2
OCT: 3B Reese – SS Farias – 2B O. Torres – RF Bailey – LF Blanc – 1B J. Roberts – C B. Campbell – CF P. Estrada – P R. Jimenez
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF Gentry – 3B Canning – P Hood

Hood, the twat, used over 30 pitches in a scoreless first in which he walked a pair and nursed three full counts in total before striking out Roberts to end the inning. The Thunder shrugged that minor defeat off and took the lead in the second as Reese singled home Estrada. In the bottom of the inning, Palmer was on base and tried to get a steal off but Gentry gently rolled into a double play. The Coons got Canning on with a leadoff single in the bottom 3rd, only for Hood to force him out at second with a junior high level bunt (you recognize the fat kid that can’t bunt by the bloody nose). Things still took a turn for the better (!!!!!) when Yoshi walked and Carmona doubled, which tied the game, and the go-ahead run scored on Mike Bednarski’s grounder to short, 2-1 Dumpster Divers. But for how long?

Hood, the dork, issued yet another leadoff walk in the fourth (to Roberts), and ended up facing Reese, the black death, with two runners in scoring position and two outs. Somehow Reese bounced the ball back to Hood, who made a play without breaking anybody’s leg. From the unbelievable to the surreal in the bottom 4th, where it was Hood’s turn at bat with Gentry (reached on error) and Canning (double!) in scoring position and two outs. And Jimenez smacked him. A bit worse for wear, Hood filled the bags for Yoshi to come up with the potential to deliver a killing blow, but after a battle that lasted TEN pitches, he simply popped out to short.

Top 7th, Sugano replaced Hood after six messy innings and four walks. He struck out Jimenez and Reese and appeared out of the inning when Carmona snagged Farias’ pop off the top of the grass in shallow center – but the umpire’s huddled together and ruled it a trapped ball to the dismay of the attendance who began to boo the professionals on the field relentlessly. Sugano certainly made things not one lick better when he then walked Torres, allowed a score-flipping 2-run double to Bailey, walked Blanc, and walked Roberts, which was the point where the manager showed mercy and took him out to get shot. Canning’s leaping grab on a liner that Brian Campbell hit off Josh Gibson ended the inning when the Raccoons least deserved so. Perpetual last straw replacement Sergio Vega appeared in the eighth for his season debut, got two quick outs, then walked Reese, Farias singled, Torres walked – and Bailey hit a liner right into the ducking Vega’s glove. While the pitching staff was mocking around – Vega actually pitched a clean ninth – the offense was still technically able to come back from a 3-2 deficit. Robert Parsons opened the bottom 9th by allowing an infield single to Palmer, putting the tying run on for the first time since Sugano had blown the lead. The Coons sent up three pinch-hitters, J-Alex, Rodgers, and Bowen, and netted two whiffs and a bouncer to the pitcher to end the game. 3-2 Thunder. Canning 2-3, 2B; Vega 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 1 K;

Serge, there’s an opening in the setup department, if you’re interested…

Game 3
OCT: 3B Reese – SS Farias – 2B O. Torres – RF Bailey – LF Blanc – 1B J. Roberts – C B. Campbell – CF P. Estrada – P Amador
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF J. Alexander – 3B Rodgers – P Baldwin

The Fat Cat had been ravaged in the early going, but the Raccoons had to hurry, as there was rain on the approach for this series finale. Amador was walking almost six per nine innings, but made it through three frames on the minimum number of batters with a Yoshi single and a Bednarski double play involved, and used less than 30 pitches while doing so. Baldwin didn’t allow a run through three, either, but issued a leadoff walk to Bailey in the fourth, followed by a ringing double off the fence hit by Mohammed Blanc. The Thunder quickly cashed in the two runs for a 2-0 lead, and in the following inning there was nobody on with two outs before Baldwin allowed two walks and a single to load the bases. Roberts struck out with three on once more. The Coons had scored a run on Ricardo Carmona’s speed alone in the bottom 4th, then wasted a leadoff double hit by Michael Palmer in the fifth. Carmona found himself on again in the bottom 6th and reached third base on a hit-and-run in which Bednarski hit a 1-out single. Adrian Quebell forewent this excellent chance of letting the air out with a double play and had an ACTUAL PRODUCTIVE AT-BAT with a game-tying RBI single to right. D-Alex flew out to center, but Palmer gave the Coons the lead with an RBI double to right center. Quebell was held at third against Bailey’s strong arm, but John Alexander grounded out, leaving the score at 3-2.

Baldwin’s response was to walk Torres with one out in the top 7th, his sixth free pass, and then yielded a double to Bailey. Josh Gibson replaced him and conceded a 2-out, 2-run double to Roberts. Top 8th, Slayton threw one pitch that Estrada grounded to Nomura, who bungled it for an error, before Sugano replaced Slayton. Sugano not only replaced that run already on base, but one more on back-to-back doubles by left-handers Farias and Torres. The Coons had the bases-loaded in the rain in the bottom 8th, with John Alexander popping out to short and Rodgers rolling out to first to end the inning. 6-3 Thunder. Nomura 2-5; Bednarski 3-4, RBI; Palmer 2-3, 2 2B, RBI;

Anybody giving a lick for a 12-game hitting streak by Yoshi Nomura? Since he doesn’t cut it when it counts, I guess not.

I don’t quite know how this works, from a medical point of view. But Ivan the Druid came back to announce that Jon Merritt had strained a hamstring while pitching and would be out for the next three moon cycles. Give or take a few days.

By the way, this week’s musical suggestion is anything by British cult band Madness. Really, anything works.

Raccoons (9-12) @ Titans (16-6) – April 26-28, 2013

The Raccoons were already 1-2 against the Titans on the season, and there was a not-too-slight chance that they would drop back further in this set. The Titans were the best in preventing runs with only 77 counters against them, working out to 3.5 per game, while scoring 112, fourth-most in the league. The Raccoons led the league in disabled players, and nothing else.

Projected matchups:
Bill Conway (1-0, 3.31 ERA) vs. Ian Rutter (3-1, 2.60 ERA)
Hector Santos (0-2, 4.56 ERA) vs. Alex Lindsey (0-0)
Nick Brown (1-4, 5.34 ERA) vs. Curtis Tobitt (3-1, 4.41 ERA)

Conway was supposed to be skipped but he actually has the best ERA of any assumed starter by now, so he gets the ball as long as he doesn’t cock up worse than the others. Jon Merritt had gone to the DL, and we added the entirely forgettable Pat Whitehouse, batting .328 in AAA.

The Titan’s southpaws are not going to make an appearance in this series with Tony Hamlyn (3-0, 1.76 ERA) pitching on Wednesday, and Chester Graham (1-0, 3.78 ERA) on the DL with a sore shoulder.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF J. Alexander – 3B Canning – P Conway
BOS: SS M. Rivera – CF R. Pena – 2B J. Ramirez – C Suda – LF J. Gusmán – 1B Hayashi – 3B B. Butler – RF Grindstaff – P Rutter

Ian Rutter had enjoyed a sandwich before the game and was still smelling faintly like peanut butter. Bad mistake. Really bad mistake. The Raccoons mercilessly undressed him in the first inning with Yoshi walking, Carmona adding a bloop single, and then Bednarski tripled home the runners. He scored on Quebell’s sac fly before D-Alex homered, 4-0. Driven to insanity by the peanut butter smell, Matt Pruitt broke out of the dugout between at-bats to steal Rutter’s cap off his head (that hung in shame), with Palmer singling, J-Alex doubling, but Rutter then struck out Canning and Conway to end the inning – finally.

But don’t you worry about the Titans as a whole. Conway was just as **** as Rutter, and issued two hits and three walks – including one with the bases loaded – in the bottom of the first inning, getting the Titans right back to 4-2. Conway coughed up another run with two outs in the second, 4-3, then came to bat with the bases loaded and nobody out in the top 3rd. He grounded a 1-0 pitch to third base where nobody could make a play and Conway had an RBI infield single. Yoshi hit into a run-scoring double play (…) before Carmona’s RBI triple sent Rutter to bed, 7-3. Bednarski flew out to center, ending this frame. The other ****ing donkey-faced piñata in the game opened the bottom 3rd with a free pass to Javier Gusmán and single given to Toki Hayashi before being yelled at by the pitching coach, which included being slapped on the head with Nomura’s cap. Didn’t work. Bob Butler hit a real rocket on the first pitch he saw, which Canning somehow reverse-engineered into a double play, but Dylan Grindstaff doubled home a run anyway, 7-4. Conway allowed a leadoff single to Mike Rivera in the fourth before striking out the next three, then walked Gusmán to start the fifth. OH MY ****ING GOD!!! CAN’T YOU PITCH A SINGLE ****ING CLEAN INNING???

‘course not. But Canning turned another double play for the wildly bearded dork on the mound that called himself pitcher – a real insult to the craft. He somehow got through the sixth inning – more infield and outfield heroics were required – and was hit for with Whitehouse in the top 7th with the Coons ahead 8-4. Whitehouse got plunked, putting two on with two outs, but Yoshi Nomura again refused to deliver the killing blow. In turn, Ron Thrasher worked hard to relentlessly blow this lead. He faced four batters in the bottom 7th, retired Roberto Pena, but then allowed a single to Jesus Ramirez, walked “Quasimodo” Suda, and another single to Gusmán to load the bases. The tying run was at the plate, and Slayton took over. Of ****ing course Hayashi and Butler would drive in three between them before Slayton struck out Angel Solís and Todd Moultrie, 8-7. Bottom 8th, Mike Rivera hit a leadoff double off Slayton, who was then banished for Sugano, who walked PH Tim Austin before striking out three. Hoshi Watanabe actually managed to save the game. Well, Canning did with another nifty grab. 8-7 Blighters. Carmona 2-5, 3B, RBI; D. Alexander 2-5, HR, RBI; Palmer 2-5; J. Alexander 2-5, HR, 2B, RBI; Canning 2-3, BB;

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – LF J. Alexander – 3B Canning – P Santos
BOS: SS M. Rivera – CF R. Pena – 2B J. Ramirez – C Suda – LF J. Gusmán – 1B Hayashi – 3B B. Butler – RF Grindstaff – P Lindsey

Capital misconceptions about the nature of the strike zone was the main factor in Lindsey getting licked even worse in the first inning than Rutter in the opener. He walked three, including 13-game hitting streak owner Yoshi Nomura to start the game, and allowed three hits, including a huge bases-clearing double by Canning with two outs to hemorrhage five runs in the opening frame. Santos came off a 13 K outing, had enjoyed an extra day off, but still didn’t have the same fatal bite back he had displayed against the Knights. The Titans didn’t score the first time through, however, despite some hard contact to centerfield. The Coons tacked on a run in the fourth on a Nomura double and two errors by Rivera and Pena. Quebell made an error that put Gusmán on base to start the bottom 5th, but now Santos responded with three K to Hayashi, Butler, and Grindstaff, reaching six on the day. The right-handed fireballer got stuck in the sixth. Pena singled with two outs before he walked Ramirez and threw a wild pitch to Suda, who ended up grounding out to Canning, the true glue of this team in this weekend set. Although the Coons shot up Dan Parker for three runs in the top 7th, Palmer hitting a 2-run double, Santos was removed after seven once he shot through 100 pitches, but at least that final pitch resulted in Bob Butler grounding into an inning-ending double play. Mathis and Vega finished the game without much fuss. Well, Vega drilled Alexis Legendre, but got a double play from the next batter, Suda, in the ninth. 9-0 Critters. Bednarski 3-5; D. Alexander 2-4, BB, RBI; Canning 1-4, 2B, 3 RBI; Pruitt (PH) 1-1; Santos 7.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 7 K, W (1-2) and 1-3;

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Pruitt – 3B Rodgers – SS Canning – C Bowen – P Hood
BOS: SS M. Rivera – 1B Legendre – 3B B. Butler – C Suda – RF Hayashi – LF T. Austin – 2B Moultrie – CF Grindstaff – P Tobitt

Yep, that’s not Brownie on that mound. Why not? It’s his turn! Yep, true. For more substantial inquiries find him in the clubhouse, through the blue door, in the second stall from the end, where he’s been barfing all morning. It is not a pleasant sight, so beware. Don’t slip. And I did tell him that two 12-boxes of donuts were enough, but he had none of it last night! He was thoroughly unable to take his turn and had to be skipped. Rich Hood (1-1, 3.91 ERA) got the ball.

Yoshi drew a leadoff walk to start the game for the third time in the series. The Coons had scored nine first-inning runs in the set, but Tobitt was made from sterner steel and was not tagged for anything in the inning, while Hood didn’t respond well to the unexpected assignment and was torched in the first inning now. Four of the first five batters reached on two singles, a walk, and a hit batsman before Tim Austin cranked a bases-clearing triple to set the Titans 4-0 in front, and Moultrie’s single made it 5-0. Hood would go five without any more nasty accidents – if you were kind enough to overlook the disconcerting tendency to walk left-handers – before being hit for to no great effect by Pat Whitehouse. Tobitt faced one over the minimum through six innings, and since Yoshi’s leadoff walk in the first 18 straight Coons had gone down meekly. The no-hit bid didn’t end until the eighth inning, when Pruitt doubled into the gap in right center to start the frame. Pruitt never moved off second base with two K’s (Rodgers and Bowen) and a pop to short (Canning) playing the Coons out of the inning. Palmer singled to start the top 9th, and Yoshi licked his snout hoping for another hit to extend his streak, lined the first pitch to left, and it was in! Single for Yoshi, 15-game hitting streak, and two on with nobody out. A Carmona fly to center and Bednarski’s grounder to Moultrie that yielded two for the Titans later Tobitt had a 3-hit shutout. 5-0 Titans. Palmer (PH) 1-1; Vega 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

Oh well. It’s Tobitt. Losing against Tobitt is like rain in Portland in April. It happens. Not newsworthy.

In other news

April 23 – RIC LF Earl Clark (.319, 0 HR, 8 RBI), a career .312 hitter with 117 homers, lands his 2,000th career base hit, a fifth inning single off the Pacifics’ Brad Smith.
April 23 – NAS LF/RF Ken Potter (.305, 3 HR, 11 RBI) requires hip surgery and is out for the season.
April 26 – NYC SP Richard Williams (1-0, 2.51 ERA) fires a 3-hit shutout in a 7-0 win over the Indians.
April 26 – Denver’s Lionnel Perri (.363, 3 HR, 14 RBI) has three hits and misses the cycle by the homer in a 4-3 Gold Sox win over the Stars.

Complaints and stuff

WILLIAMS!! WILLIAMS!! I KNEW IT!! I KNEW IT!!!

Lost in all the misery so far is that Angel Casas is a free agent and had already made $1.5M this season. It doesn’t look like we can retain him. Well… there are A LOT of free agents for this team come fall. And yet it will not be THAT much of trouble unless Nick Brown voids his player option for 2014. If that happens, he might easily get $3M per year for a few more seasons, and that will blow out everything for us, especially considering that this team and its rampant replacement level pitching will probably end up with a losing record, and the Mexican Prick will damn sure take the slightest opportunity to slash the budget.

Oh well. No point in crying over something that will happen half a year from now. We’ve still got five months of actual baseball games to cry over.

Nick Brown *probably* won’t be able to pitch in the next series against the Elks, either, so we might end up with a true skip of his spot in the rotation. Problem is that we would need Conway and Santos to pitch on short rest, which is an issue at least for Santos. Jonathan Toner (3-0, 2.53 ERA, 27 K in 32 IP) is doing REALLY well in AAA… Oh, dangerous temptation! Another option is a spot start by Slayton, who has the stamina and is a useless reliever anyway.

By the way, Sandy Sambrano suffered a setback with that rib thing and he will miss another two weeks.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (11-13) @ Canadiens (16-8) – April 29-May 1, 2013

Normally I’d say that I have a feeling that this is going to hurt, but in fact the pain hasn’t subsided one blip in seven months. So we just might as well get rolled over by those guys and piece our lives and minds back together on the following off day. The Elks had won their last five games, were fourth in offense and topped the league in pitching. Their rotation was third overall with a 3.66 ERA, with an above-average bullpen. The Raccoons in turn were bleeding out of all cavities and were looking forward to a beating.

Projected matchups:
Colin Baldwin (2-2, 4.18 ERA) vs. Bill King (2-2, 6.04 ERA)
Pat Slayton (3-0, 5.56 ERA) vs. Rod Taylor (4-0, 2.50 ERA)
Bill Conway (2-0, 4.03 ERA) vs. Juichi Fujita (4-1, 4.29 ERA)

I decided against pitching Hector Santos on short rest. Instead, Slayton would get the middle game (oh yay), and Conway would pitch the series finale. Nick Brown had not made the trip to Canada and was instead back in Portland after being flown in on Monday with a specially chartered plane that would have to be thoroughly decontaminated afterwards. Carlosito was going to love that bill…

Ivan the Druid had left Maud with handwritten instructions for a healing tea for Nick Brown, but there was a bit of a language barrier when it came to writing for him… Maud did her best for sure, but the resulting “tea” was shimmering a brownish green, with crumbs in it, and the entire office smelled like someone had dropped a roadkill skunk that had smoldered in the dead summer heat for six weeks into your air condition. Brownie drank it before I could get confirmation that our insurance would cover death by poisoning, then spent the next few days in a wide-eyed daze. Brownie, you think you can pitch on Friday? – Brownie? – Brownie?

Good grief.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – SS Palmer – LF Pruitt – C D. Alexander – 3B Rodgers – P Baldwin
VAN: CF Holland – 3B Suzuki – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 2B Madison – SS Sharp – RF Southcott – C Hurtado – P King

Baldwin was shoved around for four singles and two runs in the bottom of the first inning, including a 2-out RBI single by Sharpie, who came in batting .239 with 2 HR and 15 RBI. Baldwin continued to wobble mightily while King sat down the first ten batters before Carmona drew a walk in the fourth. He stole second base, his eighth bag of the season, before Bednarski cracked his fourth homer to tie the score at two. Ties don’t last forever, and this one was soon broken. Palmer made a little league error by taking his eye off Mitsuhide Suzuki’s grounder in the fifth inning, putting the leadoff man on base. Baldwin promptly walked Ray Gilbert, whose pair of homers had destroyed the 2012 Raccoons, and Don Cameron singled to put the Elks ahead, 3-2. Yoshi had a leadoff single in the sixth, extending his hitting streak, moved up on consecutive outs before a ****ty grounder by Quebell left him at third base, and when Palmer led off the seventh with another single, he was thrown out at second by Ross Holland on a dumb baserunning mistake. By then Baldwin was already removed from the game, having gotten stuck and rescued by Josh Gibson in the bottom of the 6th. Ken Rodgers tied the score with a homer off King in the eighth, but the Raccoons had a Pedro Alvarado-sized problem in the ninth and were unable to mount something to take the lead. Ray Gilbert, the continuous source of pain – well one of them on their roster – would walk off the Elks in the bottom of the inning with a 2-out homer off Chris Mathis. 4-3 Canadiens. Rodgers 2-3, HR, RBI;

Game 2
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – CF J. Alexander – RF Bednarski – LF Pruitt – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – 3B Canning – P Slayton
VAN: CF Holland – RF K. Evans – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 3B Suzuki – C Baca – SS Sharp – 2B C. Aguilar – P R. Taylor

The hope was for Slayton to be halfway decent and go five innings, which was a tough challenge for any ordinary starter on the team on a normal day. The Elks promptly took a 1-0 lead in the bottom 1st, Gilbert singling home Holland, and the Raccoons were held to one hit by Rod Taylor through four innings, but then chained together four singles in the top 5th to flip the score. Canning drove in Pruitt with the tying run, and Slayton (!) singled home D-Alex with the go-ahead run. Slayton squeezed through the fifth with the tying run in scoring position, and retired after 80 pitches. J-Alex homered off Taylor in the top 6th for a little cushion, with the 3-1 lead handed to Mathis, with Gilbert leading off the inning, and he certainly gave a Mathis pitch a ride to deep center, but John Alexander made the play there. Sugano again failed to pitch an inning, putting two on with two outs. Gibson had to bail him out, and Thrasher was in by the eighth, again led off by Gilbert, and – oh look – a homer. Thrasher retired the next three before Bednarski opened the top 9th with a single up the middle, still off Taylor, who went the distance of nine innings. Carmona ran for Bednarski when a hit-and-run with Pruitt batting went awry. Pruitt lined out to César Aguilar, and Carmona was easily doubled off, the Coons’ second line drive double play hit into in this game. At least Hoshi pitched an accident-free ninth. 3-2 Critters. D. Alexander 2-2, BB, 2B; Slayton 5.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, W (4-0) and 1-2, RBI;

Yoshi posted an oh-fer and had his hitting streak end at 16 games.

Alonso Baca caught only one inning before getting ejected for arguing balls and strikes, mainly strikes. The Elks made another attempt to give Hurtado his day off on Wednesday.

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 1B Pruitt – LF J. Alexander – C D. Alexander – 3B Rodgers – P Conway
VAN: CF Holland – RF K. Evans – 1B Gilbert – LF Cameron – 3B Suzuki – C Baca – SS Madison – 2B Lawrence – P Fujita

Yoshi, just unstreaked, hit a single to start the game, and at least we could say that this Juichi Fujita start wouldn’t result in another no-hitter. Baby steps, y’know? Of course, Nomura was left on in that first inning, and the Raccoons generally didn’t have many runners, and when they had runners, like Palmer in the third and Carmona in the fourth, they ran and were caught stealing by Alonso Baca. The Elks soon took the lead, 2-0, on Ross Holland’s homer in the bottom 3rd, but that was all Conway allowed in six innings. He was hit for with two outs in the top 7th when the Raccoons finally amounted to something against Fujita after three singles, with one run already in, but Craig Bowen flew out to Don Cameron and both runners were stranded. The Raccoons made it to the ninth with three times as many hits as the Elks, yet trailing by a run, and Alvarado just casually sawed them off. 2-1 Canadiens. Nomura 2-4; Palmer 2-4; Conway 6.0 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 5 K, L (2-1); Sugano 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 1 K;

Raccoons (12-15) @ Wolves (10-17) – May 3-5, 2013

The Wolves had won their last three games – are we ever going to play an actively losing team? – but overall their numbers were disturbing. They were in the bottom 3 both in runs scored and runs allowed, with a grisly rotation. Their bullpen was really good, though, maintaining a 2.37 ERA for the young season. This was the fourth consecutive year of us playing the Wolves, and we had drummed them 8-1 combined in the last three years.

Projected matchups:
Nick Brown (1-4, 5.34 ERA) vs. Brian Benjamin (3-0, 1.64 ERA)
Hector Santos (1-2, 3.52 ERA) vs. Tim Dunn (0-5, 4.58 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (2-2, 4.03 ERA) vs. Cesar Ochoa (1-4, 6.03 ERA)

It lives! But will it pitch well? A horrible April is so out of the ordinary for Barfie- Brownie, so I am hesitant to imagine what the summer might bring. To be fair, though, the defense behind him was mildly horrendous, too…

Other left-handed pitching does exist, too, with proof going to face us on Saturday.

Game 1
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – LF J. Alexander – 1B Quebell – C Bowen – 3B Rodgers – P Brown
SAL: CF A. Ruiz – 2B J. Gutierrez – RF J. Gonzalez – C T. Delgado – SS Ruggeri – 1B S. Stevens – LF Luxton – 3B Dawson – P Benjamin

Michael Palmer had the Raccoons’ first two hits in the game, so there was a misleading hint of how the offense went early, since the Raccoons still generated enough base runners for double plays in the first two innings, which Bednarski and Bowen (batting under .100) hit into. Brian Benjamin threw balls, but was helped out by the defense, while Nick Brown threw all kinds of stuff and had to manufacture his own luck, but the Wolves got only one hit off him early on. Top 5th, Brownie hit a 2-out single that didn’t look like much, but additional singles by Yoshi and Palmer loaded the bases for Carmona, who grounded the first pitch to second base, but Javier Gonzalez looked bad on a play he didn’t make, the grounder escaped, and the Coons put two runs on the board, the first tally of the game. Bednarski then grounded out in a way that would have generated another double play had there been that many outs to get for the Wolves. Ryan Dawson singled in the bottom 5th, but Benjamin bunted into a double play started by Brown himself. There was absolutely no offensive action save for a Gonzalez single in the next three innings and both starters were still at it in the ninth, in which Craig Bowen reclaimed a .100 batting average with a solo shot to right center. Nick Brown had a few really quick innings with lots of poor contact, arriving in the ninth inning on 92 pitches and facing the 2-3-4 batters. Relief was warming up, as Jose Gutierrez grounded out. Javier Gonzalez popped out (both to Yoshi), bringing up Tony Delgado, batting .184 with no homers, but he had hit 14 dingers in ’12. Brownie, 101 pitches in, claimed he had him when the pitching coach kindly inquired. Delgado grounded the 0-1 softly to third, Rodgers hustling in and making a running grab and throw – out at first! 3-0 Brownies! Nomura 2-4; Palmer 2-4; Brown 9.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 5 K, W (2-4) and 1-4;

Barfie- errr, Brownie should vomit more often. It leads to great results! I will have Ivan look into “measures”. This was his 13th career shutout, and his 23rd complete game, and his ERA is now close to a much more pleasant four.

We have waited quite a bit for a southpaw to come up. Yoshi will get a day off. So will Quebell, who has dropped his batting average under .200 and his OPS almost to .500! He’s mired in a 2-for-30 spell.

Game 2
POR: 2B Palmer – CF Carmona – 1B M. Pruitt – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 3B Canning – LF Gentry – SS Whitehouse – P Santos
SAL: LF J. Pruitt – 2B J. Gutierrez – RF J. Gonzalez – C T. Delgado – SS Ruggeri – 1B S. Stevens – CF Luxton – 3B Dawson – P Dunn

Perpetually red-faced Tim Dunn had the Coons under control for the first three innings while being spotted a lead when Santos allowed a triple to Gonzalez in the first, then brought him home with a very wild pitch. The top 4th opened with a Bednarski walk, after which D-Alex grounded hard to short for what should have been two, but instead D.J. Ruggeri threw wildly past Jose Gutierrez and we had two on with nobody out. And then, Canning with the double play. Hooray, hooray. The Coons still found relief in Pat Whitehouse’s solo jack in the fifth inning, which knotted the score, but Santos was in trouble in the bottom of the inning after Simon Stevens and Tim Dunn (…) had singled and were on the corners with two outs. Matt Pruitt’s cousin Jonathan Pruitt grounded out to his cousin, Matt Pruitt, to end the inning. Flip to the top 6th, and Matt Pruitt would open the frame with an easy F7 to Jonathan Pruitt. The mind, it boggled. The Coons still grabbed the lead on D-Alex’ solo homer later in the inning, 2-1, but Santos managed to put it into danger soon enough. Gutierrez opened the bottom 6th with a blooping single to right. Gonzalez grounded to Palmer, who only got the lead runner, and then Tony Delgado rammed a hard drive to right, but Bednarski managed to cut it off for a single. Gonzalez was on the way to third, where Bednarski’s throw arrived ahead of him, Canning tagged him just as Gonzalez came crashing into the base and Canning, and both players tumbled into foul ground. Both were out: Gonzalez on the tag, and Canning was in pain. Rodgers replaced him.

Top 7th, Gentry hit a leadoff single, then stole second base. Whitehouse walked, Santos bunted them over. Prime chance to do damage! Palmer failed, but Carmona hit a single to right and both runs scored, 4-1. The “Captain Clutch” moniker for him is still in the race! Santos completed seven, but not without allowing a big homer to Robbie Luxton, 4-2. The Wolves had a leadoff double by Gutierrez off Josh Gibson in the eighth, but didn’t get the runner further than second base, but Hoshi Watanabe was not so lucky in the ninth. Stevens singled, Luxton hit another bomb to tie the score, and he didn’t even survive the inning. Xavier Cutler hit another homer to walk off the Wolves. 5-4 Wolves. Carmona 3-5, 2 RBI; Gentry 3-4; Santos 7.0 IP, 9 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 0 BB, 5 K and 1-2;

Game 3
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – LF M. Pruitt – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – 3B Rodgers – P Baldwin
SAL: CF A. Ruiz – 2B J. Gutierrez – RF J. Gonzalez – SS Ruggeri – 1B S. Stevens – LF M. Perez – C Hair – 3B Dawson – P Ochoa

Bednarski missed a homer by less than ten feet in the first inning, but Dylan Alexander was not denied in the second, cracking a 2-piece for the first runs in the game. Quebell had actually been on base after a single – what success! For Colin Baldwin it would be a bit harder to file home a success report, with muddy control, missing stuff, and lotsa luck required to not drown early. The Wolves had two men on in the second after a walk and an infield single, but didn’t score, but in the third inning the sacks were full with one out. Gonzalez and Ruggeri then hit consecutive groundouts to Yoshi that kept the damage to one run. On to the fourth, where Matt Pruitt and Adrian Quebell hit back-to-back homers – look who’s poking his nose and his sleepy eyes out of his burrow! Yep, winter’s over, suckers! – to give the Raccoons a 4-1 lead. Every run was precious here, with Baldwin allowing two more singles in the bottom 4th and only escaped when the pitcher came up with two outs. Ochoa whiffed. But move on to the fifth inning, and the Wolves had two men on IMMEDIATELY. Abe Ruiz singled, Baldwin haplessly walked Gutierrez. It was outrageous. The insufferable southpaw was yanked after a 1-out walk to Ruggeri that filled the bags. Josh Gibson inherited three runners, of which he surrendered two onto the board on Simon Stevens’ looper to left before Manny Perez grounded into a fielder’s choice and Dave Hair struck out. Bottom 6th, more mouth wide open in disbelief when Gibson allowed a 1-out triple to OCHOA, the ****ing pitcher! The Wolves managed to run themselves out of it, though, when Abe Ruiz’ fly to right was caught, Ochoa as the tying run was sent and out by a mile against Bednarski’s murder throw.

The Coons had Rodgers on to start the top 7th, then left him on when deep drives by J-Alex, Nomura, and Palmer were ALL caught. Next inning, two more drives to the deep outfield by Bednarski and Pruitt, and even less success. Not even a double, not even a SINGLE. Flatout nothing, while Thrasher in the seventh and Slayton in the eighth kept putting the leadoff man on and encouraged him to move further ahead. Slayton had to dig out Thrasher in the seventh, then was immediately junked in the eighth on Perez’ single and Hair’s double. Those were the go-ahead runs in scoring position with nobody out, and Sugano came on to do something with his astronomical ERA. He struck out the pinch-hitting Luxton, then had PH Domingo Ortega at 1-2 before plunking him and putting him onto the open base. Abe Ruiz came up and grounded the first pitch to Palmer, six to four to three, inning over. Oh my - …!!! Top 9th, Dan Hutchings walked Ken Rodgers with two outs, then picked him off. …!!!!!! Bottom 9th (voice cracks) was another shot for Watanabe. He faced the 2-3-4 batters like Brownie on Friday. Gutierrez popped out, but then Gonzalez and Ruggeri hit back-to-back doubles to tie the game, and Stevens hit an absolute rocket line drive to left, uncatchable for Pruitt, to walk off the Wolves for consecutive games. 5-4 Wolves. Quebell 2-4, HR, RBI; D. Alexander 1-2, BB, HR, 2 RBI;

Well, the Wolves out-hit us 14-7. This is fair. It’s just not pretty. Or palatable.

Why is a player named Dave Hair not on the Raccoons? He’d fit here. He’s batting .182…

In other news

April 30 – A 3-hit shutout is spun by BOS SP Tony Hamlyn (4-0, 1.44 ERA).
April 30 – The Knights acquire 2B/3B Josh Downing (.284, 0 HR, 11 RBI) from the Aces, along with unranked pitching prospect John Kennington, for LF/RF John Kelsey (.208, 0 HR, 10 RBI).
May 2 – NYC RF/LF Stanton Martin (.333, 10 HR, 29 RBI) signs a 2-yr, $5.72M extension with the Crusaders, keeping him in the purple through 2015, his age 36 season.
May 2 – The Miners’ SP Micah McIntyre (3-2, 3.27 ERA) shines with a 3-hit shutout over the Buffaloes.
May 3 – The Rebels lose OF Winston Jones (.381, 4 HR, 31 RBI) to a torn posterior cruciate ligament. He’s out for the season.

Complaints and stuff

I asked Maud the details about the contents of Ivan’s tea, but she told me that I didn’t want to know, but that she had finally lost all inhibitions. Whatever that meant. Women. Tsk.

Next pitcher out for the year is Gary Dupes with a torn flexor tendon in his elbow. He was 1-2 with a 3.96 ERA in St. Petersburg. Chris Brown (1-3, 5.63 ERA) also had an abbreviated start this week with a swollen and sore thumb, which apparently was swollen for no good reason. It also didn't respond well to Ivan the Druid's treatment plan, which he wired down to the Alley Cats' trainer, and which involved wrapping the thumb in thin cucumber slices inside a small ice pack overnight. That was actually his secondary suggestion. The first was amputation, but I was keen on a more "conservative" treatment.

[Westheim]

The Critters had Monday off and used the spare time to put Walt Canning on the DL with a sore wrist, sustained in an on-base collision with Salem’s Javier Gonzalez over the weekend. We went on to promote our 2010 fourth round pick, 3B Matt Nunley, to the 40-man and 25-man roster. Nunley, a very good defensive third baseman with a rocket launcher for a right arm, was batting a left-handed .306/.381/.329 in AAA at the time of promotion. He has hit 12 home runs in almost three years since being drafted, so nothing much is to be expected in the power department, and he also can’t run. Not much gap power, either. Oh well, it’s only for two weeks.

Raccoons (13-17) vs. Cyclones (16-14) – May 7-9, 2013

For once, we encountered a team on the same way as us in the standings: down. Cincy had lost four straight, but they were conceding the least runs in the Federal League. The offense was not even close in performance, ranking eighth in runs scored. There was also a stark contrast between the rotation and the bullpen. The former ranked 10th, the latter was the best in the FL. The Raccoons had won three straight series against the Cyclones prior to losing two out of three games in 2011, the most recent meeting between teams.

Projected matchups:
Rich Hood (1-2, 4.75 ERA) vs. Shunyo Yano (2-1, 4.50 ERA)
Bill Conway (2-1, 3.81 ERA) vs. Jeremiah Bowman (0-5, 8.02 ERA)
Nick Brown (2-4, 4.06 ERA) vs. Luis Guerrero (2-2, 6.00 ERA)

Their rotation was a mess – except for the usually good Nathan O’Herlihy and his 2.30 ERA – and after playing a double header on Saturday and disabling starter Brian Doumas (1-0, 2.78 ERA) their probables aren’t set in stone. Guerrero is a swingman, whether he actually starts will be anybody’s guess. He is also the only left-hander we expect right now.

Game 1
CIN: SS J. Amador – 1B T. Cardenas – C Jolley – LF DeWeese – 2B Morrison – 3B R. Harris – CF J. Silva – RF Rincón – P Yano
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Quebell – LF Gentry – 3B Nunley – P Hood

Both teams left runners on second and third in the first inning, and the Cyclones did so again in the top 2nd, with no team scoring. Hood was plainly awful, easily hittable, and fooled nobody. A double play dug him out of giant hole in the fourth inning and kept the Cyclones at bay before the Raccoons got a 2-out triple by Dylan Alexander in the bottom 4th, of course with nobody on base. Quebell, however, mashed an enormous home run to right, and the Coons were up 2-0. Rich Hood’s situation remained dicey, not only because his obvious non-stuff, but also because an interruption caused by a rain shower that delayed action for 38 minutes in the fifth inning. The Cyclones came close to a 2-run homer for R.J. DeWeese in the top 6th, but Bednarski made a great catch right against the wall in rightfield to retire him, and the base runner, Jayden Jolley, ended up picked off by Hood afterwards. Jolley was the Cyclones’ only base runner after the fourth inning against Hood, who was ready to topple over in the first inning but was never charged with a run in the game. The Coons’ offense was dead-silent, and when Pat Slayton entered in the eighth, he did his usual thing, which is to mean that he put the tying runs on base and didn’t finish the frame. Ron Thrasher replaced him with runners on the corners against the left-handed DeWeese, but the Cyclones sent a .182/.217/.228-slashing Julio Mata, batting right-handed, in his place. Mata in an 0-2 count, and Pat Morrison in a 1-2 count afterwards, both hit RBI singles, and the lead was blown.

Bottom 8th, Francisco Rodriguez pitching for Cincy, the Coons loaded the bases with one out on a Nomura single, Palmer walking, and an infield single by Bednarski. Dylan Alexander had a chance to be a hero, and slapped the first pitch he got into a double play. Mathis cocked up the go-ahead run for the Cyclones after Jose Silva’s leadoff double in the ninth, and the Raccoons faced Ian Johnson (12.2 IP, 0 BB, 15 K, 0.00 ERA) in the bottom 9th. Quebell struck out. Gentry struck out. Bowen hit for Nunley, down two strikes, wonked a ball to left, and it went – game-tying homer! Next, John Alexander batted for Mathis, ran a full count, and hit a homer to right – walkoff! 4-3 Raccoons. Carmona 2-4; Bowen (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; J. Alexander (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI; Hood 7.0 IP, 5 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 3 K;

Chris Mathis got his first career win, Matt Nunley got his first career hit, a double off Yano … that bullpen, though…

Sandy Sambrano would start a rehab assignment with the Alley Cats on Wednesday.

Game 2
CIN: 1B T. Cardenas – 3B J. Amador – C Jolley – LF DeWeese – SS Morrison – 2B R. Harris – CF J. Silva – RF Rincón – P Guerrero
POR: 2B Palmer – CF Carmona – C D. Alexander – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – LF Gentry – 3B Rodgers – SS Whitehouse – P Conway

Initially the Goat of the Day award was to go to Bill Conway, who opened the game with a double hit by Tomas Cardenas, which he somehow survived unharmed, but then served up a hit-me cougher down the middle to Robbie Harris after walking Morrison to start the top 2nd. Harris surely hit it, and very far, 2-0 Cyclones. But Conway would ultimately go eight innings with only one more run charged to him, and that was partially balmed on the real Goat of the Day, Dylan Alexander, who made a grievous throwing error in the fourth, trying to keep DeWeese from stealing, which gave DeWeese an extra base and enabled him to score in the inning. D-Alex had already killed the bottom 3rd with two runners on base by hitting into another double play and that virtually ALL the Raccoons did against the swingman Guerrero for seven innings, during which he maintained a 3-hitter. The bottom 8th then started with walks by Yoshi and Palmer, bringing up Carmona, who popped out, and then Alexander. Nah. Pruitt hit for him, a pathetic pop to David Rincón in shallow right. Bednarski’s RBI single was by far not enough. Ian Johnson had another shot with a 3-1 lead in the ninth but started to sweat after Brett Gentry’s leadoff single to shallow right. First base would be the farthest the Raccoons got this time, however, never hitting another ball past the infield dirt. 3-1 Cyclones. Bednarski 2-4, RBI; Conway 8.0 IP, 8 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 1 BB, 5 K, L (2-2);

Game 3
CIN: SS J. Amador – CF J. Silva – C Jolley – LF DeWeese – 2B Morrison – 3B R. Harris – 1B Gershkovich – RF Rincón – P O’Herlihy
POR: 2B Nomura – SS Palmer – CF Carmona – 1B Quebell – RF J. Alexander – LF Pruitt – C Bowen – 3B Nunley – P Brown

Sneakily smuggled into the set, O’Herlihy was looking forward to shut down the Coons, and by the time he got the ball the Cyclones had already put two runs, one earned, on Nick Brown, who was whacked hard for a Jesus Amador double, singles by Silva and Jolley, and then a fielding error by Nomura in the first inning. While Brown settled down after the early assault and didn’t allow another run, the Raccoons’ offense, ranked 10th in the CL for a reason, performed in completely inept fashion once more. Yoshi’s leadoff single in the bottom 1st was answered by Palmer with a double play grounder to short. An inning later, Quebell and John Alexander reached base, but Pruitt, Bowen, and Nunley all made sorry outs. Then, silence for three innings. Bottom 6th, Nomura drew a leadoff walk before Carmona singled with one out. O’Herlihy took away the double play from Quebell with a wild pitch. Quebell, insulted, then struck out in disgust, but John Alexander hit a 2-2 pitch into the gap in right center and all the way to the wall for a game-tying 2-run double. Brown pitched another scoreless inning, but was left with the no-decision. As soon as the pen took over there was danger again. Gibson allowed a single to Jolley with two outs in the eighth. Sugano replaced him to face DeWeese, who was again hit for by Mata, whom Sugano walked. Watanabe then got a grounder to short from PH Tomas Cardenas to end the inning and also pitched a quick ninth. While Brown had retired after 104 pitches through seven, O’Herlihy was still there in the ninth inning for whatever reason, entering on 103 tosses. #108 was a leadoff single for J-Alex, who moved to third on Pruitt’s single. We could not hit for Bowen with D-Alex having already batted for Nick Brown (stupid manager!) and O’Herlihy had him on two strikes quickly before Bowen knocked a high shot to rather deep right. It wasn’t going out, but it was certainly falling in, and the Raccoons had their second walkoff in the series. 3-2 Critters. J. Alexander 3-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Brown 7.0 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 K; Watanabe 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, W (2-2);

Raccoons (15-18) vs. Indians (14-21) – May 10-12, 2013

The Coons had lost two of three in the year’s first series against Indy, but the Arrowheads were dead last in the division and we should really reclaim some ground against them, despite all our injuries. They were ninth in runs scored and tenth in runs allowed, with a -45 run differential that was quite bad for this being still inside the first quarter of the season. They even had a worse bullpen than the Coons, so we had that going for us, and they had a few short-term injuries, including regular coonskinner Ming Kui and their best slugger Juan Ortíz, who were both on the DL for another week.

Projected matchups:
Hector Santos (1-2, 3.35 ERA) vs. Tristan Broun (3-3, 5.73 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (2-2, 4.25 ERA) vs. Samuel McMullen (0-5, 7.24 ERA)
Rich Hood (1-2, 3.86 ERA) vs. Aaron Walsh (4-3, 5.14 ERA)

The Raccoons are winless against southpaws in 2013, and this series will start with a pair of them. And they are horrible! Even the meager Coons should manage to get something going against them! Walsh on Sunday is a righty. Sandy Sambrano is also to be expected to return some time this weekend.

Game 1
IND: CF J. Wilson – RF Tanner – 2B Kym – 1B Tsung – C Padilla – 3B Mathews – SS R. Miller – LF J. Gonzalez – P Broun
POR: 2B Nomura – 1B Palmer – CF Carmona – RF Bednarski – 3B Rodgers – LF Gentry – C Bowen – SS Whitehouse – P Santos

While Santos retired the first dozen in order with six strikeouts, the Raccoons’ offense was somewhere between despairing and jaw-dropping. Carmona got Palmer forced out in the first inning, then was caught stealing. In the bottom 3rd they patched a run together with a Whitehouse walk and singles by Santos(!) and Palmer, before Carmona made a poor groundout to short to end the inning. Bottom 4th, bases loaded on two walks and an error, but with Whitehouse up and one out already on the board. Whitehouse struck out, Santos popped out to Jose Gonzalez in shallow left. Whitehouse made up for his ineptitude with the stick when he got a line drive by Joey Mathews up the middle to end the fifth inning, but the perfect bid was then broken up by Ryan Miller and his leadoff single in the top 6th. John Wilson’s 2-out homer flipped the score, and the Indians held a 2-1 lead. Santos got hopelessly stuck in the seventh, Gibson replaced him with the sacks full and struck out Gonzalez to end the inning. While the Coons had another near-implosion of their pen in the top 8th before Thrasher got his **** together and struck out a pair to leave runners in scoring position, they also forked up Ken Rodgers’ leadoff double in the bottom of the inning and left him on third base. Bottom 9th, Helio Maggessi issued a leadoff walk to the PH’ing Adrian Quebell, before J-Alex PR’ed for him. Yoshi got Alexander forced with a grounder, however, before Palmer singled to represent the winning run. Carmona chipped a 1-2 pitch up the middle to load the bases with a single, and Bednarski ran a full count before also grounding up the middle, but Clint Philip made a play behind second base, but too late to get anybody anywhere: infield single, tied game, still bases loaded, and still one out. The Raccoons got their third walkoff in due order when Ken Rodgers flew out to fairly deep and certainly deep enough centerfield. 3-2 Blighters. Palmer 2-3, 2 BB, RBI; Santos 6.2 IP, 3 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 6 K and 1-3;

Roster move after this game, as Brett Gentry, who was hitting a docile .308/.308/.308, was demoted back to St. Pete while Sandy Sambrano rejoined the team, very much looking forward to his second game of the season after missing the team’s last 33 contests.

Game 2
IND: CF J. Wilson – RF Tanner – 2B Kym – 1B Tsung – C Padilla – 3B Mathews – SS R. Miller – LF J. Gonzalez – P McMullen
POR: 2B Nomura – CF Sambrano – 1B Palmer – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – LF Pruitt – 3B Rodgers – SS Whitehouse – P Baldwin

Not only was Colin Baldwin walking people left and right, he was also entirely and utterly hittable. The Indians got a run on a walk and two really hard singles in the first inning, and Dave Padilla, who had already drive in that run, hit a 2-run double in the third. The Raccoons’ offense was missing in action entirely against the certified pushover Sam McMullen. While Baldwin allowed six hits, four walks, and three runs in 5.1 innings, McMullen threw nothing less than a 1-hit shutout through five frames, and when Pat Whitehouse hit a leadoff single in the bottom 6th, McMullen casually struck out the next three batters, and despite coming in with 19 walks in 41 innings, he didn’t issue a freebie until with two outs in the bottom 8th. That one was drawn by Matt Nunley, who accompanied Whitehouse on the bags with Yoshi coming up as the tying run. And he grounded out pathetically. The ultimate indignity of having a 7+ ERA pitcher fire a shutout against the Critters they were ultimately spared, since the Indians were cowarding out of the situation and sent Maggessi for the bottom of the ninth inning. Quebell reached on an error with one out, Bednarski hit into a double play, fín. 3-0 Indians. Whitehouse 2-3; Vega 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

The semi-ultimate indignity was successfully achieved with this drab contest, however: the Raccoons arrived in last place in runs scored.

Game 3
IND: CF J. Wilson – RF Tanner – 2B Kym – 1B Tsung – C Padilla – 3B Mathews – SS R. Miller – LF J. Gonzalez – P Berry
POR: LF Sambrano – CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – RF J. Alexander – 3B Nunley – P Hood

Rather than Walsh, we got Jack Berry (4-2, 3.86 ERA), another right-hander, for the rubber game.

The Portland Amateur Theater gave a grotesque, with Rich Hood in the lead role of a chronic loser getting endlessly humiliated and was tagged for three runs in a nightmarish first inning, where he was not only completely hittable even in 2-strike counts, but also hurt himself with shoddy defense. Dave Padilla drove in two more runs to move up quickly on the list of coonskinners around the division, at least for a while. Padilla played Icarus, who dared to fly too close to the sun, in the vicinity of which he would make two errors inside the first three plays in the bottom 1st. Sandy had led off with a single before Carmona chomped a 3-0 pitch into the dirt in front of home plate, a ball nevertheless thrown into the ether by Padilla, who also threw away another ball when Sandy and Ricardo set out for a double steal. Sambrano scored, Carmona went to third, and Yoshi walked to bring up the go-ahead run in Adrian Quebell, who was cast as the village fool and struck out. Carmona came home on D-Alex’ groundout before Palmer grounded up the middle, where Ryan Miller – giving the banished son – made a clumsy error that put runners on the corners again. J-Alex failed, however, and grounded out to Jong-beom Kym, the mystic prince from a faraway land, who in the top 2nd desired to show Hood from where he had come from, mashing a magic sphere to deep centerfield, where Carmona almost tore out a few legs on a sprawling catch that spared at least one run.

Carmona played the likeable young guy who had suffered a terrible radiation accident as a child and had been granted the superpowers of reaching base whenever he wanted, unless someone managed to contain him with an amulet made up of Doubleplaylite. Guess what, Jack Berry, cast as Moses in the bulrushes, had such an amulet! And so a situation with Nunley and Sandy on the corners and one out in the bottom 2nd turned into less than little and the inning ended. The Coons had their first two batters on the next inning, and this time success was radioed back to earth by Buzz Aldrin, convincingly performed by Dylan Alexander, who hit a real moonshot for a 3-run homer and gave the Furballs a 5-3 lead.

Berry lasted only three innings, while Hood dragged himself through five, while the third act then saw the long-awaited appearance of the mad arsonist, spectacularly performed by Pat Slayton, who entered into the sixth inning with the 5-3 lead, and shoveled the bases full on three singles to Padilla, Miller, and Gonzalez before being locked away in a mental health institution. Manobu Sugano replaced him, struck out Javier Cardenas and got a grounder from John Wilson to end the inning and strand a full set. Kym made another error for the Indians in the bottom 6th, their FIFTH on the day, but the Coons failed to exploit it, and Sugano – to everybody’s surprise – turned out to be another arsonist in disguise in the seventh, allowing singles to Kym and Mun-wah Tsung. Josh Gibson, portraying an FBI agent with low self-esteem, locked him up and got a double play from “Icarus” Padilla to end THAT inning.

The final act dropped off a bit. While there were a few more surprises, like Mike Bednarski hitting a pinch-hit home run in his role as the distant cousin from Wyoming, the play’s conclusion was a bit dull and lacked the special something when Hoshi Watanabe retired the Indians on three grounders. 6-3 Coons. Sambrano 2-5; Quebell 2-4; D. Alexander 1-4, HR, 4 RBI; Nunley 2-4, 2B; Bednarski (PH) 1-1, HR, RBI;

Yeah, people actually paid money to see the Indians make five errors and the Coons strand nine again despite all the involuntary help.

In other news

May 7 – The Capitals blow out the Aces, 19-3, scoring in all but two innings.
May 9 – It’s 300 home runs for RIC 1B César Gonzalez (.353, 1 HR, 7 RBI)! The 40-year old switch-hitter takes Tijuana’s Michael Colvard deep in the first inning to reach the milestone. Gonzalez won three Platinum Sticks and two Gold Gloves in an 18-year career, and was an All Star seven times. He won a championship with the 2010 Cyclones, although his most productive years were with the Blue Sox in the 2000s.
May 9 – A broken finger might cost TOP 3B Pedro Cruz (.202, 4 HR, 9 RBI) two months on the DL.
May 10 – MIL 1B Mike Rucker (.242, 5 HR, 21 RBI) might miss about a month with a broken foot.

Complaints and stuff

The Raccoons last scored more than four runs in a game on April 27, over two weeks ago. That’s some BAD hitting going on here!

Anybody still remember César Gonzalez’ time with the Coons when he should have been in full juice at 26/27? No? Oh, you lucky bastards! I can’t un-see it!

Jason Seeley is slugging .500 in AAA. There ain’t room on the roster, however… or maybe we could go back to the six outfielder setup from last year. But then again there isn’t really a place for him to play in… Hmmmm. Well, it’s the Raccoons. The next broken paw / leg / neck can’t be far around the corner.

[wpnads]

Finally got caught up reading your dynasty. I have to say, I have really enjoyed seeing how far The Critters have come and hopefully you'll be able to get them back to the championship. Out of curiosity, would you ever consider moving Brown to pitch out of the bullpen so you could move another pitcher up?

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by wpnads

Finally got caught up reading your dynasty. I have to say, I have really enjoyed seeing how far The Critters have come and hopefully you'll be able to get them back to the championship.

Congratulations for committing to an endeavour that hopefully was worth it. I told Slappy to fashion you an endurance medal and he came back with an empty box of matches stapled to a used bandaid, but wouldn't tell whose bandaid that was. Make of it what your heart desires.

Originally Posted by wpnads

Out of curiosity, would you ever consider moving Brown to pitch out of the bullpen so you could move another pitcher up?

Well, right now ... I don't ... I don't think I can answer anything related to Nick Brown's status right now.....

(a distant bell tolls)

+++

Raccoons (17-19) vs. Loggers (17-20) – May 13-15, 2013

The Loggers weren’t quite as horrible as in recent years so far, and that is not only based on their record. They remained reasonably close to .500 into the latter half of May in ’12 as well, but then with a horrendously lop-sided run differential (and not in their favor). This year, their run differential is -13, and they are close to the league average in runs scored and runs allowed. We beat them 11-7 last year and haven’t lost the season series since 2006.

Projected matchups:
Bill Conway (2-2, 3.72 ERA) vs. Bruce Morrison (2-3, 3.72 ERA)
Nick Brown (2-4, 3.63 ERA) vs. Jim Pennington (3-3, 4.75 ERA)
Hector Santos (1-2, 3.25 ERA) vs. Jim Baker (3-2, 3.51 ERA)
Colin Baldwin (2-3, 4.34 ERA) vs. Ramón Huertas (3-3, 3.12 ERA)

We will face four right-handers, which can only be a good thing.

Game 1
MIL: 1B C. Martin – SS Howell – RF Dally – CF Brissett – 2B O. Sandoval – LF MacNamara – C R. Rucker – 3B Jennings – P Morrison
POR: LF Sambrano – CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – C D. Alexander – SS Palmer – RF J. Alexander – 3B Nunley – P Conway

Two pitches into the game, Corey Martin had slapped his first career home run, although I was going to dispute that it counted – against CONWAY. Justin Dally hit an even bigger bomb in the same inning, and Conway fabricated another run on two walks and a wild pitch in the top 2nd to sit in an early 3-0 hole. The Raccoons actually made that up on a bunch of singles for two runs in the bottom 3rd and then Matt Nunley’s first career RBI, a 1-out RBI single that plated Michael Palmer in the fourth, tying the score at three.

The Coons’ pitching staff’s answer to the tied game was quite simply to suck harder. Conway was yanked after five-plus with a leadoff walk to Brian MacNamara, his fifth free pass against seven strikeouts. Sergio Vega took over, was stabbed in the back by Palmer’s error on a grounder by Dave Jennings, but then walked Morrison to load the bases with one out. Even then, Martin struck out, but ex-Coon Rob Howell singled up the middle and into center, and two runs scored to break the tie. Vega was socked with two more 2-out RBI singles, all runs unearned though, and the Raccoons’ offense chose to keep a low profile against the mediocre Loggers pen throughout the latter half of the game. 7-3 Loggers. Carmona 3-5; Quebell 3-4, RBI;

Outside of Carmona and Quebell, the Raccoons had two more hits. Singles, of course. Can anybody on this miserable crew whack a ball real hard??

Game 2
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – RF Dally – 2B O. Sandoval – 1B C. Martin – C R. Hernandez – CF Brissett – 3B Jennings – P Pennington
POR: LF Sambrano – CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – SS Palmer – C D. Alexander – 3B Rodgers – P Brown

Bednarski being hit by a pitch and two singles by Palmer and D-Alex gave the Coons a bases-loaded situation with one out in the second, but pops by Rodgers and Brown that were very high without going very far resolved the situation in the Loggers’ favor. Brownie, while not necessarily to blame for the team not scoring as a whole, then melted in wonderful fashion in the top 3rd. Jim Pennington hit a 1-out single, the Loggers’ first hit on the day, before Howell reached on another Palmer error, and Brown smacked Dally in a 3-0 count. Bases loaded, 0-2 pitch to Oscar Sandoval, bounced to left and to Palmer, who misses it completely, and the Loggers plate two. Corey Martin would strike out, but the mind was boggling already. It also started to drizzle lightly a short period later. A mess of a game also saw Brown drop a feed from Quebell at first base two innings later, but the Loggers were held completely away from third base in the middle innings. The Raccoons reached there exactly once, on Sandy Sambrano’s leadoff triple in the fifth, from where he scored on a sac fly by Ricardo Carmona, and that was that. Brownie finished seven without allowing another run, and his turn to bat came up in the bottom 7th. Rodgers had just drawn a leadoff walk, representing the tying run and with no trust whatsoever in a productive at-bat from the bench-dwellers, Brownie was asked to bunt the runner to second base before having a snack. That worked well enough, and Carmona scored Rodgers with a 2-out single to take Brown off the hook, but he was again denied a win. Worse, the first pitch of the bullpen (Gibson’s) was catapulted out of leftfield by Corey Martin, and the Loggers retook their lead RIGHT AWAY. Thrasher and Mathis were run out there to finish regulation without any more accidents, but the Coons were 3-2 behind in the bottom 9th, facing lefty Kevin Cummings, with nothing but left-handers coming up or on the bench. D-Alex singled anyway, and moved up on Rodgers’ grounder to first. J-Alex batted for Mathis, and left/right splits are totally overvalued. Alexander wonked a tremendous shot to deep right, and that was TOTALLY gone. 4-3 Raccoons! Carmona 2-3, 2 RBI; D. Alexander 2-4; J. Alexander (PH) 1-1, HR, 2 RBI; Brown 7.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 0 ER, 2 BB, 9 K;

The Corey Martin strikeout in the third inning marked 2,600 K for Nick Brown in his major league career. This was also the Furballs’ fifth win on the homestand (in eight games) and the FOURTH walkoff!

Ricardo Carmona stole his 12th base (against five failures) and grabbed a share of the CL Lead, tying BOS Mike Rivera. The CL lead is 15, held by Richmond’s Danny Flores.

Game 3
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – RF Dally – CF Brissett – 2B O. Sandoval – C R. Hernandez – 1B C. Martin – 3B Jennings – P Baker
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – LF Pruitt – SS Rodgers – 3B Nunley – C Bowen – P Santos

The first major league error for Matt Nunley put the first Logger on base in the top 2nd, Raúl Hernandez reaching, but Santos quickly extinguished Corey Martin with a strikeout – no harm done. The Raccoons continued their unimpressive ways with the stick, getting two men on through various ways in the second and third innings, but didn’t actually score. If your pitcher reaches on a bloop single and you still can’t make the other team pay for it even a tiny bit – it’s sad. Santos was maintaining a no-hitter through four innings, but before he could continue there was a brief rain delay. Although it only lasted about 20 minutes, Santos’ stuff was already diminished on the other side of it. Hernandez singled with one out, Martin singled as well, and Jim Baker plated the first Loggers run with a 2-out single past Nunley. Bowen’s leadoff double in the bottom 5th didn’t lead to a run, either. Another runner was left in scoring position in the bottom 6th, and when Bowen hit a 1-out single in the bottom 7th, J-Alex batted for Santos and grounded into a double play. Vega put two of his three batters on base in the top 8th before Sugano cleaned up, before Yoshi’s 1-out double in the bottom 8th made him the tying run. Quebell struck out (…!), Bednarski gladly walked to not being blamed for doing anything wrong (better not do anything…), and Pruitt was 0-2 against an unfazed Baker until he chipped the third pitch up the middle and it eluded Gold Glover Oscar Sandoval for a single. Yoshi ran has hard as the paws would let him and scored, tied game. Rodgers struck out (gaaahh!!!), before Watanabe in the top 9th allowed a leadoff single to pinch-hitter Robert Rucker, who was swiftly run for by Aaron Moody. After moving up to second on a groundout by Hernandez, Moody took off for third, Bowen’s throw was CAPITALLY off and into leftfield and Moody scored. AAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!! AAAAHHH, BOWEN!!! AAAAHHH!!!

Once Maud had calmed me with a cold towel on the forehead and some of Ivan the Druid’s wonder tea, which he claimed cured everything (even depression and madness?), the Coons were up to bat in the bottom of the inning, down 2-1. Nunley grounded out. Bowen singled to right, his third hit on the – WHAT THE?? He ran past first and towards second, and Dally threw him out!! AAAAAAAHHH!!! BOW-WEEEEEEENNNN!!!!! GAAAAAHHHH!!! 2-1 Loggers. Bednarski 0-1, 3 BB; Santos 7.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 0 BB, 8 K;

AAAAAAHHH!!! BOWEEEEEENNN!!!

(Maud is forced to load the crossbow with a tranquilizer bolt)

Game 4
MIL: LF Knowling – SS Howell – RF Dally – 2B O. Sandoval – 1B C. Martin – C R. Hernandez – CF Brissett – 3B Jennings – P Huertas
POR: CF Carmona – 2B Sambrano – 1B Quebell – RF Bednarski – LF Pruitt – SS Palmer – 3B Rodgers – C D. Alexander – P Baldwin

For once, Baldwin didn’t come out to walk everybody’s mother. He whiffed six his first time through the Loggers’ lineup, and even was spotted a run by an accidental RBI single hit by Quebell in the bottom 1st, plating Sambrano after Carmona had reduced the loot by a run for getting caught stealing earlier. Sambrano drew his second walk his second time up, then got caught stealing himself. While no additional run support for him was coming forward, Baldwin snapped and lost it from one inning to the next, opening the sixth with a walk to the pitcher Huertas. After another walk to Zach Knowling, Sandoval singled home Huertas to tie the game, and Baldwin walked Corey Martin to eventually load the bases. Gibson replaced Baldwin and got a grounder to third from Hernandez that ended the inning at 1-1, and Gibson also did a quick seventh. Sugano had a scoreless eighth, which included handing Justin Dally a golden sombrero in the course of the inning. When D-Alex drew a leadoff walk in the bottom 8th and represented the go-ahead run, the excitement almost was too much to bear. OFFENSE, maybe. Yoshi batted for Sugano and rocketed a 1-0 pitch to deep right, and well beyond the reach of Dally, into the corner for a double. No outs, runners on second and third, top of the order up. With a terrible wheezing noise, the Raccoons would get ONE run in on Sambrano’s liner to center that was caught by Amari Brissett on the run and D-Alex was released from third base in a move that expressed desperation better than a thousand words. Alexander scored, but mostly because the throw was not very good. Hoshi saved the game on three harmless pops. 2-1 Blighters. Bednarski 2-3, 2B; Nomura (PH) 1-1, 2B; Gibson 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K;

As the Coons were preparing to fail against the Condors over the weekend, their last two wins by starting pitchers had been by series opener Rich Hood last Sunday, and before that by Nick Brown in his shutout two weeks ago.

Raccoons (19-21) vs. Condors (19-22) – May 16-18, 2013

Hey, another bullpen worse than the Coons’ inept collection of dizzying nauseants, with a whopping 6.59 ERA charged against the Condors’ “relievers”, who weren’t relieving much except their fans’ burning desire to stay past the sixth inning for their games. Their rotation was average, as was their offense. The Raccoons had won the season series for eight straight years, including three straight 5-4 squeeze jobs.

Projected matchups:
Rich Hood (2-2, 4.04 ERA) vs. Dave Hogan (1-5, 5.47 ERA)
Bill Conway (2-3, 3.92 ERA) vs. TBD
Nick Brown (2-4, 3.14 ERA) vs. Michael Colvard (3-2, 3.44 ERA)

TBD would be the turn of southpaw Wes Yates (2-3, 4.79 ERA), who’s day-to-day with a back ailment. It is uncertain whether he can pitch. If he can’t, and Colvard moves up, we might face “Midnight” Martin (2-5, 2.37 ERA) on Sunday.

Game 1
TIJ: 3B Dasher – 2B Dougal – C M. Torres – CF Feldmann – RF Branch – 1B May – LF Eroh – SS M. Miller – P Hogan
POR: LF Sambrano – CF Carmona – 2B Nomura – RF Bednarski – C D. Alexander – 1B Pruitt – SS Palmer – 3B Nunley – P Hood

Doubles by Craig Dasher and Miguel Torres gave the Condors an early lead, and Ezra Branch’s single past Pruitt assured them of two runs in the opening frame. The waffling never stopped for Hood, who coughed up single runs in the next two innings to drop to 4-0, but then had a 2-out RBI double in the Raccoons’ 3-run fourth. Hood had already been the first Raccoon to reach base with a 2-out single in the previous inning, but after Sambrano’s double Carmona had struck out to leave two in scoring position. Hood’s double drove in the third run of the inning, left him and Nunley in scoring position, and then Sambrano struck out. The Coons had runners on the corners in the bottom 6th, bringing up Nunley with one out, with the rookie generating a sorry pop to short, and J-Alex hit for Mathis, who had replaced the successless Hood at the start of the sixth, but had grounded out.

While Craig Dasher stole three bases off the Coons in this game, none of these steals mattered greatly, but when Carmona took his 14th bag of the season in the bottom 7th, he moved himself with the tying run into scoring position with one out, was able to tag up on Nomura’s fly out to Ryan Feldmann, and then scored on a soft single by Bednarski into left – tied game. Bottom 8th, Pruitt led off with a single that went under Ezra Branch’s glove and dinked against the inside of his leg. Pruitt thought he had second base, but DIDN’T, and halfway between bases suddenly realized that the ball hadn’t gone to the track and that he was going to be very out at second base. He threw the anchor, scrambled back to first and lunged onto the base JUST AHEAD of Nick May’s tag. Not that it mattered. The next three batters never moved Pruitt off first base. The ninth inning then brought the daily bullpen implosion, with Pat “****ing” Slayton walking a pair before being yanked for Gibson, who allowed back-to-back singles and three runs to Stanley Dougal and Miguel Torres. Dougal had gained an extra base when Carmona’s throw back in went wild. Carmona would leave the game with an injury, and with the Coons out of outfielders, Pat Whitehouse had to go to centerfield. Gibson somehow got out of the inning, but the Raccoons went down 1-2-3 in the ninth. 7-4 Condors. Pruitt 2-4; Vega 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K;

Ricardo Carmona had a blister on his finger, nothing too serious, but he wouldn’t start the middle game. He was available to pinch-hit, but nothing more.

Game 2
TIJ: 3B Dasher – SS Eroh – RF Branch – 1B R. Morris – LF Raupp – CF Feldmann – C M. Torres – SS M. Miller – P Colvard
POR: 2B Nomura – LF Sambrano – C D. Alexander – RF Bednarski – CF J. Alexander – 1B Pruitt – SS Whitehouse – 3B Rodgers – P Conway

Wes Yates was not available, but was not ruled out to start on Sunday rather than “Midnight” Martin. Colvard went on short rest.

Conway struck out three in the first inning, then was brought back to earth by the second, in which he walked the leadoff man, Jimmy Raupp, who scored two hard hits later. The Coons would tie the game again in the bottom 2nd when Whitehouse reached, stole second, and came home on Ken Rodgers’ double, all with two outs. Two innings later, the Coons would have a leadoff double once again, hit by John Alexander, and in good tradition it didn’t lead to anything, and certainly not to a lead. The Raccoons WOULD take a lead, however, in the bottom 6th, opened with back-to-back homers by Bednarski and J-Alex. Bill Conway had performed decently in the middle innings, but spilled singles to Matt Miller and Craig Dasher in the top of the seventh and was removed with two outs. The ball went to the rookie Mathis, because Gibson had been abused quite a bit this week, and I didn’t trust Pat Slayton with yesterday’s half-eaten sandwich, much less with a 3-1 lead with the tying runs on. Mathis got Ron Eroh to ground out to Whitehouse, and the danger was turned away for the moment. But just like Sambrano ruined the bottom 7th with a double play, Thrasher ruined the eighth by hitting the leadoff man Branch. He got Rob Morris, but we now longed for a right-hander, and by now the choice was not much of a choice anymore. So here came Slayton, and wouldn’t you ****ING believe it, he served up the tying home run to Ryan Feldmann! Slayton cocked up two more base runners in the ninth, and Branch singled in the go-ahead run off Sugano. The Condors rolled in Kaz Kichida for the bottom 9th, who had an ERA of more than 11, but struck out Pruitt and Whitehouse to get started. Palmer drew a pinch-walk before Carmona singled, and then Yoshi also walked, loading the bases for Sandy Sambrano, batting a sad .200, who was almost instantly down two strikes before knocking a little looper to right, out of the reach of Dougal at second, and into rightfield! Palmer in to tie it, and Carmona came FLYING down the third base line, well ahead of a throw – it’s a walkoff!!! 5-4 Critters. Sambrano 1-5, 2 RBI; J. Alexander 2-4, HR, 2B, RBI; Rodgers 1-2, BB, 2B, RBI; Palmer (PH) 0-0, BB; Carmona (PH) 1-1; Conway 6.2 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 7 K;

Pat Slayton (6.43 ERA) had a rough Sunday morning. The delivery boy had been instructed to make as much noise as possible on bringing him his plane ticket to St. Petersburg in the first place, but the actual idea of nailing it onto his apartment door had been mine.

Matt Nunley (.227, 0 HR, 1 RBI) joined him on the way to St. Pete, with Walt Canning coming off the DL in time for Sunday’s game. The bullpen was reinforced by Juan Gallegos, a 3-year old discovery from Venezuela that Whitebread had dug out there six years ago. He was nothing special at all. 87mph fastball, a good curve, and a ****ty changeup. He was pitching to a 2.87 ERA in Florida, and hey, why not?

Game 3
TIJ: 3B Dasher – 2B Dougal – C M. Torres – CF Feldmann – RF Branch – 1B May – LF M. Herrera – SS M. Miller – P W. Yates
POR: 2B Nomura – LF Sambrano – CF J. Alexander – RF Bednarski – 1B Quebell – SS Palmer – 3B Canning – C Bowen – P Brown

Nick Brown left the Sunday game after two pitches with an apparent injury, which was well enough to sent me into a frenzied madness. Vega replaced him, walked two in the inning, but got out, somehow, then loaded the bases with nobody out in the second inning, and still didn’t allow a run. His highly erratic ways prevented him from doing any actual long relief, and he was totally toast after the third inning, having thrown over 50 pitches. The Raccoons usually got Yoshi Nomura on base before developing an existential crisis and the game was scoreless when Juan Gallegos made his major league debut in a spot you would not have expected him in, starting the fourth inning. Mike Herrera hit a leadoff single against him and advanced on two groundouts, but was left on third when Gallegos struck out Dasher. The Raccoons remained offensively inept, and to drive the misery to the max, it started to rain in the fifth inning, ultimately resulting in a 38-minute rain delay in the sixth inning after Gallegos had spun three shutout innings and had hit a single in the fifth inning – of course without spawning general excitement in the lineup. Yoshi singled behind him, Gallegos went to second base, and then everything died once again.

The Condors sent a soaked Wes Yates back out for the bottom 6th, and he quickly retired Bednarski and Quebell before Palmer hit a single. A hit-and-run was called, because who even still gave a ****, and Canning singled just past Dougal into right, sending Palmer to third. Craig Bowen got a fat pitch and KILLED it, and I mean he KILLED it. 433 feet to almost dead center – HOME RUN!! Carmona hit for the hero Gallegos, walked, and was dashing when Yoshi doubled to center off reliever Ted Miller. Feldmann’s throw back in was way wild, Carmona scored, 4-0. Gibson was not touched in the seventh, but the Condors shook a run out of Thrasher’s pockets in the eighth. Hoshi faced the top of the order in the ninth, struck out Dasher, Dougal, and Torres in order and sent me to a sleepless night. 4-1 Coons. Nomura 3-4, BB; Bowen 2-4, HR, 3 RBI; Gallegos 3.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 4 K, W (1-0) and 1-1;

Must… not… think… about… Brownie… being… hurt… must… not… think… about… Brownie… being… hurt… must… not…

In other news

May 14 – BOS CL Iemitsu Rin (1-0, 0.96 ERA, 14 SV) seals his 300th career save in the Titans’ 4-1 win over the Indians.
May 14 – A sprained wrist will put RIC LF Earl Clark (.324, 1 HR, 19 RBI) out of action for the next five to six weeks.
May 15 – The Pacifics acquire 41-year old CL Ryosei Kato (0-3, 6 SV, 11.85 ERA) from the Aces for three rather dull prospects.

Complaints and stuff

Teamwide failure is always tricky to diagnose. It might be something in the water, or perhaps with the air condition, but the staff now has the problem narrowed down and it must be a nutritional problem. They’re not eating enough! As fat as most of the Raccoons are, 6,000 kilocalories is NOWHERE enough a daily ration to find any energy on the field!

I had eyed Chris Brown in AAA for a potential promotion to the Bigs in September, but he got blown up for long enough to still have a 7+ ERA in mid-May and was sent back to Ham Lake to get readjusted.

As we are on the subject of Browns – now please excuse me. I have some banging of fists against walls to do along with furious howling.

[MarkCuban]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Nick Brown left the Sunday game after two pitches with an apparent injury, which was well enough to sent me into a frenzied madness.

As we are on the subject of Browns – now please excuse me. I have some banging of fists against walls to do along with furious howling.

And thusly, the season ended with a furious howl.... and some banging at the same time. Sounds like a way to go out, Wesheim.

[wpnads]

Wow, that would be a HUGE blow to the organization if Brown is lost for the rest of the year or even for a few weeks. Maybe it's time for the team to storm a certain Mexican pricks' compound with bats and demand more money to help the team or they'll start mailing pieces of him to his relatives. Starting to wonder if Saito put a curse on the team from where he got no run support.

[Questdog]

What about making Adrian Quebell a relief pitcher? He throws left-handed and I see you only have 2 other left-handed relief pitchers. Plus he's hitting like a pitcher.....

[alexsimon99]

Having followed along with this for years, seeing Brown rise to success has been awesome, and I was hoping this year could be the year where he rides off into the sunset with a championship. If he's hurt? I'd be crushed. I can't imagine how you'd feel, Westheim. Sending love and good thoughts <3

[Westheim]

I appreciate the kind words, which brings us swiftly to - and I am not ****ting you - this:

Service announcement:

Overnight, the power unit to my laptop died a silent death and since the battery of the laptop has been as good as dead for a while, I can't even start it anymore. Worse, the guy at the shop (which is not where I bought it) told me - literally - that the power unit I had was an "exotic" component and they didn't have it at hand at all. There seems to be ONE online shop carrying a suitable replacement power unit and delivery takes three days, at least, excluding Sundays. It also costs a fortune, but like I said, it's an "exotic" component.

I can't imagine that there is damage to the laptop (all was fine when I went to bed), but looking at how life has been going for me the last few months, nothing would surprise, nor shock me right now.

I *do* know the actual injury for Nick Brown, which was reported on the next day, but I had something written up that I wanted to edit today, but I can't access it anymore. Not starting from scratch, either, and I don't just barf anything in here right now, because ... ah, I just generally can't handle **** anymore... This should not be interpreted as an indicator that the injury might be severe, and this sentence should not be interpreted as an indicator that the injury is not severe. Not tellin' right now.

ANYWAY. I'm on the previous laptop right now (the one that I LITERALLY bought at the grocery store) and it is not a pleasure. Since I can't access the Raccoons file the way things are right now, no update is going to come forth until at least the middle of next week. And in case the broken power unit fried the current laptop this morning - well, I don't know. I have no way of telling. The most recent external backup is from Opening Day.

**** my life.