Portland Raccoons (ABL)

[Westheim]

Raccoons (10-5) @ Aces (7-8) – April 19-21, 1996

The Aces were last in the CL South, but only 1 1/2 games back of the top spot. This was much in contrast to the CL North early in the season, where the Canadiens were already seven games out of the leading Loggers. The Aces so far had really struggled to score runs, having only 60 of them to their credit, while their bullpen ranked 2nd in the Continental League.

Projected matchups:
Jason Turner (2-1, 4.80 ERA) vs. Rafael Espinoza (2-0, 1.21 ERA)
Miguel Lopez (1-0, 3.13 ERA) vs. Raimundo Beato (0-1, 11.12 ERA)
Scott Wade (2-1, 2.05 ERA) vs. Ben Carlson (0-1, 8.10 ERA)

The Aces’ hurlers were right-handers throughout. Royce Green had not skipped a game yet, so perhaps we could have him off somewhere in this series. But for the first game, he was moved up to cleanup with Wedemeyer not really clicking at this point, and Green was 2nd in OPS in the league (behind BOS C Luis Lopez).

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – SS Salazar – CF Reece – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – 3B O’Morrissey – LF Kinnear – C Vinson – P Turner
LVA: SS M. Gomez – LF Douglas – CF J. Vargas – RF Mashiba – 1B Zamora – 2B Duenas – 3B R. Gutierrez – C Guerrero – P Espinoza

The top 2nd saw Wedemeyer reach on an error before O-Mo and Kinnear singled to load the bases with no outs, and as usual we did not get another base knock in this situation, but at least scored a pair of runs on groundouts by Vinson and Turner. Brewer then singled, but Vinson held at third, and was left there when Salazar made the third out. While rain set in in the third inning, Jason Turner gave up our 2-0 lead with back-to-back home runs to Javier Vargas and Taisuke Mashiba in the bottom 4th. The rain forced a delay north of one hour in the fifth inning, knocking both starters from the game without a decision. Little offense until the bottom 8th, when Otero was on the mound for us. Manuel Gomez led off with a single, and then Joe Douglas reached on an error by Brewer. Uh-oh. Vargas singled to left, Gomez tried to score, but Kinnear sledgehammered him out at home. Burnett came in to face Mashiba, and got a double play ball to Brewer – but the Coons didn’t turn it, Mashiba was safe at first. Douglas was at third, and Burnett’s first pitch to Zamora was wild, and too wild for Vinson. Douglas scored, and Qi-zhen Geng sat down the first two Coons in the ninth. Vinson singled through Zamora then, and was replaced with Espinoza to run, while Ingall came out to bat. He doubled to left, but even that was not enough to score Espinoza, and Brewer grounded out to end the game. 3-2 Aces. Brewer 2-5; Reece 2-4; Wedemeyer 2-4; Ingall (PH) 1-1, 2B; Ban 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K;

Yeah, the offense. Clutch hitting has never been a very strong suit for us. Maybe I mismanaged this one. Espinoza should have been in motion during the Ingall AB.

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – SS Salazar – CF Reece – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – LF Kinnear – 3B Higgins – C Vinson – P M. Lopez
LVA: SS R. Gutierrez – 3B Waller – CF J. Vargas – RF Mashiba – LF Quintela – 1B Zamora – C Cardenas – 2B M. Gomez – P Beato

David Vinson picked George Waller off of first in the opening inning for an early highlight in the game. The Coons got a run off “Pooky” Beato in the third inning, and Wedemeyer homered in the fourth, but that run was given back by Miguel Lopez in the bottom of the inning. In the top 5th, we loaded the bags with a Vinson double, an intentional 1-out walk to Brewer and then Salazar taking a pitch to the buttocks. Yet, we didn’t score, Vargas picking fly balls by Reece and Green out of the air. We left another pair on in the sixth, before Green tripled home Neil Reece in the seventh. Bottom 7th, Lopez surrendered PH Michael Sanders with one pitch, then had Gutierrez and Walker reach with soft singles hobbling through the seams between infielders. Vargas grounded out, putting both runners in scoring position with Mashiba up. Lopez would face the left-hander – STRUCK HIM OUT!! We got another run with a Kinnear shot in the eighth, and Martinez and Miller sat down six straight Aces to get this one into the books. 4-1 Coons! Reece 2-5; Vinson 2-3, BB, 2B; Lopez 7.0 IP, 8 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 6 K, W (2-0);

Made another mistake here, accidentally putting Luke Newton as pinch-hitter for Royce Green in the ninth instead of pinch-RUNNER for Neil Reece. Man, I suck.

Game 3
POR: 2B Brewer – SS Salazar – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Espinoza – C Vinson – P Wade
LVA: 3B R. Gutierrez – SS Waller – CF J. Vargas – RF Mashiba – 1B Zamora – 2B Duenas – LF Sanders – C Guerrero – P Carlson

Wedemeyer’s 2-run shot in the first inning got us ahead early, while Wade came out not hitting the edges of the strike zone, which he relied on to be effective. He walked two in the first inning, while the Aces didn’t score, but they got a run back in the second with three hits off Wade. But the ground beneath Ben Carlson came out pretty quick. The Coons scored a pair in the third, and Vinson homered in the fourth, and while Wade was whacked pretty good with a Sanders triple and a Guerrero double in the bottom 4th, we were still up 5-2. The Raccoons added a few runs along the way, while Wade was taken deep by Raul Duenas in the sixth, and then left in the seventh with two out and a man on second base. Salcido came in to face the lefty Mashiba, but the run scored, adding zero to Salcido’s reputation either with the fans or the front office. Nevertheless, the Coons had scored enough in this game to not sweat through the last innings. 9-4 Raccoons! Brewer 2-5, BB, 2B, RBI; Kinnear 2-4, BB, 2B; O’Morrissey 2-4, BB, RBI; Vinson 2-5, HR, RBI;

With this win, we tied the Loggers for the division lead at 12-6, the first time this season we managed to get at least into a tie for first place. That’s what you get for starting out 0-1.

At this point, neither Brewer nor Salazar were getting on base an awful lot. Brewer was also racking up strikeouts like crazy.

Raccoons (12-6) @ Falcons (11-8) – April 22-24, 1996

Despite the CL-leading .292 team batting average they sported, the Falcons ranked 8th in runs scored. But they also ranked 2nd in runs allowed, mainly on the strength of the best rotation in ERA in the CL, with their 2.90 mark just ahead of our 3.04 value. However, the Falcons’ starters for this series were not yet lined up after they had just lost veteran John Douglas to injury.

Projected matchups:
Antonio Donis (1-0, 4.09 ERA) vs. Terry Wilson (2-2, 3.47 ERA)
Kisho Saito (2-1, 2.39 ERA) vs. TBD
Jason Turner (2-1, 4.66 ERA) vs. Manuel Paredes (1-1, 3.20 ERA)

Brewer and Salazar were both given a day off against the southpaw Terry “Loudmouth” Wilson, as was Kinnear.

Game 1
POR: 3B O’Morrissey – 2B Higgins – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – LF Newton – SS Ingall – C Vinson – P Donis
CHA: 1B R. Garza – C Escobedo – SS Kent – CF Dunphy – 2B Barrón – 3B Jackson – LF P. Flores – RF Young – P Wilson

We got two runs on five hits in the first inning before Vinson grounded out to short to end the inning with the bags full. We got another run in the second when a double steal successfully executed with Higgins and O-Mo put the latter in position to be scored by Reece with a sac fly. Reece would also take care of the next run scored, when with two out and the bases loaded in the sixth, he blooped a single into shallow center to score David Vinson. That knocked Wilson from the game, and Pancho Gutierrez got Wedemeyer to ground out to first, so we left the bags full again. That was right before Antonio Donis, who had scattered five hits through five shutout innings so far, ran into a 3-run homer by Joe Jackson, the former Raccoon, in the bottom 6th. We ran into trouble in the bottom 8th then. Ban put a man on, and with two out Burnett came out to face Grady Young, who was replaced by Pedro Lozano, and Burnett walked him. Right-hander Mark Hall came out to hit in the #9 hole and we brought Daniel Miller. Miller walked Hall, and then surrendered a pretty hard fly ball to Ramón Garza – which Newton caught. Escobedo singled to lead off the ninth, and Christian Dunphy’s 1-out grounder to short could not be turned for a double play by Ingall and Higgins. Miller walked Barrón, which brought up Jackson again. This nail biter ended here, with Jackson … (tension) … grounding out to Miller. 4-3 Furballs!! O’Morrissey 3-5; Reece 2-4, 2B, 3 RBI; Ingall 2-4, 2B; Kinnear (PH) 1-1;

Since the Loggers did not play, we moved into sole possession of first place with this oh-that-was-close win. We left 11 on base, the Falcons a full dozen, so this was pretty much a question who didn’t hit in the clutch the most.

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – 3B O’Morrissey – SS Salazar – C Kondo – P Saito
CHA: 1B R. Garza – C Escobedo – SS Kent – CF Dunphy – 2B Barrón – 3B Jackson – LF P. Flores – RF Velez – P Paredes

The Falcons moved Paredes up to start this game on short rest. It didn’t bother Paredes one tiny little bit. He mowed the Raccoons down at a rapid pace, while Kisho Saito was not sharp, surrendered single runs with two outs in three of the first six innings, and then failed to retire anybody in the seventh. De La Rosa made it worse, hitting a man, and walking another and the Falcons scored three runs (all on Saito) in the inning. Paredes struck out nine during eight shutout innings of 2-hit ball, before being taken out. The Raccoons then obliterated reliever Ray Hoskins, when Reece and Green hit 2-out homers in the ninth for a total of three runs. To no avail, of course. 6-3 Falcons.

Well, that game sucked. Saito was still decent through six, despite three runs. Felix Velez got him twice with those 2-out runs, and you can always say why not walk him and go after Paredes. Looks like I mismanaged some more. I will manage this team to the bottom half of the division in short time, it seems. For the moment we lost first place again.

Game 3
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Reece – RF Green – LF Kinnear – SS Ingall – 1B Higgins – C Vinson – P Turner
CHA: CF Dunphy – C Escobedo – 3B Combes – SS Kent – RF R. Garza – 1B Jackson – 2B M. Hall – LF Velez – P Venegas

Ex-Coon Alejandro Venegas (1-1, 3.80 ERA) was thrown into this game. Venegas, 36, was with us 1987-88, going a total of 12-15. He is 57-54 for his career, and on his sixth team post-Portland, not even pitching in the Bigs 1992-93. There was rain in the forecast, and it started early in the third inning. By then the Raccoons were up 2-1, all runs scored on chains of singles in separate innings. The rain eventually forced play to be suspended in the fifth, just after Venegas hit a 1-out single off Turner. After a delay of just over 45 minutes, Turner went back out, but threw a wild pitch and hit Dunphy, and was brought back in. Martinez surrendered the tying run, both starters were gone, and the game was tied, 2-2. In this brand new ballgame, the Falcons brought in Hoskins, who had been clobbered two days ago, and between two walks and a Kent error, the Critters loaded them up with one out for Vinson, now facing Mike Dye, one of our closers last year. Vinson was walked on four straight for the go-ahead run. Salazar batted for Martinez and grounded out, but a run scored. Dye would issue *four* walks in the inning, and the Raccoons scored *four* runs in the inning – without EVER knocking a base hit! Otero then pitched a messy sixth, where a Higgins error scored an unearned run, but we were still up 6-3. Vinson homered in the eighth, while Ban sat down the Falcons, and then in the ninth, the Falcons failed to retire any of the first six Raccoons to step to the plate, and we plated five more runs. Ban tried to pitch a 3-inning save, and although he walked a pair in the ninth, he came through, as the Raccoons smothered the Falcons in this one. 12-3 Furballs!! Green 3-4, BB, RBI; Wedemeyer (PH) 1-1, RBI; Vinson 3-4, BB, HR, 2B, 4 RBI; Ban 3.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 4 K, SV (1) and 1-1, RBI;

Have I ever seen four runs scored in an inning without the benefit of an actual hit? I don’t think so.

Raccoons (14-7) vs. Loggers (14-7) – April 26-28, 1996

The Loggers were above average on the pitching side, but a bit below average on the offensive side, with 90 runs scored in their 21 games. We split a 2-game set to open the season. The Loggers were without SP Davis Sims and OF Gates Golunski in this series. Sims had forearm tendinitis and was not on the DL, so it would not surprise us if the Loggers would further shuffle their rotation in this series.

Projected matchups:
Miguel Lopez (2-0, 2.70 ERA) vs. Rafael Garcia (3-1, 3.41 ERA)
Scott Wade (3-1, 2.51 ERA) vs. Martin Garcia (4-0, 0.89 ERA)
Antonio Donis (2-0, 4.15 ERA) vs. Jorge Casas (1-2, 5.79 ERA)

Lefty Martin Garcia will be a tough nut to crack. He basically has been untouchable so far. But

Game 1
MIL: CF Fletcher – 2B J. Perez – RF C. Ramirez – LF Hiwalani – SS Grant – 3B Rush – C M. Vela – 1B Chevalier – P R. Garcia
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – 3B O’Morrissey – SS Salazar – P M. Lopez

As the game started, black clouds were already visible on the horizon. The Raccoons scored three runs in the bottom 2nd for Lopez, but would we get through five before the rains came? Well, would LOPEZ get through five? Through 3.2 innings, he surrendered only one hit. Then, the Loggers unleashed terrible 2-out terror, with five straight hits, capped by a 3-run homer by Jamal Chevalier, to take a 5-3 lead. The Loggers put another (2-out) run on Lopez in the fifth to make this a really crappy day. The actual rain didn’t come until the eighth inning, but by then the mood was already wet anyway. The Raccoons had the tying run at the plate in the last two innings, and never could buy a hit. 7-5 Loggers. Green 2-2, 2 BB, 2B;

What a stinker of a game. Six 2-out runs against you just suck. It is … argh!

Game 2
MIL: CF Fletcher – 1B Evans – RF C. Ramirez – SS Grant – LF Hiwalani – 3B J. Perez – C L. Ramirez – 2B A. Gonzalez – P Casas
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – RF Green – C Vinson – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Higgins – SS Salazar – P Wade

The Loggers moved Casas up to this game. Meanwhile their whole lineup amounted to one (1) home run this season, that slugger being Cristo Ramirez. The Raccoons loaded them up with one out in the bottom 1st, but scored only one run on Vinson’s sac fly. Salazar dropped a ball in the fourth inning that helped the Loggers to score a pair of unearned runs on Scott Wade to turn the game around. This was a game of little action. The Coons left Brewer on third base in the bottom 5th, but then had Vinson, O-Mo, and Higgins all reach with no outs in the bottom 6th. Salazar popped out, forcing Wade to be removed for a pinch-hitter. Espinoza popped out. I swear, goddamnit, I will – Brewer hits the first pitch to deep right, it is gone!! GRAAAAAAND SLAAAAAMMM!!!! We got to the ninth with a 7-3 lead. De La Rosa was put into the game, plunked Bob Rush, and then walked Fletcher and Evans. What the …? Daniel Miller came in, trying to save this one. Cristo Ramirez reached on an infield hit, scoring the first run. Bob Grant grounded out, but the Raccoons failed to turn two, and another run scored. Miller then walked Hiwalani. Jessie McGuire pinch-hit and grounded out to third, scoring the third run of the inning. That forced Miller to get Leon Ramirez. On an 0-2 pitch, Ramirez shot a flyer to deep left that eluded Kinnear, and the Loggers came out of the top 9th with an 8-7 lead. They had scored five runs on two hits and tons of idiocy. John Bennett sat down the side in order in the bottom 9th. 8-7 Loggers. Brewer 4-5, HR, 2B, 4 RBI; Kinnear 3-5, 2B; Reece 3-5, RBI; Ingall (PH) 1-1, RBI; Vinson 2-4, 2B, RBI; Wade 6.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 0 ER, 3 BB, 3 K;

Bloody ****!!! The bullpen retards are back! AAARGH!!!

And you most love these games against the team you battle for first place. Great job! GREAT JOB!! AAAH, I HATE you all!!

Game 3
MIL: CF Fletcher – 2B J. Perez – RF C. Ramirez – LF Hiwalani – SS Grant – 3B Rush – C M. Vela – 1B Chevalier – P M. Garcia
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – SS Ingall – LF Kinnear – RF Newton – C Kondo – P Donis

Garcia is undefeated, and his ERA tells you “You won’t score”. So what, we get swept. It is still early. The more often I say that, the less it is true.

Garcia’s ERA almost doubled when Liam Wedemeyer slapped a 3-run homer off him in the first inning. Now Donis just had to hold onto that. A run that Donis surrendered in the third inning was given back by Garcia in the fourth, when with two out and runners on the corners, he tried to pick Brewer off first base, but his throw went past Jamal Chevalier, and Luke Newton dashed home from third, 4-1. Donis still was not on the safe side. The Loggers loaded them up in the sixth with one out, and Donis only got out because Luke Newton made two awesome plays on fly balls with hair on them. Donis managed to go seven, still up 4-2. The Coons then had three soft singles by Higgins, Brewer, and O-Mo to start the bottom 7th. Three on, no out. Once more, we did not get a hit in this situation, but Reece and Wedemeyer at least managed two score a pair with groundouts, and we added another two runs in the eighth. How could we blow this one? Nah, I just put Ban in, and he got the ninth taken care of. 8-2 Raccoons. Brewer 2-4, BB; O’Morrissey 2-5; Wedemeyer 2-4, HR, 4 RBI; Higgins (PH) 1-1, BB; Donis 7.0 IP, 6 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 6 K, W (3-0);

So, Donis, struggling with control, struggling with going deep into games, and he is undefeated and ties for the lead in wins on the staff, huh? To be fair, if the hunchbacked retards in the pen had blown out the middle game, Scott Wade would be 4-1 though.

You know who does not tie for the lead in wins on the team? Kisho Saito.

Raccoons (15-9) vs. Canadiens (6-18) – April 29-May 1, 1996

The Canadiens were in a boat load of trouble with a .250 April. They had neither offense, nor pitching, ranking close to the bottom in most major categories, including about all pitching categories. I suspect a trap and we will get turned inside out.

Projected matchups:
Kisho Saito (2-2, 3.62 ERA) vs. Glenn Ryan (0-3, 4.94 ERA)
Jason Turner (2-1, 4.50 ERA) vs. John Collins (0-1, 6.19 ERA)
Miguel Lopez (2-1, 3.86 ERA) vs. Kiyohira Sasaki (1-3, 7.09 ERA)

Game 1
VAN: CF Ledesma – 2B Mendez – LF Hartley – 1B Mosley – 3B Galindo – SS McFarland – RF Saldana – C Durán – P Ryan
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – 3B O’Morrissey – SS Salazar – P Saito

Saito struggled early on, and fell 1-0 behind in the first. He came to bat with the sacks full and one out in the bottom 2nd, and managed to coax a walk out of Glenn Ryan! Brewer lobbed a soft single into center for the go-ahead run, bringing up Kinnear with the bags still loaded. Ryan came right down the middle on him, and Kinnear went right out of the park. GRAAAAAAND SLAAAAAAMMM!!!! Glenn Ryan’s day ended after four outs and six runs. That still left Saito to battle to keep the 5-run lead alive (and we know how safe big leads are for us currently…), which was difficult, since the Canadiens hit singles everywhere. They had three in the top 3rd, but left the bags full. Saito’s game ended in the sixth. After surrendering eight mainly soft hits (and three walks against seven K’s), the ninth was a homer by Ledesma, and Saito was removed with a 7-3 lead. Just after Wedemeyer added a pair of runs in the bottom 6th with his sixth homer of the season, Martinez and Otero were blown up for four runs in the seventh. YOU WON’T DARE. Salazar and Brewer drove in runs in the bottom 7th, which brought the score to – I don’t know who’s still counting – Raccoons 11, Canadiens 7, and still six outs to collect. Otero was still in with our pen a bit thin after a weekend of pitching horrors, and managed to collect the first three of those. With another insurance run in the bottom 8th, Miller was sent out there, while Kondo replaced Vinson behind the dish. He gave up a walk and two hits to the Canadiens, who brought the tying run to the on-deck circle, before Neil Reece had enough of this and made a seemingly impossible catch on a Ledesma pop to shallow right center. 12-8 Furballs. Brewer 2-5, 2 RBI; Kinnear 1-5, HR, 4 RBI; Reece 3-4, BB, Wedemeyer 2-4, HR, 2 RBI; Newton 1-1; O’Morrissey 2-4, BB, 2B; Salazar 2-4, BB, RBI;

Saito has 1,059 AB in his career, and just 23 walks. So, drawing a game-tying walk is something sweet for sure. Of course, the first run of 12 in a game always gets a little bit overshadowed in the end. But Saito has another number on his ledger after this game, which is #198. He needs two more wins to 200! I expect to see this happen in May. Of course, I expected it to happen last June already.

Also, after hitting zero at the start of the year, Liam Wedemeyer took over the team lead in homers in this game. You got anything to say to that, Royce?

Game 2
VAN: CF Ledesma – 2B Mendez – LF Hartley – 1B Mosley – 3B Galindo – SS McFarland – RF Moore – C E. Ramos – P Collins
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – 3B O’Morrissey – SS Salazar – P Turner

The Canadiens rushed Turner in the first inning with a walk and four hits for two runs, and Turner never found a groove, giving up four runs in five innings of unwatchable work. The Furballs had to run after the Canadiens, but it looked less like running and more like crawling. John Collins held them to two hits and one run until a sudden rain shower knocked him out before he could complete the fifth inning, forcing a 1-hour delay. The Raccoons continued to be nowhere. Bottom 9th, Canadiens up 4-1. Albert Matthews and his 8.00 ERA entered, and Vinson singled to left. Then O-Mo worked a walk. Tying run to the plate. Salazar was that tying run and singled up the middle. Bases loaded, no outs. We had only Nori Kondo left on the bench, but Espinoza was in the #9 slot already, but flew out to shallow left. Brewer grounded out, scoring Vinson, but the ship was sinking, and Kinnear flew out to Roland Moore in right. 4-2 Canadiens. Newton 1-1; Salcido 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K;

You think that was all? To make this stinker of a game complete, we also suffered our first significant injury of the season, as Neil Reece tweaked his side on a catch in the eighth inning. Oblique strain, out for at least two weeks, so that meant a trip to the DL. And here we go!

Finding a replacement for Reece was not easy, actually. Just in time, our AAA team had been stricken with injuries, too, with outfielders Kevin Savary and Kenny Crockett both down. In AA, Manuel Villa, our first round pick from last season, suffered a really severe concussion and was out for the year and possibly forever. In the end, the callup went to 3B Mike Crowe, who would not see much playing time, but you need the bat… Crowe was a supplemental round pick in 1992 for us. His problem is that he is blocked by O-Mo (and at the very least O-Mo is blocked by Wedemeyer at first).

Game 3
VAN: RF Saldana – 2B Mendez – LF Hartley – 1B Mosley – 3B Galindo – SS McFarland – CF D. Edwards – C Durán – P Dominguez
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – CF Newton – SS Higgins – P M. Lopez

The Canadiens scratched Sasaki and entered Jose Dominguez, who was 14 years Sasaki’s junior, but still 1-4 with a 6.37 ERA. Dominguez got chainsawed in the first inning with a 2-run homer by Wedemeyer and 2-out, 2-run single by Higgins as the Raccoons batted through the order. While that knocked out Dominguez instantly, Miguel Lopez was torn up for FIVE runs in the second inning. These Canadiens would just not stop hitting singles. Oh, and a 3-run homer by Alberto Durán. Then the Canadiens brought in Jackie Lagarde and he surrendered three runs (two earned) in two innings. So, we were up 7-5 after, uh, three innings. We put two more on Holden Gorman in the fourth, while Lopez barely made it through five innings, with ten hits and five runs surrendered, while he only struck out one batter, and that was the last one he faced, Drew Edwards, to end the fifth. Things didn’t get better with Martinez coming in to pitch the sixth. Well, the Canadiens played themselves out of an inning, with Durán thrown out at third base for the first out by Kinnear’s strong arm, and after Peter Hughes, the next reliever in line, singled his way on, Salvador Mendez hit him with his grounder to end the inning. Then, Vinson got himself thrown out stretching a double in the bottom of the inning. This game would just not stop being crazy! Durán homered off Burnett in the eighth to get back to within three runs of the Raccoons. Miller came in to save that 9-6 game. A 1-2-3 inning would be boring, and so with one out the tying run was at the plate, but McFarland flew out leisurely to Kinnear. That brought up the lefty Edwards. The pen was empty, this had to be all Miller’s. Edwards doubled in the runners, and Ledesma came out to hit for Durán to counter Miller’s right arm. He was walked intentionally to get to the pitcher’s spot, where the Canadiens, after expending the entirety of their bullpen, had installed the previously scratched Sasaki in the ninth. They removed him for Edgardo Ramos to hit. He singled up the middle and the bags were full. Miller against Saldana. The count ran full. 3-2 pitch, Miller got into motion, the runners got into motion, Saldana got into motion to take a big rip. He missed. 9-8 Raccoons. Green 2-4, BB, 2B, RBI; Vinson 2-4, BB, 2B; Newton 2-3, BB, RBI; Higgins 2-4, 2 RBI;

Wow.

Looking at this game and the series opener, in both games the teams combined for 31 hits. The Canadiens out-hit us each time, 17-14 and 19-12 respectively, and we still won both. But wow, is our pitching in trouble!!

The last two series, not pleasant. Just not pleasant.

In other news

April 19 – SFW LF/RF/1B Hjalmar Flygt (.475, 1 HR, 13 RBI) is not only on fire early on in the season, he has also an accomplished career in the record books. During the Warriors’ 4-3 win over the Rebels today, Flygt knocked three base hits, with a leadoff double off Chris O’Keefe in the sixth being his 2,000th career hit. Flygt, 33, was the second overall pick in the 1984 draft by the Titans, for whom he played until 1994.
April 19 – 185-game winner SP John Douglas (2-1, 2.70 ERA) of the Falcons will have to sit out three months with a torn triceps.
April 19 – Pittsburgh’s SP Craig Hansen (1-1, 7.04 ERA) 3-hits the Stars in a 6-0 win for the Miners.
April 27 – IND SP Lorenzo Ángel (2-1, 3.24 ERA) will miss four months with shoulder inflammation.

Complaints and stuff

Neil Reece was named CL Player of the Week for the week we ended in Las Vegas, going 12-25 with one dinger and five driven in. Yaaaay, Neil!! It is his eighth POTW award and he is yet to turn 30 (which he will do in September). I must say, Neil is by far by favorite person from Massapequa, NY! Of course, now he is on the DL and I will cry myself to sleep for a couple of weeks.

To continue with awards, Antonio Donis’ undefeated April (3-0, 3.70 ERA) made him the CL Rookie of the Month for April!

Scott Wade notified me of his desire to stay in Portland past the end of this season. He is the first of our group of to-be free agents to turn to me, and given the circumstances the one most likely to be retained, given that he has always worked for cheap, and I love his style.

Fine stat: Ben O’Morrissey averaged 18.3 errors 1992-94. He had nine in an injury-shortened season last year. He was errorless in April!

[Westheim]

Raccoons (17-10) @ Buffaloes (8-20) – May 3-5, 1996

Here was another team that so far had been nothing but shelled. Their main problem was the offense, which was scoring less than four runs a game, while their rotation was above average despite a 4.12 ERA. The offense in the Federal League seemed to be a bit out of whack a month into the season. The bullpen however was horrendous with a 4.90 ERA. Those were three right-handers we were scheduled to face.

Projected matchups:
Scott Wade (3-1, 2.08 ERA) vs. Ricardo Contreras (1-3, 3.27 ERA)
Antonio Donis (3-0, 3.70 ERA) vs. Dave Bond (0-4, 4.31 ERA)
Kisho Saito (3-2, 3.79 ERA) vs. Rob Griffin (3-2, 3.82 ERA)

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – SS Salazar – CF Espinoza – P Wade
TOP: LF F. Sanchez – C C. Ramos – 1B Patel – CF Reid – RF West – 2B Spinu – SS Solís – 3B B. Edwards – P Contreras

The Raccoons started this game with a bang, putting their first four men on base, which included home runs by Kinnear and Wedemeyer. Kinnear’s shot went all the way over the bleachers and into the lot behind them. Contreras’ revenge was striking out the side in the second and the Raccoons didn’t get much going after that, either. Bottom 4th, Scott Wade had surrendered only one hit so far, but the Buffaloes came out putting their first five batters on base. Wade got two, but a 2-out double by Edwards tied the game in the inning. Back to square one, the Coons continued to be befuddled by Contreras until the seventh inning started just like the first, with a Brewer double. But Contreras surrendered the next three batters to quell the thread. Wade surrendered nine of the next ten men he faced after the fourth inning disaster. Neither pitcher got a decision, and we went to overtime, and overtime started with Ben O’Morrissey slapping a home run off reliever Miguel Lopez (not related to our Miguel Lopez, for all I know). We faced a dilemma then in the bottom 10th after we left two men on in the top. Three of the first four batters to come up were lefties, but Ken Burnett had already been used, and Daniel Miller … well, I didn’t trust Cesar Salcido one lick, so Miller had to pitch this. Interestingly, the only guy Miller put on in the inning was righty Dave Reid, while he surrendered lefties Carlos Ramos, Corey Patel, and Gary West. 5-4 Furballs. Brewer 2-5, 2 2B; Wedemeyer 2-4, HR, 2 RBI; Vinson 2-4; Crowe 1-2; Ingall (PH) 1-1; De La Rosa 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K, W (1-0);

Mike Crowe made his debut in this game as a pinch-hitter for Jorge Salazar to counter southpaw Rafael Negrón, then stayed in to play third as O-Mo shifted to first for defense. Crowe got his first major league hit in the tenth, a single.

But boy, these big innings keep happening, and the Queen is all but amused. We scored all our runs with the big ball, which is thrilling, but you know what happens when you stop hitting them? Look at our last September. Another odd stat about this game: Daniel Miller punching out Carlos Ramos to lead off the tenth was our only K all day long.

Intermission: free agent signings

I had reached out to veteran free agent outfielders for minor league contracts. One of those is a former Raccoon. They both signed on the morning of the second game in Topeka.

OF Joe Macombe, 27, was the supplemental round pick of the Stars in the 1989 draft. He had appeared for them in 28 games in 1993, hitting .259, but never had gotten another chance after that and had become a minor league free agent. He will probably never amount to more than a fringe player, but at the moment we have an epidemic of injuries and we need bats.

The other guy that signed was a supplemental round pick for the Pacifics in 1984, with whom he debuted in 1988, before being traded to the Raccoons, for whom he played intermittently for the next four years before moving on to Oklahoma, where he won a ring in 1994, when he appeared in a career-high 135 games. He is now 30 years old and a career .250 batter. And his name is … Jeff Martin. He was also assigned to AAA, but I was planning to call him up and sent Mike Crowe back down shortly. He has no options remaining, so when Neil Reece comes off the DL in a little over a week and we have to sent Martin back down, it could even pose a problem, since he can refuse a minor league assignment.

Both signed minor league contracts for the moment, though.

Raccoons (17-10) @ Buffaloes (8-20) – May 3-5, 1996

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – C Vinson – 3B Crowe – SS Salazar – CF Newton – P Donis
TOP: RF Fukushima – SS Hitchcock – CF Reid – 1B Patel – C C. Ramos – 2B Spinu – LF West – 3B Solís – P Bond

Antonio Donis had his hand into about every instance of a run being scored in this game. While much of that is always true for runs giving up by a pitcher, of which there were two in the first three innings for Donis, here he fueled the offense. In the top 3rd, down 1-0, he hit an RBI single scoring Luke Newton to tie the game. Royce Green would hit a 2-out, 2-run homer in the inning to get us up 3-1. In the fourth, up 3-2, we had two on with two out and Donis coming to bat. He hit an infield single to load the bags, and Brewer then emptied the bags with a double. In a perfect world, Donis would have nursed that 6-2 lead through at least six, but he ran himself stuck in an 8-3 game, putting two on with one out. In an at least decent world, Juan Martinez would have gotten out of the mess without allowing three runs to score, but the Buffaloes moved back to 8-6. The Raccoons struck back with Mike Crowe’s first career homer, a solo shot, in the seventh. Salcido pitched the seventh, and Otero expended only seven pitches in the eighth, and with Miller a bit sore after working almost every other day recently, he was left in at least at the start of the ninth, still up 9-6. He sat down Reid, Patel, and Ramos to put the game away. 9-6 Furballs. Brewer 3-5, 2 2B, 4 RBI; Green 2-4, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Crowe 2-5, HR, RBI; Otero 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K, SV (1);

So, Donis gets rocked for five runs in 5.1 innings, and still winds up 4-0 with the most wins on the team. I don’t get this game.

Game 3
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – SS Ingall – CF Newton – C Kondo – P Saito
TOP: RF Fukushima – SS Hitchcock – 1B Patel – 2B Spinu – LF Solís – CF West – C J. Ortega – 3B R. Hernandez – P Griffin

Saito surrendered single runs in the first two innings, while each time striking out a batter to end the inning with another runner in scoring position. The Raccoons slept until the fourth inning, when O-Mo led off with a single, which was followed up by shy singles by Wedemeyer and Green, the latter scoring O-Mo. With runners on the corners, Ingall and Newton made poor outs, bringing up .105 batter Nori Kondo. And here, our two Japanese guys stunned the Buffaloes with a pair of extra base hits over the head of Gary West in center, Kondo with a triple, and Saito with a double! And then it all went wrong immediately, once again. Saito allowed a single to the just over-hit West, then walked Jose Ortega to start the bottom 4th. Hernandez doubled to score a run, and Fernando Sanchez, hitting for Griffin, flew out to right. Ortega tagged, but was hammered out by Royce Green at the plate. Two out, runner on second, rain beginning to fall once more, Arinori Fukushima got the better of Saito with a single to right, and we were tied again. There was a short rain delay in the fifth inning, in which the Coons left a pair in scoring position. Saito completed the bottom 5th, then was removed for a pinch-hitter, Salazar, with a runner on and one out in the top 6th. Salazar made the second out, bringing up Brewer, who faced ex-Coon Tony Vela and sent a bomb out of the park, 2-run homer. So, Saito was in line for the W after all, but we put Juan Martinez in for the bottom 6th, and he surrendered a homer and a double. Exit Martinez, enter De La Rosa, out of the inning. We got the run back in the top 7th, 7-5 now, and then Salcido came in to pitch the seventh. He walked the first two, and then blew the game with a triple to Raúl Solís. That piece of dirt!! Would he get the L he deserved so thoroughly? The Raccoons were down 8-7 into the ninth, facing not our Miguel Lopez again. With one out, the bases were loaded with Tzu-jao Ban having to be hit for. I went with Higgins (Espinoza being the only other remaining option), who hit at a 3-1 pitch and grounded into a force at home. Bases loaded, two out for Brewer, who quickly had two strikes on him, but made contact into the gap in right center, and deep so. Would it go out, would Fukushima get it? OFF THE WALL!!! Ingall comes home! Vinson comes home! Higgins comes home! THREE-RUN DOUBLE DAVID BREWER!!! Enter Miller, one Buffalo down, two Buffalo down, th- oops, Gary West hit a home run. No worries, we were still up 10-9. Miller punched out Ortega. 10-9 Furballs, and I am sweating! Brewer 3-6, HR, 2 2B, 5 RBI; Wedemeyer 3-5; Green 2-5, RBI; Newton 2-4, BB, RBI;

1996 Juan Martinez is much like the 1995 Jackie Lagarde by now. He can’t get anybody out. Ken Burnett is also struggling, issuing walks all the time. The bullpen remains a mess. You can’t even trust your for years most reliable pieces now. Ah, the job I have…

Meanwhile, this game was also Salcido’s last boner. I am sick of his face. He was demoted to AAA. No replacement has been named so far.

In other news

May 3 – PIT INF Roberto Rodriguez (.231, 0 HR, 10 RBI) may miss most of May with a torn thumb ligament.

Complaints and stuff

That’s all for today. Despite us pulling off a sweep, this has exhausted me mentally. It seems like every game ends 7-6 or 10-8 now. Which is great, when you judge your offense. But the pitching. Oh my god, the pitching. The pitching makes me cry.

To be exact, going back to April 21, the last game in Las Vegas, we have scored 95 runs in 13 games, which amounts to a rousing 7.3 runs per game! But you have to flinch when looking at the fact that we also gave up 72 runs, a much less cool 5.5 per game. That is an issue.

We can’t do much about the rotation for the moment, with no depth in AAA to speak of. Besides. Mostly it has been the bullpen cocking up and I will look into our options there. Starting pitching has been a problem mostly at the top of the rotation. Jason Turner had a bad April last year, and came back to win 20 games, so I am not worried yet. Somehow, Kisho Saito gives up tons of singles. His BABIP is .356, so I blame rotten luck more than him. Of course, “Saito” means “he who is crushed by a piano falling from a window in the fourth floor” in Japanese, so you can hardly be surprised. Lopez had back-to-back bad starts now, but he may be our future number one. Wade is without blemish in my eyes, and Donis, well, the sample size ain’t very big.

But the bullpen. Same old story.

By the way, Juan Martinez (10.2 IP, 19 H, 6 BB, 10 K) and Ken Burnett (7.0 IP, 9 H, 7 BB, 3 K), the two guys struggling the most after the just-banished Salcido, will be free agents after the year. Looking bad as far as a new contract is concerned.

AAA LF Stephen Buell was the Player of the Week with a 11-24, 2 HR, 10 RBI attack on pitching. Too bad he clashes so badly with Vern Kinnear when it comes to usability.

[Westheim]

Yes, here comes the payroll table again. This whole season will be as much about payroll as about what the boys are doing on the field. I last posted this early in the offseason, and here is the complete thing with new signings, as things stand on May 5, except for service times, which are those from the start of the season, and I am really not sure in the case of Tzu-jao Ban (1 year = 172 days? … seems like it).

1B/2B David Brewer - $1.4M ($7.6M through 2000)
INF Jorge Salazar - $900k (will be free agent) #
SP Kisho Saito - $900k ($2.9M through 1998)
OF Neil Reece - $850k ($5.05M through 2000)
SP Jason Turner - $550k (will be free agent) #
-
3B/1B Ben O’Morrissey - $550k (will be free agent) #
LF Vern Kinnear - $485k (will be arbitration eligible) *
OF Royce Green - $480k (will be arbitration eligible) *
C David Vinson - $425k ($875k through 1997)
SP Miguel Lopez - $413k (will be arbitration eligible) *
-
MR Andres Otero - $350k ($700k through 1997)
MR Juan Martinez - $275k (will be free agent) #
SP Scott Wade - $260k (will be free agent) #
MR Ken Burnett - $250k (will be free agent) #
OF Alejandro Espinoza - $250k ($500k through 1997)
-
INF Matt Higgins - $233k ($467k through 1997)
MR Tzu-jao Ban - $230k (will be arbitration eligible) *
MR Daniel Miller - $160k (will be arbitration eligible) *

* Service times (y.d): Ban (4.153), Green (4.019), Kinnear (4.008), Miller (3.144), Lopez (3.073)

In addition to that, the following players will be (or could be under the super 2 clause) arbitration eligible: Wedemeyer (2.118), Kondo (2.076), De La Rosa (2.008), Ingall (1.163)

Six free agents, nine arbitration cases, including four players that will be eligible for the first time, after the 1996 season. After 1997 we will have seven more players bound for free agency.

The first free agents group contains Salazar, Turner, O-Mo, Martinez, Wade, and Burnett, the latter group will contain Kinnear, Green, Ban, Otero, Espinoza, Higgins, and Vinson.

It is safe to assume that at least Turner, O-Mo, Kinnear, and Green will be looking for contracts in the range of what Neil Reece got before he was bound for free agency, which were $5.8M over six years. Especially Royce Green could look for much more than that. None of these players is very greedy, but of course all will try to take care of their retirement years…

Current payroll is $10.9M, which is about as much as can be squeezed into the budget. I can not see a significant raise coming, neither should I speculate on it. So I will have to pick the players I want to re-sign carefully. This process starts this season, even for the 1997 group. As things stand now, we can not hope to keep more than half the players in either group. Also mind that in 1998, Miguel Lopez will be a free agent.

Whom do you pick between Vern Kinnear (.273/.372/.444), Royce Green (.282/.355/.519), Ben O’Morrissey (.281/.350/.418), Jorge Salazar (.285/.354/.364), David Vinson (.249/.368/.392), Jason Turner (97-62, 3.43 ERA), Scott Wade (138-88, 3.34 ERA), and Miguel Lopez (46-23, 3.19 ERA)?

Edit: fixed wrong career slash line for Royce Green

[Westheim]

I made the move and called up Jeff Martin – without sending Mike Crowe down. We are now one arm short in the bullpen, but I am on the heels of resolving that situation shortly (read: sign an old, future- and hopeless free agent to get annoyed by him and throw him out of a random window within two weeks).

Raccoons (20-10) vs. Warriors (23-9) – May 6-8, 1996

And quick turnaround from two of the worst teams in the league to one of the strongest teams in the league. I was not quite sure how the Warriors were playing as they were playing. But they had to be doing something right… their 186 runs scored were leading the Federal League, and compared on one level to our 175 runs, which led the Continental League. Their pitching was also solidly above average, and with our pitchers drowning in runs, we had to fear the absolute worst. If anything, the best news were that we would probably miss at least one of 5-0 Neil Stewart and 6-1 Ricardo Torres in this series, and the preliminary rotation of the Warriors for this season showed three more right-handers.

Projected matchups:
Jason Turner (2-2, 4.97 ERA) vs. Ruben Prado (1-0, 5.72 ERA)
Miguel Lopez (3-1, 4.50 ERA) vs. Hector Lara (1-2, 4.79 ERA)
Scott Wade (3-1, 2.59 ERA) vs. Juan Sanchez (3-3, 5.61 ERA)

Game 1
SFW: 2B Heffer – RF Nedic – LF Flygt – CF Hensley – 1B I. Gutierrez – 3B F. Rivera – C Clemente – SS Areizaga – P Prado
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – SS Salazar – C Vinson – CF Espinoza – P Turner

Unsurprisingly, given the offensive prowess of both lineups, fans were treated to fabulous pitchers’ duel in this opener. Through the top 8th, Prado and Turner had lined up strings of zeroes, except for a single 1 on the scoreboard, courtesy of a Salazar double and Vinson single in the bottom 4th. Turner was pitching a 2-hitter while the Raccoons had made only that one run from eight hits, also whiffing six times against Prado. The bottom 8th was started with a walk by Kinnear, and then O-Mo and Wedemeyer singled. No outs, bases loaded, Green popped out to Dave Heffer at second. Salazar came up and singled into left. Kinnear scored, and O-Mo was waved around and was safe at home. Vinson then doubled over Hjalmar Flygt in deep left, and two more runs scored, as a fine piece of pitching came crashing down on Ruben Prado. After spending only 76 pitches through eight, Jason Turner then began to drift in the ninth. PH Werner Turner singled his way on, and Flygt also singled with two down. A passed ball on Vinson moved up the runners, as John Hensley was down 0-2. Could Turner remove him and save his shutout? After a ball, Hensley swung right through Turner’s 30th pitch of the inning. 5-0 Raccoons!! Salazar 3-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Vinson 2-4, 2B, 3 RBI; Espinoza 2-4, 2B; Turner 9.0 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 3 K, W (3-2);

All our positional starters had at least one hit in the game, our starting nine finished the game, and Turner and Salazar were 1st and 3rd in the top performances of the day. Well, there was exactly one other game on this Monday, in which the Indians beat the Pacifics 2-1. Vernon Robertson went eight innings of 1-run ball.

Game 2
SFW: 2B Heffer – C Clemente – CF Hensley – LF Cote – 3B F. Rivera – RF Nedic – 1B W. Turner – SS Areizaga – P Lara
POR: SS Salazar – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – 2B Ingall – CF Martin – P M. Lopez

Many things went wrong when Miguel Lopez led off the game pitching to Dave Heffer. Heffer grounded sharply to O-Mo, who got the ball, but threw past Wedemeyer at first base (first error of the year), and Lopez signaled for the trainer and left the game in obvious pain. With the game derailing two pitches in, De La Rosa was warmed up and brought in. De La Rosa got three outs with three pitches in the first inning, and struck out the side in the third, but already ran out of steam in the fifth inning, leaving a runner on second base, who scored against Ban. This was the go-ahead run, 2-1, for the Warriors in the game. Ban got us through the seventh, and the Raccoons – aided by an error by Russ Cote – loaded the bags in the bottom 7th with two out for Wedemeyer, but he grounded out to first. Otero surrendered another run in the eighth and unfortunately the Raccoons had nothing going against Lara, who was pinch-hit for in the top 9th. Raúl Vargas came out to close this one and struck out the side. 3-1 Warriors. Kinnear 3-5; Wedemeyer 2-4, 3B, RBI; Ban 2.2 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K;

Losing Miguel Lopez to injury and expending most of our bullpen (which was already a man short!), produced a critical situation, which had to be fixed immediately. Thus, Mike Crowe was sent to Florida the same night, and Pancho Padilla got the callup. Padilla, 22, had semi-successfully closed games for our AAA team, but here we needed him to eat a few innings in the next few days, which didn’t mean he would not be entered into still close games. The Dominican Padilla had been our fifth round pick in the 1991 amateur draft. He was already on the 40-man roster and his 3.07 ERA and 1.30 WHIP at AAA made him palatable.

Game 3
SFW: 2B Heffer – RF Nedic – LF Flygt – CF Hensley – 1B I. Gutierrez – 3B F. Rivera – C Clemente – SS Areizaga – P J. Sanchez
POR: 2B Brewer – CF Newton – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – LF Kinnear – C Vinson – RF Espinoza – SS Ingall – P Wade

Scott Wade proved easily hittable once again. The Warriors were whacking balls all over the place, easily scoring four runs in the first four innings. The Raccoons for the second day in a row had just nothing going that far. In the bottom 5th, Vern Kinnear dished out a 2-run home run, but that was not enough to save Wade. The Raccoons were going down, and going down hard, with the bullpen being ravaged in the eighth, when Padilla made his debut, faced two batters, and put them both on, and both scored against Daniel Miller, who replaced him. 7-2 Warriors.

For more bad news, the injury report for Miguel Lopez was devastating. He had a torn rotator cuff, and his season was most likely over.

Boom. Headshot.

Raccoons (21-12) @ Titans (20-15) – May 10-12, 1996

The Titans were 0-3 against us with a more or less average team – a bit more batting than pitching – so far this season. They had, however, a 5-game hitting streak in full motion as we came in. But from here, everything can only go horribly wrong anyway.

Projected matchups:
Antonio Donis (4-0, 4.55 ERA) vs. Jesus Bautista (2-2, 3.61 ERA)
Kisho Saito (3-2, 4.19 ERA) vs. Albert Zarate (2-3, 5.64 ERA)
Jason Turner (3-2, 3.79 ERA) vs. Doug Morrow (5-2, 2.74 ERA)

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – SS Salazar – CF Newton – C Kondo – P Donis
BOS: SS Silva – RF Quinn – LF J. Martinez – 1B Burbidge – 2B Carter – C L. Martin – 3B Elliott – CF Espinosa – P Bautista

Antonio Donis’ day started everything but good. In the first inning he dropped a throw from Wedemeyer for an error that gave the Titans their first baserunner. However, Donis quickly turned around from their, went on to pitch six innings of shutout ball with eight strikeouts, and more so went 3-3 at the plate, and drove in three runs! The Coons’ lead had initially been plated by Royce Green with a 2-run homer in the second inning, and once Donis left, we were up 7-0. The bullpen of the Titans gave up some more runs, wild-pitch-supported by reliever Pedro Cruz in the seventh, while between Padilla and Martinez the shutout went bust in the bottom 9th. 9-1 Raccoons. Wedemeyer 2-3, 2 BB, HR, RBI; Green 2-5, HR, 2 RBI; Donis 6.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 8 K, W (5-0) and 3-3, 3 RBI;

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – LF Kinnear – C Vinson – SS Ingall – CF Espinoza – P Saito
BOS: SS Silva – RF Quinn – LF J. Martinez – C L. Lopez – 3B J. Ramirez – 2B Carter – 1B Elliott – CF Espinosa – P Zarate

Our first left-handed opponent in over a week. The animal sacrifices before the game said a win for Kisho Saito was not in the liver- err, books. We quickly got to see what that meant. After both teams scored a single run in the first inning, Kisho Saito led off the bottom 3rd facing pitcher Albert Zarate, got him to 0-2, and then hit him. Daniel Silva’s grounder to second was bobbled by Brewer and everybody was safe with that error. Zarate was brought around to score, 2-1 Titans. But there was still Royce Green on the team, who didn’t believe in ancient Roman rituals. He had brought home Wedemeyer to score in the first inning, and with Wedemeyer on first base in the fourth and no outs doubled to left to put the go-ahead runs in scoring position with no outs. Kinnear zinged an 0-2 pitch down the right field line, where Bobby Quinn failed to get to it and Kinnear ended up at third base, from where Ingall would score him. Up 4-2, what does that dead sheep say now? It said “Just you wait. Bah-ah-ah.”. In the bottom 6th, still up 4-2, Saito issued back-to-back 2-out walks, bringing up Martin Carter, who shot a roaring grounder up the first base line. Oh no, Wedemeyer was never going to – GOT IT! And got to first with it! “Just you wait”. Maybe in the seventh? The Titans got a man on there, and Daniel Silva came up with two out. He won’t hit a game-tying homer, will he? Nah, he grounded out to Brewer, who made the play. “Just you wait”. Two out, nobody on in the bottom 8th, Saito walked Luis Lopez, and that was that. Ban came out to face Jose Ramirez. On a 3-2 pitch, Lopez in motion, Ramirez drilled Ban’s pitch into deep left. Uh-oh, uh-oh, uh, Kinnear after it, reaching – GOT IT!! “Just you wait”. In the top 9th, after not doing a lot for a while, Kinnear and Vinson got into scoring position with no outs. We got a run with a Higgins sac fly. Ban came up with two out and Vinson still on. I had a hunch, and wanted Ban to pitch the bottom 9th. So Ban was sent to bat, struck out, and then came out with a 5-2 lead. Ban struck out Carter. Ban struck out Elliott. Ban popped Manny Espinosa out to Brewer. 5-2 Coons! Green 2-4, 2 2B, RBI; Saito 7.2 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 6 K, W (4-2); Ban 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, SV (2);

What had the sheep to say before finally passing into the Aether? “Why you did no pitch Miller!!?? Bah-ah-ah.” And it was gone.

199!

Game 3
POR: 2B Brewer – SS Salazar – LF Kinnear – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – 3B Higgins – C Vinson – CF Espinoza – P Turner
BOS: SS Silva – CF C. Garcia – RF J. Martinez – C L. Lopez – 3B Burbidge – 1B J. Ramirez – LF Phelps – 2B Elliott – P Morrow

Both lineups were largely deprived of right-handed batters, with only three such position players fielded (Green, Ramirez, Elliott). So it came as a surprise that the only run in the first four innings was driven in by Turner himself in the second inning. Up 1-0, everything started to go wrong in the bottom 5th. With one out, Turner threw away Morrow’s slow grounder, then added a single to Silva and then plunked Martinez with two out. Bases loaded for Luis Lopez, who led the league in OPS. Behind 1-2, Lopez lashed a grounder to right, but right to Wedemeyer for the third out. Espinoza offered some relief in the top 6th then, hitting his first home run as a Raccoon, of the 2-out, 2-run variety. The Titans loaded the bases again in the bottom 6th with Silva coming up with two out, and he grounded out to Brewer. The Raccoons, no strangers to such situations either, left them loaded in the top 7th. Turner was done after seven innings with some intense traffic. Bottom 8th, up 3-0, Burnett got one out, but walked Ramirez and Salazar made an error on Jerry Phelps’ grounder. De La Rosa came in, but surrendered two RBI singles to Manny Espinosa and Daniel Silva. Sigh. Salazar led off with a double in the top 9th and was scored with a 2-out single by Royce Green. Miller was then sent out to close this one. Martinez singled, Lopez walked, and a passed ball on Vinson moved them into scoring position. A walk to Burbidge ended Miller’s closing career. Otero came in, but this was already ****ed up. Ramirez hit a sac fly to deep center, and then Phelps doubled to left to tie the game. Elliott popped out, which had the Titans throw in Bobby Quinn as the pinch hitter. He grounded out to Wedemeyer, and we went into extra innings. Martinez had to come out for the bottom 10th, so we had about lost before he threw the first pitch. But for two innings, Martinez surrendered only catchable contact, and then Jesus Colón walked the first two Coons in the top 12th. Vinson struck out, Espinoza flew out, and Ingall, hitting for Martinez, struck out. Padilla came in and got through the 12th, and then Brewer, 0-6 on the day, led off the 13th with a double. Our offense had enough spasms left to score Brewer with a Wedemeyer sac fly. Padilla remained in the game. He walked two, then allowed a single to PH Laurent Martin. He was gassed, but there was no one left we could use. It would end with the Jerry Phelps AB. Phelps overeagerly reached after Padilla’s 2-0 pitch and grounded it back to the pitcher, who threw to first in time. 5-4 Critters. Salazar 2-4, 3 BB, 2 2B; Kinnear 3-7, 2B; O’Morrissey (PH) 1-1; Turner 7.0 IP, 6 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 3 K; Martinez 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 0 K; Padilla 2.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 0 K, W (1-0);

Andres Otero faced four batters and threw only four pitches. Way to fool the competition. Oh my god, I am surrounded by imbeciles!

The sheep was right, by the way.

Complaints and stuff

What happens when you have a crap day and just want to go home and have some good time with your cuddly furballs? You get a 2-inch diameter pike rammed right into your heart.

Jose Rivera was called up to make a spot start in Miguel Lopez’ slot (maybe two) while we were trying to find a washed-up veteran on the free agent market. With no money to spend of course. Rivera pitched for us two years ago, managing an 0-5 record with a 6.26 ERA in six starts. Yep, right, that is our depth as far as starting pitching is concerned.

We were able to quickly sign 35-yr old Venezuelan Jose Gálvez off the free agent market. 59-76 with a 4.60 ERA in his big league career, he accepted a minor league contract and was assigned to AAA to get warmed up. Gálvez is what you pick off the street when you really have a gaping, blood-spurting hole to fill.

CAN’T ANYBODY PULL OUT THAT PIKE!!??

[blazertaz13]

At least you are still killing it in the standings. My sad sack team has started the season 0-7 and invent new ways to try and keep me from being a happy after a game (I was referring to an actual win).

I feel your pain, but ........

Doing what I can to help pull that spike out.

Taz

[Westheim]

Raccoons (24-12) @ Crusaders (13-24) – May 14-16, 1996

The Crusaders were not scoring runs at all, ranking 11th in the CL in both batting average and runs scored. They were about average on the pitching side, but if you are not even scoring four runs a game, that will not be enough to carry you. One of their best hitters, Pat Jenkins, was still on the DL, but would be clear to return in time for game 2.

Projected matchups:
Jose Rivera (0-0) vs. David Ramirez (2-4, 4.19 ERA)
Scott Wade (3-2, 3.02 ERA) vs. Anibal Sandoval (4-3, 3.73 ERA)
Antonio Donis (5-0, 3.79 ERA) vs. Francisco Garza (1-5, 4.39 ERA)

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – C Vinson – RF Green – LF Kinnear – 1B Ingall – SS Salazar – CF Newton – P J. Rivera
NYC: 3B Wilson – 2B Corona – LF A. Johnson – C Melendez – CF C. Clark – 1B Rigg – RF Latham – SS Lammond – P D. Ramirez

Hitting came about at a much reduced pace in the opener, despite a pitcher with a career ERA over six and David Ramirez on a terrible start to a season in it. A Brewer triple to lead off the top 3rd led to the only run through five innings. Ed Rigg then crashed Rivera’s start with a 2-out, 3-run double in the bottom 6th that got the Crusaders ahead. Rivera was removed in the seventh. Brewer then led off the top 8th with a single, and went to third on a hit-and-run as O-Mo singled to left. Nobody out, Vinson hit a sac fly that a) tied the game, b) took the steam out of the inning. We could not get anything going, the game went to extra innings, and with two out in the top 10th Vinson hit a double that he tried to stretch and was out at third by a country mile. And the Crusaders had Ramón Corona get on to lead off the bottom 10th with a bloop into shallow left. With one out, Corona went to steal second, and Vinson’s throw went into the outfield. Corona went to third and Ruben Melendez walked off his team with a sac fly. 3-2 Crusaders. Brewer 2-4, 3B; Green 3-4; Rivera 6.2 IP, 7 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 5 K;

Decent start by Rivera. He should get another one. Nori Kondo would catch Wade in the middle game for no special reason. David Vinson left the park with a black eye for no special reason.

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – SS Salazar – CF J. Martin – C Kondo – P Wade
NYC: 3B Wilson – CF C. Clark – RF A. Johnson – LF P. Jenkins – C Melendez – SS R. Rodriguez – 1B M. Williams – 2B Lammond – P Sandoval

Wade had a shoddy first and fell 1-0 behind while the Coons did not manage a hit through three innings against Sandoval, then led off the fourth, starting with O-Mo, with four straight hits, but only got two runs out of it when Jeff Martin popped out and Kondo hit into a double play. Mark Williams re-tied the game in the bottom 4th with a home run, then drove in the go-ahead run off Wade in the sixth. Wade did not get out of there, allowing two runs and loading the bags. Burnett came in and got Clement Clark with a grounder to first to end the game with a 4-2 deficit. Padilla surrendered another run in the seventh on his own throwing error, and while the Raccoons got another run, but left the bases loaded, with PH Ingall (for Martin) grounding out to second. Nothing came about with the offense for the second day in a row. 5-3 Crusaders. O’Morrissey 3-3, BB, 2B; Wedemeyer 2-4, RBI;

Game 3
POR: LF Kinnear – SS Salazar – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – 2B Ingall – CF Espinoza – P Donis
NYC: 1B M. Williams – 3B Rigg – LF P. Jenkins – C Melendez – SS R. Rodriguez – CF Cobb – RF C. Clark – 2B Lammond – P F. Garza

Vern Kinnear hit a leadoff homer, but Donis was getting butchered from the start, had the game tied in the bottom 1st, and Ed Rigg homered the Crusaders into the lead in the bottom 3rd. We were down 4-1 after four, lost Vern Kinnear to injury, Donis was knocked out in the fifth with the bases loaded, and when the Raccoons managed to get two on in the sixth, they managed to get out of that scoring chance rather quickly. Down 4-2 after seven, Salazar singled to lead off the top 8th. O’Morrissey got him forced out with a grounder, but then Wedemeyer walked, putting Royce Green into a position where with one big - … double play he ended the inning. Bottom 8th, Miller in his second inning, he had two out, then plunked Larry Wilson. Williams grounded to Ingall, who made a horrible throw into the stands. Then Miller hit Johnson. Pat Jenkins had a chance to hit the most miserable grand slam in history, but whiffed. The Raccoons still went down. 4-2 Crusaders. Kinnear 1-2, HR, RBI; Green 2-3, BB, RBI; Otero 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 0 K; Miller 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 3 K;

I am raging.

Jeff Martin, who had batted 1-12 in his time here, was waived and designated for assignment as we made room for Neil Reece to come off the DL. Also, Vern Kinnear’s injury turned out to be a mild ankle sprain. He was listed as DTD over the weekend at least, but might be available to pinch-hit here and there.

Raccoons (24-15) vs. Knights (21-19) – May 17-19, 1996

The Knights were holding on despite an offense that was merely above average, and a pitching staff that ranked consistently in the bottom half of the league, but we would not face any pushovers in this game.

Projected matchups:
Kisho Saito (4-2, 3.73 ERA) vs. Carlos Asquabal (4-5, 3.56 ERA)
Jason Turner (3-2, 3.20 ERA) vs. Pat Cherry (3-1, 3.59 ERA)
Jose Rivera (0-0, 2.70 ERA) vs. Jim Harrington (4-3, 3.64 ERA)

This was the first game that Kisho Saito would be on the cusp of knocking over the big two-oh-oh. I would very much love it if it would not take a second such game. He faced 221-game winner Carlos Asquabal, who had played his whole career in Atlanta.

ATL: LF F. Gonzalez – SS Utting – 3B Nicks – 1B Tinker – 2B M. Guzman – CF G. Hall – RF M. Smith – C J. Johnson – P Asquabal
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – SS Higgins – LF Espinoza – P Saito

The Coons missed a chance in the first inning, then had Saito, Brewer, and O-Mo all single to start the bottom 3rd. Bases loaded, no out. The three runners were scored with a Reece sac fly, a Wedemeyer double, and a Green groundout. Saito up 3-0, now it is his one to lose. Saito was pitching an odd game in that he lacked control, and found himself into a chain of 3-2 counts. But he did not surrender a hit through four, five, six innings. The Knights had only eight outs left when Bill Tinker singled right over the second base bag into center in the seventh. Guzman tripled him in instantly as Saito ran out of steam, but he struck out Gerald Hall and got Smith out to end the inning. Asquabal gave the run back in the bottom 7th with a wild pitch that scored O-Mo. De La Rosa replaced Saito in the eighth, sat down the side in order, and the Raccoons tacked on two runs in the bottom 8th, when with Higgins at third and one out, Salazar hit for De La Rosa, knocked a triple, and after Brewer was intentionally walked, O-Mo brought in Salazar with a single. Martinez finished the game in the ninth, despite putting two on with two out. 6-1 Raccoons! Brewer 2-4, BB; O’Morrissey 4-5, RBI; Vinson 2-4, 2 2B; Higgins 2-4, 2B; Salazar (PH) 1-1, 3B, RBI; Saito 7.0 IP, 2 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K, W (5-2) and 1-3;

SAITOOOOOO!!!! We all had some uncooked fish and swordfights that night. No important players were harmed in the fracas.

Also, David Brewer is carrying a 12-game hitting streak.

Game 2
ATL: 3B Nicks – C F. Ramirez – CF J. Gonzalez – RF Hatch – SS Tanaka – 1B M. Guzman – LF Utting – 2B J. Rojas – P Cherry
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – LF Newton – SS Salazar – C Vinson – P Turner

Turner struck out four in a row between the third and the fourth, and was un-hit against that far, but then issued a walk and two singles, but Reece hammered out the runner at home. But for Turner, it was rapidly coming apart, as in the fifth of the scoreless game, despite Luke Newton getting another out at home, the Knights squeezed in the first run of the contest. The Knights AGAIN hit three singles off Turner in the sixth inning. As Utting singled, Hollis Hatch made for home from second, and Reece brought the ball home – OUT AT THE PLATE!! But as thrilling as three outfield assists at home plate (in consecutive innings!) were, the Raccoons were 1-hit by Pat Cherry. The game went out of the window in the seventh for good. Jose Rojas walked to start it, and Vinson threw away Cherry’s bunt, putting runners in scoring position with no outs. Both runners scored as Burnett had terrible trouble cleaning up and Miller had to dig Burnett out with the bases loaded. Cherry remained in for the ninth, where Neil Reece led off with a double. Wedemeyer singled, which brought the tying run to the plate in Royce Green. Cherry remained in. Green grounded out to short, and the Knights neither turned the double play, nor did they keep Reece from scoring, but Newton and Salazar made the final outs against Enrico Gonzalez quickly. 3-1 Knights. Reece 2-4, 2B; Miller 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K;

We are still not shut out this season, but we’re getting closer. The offense is not clicking at all now and we have lost four of our last five. Brewer’s streak, now that it has been mentioned, ended here.

Game 3
ATL: 3B Nicks – C F. Ramirez – CF J. Gonzalez – SS Tanaka – 1B M. Guzman – LF Utting – RF F. Gonzalez – 2B J. Rojas – P Harrington
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Reece – RF Green – C Vinson – 1B Higgins – SS Salazar – LF Newton – P J. Rivera

The Raccoons 3-spotted Harrington in the first with run-scoring doubles by Vinson and Higgins with two out. About two out, it is treacherous. Rivera had two out and nobody on in the top 3rd, and still managed to give up a 3-run homer to Sosa Tanaka in the inning. Tied again, Rivera was laboring hard, but put up two more scoreless. The Coons loaded the bags with one out in the bottom 5th, and Vinson was up. He had had a big hit to score a pair in the first, and he came through again, a single to right, on which Neil Reece, starting from second base, made for home, and Freddy Gonzalez’ throw was late, while everybody moved up a base. So, two in, two in scoring position, still one out, Higgins got in one more run with a groundout, and we were up 6-3. Rivera went six, Martinez pitched around a Higgins error in the seventh, and we got an unearned tack-on run in the bottom of that inning. When Padilla put two on in the eighth, we broke out Tzu-jao Ban, our new designated closer. He struck out Jose Rojas to escape the eighth, but surrendered a homer to Hollis Hatch in the ninth. He still put the game away. 7-4 Coons. Vinson 2-4, 2B, 4 RBI;

In other news

May 15 – The division-leading Capitals trade a key piece of their early-90s dynasty, sending OF Dale Cleveland (.303, 3 HR, 15 RBI) and a minor prospect to the Condors for CL Jose Valentin (2-0, 0.95 ERA, 13 SV).
May 19 – 36-yr old BOS SP Francisco Vidrio (4-4, 5.89 ERA) spins a 3-hitter as the Titans shut out the Aces, 3-0.

Complaints and stuff

Most of the guys whose contracts expire have contacted me by now that they want to stay. Who also messaged me? Jeff Martin, on the morning of the first game in New York. Honestly!? You’ve been here a week, you’re hitting a hundred, and you wanna talk millions??? ARE YOU CRAZY??? Nobody claimed him off waivers and he was re-assigned to St. Petersburg.

And once you looked past Kisho’s 200th win, this week had a terrible stench to it, so we will skip discussion of the shortcomings right away and go to a few numbers of Raccoons pitchers over the years (almost 20 now!)

Naming the top 5 pitchers in W’s for the Raccoons may not be a difficult exercise apart from the exact order. This is it: Kisho Saito (151), Scott Wade (138), Logan Evans (124), Christopher Powell (104), and Jason Turner (98); No other pitcher has won more than 50 games with our team! To be *exact*, sixth place on the list is held by a reliever, with 49. It is not Grant West (he is 9th with 43, behind Miguel Lopez and Robert Vázquez).

It’s old Wally Gaston! And would you know that Gaston is also second on the all-time saves list for the Coons? He had 94 to Grant West’s 522. And Ben Green, that horrible closer we had in the inaugural season, who got booted so quickly and only saved nine games? He is still tenth on the list! Grant West just never let anybody close games. Ah, Grant West. (sighs)

By the way, long-retired Jorge Romero completes the top 10 with 40 wins, and he left in 1982. The top 5 listed above never were together as one rotation, because Powell retired before Turner debuted. Powell and Evans were joined by Saito (mid-1984) and Wade (late in 1985), before Powell hung up the cleats (after 1986), and Turner didn’t make his debut until 1988. Evans left in 1989, but the other three are still together here.

But for how long? Turner’s contract is up this fall.

“Old Chris” Powell has been retired for TEN years? Really? He was here like forever! Time is flying past. It makes you feel small. All those kids that weren’t even born when the Raccoons played their first game (a 5-4 win over the Crusaders, won on Pedro Sánz’ 3-run shot), are going to college now. In their lives, the Furballs have always been there.

We better close this one before I start to cry.

[edtheguy]

SAITO!! The way 1995 ended for him I was beginning to wonder if we would see any more good seasons from Kisho (starting pitchers near the age of 35 make me twitch nervously...). I'm happy to see that in 1996 (so far) he has been the old (I mean young) Saito again!

[Orcin]

Well, if we are going to get sentimental and start crying anyway, I just want to say that it has been two years now since I made post #4 in this thread. The Fur Balls saga has broken into the Top 25 in all-time number of views on the dynasty forum. Well done!

[Westheim]

Originally Posted by edtheguy

SAITO!! The way 1995 ended for him I was beginning to wonder if we would see any more good seasons from Kisho (starting pitchers near the age of 35 make me twitch nervously...). I'm happy to see that in 1996 (so far) he has been the old (I mean young) Saito again!

Well, no. He is in fact getting old. His WHIP is 15 points higher than it was seven to eight years ago (about 1.20 compared to between 1.04 to 1.06 in his best seasons). The walks are up slightly, but mostly he has become more hittable due to losing the late movement on his fastball. It's not more home runs (he has given up only three so far this year), but more singles, which will also mount to many runs at some point. An example of this occurred in this update.

Mainly he is 5-2 because of the excellent run support he got so far (5.5 R/G), which makes up for the run support he lacked the last few years.

He is under contract through 1998. We will see how far it will take him.

Originally Posted by Orcin

Well, if we are going to get sentimental and start crying anyway, I just want to say that it has been two years now since I made post #4 in this thread. The Fur Balls saga has broken into the Top 25 in all-time number of views on the dynasty forum. Well done!

I wonder how many of those views are by me - whenever I am bored in the office I like to take a look at my roster.

But well, thank you, and the other guys who come in here now and then for a little pep talk when I am having my moods.

---

There were three more series against teams from the CL South on our platter, and to be exact these were the three westernmost division members, all of whom had winning records at this point. So let’s hop down the coast and see where this goes.

Raccoons (26-16) @ Bayhawks (23-22) – May 21-23, 1996

The Bayhawks had issues with their rotation, which ranked 11th in the CL, and their 217 runs surrendered were equally bad. The offense was about average, but the Raccoons’ offense had slowed down recently and we weren’t scoring seven runs a game anymore (still over five per game on the season, though). The really bad news were that we weren’t exactly facing any pushovers on the mound in this series…

Projected matchups:
Scott Wade (3-3, 3.38 ERA) vs. Charles Bywaters (6-1, 3.54 ERA)
Antonio Donis (5-1, 4.24 ERA) vs. Jorge Chapa (2-2, 3.73 ERA)
Kisho Saito (5-2, 3.43 ERA) vs. Ricardo Sanchez (6-2, 2.11 ERA)

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – SS Salazar – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – LF Kinnear – 3B Higgins – P Wade
SFB: 2B J. Gomez – 3B P. Hernandez – 1B Dean – RF P. Perez – LF J. Thompson – CF A. Marquez – SS Powys – C J. Ortíz – P Bywaters

The Raccoons’ first hit was a 3-run triple by David Vinson in the first after Bywaters had walked three batters. Neither pitcher was very good in this start and both needed over 100 pitches through five innings, after which the Raccoons were up 6-3, and were playing minus Liam Wedemeyer, who had been ejected for arguing balls and strikes (mainly strikes). Wade was removed after 5.1 innings with a runner on third, who was held on by Andres Otero. Burnett and Martinez advanced the game to the ninth with no scoring in the meantime. Tzu-jao Ban faced the 2-3-4 batters, with the latter two being the first of four consecutive left-handers. Ban removed Hernandez and Dean in full counts, before Pedro Perez singled, but Jim Thompson popped out to short. 6-3 Raccoons. Reece 2-4, BB, 2B; Green 1-2, 2 BB, 2B, RBI; Vinson 3-4, 3B, 2 2B, 4 RBI;

David Vinson was really the player of this game. He has been much chastised for many things in recent years, but he is extremely hot at this point. He is fourth in OPS in the league at this point (with Green 2nd and Kinnear 5th), and he is controlling the stealing game this year, going 11/27 so far, and he threw out both runners that attempted to take second base in this game.

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – LF Kinnear – SS Ingall – P Donis
SFB: RF S. Adams – C J. Ortíz – 3B P. Hernandez – LF P. Perez – SS Powys – 2B J. Gomez – CF J. Thompson – 1B Chen – P Chapa

No pitching, all offense again in this game. The Raccoons stormed out to a 3-0 lead again in the first inning, with Wedemeyer going deep for the first two runs. Both teams scored two in the second, and two in the fourth, as Chapa was knocked out early, and Donis barely managed to limp through five. Donis was wild, wilder, the wildest thing around in this game, walking four and going to at least two balls on almost everybody. We needed two innings from somebody here, and De La Rosa was destined for these things. Jim Thompson homered off him in the sixth, but he got to two out in the bottom 7th, up by two, with a runner on third, and Pedro Perez batting. No, he was put on intentionally and De La Rosa went after Powys, whom he struck out. Both Miller and Ban pitched perfect innings after that. 7-5 Raccoons. Brewer 4-4, BB, 2B; Reece 2-5, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; Wedemeyer 2-5, HR, 3 RBI; Kinnear 3-4, BB, 2B, RBI; Ingall 2-4, BB; De La Rosa 2.0 IP, 1 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 2 K;

Liam Wedemeyer is the third player to double-digit home runs this season, after the Bayhawks’ Pedro Perez (why would I have walked him intentionally unless I was scared?) with 11, and Rául Vázquez, the Rebel, with 14.

But what is it with OUR stealing? Brewer was thrown out twice in this game by Jose Ortíz, and that brought us down to 16/29 for the year. I am really not having the boys steal a lot, but this is just abysmal!

Game 3
POR: 2B Brewer – SS Salazar – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – C Kondo – P Saito
SFB: RF S. Adams – C J. Ortíz – 3B P. Hernandez – LF P. Perez – CF A. Marquez – SS Powys – 2B J. Gomez – 1B Chen – P R. Sanchez

That was a tough nut to crack. Ricardo Sanchez had been lights out all year, but Neil Reece touched him with a 2-run home run, a line drive basically, to left in the first inning. This however preceded Kisho Saito taking a timber beam square to the face in the bottom 1st, where Pedro Perez drove in a run, and then Powys drilled a 3-run homer with two outs. Saito however did something else well, besides recollecting himself fairly well after that. He had hits in his first two AB’s against Sanchez, with the latter scoring a run with two out in the fourth. It also moved Nori Kondo, who had been walked intentionally, to third, but Brewer grounded out. Saito found himself at the plate again in the sixth, down 4-3, with the bags full and one out, and we COULD not hit for him with the bullpen going four innings the last two days. He grounded out, but this time Brewer came through with a single, and Salazar also singled, turning that game around in the Coons’ favor. Reece struck out to end that inning up 5-4. After Saito struck out the side in the bottom 6th, he again came to bat with the sacks full in the seventh, by now against the bullpen, but with two out. Go bat, son. He flew out, and maybe that was my fatal mistake in the game, but for now Saito sat down the Bayhawks in order, punching out two more for five consecutive K’s (10 in total in the game), to end his day’s work. We were playing for one insurance run in the top 8th when Brewer singled to lead off. Salazar bunted him to second, and then Reece singled him in. Wedemeyer hadn’t read the script about the one run and homered to dead center! The Bayhawks’ bullpen became rapidly unhinged at this point. Gary Nixon was thrown in to get out of the inning, but the Raccoons would not stop hitting, and also got the benefit of doubt with a critical error by Pedro Hernandez in the inning. A full dozen Coons came to the plate, and we plated six runs in the eighth. Padilla pitched two wild innings to put the game away. 11-4 Raccoons! Brewer 3-6, 2 RBI; Salazar 3-5, 2 RBI; Reece 2-5, BB, HR, 3 RBI; Green 2-6, 2B; Kinnear 3-4, BB, 2B; Kondo 2-3, 2 BB, RBI; Saito 7.0 IP, 5 H, 4 R, 4 ER, 2 BB, 10 K, W (6-2) and 2-4, 2B, RBI; Padilla 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 3 K;

Win! Sweep! Kisho! Everything tastes like sugar!

I would not normally list a guy to surrender four runs in the merits report after the game, but how hard Saito was rocked in the first, and how amazing he was the next six frames (2 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 9 K in those), he deserved it. We will call Mike Powys’ 3-piece a nasty aberration and pretend it wasn’t so. Also, #201! Is it worth the bother to count up to #250?

Raccoons (29-16) vs. Condors (28-19) – May 24-26, 1996

With the last win we moved back into a virtual tie for first with the Loggers, and now faced the division-leading Condors at home. They had surrendered the least runs in the CL, just 165 of those, so you better trusted your own pitching against the #4 offense in the league.

Projected matchups:
Jason Turner (3-3, 2.98 ERA) vs. Woody Roberts (4-2, 2.51 ERA)
Jose Rivera (1-0, 3.55 ERA) vs. Harry Griggs (7-2, 2.96 ERA)
Scott Wade (4-3, 3.53 ERA) vs. Sergio Gonzalez (2-6, 4.03 ERA)

There were so six right-handers scheduled to pitch in this series!

Game 1
TIJ: LF Cleveland – RF E. Garza – 2B Boyle – CF O’Day – 3B J. Garcia – C Manuel – 1B Morales – SS Liang – P Roberts
POR: LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – 2B Higgins – SS Salazar – P Turner

There was not a lot of offense going on in the game early on. The Coons got a run in the second, but Turner gave it back in the third when the Condors put on three batters with two outs in the inning, and Cleveland came in to score. There was no major scoring chance until the bottom 6th. With one out, Neil Reece extended a 10-game hitting streak with a bloop into shallow right and advanced to third on a Wedemeyer single. The Green was hit by Woody Roberts, and Vinson came up with the bags full. Vinson was patient and walked to give Turner a new lead, and Higgins hit a sac fly, but when Salazar popped out, we had not gotten a hit with the bases loaded again. And with two out in the seventh, it fell apart for Turner again. He surrendered back-to-back RBI doubles to PH Paul Theobald and Dale Cleveland, then was yanked. Burnett came in and retired Garza to hold the game tied. We got Ingall (in the #9 hole) and Kinnear on in the bottom 7th, and with one out, Reece doubled to center to give the Raccoons their third lead of the day. All this was against the right-hander Daniel Perez, who was not removed when Wedemeyer stepped in, neither did they walk him to create a double play opportunity. Wedemeyer brought out his bat that read “divine punishment” and zinged a 2-run double into the corner in left. Burnett hit and hurt Bruce Boyle in the top 8th, but the Condors did not score, but Tzu-jao Ban was whacked in the ninth. He put the leadoff man Morales on, then alternated strikeouts and doubles past Alejandro Espinoza in right field for four batters. The Condors had the tying run on when Dani Rivas grounded out to first to end the game. 6-5 Raccoons. Reece 2-4, BB, 2B, RBI; Wedemeyer 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI;

That’s five wins in a row, and some nail biters among them!

Game 2
TIJ: LF Cleveland – 1B Morales – CF O’Day – 3B J. Garcia – C Manuel – RF Givens – 2B Rivas – SS Liang – P Griggs
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – C Vinson – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Newton – SS Salazar – P J. Rivera

Liam Wedemeyer was hot and made sure everybody knew it, smashing a 3-run homer in the first inning, in which the Coons batted through the order, but left the bags full. The Condors did not get a hit until the third, a double by Chun-mei Liang, but the Condors left him on third base. After that, Harry Griggs switched into “lights out” mode and the Raccoons didn’t progress past second base, so Jose Rivera was very much on his own. And while he did not strike out anybody until the seventh inning, then he was still pitching a 3-hitter! Griggs shoveled himself into a deeper hole then in the bottom 7th. Kinnear was on first with two down. Pitching to Wedemeyer, Griggs threw a wild pitch, and when Wedemeyer then singled to left, Kinnear was waved around third despite Dale Cleveland having one of the best arms in the league, and Kinnear came in and was SAFE!! Rivera, tossing a 4-hitter on 100 pitches through eight, was left to bat for himself in the bottom 8th, struck out for the third time, then went back out to the mound, up by four. De La Rosa was getting ready, just in case. But Rivera didn’t need him. He struck out Jose Morales to start the frame, then got fly balls more or less right to Kinnear and Newton, respectively. 4-0 Furballs!! Wedemeyer 2-4, HR, 4 RBI; Newton 3-4; Rivera 9.0 IP, 4 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, W (2-0);

Of course this is the first career shutout (and second career win) for Jose Rivera. He is certainly making a case for keeping Miguel Lopez’ slot in the rotation for the remainder of the season, although the veteran we hired, Jose Gálvez, is not that horrible in St. Petersburg. We will keep watching this one.

All our positional starters had at least one hit in the game, and the starting nine finished, which is always nice.

Game 3
TIJ: LF Cleveland – 1B Morales – 2B Boyle – CF O’Day – 3B J. Garcia – C Manuel – RF Theobald – SS Liang – P S. Gonzalez
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – 3B O’Morrissey – SS Salazar – P Wade

Two fantastic offensive lineups met, and a pitchers’ duel broke out! Gonzalez and Wade *literally* gave up nothing through five innings, no team even getting to third base. Gonzalez then led off the top 6th and doubled past Royce Green in right, but went to third, and Green laser beamed him out there. Wade had a 3-hitter going after eight, while Sergio Gonzalez allowed only two hits through seven innings, but also walked a bunch and was taken out. Wade offered his first walk in the ninth to Gilberto Flores with one out. Flores stole second, and Wade walked Boyle, which got him out for Ken Burnett to face Preston O’Day. Burnett’s first pitch was popped up for Brewer to catch, and we were as good as out of the inning. Jesus Garcia then slapped a hard grounder off Burnett – but right to Salazar. Now we had a chance to walk off. Roberto Carrillo, former Raccoon, came in, and had Wedemeyer reach on an error. Wedemeyer tried to steal, but couldn’t get a good jump while Royce Green was batting, and when Green finally made contact, he didn’t need to run, but could trudge home slowly. Green had pulverized Carrillo’s 0-1 offering way out of left field – WALK OFF HOME RUN ROYCE GREEN!!! 2-0 Furballs! Green 1-4, HR, 2 RBI; Wade 8.1 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 3 K;

We had three hits all day, and unfortunately Wade was not rewarded for his great outing. These pesky Condors, all of a sudden they laid off pitches! Nevertheless, we are at SEVEN in a row!

Raccoons (32-16) vs. Aces (27-22) – May 27-29, 1996

The Aces had come to within half a game of the CL South lead as we had swept the Condors. They had a well-rounded team, ranking in the upper half in the CL in most categories, and their rotation was ranked 2nd in ERA. This time however, we would miss the two best pitchers in the rotation, 8-2 Carlos Guillén and 5-3 Rafael Espinoza, both with ERA’s in the 2’s.

Projected matchups:
Antonio Donis (6-1, 4.57 ERA) vs. Ben Carlson (4-4, 3.98 ERA)
Kisho Saito (6-2, 3.62 ERA) vs. Raimundo Beato (1-5, 6.52 ERA)
Jason Turner (3-3, 3.10 ERA) vs. Jou Hara (4-5, 3.94 ERA)

Three more righties from the opposition. Sad to see “Pooky” get hosed this way, I liked him (most of the time) when he was on our staff.

Game 1
LVA: 2B M. Gomez – LF Quintela – CF J. Vargas – RF Mashiba – C Cardenas – 3B Waller – SS R. Gutierrez – 1B Duenas – P Carlson
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – CF Newton – SS Salazar – P Donis

Donis reached his 50th strikeout on the year (in 46.1 IP!) in the first inning, fanning two, with a drilled batter in between. Vinson was brushed in the bottom 2nd, but we did not see any intention there. There was precious little offense again early on, but the Raccoons loaded them up in the bottom 4th with one out and Salazar up. Salazar worked a walk, the third in the inning, to push in the first run of the game. Donis scored another run with a groundout, giving himself a 2-0 lead, and Royce Green drove in a run in the fifth. Donis hit another batter in the sixth, and then issued his first walk of the day, but got out of it without any more unhealthy wildness. Still, Donis was totally gassed after seven innings and the bullpen took over, De La Rosa pitching around an error by O’Morrissey in the eighth, and then Ban came out for the ninth. Ban got mildly pressured when with two out Miguel Cardenas squeezed a grounder through Salazar for a single, but ended the game in due time. 3-0 Critters!! Donis 7.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 8 K, W (7-1);

We have not been scored on for TWENTY-SEVEN innings!! Of course, Saito is coming up, and the big inning has loved him recently, but three consecutive shutouts!! Wow!!

Of course, we had only four hits in this game. I am concerned, but I will not throw tantrums as long as the opposition does not pummel our pitchers.

Game 2
LVA: 2B M. Gomez – LF Quintela – CF J. Vargas – RF Mashiba – C Cardenas – 3B Waller – SS R. Gutierrez – 1B Duenas – P Beato
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – 3B Ingall – SS Salazar – C Kondo – P Saito

An error by Manuel Gomez prolonged the first inning long enough for the Raccoons to score a pair of unearned runs for Saito, who started the game off very sharp, in contrast to Beato. The Raccoons loaded the bags with no outs against “Pooky” in the bottom 3rd, with Ingall to the plate. Beato did not make it out of the inning. Ingall singled home a pair, Kondo drove in a run, as did Brewer, and with two out, Beato walked Reece to ramp the score to 7-0. Jose Sotelo got Wedemeyer to ground out to short to escape the nightmare. Saito had all he needed to cruise the rest of the way. The Coons kept adding, with a 3-run fifth, during which Brewer jumped up to 4-4 on the day, but walked when he came up in the sixth, reducing the chances for a 6-6 day to almost zero. Saito obliterated the opposition for seven innings, but then suddenly the Aces hit three singles to start the top 8th. There was no way out of there without a run scoring. Unfortunately, all three runs scored, soiling Saito’s line and ending our consecutive scoreless innings streak at 34 frames. The game however, was not getting away anymore, we were at a streak of nine! 11-3 Furballs! Brewer 4-4, 2 BB, RBI; Reece 2-4, BB, RBI; Wedemeyer 2-5, RBI; Ingall 3-5, 2B, 3 RBI; Espinoza (PH) 1-1; Saito 8.0 IP, 6 H, 3 R, 3 ER, 0 BB, 7 K, W (7-2) and 1-4;

I am really twisted when it comes to knocking over “Pooky”. Like I said, I very much liked him on the Coons. And like I said, the big inning, with all those needle stabs of shy and soft singles, has its way with Kisho Saito recently. That should have been a shutout, but it just got away there and there was really nothing you could do about it. All those balls fell into no man’s land.

Game 3
LVA: 3B R. Gutierrez – CF J. Douglas – 1B J. Vargas – RF Mashiba – SS Duenas – LF Carter – 2B Waller – C Guerrero – P Hara
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Reece – LF Kinnear – RF Green – C Vinson – SS Salazar – 1B Ingall – P Turner

The Coons got a 1-0 lead in the second with a 2-out RBI Ingall single, and aided by a throwing error by Mario Guerrero they added a run in the third. Through four, Jason Turner faced the minimum 12 batters despite allowing a hit, but Vinson threw out the runner. Taisuke Mashiba’s leadoff double in the fifth complicated matters for Turner and the Aces brought Mashiba in, but in the same inning, Vinson threw out another runner. Turner, who had not struck out anybody through five, started to come apart in the sixth, where Guerrero reached with a single to lead off. Hara then bunted, Turner tried to get Guerrero, but everybody was safe. With one out, the bases were loaded, and the 2-1 lead in active danger. Javier Vargas then popped to short, which put the focus on Mashiba. Now, if Ken Burnett wasn’t issuing so many walks, he would come in here, but a walk blows the lead, so we stayed with Turner. Mashiba fouled out to O-Mo, and the park was exhaling for the first time in five minutes, but a pair of doubles tied the game anyway in the seventh, and Turner was knocked out. De La Rosa put on Guerrero and with two out, two runners were in scoring position. Carlos Quintela hit for Robinson Gutierrez and singled up the middle. One run scored, but Reece battered out Guerrero at the plate. Still, we were behind, a strange feeling. Bottom 8th, Higgins, entered in a double switch, singled to right, and then stole second base. Brewer drew a walk against Jou Hara, putting the go-ahead run on base again, with O-Mo, Reece, and Kinnear coming. Hara walked O’Morrissey! Bases loaded, no outs! And … we didn’t get it done. Kinnear hit a sac fly, scoring Higgins, tying the game, but that was it. 3-3, Burnett was in from the last out in the eighth, and his first pitch was sent to Idaho by Raúl Duenas. Burnett didn’t retire anybody, and with errors by Vinson and Miller in the inning another run scored. The streak was going bust, right here, as Qi-zhen Geng sat us down 1-2-3 in the ninth. 5-3 Aces. Higgins (PH) 1-1;

In retrospect, why do I have Kinnear bat cleanup if Reece would be much better suited? Maybe it is just that I like to have my favorite boys in the three hole. This last sentence only fully blossoms if you imagine it being said with a cheeky grin by Emperor Nero, the burning Rome in the background.

Ha, madness, I love you!

In other news

May 21 – 22-year old NYC SP Anibal Sandoval (6-3, 3.26 ERA) narrowly misses entry into the record books, tossing a 1-hit shutout as the Crusaders beat the Knights, 3-0. Francisco Ramirez breaks up the no-hitter with a 1-out single in the bottom 9th.
May 25 – Milestone day in Topeka, as SFW CL Raúl Vargas (2-2, 1.69 ERA, 16 SV) saves a 2-1 Warriors win over the Buffaloes, notching his 300th career save.
May 25 – SAL OF Will Jackson (.312, 6 HR, 28 RBI) has come down with a sore shoulder and is expected to miss a month.

Complaints and stuff

I tried, but I can’t find much to complain about.

Our next opponent will be the Loggers, so things are tense as the calendar will flip to June.

Odd thing I realized: whenever Scott Wade pitches, I have to be careful about who is manning short and home plate, otherwise our lineup could be mistaken for a meeting of the Aryan Nation, with all-white players, and people could draw odd conclusions. Ah, the mind, it wanders. And boggles.

[Questdog]

I think you can move Jorge Salazar off the list of players we hope to retain.....

[Westheim]

No proper update today, since I did horrendous taxes for a friend of mine and I can't think anymore. Did I mention that that's also my proper job? Doing tax returns, and getting refunds in the four to five digit region for people that don't deserve it, some of them crooks, a few of them even convicted, and that most aren't even very nice to me. Did I mention that I am getting a slave's pay for that?

Did I mention that I am a bitter person because of that?

Anyway.

Originally Posted by Questdog

I think you can move Jorge Salazar off the list of players we hope to retain.....

His offense is certainly the worst it has ever been. His defense is still top, though. I think he has three errors on the year (too braindead to even launch the game right now, sorry).

Now, he has the biggest contract of those free agents-to-be. We certainly will not resign him in that $1M range. But freeing up the $900k on his salary and using it to resign O-Mo and Jason Turner ........ sounds like an idea, right? Turner would be the main priority, since I have always been a fan of quality starting pitching, and with Kisho getting old (as proven above), and Scott Wade certainly not getting any younger, either ...

Wade is also high in the order of resigning priorities, I would even say it goes Turner, then Wade, and then O'Morrissey.

Ah. Some Morrissey would be nice now. "Every day ... feels like Sun...day ..." (hums)

[Questdog]

Originally Posted by Westheim

Ah. Some Morrissey would be nice now. "Every day ... feels like Sun...day ..." (hums)

Not a Morrissey fan, but I am an O'Morrissey fan.....

[Westheim]

1996 AMATEUR DRAFT POOL

The Raccoons will have the 23rd pick in every round, plus two picks in the supplemental round, which gives us four of the first 90 picks, and I think that is more than what he have had for quite some time. Now you just need a good draft pool and some boys being overseen by all other teams. Sounds doable!

In fact, it was a rather rich draft, especially on the pitching side. While there weren’t really several future Pitchers of the Year in there, the pool held a whole group of guys that would have no problem to pitch in the big leagues for a long time, without getting abused every five days. Also, the relievers available held quite a few with closer potential.

The pool was a bit more shallow as far as hitters were concerned, with a few projected killers in there, but in total the peak of the hitters pool was a bit smaller, at least according to our scout, Vicente Guerra. We earmarked the following pitchers and players for preferred grabbing:

SP Dave Crawford (11/16/12)
SP Jeff Moore (9/18/18)
SP Randy Farley (11/15/14)
SP Cal Holbrook (13/13/12)
SP Tommy Sullivan (12/12/12)
CL Johnny Smith (20/16/14)
MR Juan Diaz (20/10/11)
MR Manuel Martinez (16/17/17)
CL Donald Sims (18/13/12)

SS/2B Kurt Metting (20/20/20)
LF/RF Will Taylor (16/20/20)
1B Brian Nichols (20/6/15)
1B Lawrence Wilson (15/15/14)
LF Lionnel Perri (13/12/13)

Metting, who hails from Germany, is also said to be a very good middle infielder. If he is real, the team that picks him could have a torture device in its lineup for a very long time. The others all somewhat suffer from questionable defense, but Metting could be that once-in-a-generation player.

We are at this point about two and a half weeks removed from the draft. We will now care about more important things, like … taking an axe to those Loggers.

[Westheim]

Raccoons (34-17) @ Loggers (33-20) – May 31-June 2, 1996

The Critters led the league in runs scored and runs allowed, while the Loggers were 3rd and 5th in the respective categories. They were struggling a bit in the rotation, which was only 6th with a 4.04 ERA, but the bullpen was better than the Coons’. We skipped Jose Rivera. Well, I was not quite sure yet, but at least we moved Wade and Donis up in the rotation, utilizing the off day we had before the series, but all intention was for using Saito in game 3, and add Rivera to the bullpen as a long man for this series, then slotting him back in for the first game against the Blue Sox next Friday. I would really dig winning this series, which would give up a 3-game lead going into a hard month of June, where we will have all of seven(!) home games.

Projected players:
Scott Wade (4-3, 3.09 ERA) vs. Davis Sims (6-4, 3.52 ERA)
Antonio Donis (7-1, 3.96 ERA) vs. Rafael Garcia (7-3, 4.10 ERA)
Kisho Saito (7-2, 3.59 ERA) vs. Tim Butler (5-4, 5.91 ERA)

Again, we will face three right-handers here unless the Loggers shake things up. Missing Martin Garcia (6-5, 2.06 ERA) in the series would be one for the Coons already.

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – 3B Higgins – SS Salazar – P Wade
MIL: CF Fletcher – 1B Evans – RF C. Ramirez – SS Grant – LF Hiwalani – 3B J. Perez – C M. Vela – 2B Chevalier – P Sims

Scott Wade struggled out of the gate with those Loggers, who crowded him good in the second inning and scored a run, driven in by Sims, but left the bases full. The Raccoons responded by taking the bat to Sims in the top 3rd, with the top 3 in the lineup getting on, and Reece’s single scoring Brewer to tie the contest. Wedemeyer walked to load the bags, and Sims scored Kinnear with a wild pitch, before Royce Green doubled in a pair, 4-1. An bad throwing error by Vinson in the third scored an unearned run, but Wade wasn’t getting things done here. After Higgins left a pair in scoring position in the top 5th, Wade came apart completely in the bottom 5th, and left in a tied game with one out and runners on the corners, a situation that Andres Otero failed to resolve to our favor. Brewer surrendered Miguel Vela on a line drive, but Otero walked Jamal Chevalier, and then Sims singled in two runs, the second time he got to the opposite pitcher on the day. After that abysmal 4-run inning, we were having Salazar and PH Newton in scoring position with one out in the top 6th, but only got one run on Kinnear’s sac fly. Martinez and Miller held the Loggers in check, but the offense would not restart. We had the top of the lineup going in the ninth against John Bennett. Or more, not going. Bennett clicked the Coons off 1-2-3. 6-5 Loggers. Kinnear 2-4, RBI; Green 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Vinson 2-4, 2B; Salazar 2-4; Newton (PH) 1-1; Martinez 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K;

Sucks to end a great month of May (18-8) with such a stinking loss.

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – C Vinson – 3B O’Morrissey – SS Salazar – P Donis
MIL: CF Fletcher – C L. Ramirez – RF C. Ramirez – LF Hiwalani – SS Grant – 2B J. Perez – 3B Rush – 1B Chevalier – P R. Garcia

With two walks sandwiching a Kinnear double, the Coons had the bases loaded with no outs in the first, and they managed to get out of there with no RBI’s, but two runs scored, as Green hit into a double play, second and first, scoring Brewer, before Garcia brought home Kinnear with a wild pitch (flashback to game 1?). One run got away again immediately from Donis, who had no stuff, but was very wild. In the bottom 2nd, the Loggers had a pair in scoring position with no outs, when Donis struck out Chevalier, but Vinson lost it, Chevalier went to first on the uncaught third strike, and Jose Perez, who had reached after being hit by a pitch, scored the tying run. Leon Ramirez would hit a 2-out, 3-run homer, and there was another ugly four on the scoreboard. Also, through two frames, the Loggers had scored five runs on four hits and no walks. The Raccoons did everything in their power NOT to come back in this game, leaving a runner on almost every inning, and sometimes on third base, scoring only once on doubles by Wedemeyer and O’Morrissey in the sixth, and they did not get anybody on base in the last three innings of total Loggers domination. 5-3 Loggers. Wedemeyer 3-4, 2B; Padilla 3.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 3 K;

After winning nine straight, we have now lost three in a row, and of course we are losing the important ones. Of course!! Now bring in Kisho-san and wait for 15 straight singles to tear him up.

Game 3
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – 3B O’Morrissey – SS Ingall – C Kondo – P Saito
MIL: CF Fletcher – C L. Ramirez – RF C. Ramirez – LF Hiwalani – SS Grant – 2B J. Perez – 3B Rush – 1B Chevalier – P Butler

Bottom 1st, up 1-0, Fletcher doubled to lead off, and moved on to third as Leon Ramirez grounded out. Cristo Ramirez grounded to Saito’s feet, and Saito threw the grounder away, scoring Fletcher and putting Ramirez on second. Then Hiwalani walked, and Grant doubled them both in. Saito then plunked Perez and we had about lost by then. Before all was over, Grant would score on an infield single by Chevalier that Ingall failed to dig out and make a play on. Down 4-1, three runs unearned, but then not quite, and **** was steaming. Saito threw a wild pitch that helped the Loggers to score a run in the second, and a horrible start for Saito ended in the fourth inning with home runs by both Ramirez and Hiwalani. 8-1 behind, Rivera was thrown in. The Raccoons had nothing going through seven innings, and then only got to Butler when he was tiring and the Loggers didn’t replace him in time. Having scored a pair and having the bases loaded with one out, Nori Kondo was sent to bat, and double-played us out of the inning in style. 8-3 Loggers. Salazar (PH) 1-1; Kinnear 2-4, BB, RBI; Rivera 4.1 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 0 K;

Lost four in a row. Smashed by 4-run innings in every game in Milwaukee. We have not heard from them in a long time, but here they are, your – much beloved – INEPTICOONS.

Raccoons (34-20) @ Indians (30-27) – June 4-6, 1996

As everything was coming apart and rapid speed, we hopped on a bus to Indianapolis. Why not help out those guys to get back into the division race against the Loggers? They couldn’t score a lick against other teams, but hey, the Inepticoons were coming to town! We were starting a string of 17 consecutive games here, and were right in the hunt to go 0-17, so let’s go, let’s jump into those rotating bats, covered in rotating spikes!

Projected matchups:
Jason Turner (3-3, 3.22 ERA) vs. Chang-se Park (4-3, 4.14 ERA)
Scott Wade (4-4, 3.53 ERA) vs. Vernon Robertson (7-4, 2.95 ERA)
Antonio Donis (7-2, 4.40 ERA) vs. Dan George (5-5, 3.36 ERA)

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – 3B Ben O’Morrissey – C Vinson – SS Salazar – P Turner
IND: CF Maguey – C Cicalina – 3B Brown – LF Maldonado – 2B Ayala – RF Sakaguchi – SS Duarte – 1B C. Boyle – P Park

After Brewer reached on a leadoff walk in the first, Kinnear hit a perfect double play ball to Angelo Duarte, who made a throw past Ayala into the outfield. Reece walked to load the bags, and although Green struck out, the Raccoons ended up digging in deep with an RBI single by Wedemeyer, and with two out a bases-loaded walk drawn by Vinson, and a 2-run double by Salazar. Jason Turner gave half those four runs right back in the bottom 1st, surrendering line drive after line drive. Now in a 4-2 game, the Raccoons settled into their recent no-offense drag, while Turner relied on defense. Salazar was the guy to throw away a double play ball in the fifth, prolonging that inning by having Maguey and Cicalina safe on the bags, but Matt Brown popped out foul and Maldonado grounded out to Brewer to have Turner dodge that bullet. He didn’t dodge the sixth, though, walking Claudio Ayala to lead off and then throwing a ball that had “game-tying homer” written all over it to Tadanobu Sakaguchi, 4-4. So, Turner failed to go six, straining the bullpen even more than it already was. Higgins and Brewer got on to lead off the top 7th and then Kinnear, Reece, and Green didn’t advance them one inch on the way to the bottom 7th. Higgins was left on second base once more in the ninth, as the Raccoons just could not score, and Luis Maldonado hit a walk-off double in the bottom 9th off Miller. 5-4 Indians. O’Morrissey 2-4; Higgins 1-1, BB; De La Rosa 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 3 K;

It continues. No hitting. Neil Reece has dropped 24 points off his average in a week. Vinson and O’Morrissey aren’t hitting anything, either. It continues.

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – LF Kinnear – RF Green – C Vinson – 1B Higgins – CF Newton – SS Ingall – P Wade
IND: CF Maguey – C Cicalina – 3B Brown – LF Maldonado – 2B Ayala – RF Sakaguchi – SS Duarte – 1B Thompson – P Robertson

Tomas Maguey got himself thrown out trying to steal third in the bottom 1st, and the Indians didn’t score despite getting a pair on with two out against Wade. They scored a run in the second, though. Vernon Robertson took a perfect game into the fifth inning before walking Vinson and surrendering a line drive single to Higgins. Luke Newton singled to left. Bases loaded, one out. Ingall lined Robertson’s first pitch just over the glove of Ayala at second for a game-tying RBI single. But Wade lifted out to shallow left, and Brewer grounded out. Wade threw a run-scoring wild pitch in the bottom of the inning, and rinse and repeat. At least Wade managed to survive the sixth, and the seventh, and the eigh- … Claudio Ayala’s 2-out home run, although it only shoved the score to 3-1, put the game away. Jim Durden came out and I burned my scorecard right away. Vinson singled and Espinoza ran for him. Higgins and Newton made outs, moving Espinoza to third. Wedemeyer hit for Ingall, and grounded out. 3-1 Indians. Wade 8.0 IP, 9 H, 3 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 6 K, L (4-5);

Nothing is working. We thus made roster moves. Pancho Padilla was demoted to St. Petersburg, and Tim Mallandain was caught up, as he as annihilating AAA batting. Nothing to say about Mallandain. You know that sucker. And then we called up 20-year old Stephen Buell from St. Petersburg, and Alejandro Espinoza was designated for assignment, which he took personally.

Buell is a former international discovery from Canada. He only plays left field competently, and bats from the right side. He can play right, too, but you won’t be happy with it, and his arm is especially weak. He was slugging .905 in St. Petersburg.

Game 3
POR: 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Higgins – CF Reece – RF Green – C Vinson – LF Buell – SS Salazar – 2B Ingall – P Donis
IND: CF Maguey – C Cicalina – 3B Brown – 1B Ayala – LF Maldonado – RF Sakaguchi – SS Duarte – 2B M. Carter – P George

Donis was surrounded by Indians early on. After Urbano Cicalina’s solo shot in the first got in the Indians ahead, they left the bags full when Donis struck out Angelo Duarte to end the frame. Stephen Buell knocked a single in his first big league AB, stole second, and was left on by the Suckers. The Raccoons had NOTHING going. NOTHING. While Donis was wild, the Indians were leaving everybody on base, but Donis was totally toast after only five innings of 5-hit, 4-walk, 1-run ball. Mallandain appeared in the bottom 6th, and a big inning broke out. He faced four batters, issued a single and two walks, and made an error on the fourth play. Otero failed to clean up and the Indians scored three runs. At 4-0, this game was far removed from those Failcoons. Yet, Dan George was Dan George, and there could always be one getting away from him. Higgins and Reece were on with one out in the eighth. Green shot a huge ball to dead center that missed the fence but fell in for an RBI double. Vinson singled up the middle to score Reece, and they were not replacing George against Buell, who countered him and thus was not hit for. Buell slapped a liner into the corner in left for an RBI double, and all of a sudden the Raccoons had come from nowhere to having the tying and the go-ahead run in scoring position with one out. Newton hit for Salazar for a right(switch)-handed bat. And while Newton flew out, he did this sufficiently deep to center to allow the slow-footed Vinson to score and tie the game. And NOW the Indians had a reliever ready, right-hander Fernando Pena. Brewer hit for Ingall in this spot, but grounded out. We needed three relievers to wiggle through the bottom 8th as both De La Rosa and Burnett put men on, and Miller got just barely out. Wedemeyer was in the #9 hole, got on to start the ninth, and was left on third, and Miller got us to overtime, and we had only Tzu-jao Ban and Nori Kondo left to throw in apart from our starting pitchers. And Kondo was not a great pinch-hitter, so when Vinson had a 1-out single and Buell walked against Jim Durden, Miller in the seven hole had to bunt them over for Brewer. Brewer failed for the second time on the day. We squeezed Daniel Miller dry as he went 3.1 innings, and both Ban and Kondo entered in a double switch before the bottom 12th. Ban struck out the first two in a perfect inning. Then, Buell led off the top 13th with a single, but never got past first. Cicalina was well advanced then after a leadoff single in the bottom 13th. Actually, all the way to home, as he was the first guy to score on Luis Maldonado’s 3-run homer. 7-4 Indians. Vinson 3-6, RBI; Buell 3-5, BB, 2B, RBI; Miller 3.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 2 K;

Seven and counting.

Raccoons (34-23) vs. Blue Sox (28-31) – June 7-9, 1996

The Blue Sox were 9th in runs scored, but 3rd in runs allowed in the Federal League, so they should have an easy time shutting out the Abysmalcoons and romp the streak to ten.

Projected matchups:
Jose Rivera (2-0, 1.73 ERA) vs. Roy Collier (0-0, 0.00 ERA)
Kisho Saito (7-3, 4.01 ERA) vs. Rafael Lopez (5-5, 4.50 ERA)
Jason Turner (3-3, 3.47 ERA) vs. Javier Cruz (3-7, 4.73 ERA)

Those were three right-handers, so there would be extra focus on our left-handed batting. What had it done recently? Nothing? Mui excellente.

Game 1
NAS: CF O. Mendoza – SS McAndrew – 2B Valdés – 3B Henry – RF Hill – 1B Granados – LF Arías – C D. Smith – P Collier
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – 3B O’Morrissey – C Vinson – SS Salazar – P J. Rivera

The sucking continued. The Raccoons didn’t get on until the third, then with Vinson and Salazar leading off. Rivera bunted them over, and Brewer popped out. Hadn’t Roy Collier thrown a wild pitch to plate Vinson, Kinnear’s fly out would have put another zero on the board. Reece singled leading off the fourth, then went to second on Duane Smith’s errant pickoff throw after Collier threw the 3-2 pitch to Wedemeyer. Wedemeyer grounded out to second, with the error making the difference between two out, nobody on and one out, runner on third. Royce Green grounded out to Horace Henry at third base, pinning Reece there. O-Mo and Vinson then came through with two singles just past Tom McAndrew. Salazar also found the hole for an RBI double, before Collier struck out Rivera to end the frame, the Coons up 3-0. At that point, Jose Rivera was tossing a 2-hitter, but his control was on and off. Still, the defense held him in the game as he went through the fifth, the sixth and so on. Bottom 8th, the first two Coons, Reece and Wedemeyer, were on. Here, Newton hit for an 0-3 Royce Green, but Newton whiffed, and the Coons would not sore in the inning. Rivera started the ninth inning still on a 2-hitter. He struck out Mauro Valdés, and converted a comebacker from Henry, before Steve Hill hobbled a grounder around the infield that he beat out at first. It didn’t matter. Mauro Granados went down looking at a splitter. 3-0 Raccoons. Vinson 2-2, 2B; Salazar 2-3, 2B, RBI; Rivera 9.0 IP, 3 H, 0 R, 4 BB, 4 K, W (3-0);

Still poor offense, but finally some pitcher stepped up and ended this horrific 7-game spill! And it was the one I expected the least to do so, tossing his second shutout not even a month after the first. Awesome!

The Indians claimed Alejandro Espinoza off waivers after this game. Fine, enjoy your new .170 batter.

Game 2
NAS: CF O. Mendoza – LF R. Castillo – 2B Valdés – 3B Henry – 1B Granados – SS R. Martinez – RF Árias – C G. Sanchez – P R. Lopez
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Newton – C Vinson – SS Salazar – P Saito

The Furballs had runners in scoring position with no outs in the bottom 1st, and after Reece struck out, only one run scored on Wedemeyer’s groundout. It continued. Well, at least Wedemeyer got people in. He hit a 2-run homer in the bottom 3rd, the first dinger the Raccoons had produced in well over a week, to make it 3-0 in support of Saito, who had struck out the side in the third and had faced the minimum through three innings, although with a hit and a double play on the scorecard. In the bottom 4th, the Raccoons loaded the bases without a hit: Salazar walked, and Henry’s throw to first was wide and pulled Granados off when Saito bunted him over. Kinnear drew a 1-out walk. Reece grounded sharply to third base, and Henry forced Saito by stepping on third, but Reece beat the throw to first, and Salazar scored, 4-0. This time, Wedemeyer struck out. Top 5th, and Saito shoveled the bags full without allowing a hit, walking a pair and drilling Gabriel Sanchez before Rafael Lopez grounded out to first to end the inning with the shutout intact. Fast forward to the ninth, on the way to which both teams left everybody on base who happened to stumble on. Saito was pitching a 2-hitter, but faced the 3-4-5 batters. Valdés lobbed out gingerly to Newton in right, Henry popped out to Buell, who was by now in left, and Granados rolled into the final out to Brewer. 4-0 Saito’s Minions. Wedemeyer 1-4, 3 RBI; Buell (PH) 1-1; Saito 9.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 3 BB, 4 K, W (8-3);

Quite a nice rebound for being impaled for eight runs in your last start, huh? He is still the Master Kisho, our Kisho Saito. Occasionally. This was his 43rd complete game and 18th shutout in his career, and the first shutout since 1994. Also, this was his sixth career 2-hit shutout (including one *against* the Raccoons, when he was with the Canadiens). Saito has never pitched a 1-hitter (or better). Kisho also tied for the CL lead in wins with this little gem here.

So we win nine, then lose seven, and now we get back-to-back shutouts? Something’s messin’ with me.

Again, we had only six hits. In the last five games, four times we were held to six hits or less, including both shutouts.

Game 3
NAS: CF O. Mendoza – LF Árias – 2B Valdés – RF Hill – 1B Granados – SS Nielsen – 3B R. Martinez – C D. Smith – P Cruz
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Green – SS Higgins – C Kondo – P Turner

With rain in the forecast, Turner matched Saito’s first three innings of the day before in that he faced the minimum through three with a hit and a double play turned behind him. The Raccoons had not been on base until the bottom 3rd, but Higgins led off with a walk then. Turner’s bunt was taken to second base by Ramón Martinez, but Higgins was safe, and so was Turner at first. Brewer walked: one out, bases loaded. Break through now!! Kinnear worked a walk, before Cruz balked home Turner, and Reece hit a sac fly. No hit, but three runs are three runs sometimes. In fact, Cruz was pitching a no-hitter at this point, losing 3-0. In mild rain, the Blue Sox got a run off Turner in the fourth, but after batting close to zero the last week, Royce Green clobbered Cruz with a 2-run homer in the bottom of the inning. In the strangest of games, the Raccoons led 5-1 on a single hit, before hell broke loose in the top 6th. Turner loaded the bags with no outs, and Granados hit a sac fly to Reece, 5-2. Jeffrey Nielsen grounded to Higgins, and that would have and should have been a double play, but Higgins dropped the ball after picking it up and all hands were safe. Ramón Martinez grounded back to Turner who got the force at home, and then Burnett came in to face the lefty Duane Smith – and walked him, still pushing home a run, before we limped out of the inning. Orlando Mendoza in the top 7th made the cardinal error of making the first out at third base trying to stretch a double on Vern Kinnear’s left wing of death. Top 8th, up 5-3, Juan Martinez allowed a 2-out double to Ramón Martinez. Smith up again. Well, bring the other left-hander, Mallandain. Smith whacked an RBI single off Mallandain, and that was that. Ban came in and ended those shenanigans. With one out in the bottom 8th, Wedemeyer walked, and O-Mo then ACTUALLY had another ACTUAL hit, a single, but the Coons failed to score. We still got out on the upside: Ban sat down the Blue Sox 1-2-3 in the ninth. 5-4 Inepticoons. Green 1-3, BB, HR, 2 RBI; Ban 1.1 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K, SV (8);

We were actually out-hit 10-2 in this game. We drew eight walks to make up for all other shortcomings.

In other news

May 31 – Tijuana’s Harry Griggs (8-3, 2.85 ERA) spins a 3-hit shutout in a 3-0 win over the Bayhawks.
June 4 – The Titans sign off on two deals on the same day, first acquiring MR Tony Simpson (0-2, 7.27 ERA, 1 SV) from the Indians for 2B/3B Martin Carter (.242, 2 HR, 8 RBI in 99 AB) and a minor leaguer, then send LF/RF Roman Reyes (.267, 0 HR, 5 RBI in 60 AB) and a non-prospect to the Blue Sox for SP Vicente Navarro (1-4, 2.95 ERA) and another non-prospect.
June 7 – INF Raúl Duenas (.260, 4 HR, 24 RBI) is traded from the Aces to the Cyclones in exchange for INF Bob Petipas (.303, 2 HR, 21 RBI)
June 7 – LVA 1B/3B Javier Vargas (.284, 3 HR, 22 RBI) is hurt in today’s game against the Gold Sox and will miss the rest of the month with a knee sprain.
June 8 – The Thunder send SP Arnold McCray (4-9, 5.78 ERA) to the Capitals for LF/RF Tommy Norton (.297, 2 HR, 21 RBI).
June 8 – LAP SP Bastyao Caixinha (10-2, 2.73 ERA) spins a 2-hitter against the Titans. Pacifics win, 9-0.

Complaints and stuff

We’re in the horse dung here. We got doused, and we are toast. Never mind a few shutouts sprinkled into the mess. The offense has deflated alarmingly, and as I said earlier, this team relies on the long ball, and they didn’t get it apart from one shot by Wedemeyer (#13, leading the CL) in Saito’s shutout, and Green's in that last freak game. Most everybody on the team is in a slump and you will note a sharp drop between the batting stats here and the last update for about every batter.

The pitching was not THAT bad, but failed to stem against the storm.

By the way, Tim Mallandain’s ERA is not zero. He has FAILED to retire a SINGLE batter. I would trade him for a bag of baseballs, if there only was a team DUMB enough to do that!! SUCKER!!

No, I did not have fun these ten days. Not a bit. See where those Loggers are! They were two games behind us!! Come on!!

Well, they still draw walks. If the legs ain’t working, and the arms ain’t working, but the eyes are still gleaming into the darkness, horrified by the two red dots staring back at them.

[Westheim]

No proper update today, since the draft falls on Saturday in the current week, and while I played up to it, I have to go to bed at some point, since I need my sleep for another week of hell.

However, I dug out some strange, odd, but perhaps illuminating numbers here... alright, they are mostly strange ...

8 - number of consecutive seasons the Raccoons' actual record is below their expected record, which is an active streak; we are -1 this year, too.

250 - number of players that have appeared in the big leagues for the Raccoons after 19 1/2 seasons.

579 - number of runs allowed by the Raccoons in 1985, the least they ever conceded in a season, equating to 3.6 R/G; we are currently a hair above that mark, at 3.7 R/G.

789 - number of runs scored by the Raccoons in 1989 and 1992, for their high water mark; 789 equate to 4.9 R/G, and we are currently on pace for 5.3 R/G and about 850 to 860 runs for the year.

1,886 - number of most hits for the Raccoons by a single player; that player is of course Daniel Hall. In fact, Daniel Hall leads all "most of ..." categories for the Raccoons, except for ...:

213 - number of most stolen bases for the Raccoons by a single player (Matt Higgins);

.917 - highest OPS for a position player in his Raccoons career, held by Royce Green; why position player? Because ...:

2.000 - highest OPS for a player in his Raccoons career, jointly held by relievers Cesar Salcido and Emerson MacDonald, who both had a single in their only AB's with the Raccoons;

2.09 - best ERA for a pitcher in his Raccoons career with at least 100 IP, held by Gabriel De La Rosa; that's right, he's nudging out Grant West by .03 ER here;

2.78 - best ERA for a starting pitcher in his Raccoons career with at least 100 IP; no, it is not Kisho Saito, but you're close. It is Kinji Kan!

1,833 - most strikeouts by a pitcher in his Raccoons career, and THIS one is held by Kisho Saito; Kisho is the Daniel Hall of pitchers for us, holding almost all "most of ..." categories.

0.2 - total of innings pitched by position players for the Raccoons; Bobby Quinn was the unlucky hero in 1989, surrendering two runs along the way.

and ...:

11 - rank of the Raccoons' all-time record of (right now) 1,597-1,548 in comparison to all other teams, and ...

75.5 - number of games back the Raccoons are in relation to the Capitals, who have the best all-time record at 1,674-1,474.

Well, proper update tomorrow, unless I have a terrible stapling accident in the office.

[Westheim]

This upcoming week will also see the amateur draft being held on Saturday. I hate that, it chops up the current series so badly …

Raccoons (37-23) @ Stars (24-38) – June 10-12, 1996

What was going on in Dallas? While their offense was not thrilling, their pitching was abysmal. Their rotation ranked 10th in the FL, and their bullpen was just a bad excuse, racking up an ERA of almost SIX at this point. They were clearly in a boat load of trouble. They also had lost six in a row. Would the Raccoons cash in?

Projected matchups:
Scott Wade (4-5, 3.52 ERA) vs. Judd Montgomery (6-4, 4.06 ERA)
Antonio Donis (7-2, 4.19 ERA) vs. Chang-bum O (1-2, 6.75 ERA)
Jose Rivera (3-0, 1.29 ERA) vs. Manny Ramos (3-5, 4.61 ERA)

The southpaw Chang-bum O had once been very high on our list for the draft, but the Stars had snatched him away before we got to picking. That was in 1992. Who was our top pick in that amateur draft then? Luke Newton.

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Green – SS Salazar – C Vinson – P Wade
DAL: SS Lowe – CF Allison – RF Hino – 1B Woods – 3B C. Gonzalez – C James – LF Monnier – 2B E. Lopez – P Montgomery

The Raccoons made a case for grabbing the record of leaving the most players on third base in a game, doing so in the first, third, and fifth innings, not exactly supporting Scott Wade, who was overmatched by the Stars lineup. Moromao Hino homered off him in the bottom 1st, and the Stars added another run in the fourth. While the Raccoons scored one run with doubles by Vinson and Brewer in the top 5th, Brewer was one of those left on third base, getting there with one out. Top 6th, O-Mo led off with a double and went to third when Green grounded out. Salazar grounded to right – and it went through, FINALLY! Wade also settled into a rhythm in the middle innings and went seven frames, pitching around a 1-out double by Mark Ball in the seventh. Ball had replaced Enrico Lopez, who had gone down to an injury in the first inning. The Raccoons failed to generate offense, leaving Brewer on third base once more in the ninth inning, as Neil Reece went 0-5. Andres Otero put the first two batters on in the bottom 9th, but somehow the Stars groundballed themselves out of the chance to have an easy walkoff, and we went into overtime. Nothing happened for three innings, before Wedemeyer led off the top 13th with a solo home run off ex-Coon Toru Fujita. And the Japanese was about to collapse, walking the bases full. The Stars bullpen didn’t have much left, and so Fujita continued, struck out Vinson, struck out Buell, and Brewer lobbed out to center. Oh my god. Tzu-jao Ban was brought in to save the 3-2 game, struck out Hino, and got out with two groundouts to Brewer despite a walk to Cesar Gonzalez. 3-2 Raccoons. Brewer 2-6, BB, 2B, RBI; Kinnear 3-5; Wedemeyer 2-6, HR, RBI; Salazar 2-5, BB, RBI; Wade 7.0 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 3 BB, 4 K; Burnett 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 1 K; Miller 1.2 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 1 BB, 1 K, W (1-3);

Can’t remember Toru Fujita? That’s not so bad. He made one start for the Raccoons in 1989, allowing five runs (all earned) in four innings. He was a part in the deal with the Buffaloes that brought Bob Arnold to Portland for the first time in July 1990.

The home run was Wedemeyer’s 14th on the year, which has him one off the ABL-leading 15 of Raúl Vázquez of the Rebels. It was his 86th career shot, moving him to 2nd on the list of active Raccoons, past Neil Reece, who went 0-6 to continue his current horrid slump. Who leads all current Raccoons in home runs? Royce Green, with 99. GO ROYCE!!

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – LF Buell – CF Newton – SS Ingall – C Kondo – P Donis
DAL: CF D. Rodriguez – LF Allison – RF Hino – 1B Woods – C James – SS Lowe – 2B C. Gonzalez – 3B Ball – P O

GO ROYCE didn’t take long to show results, as Green hit his 100th career dinger in the first inning off Chang-bum O. It counted for two, collecting Brewer, and O was taken out in the first inning with an apparent injury. Youngster Donis dominated the Stars as long as he could, and his breath was only enough for six innings in a 3-1 game, but in those he struck out TEN, but 100 pitches were very much his ceiling. The Raccoons tacked on a pair when Wedemeyer hit a shot that, if we had played in Portland, would have gone over Mount Hood with little effort, in the top 7th, 5-1. Up 6-1 in the bottom 9th and with two left-handers coming up, I was brave enough to enter Tim Mallandain to pitch. To anybody’s surprise, he got through the inning, and even struck out the two left-handers. 6-1 Raccoons. Brewer 3-4, BB, 2 2B, RBI; Green 1-3, 2 BB, HR, 2 RBI; Wedemeyer 2-5, HR, 2 RBI; Donis 6.0 IP, 6 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 3 BB, 10 K, W (8-2) and 1-1;

Game 3
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Reece – SS Salazar – C Vinson – P J. Rivera
DAL: SS Lowe – CF Allison – RF Hino – 1B Woods – 3B C. Gonzalez – LF Monnier – C J. Gomes – 2B Ball – P Ramos

Rivera was perfect through three innings, while also bringing in the go-ahead run in the top 3rd on a double play groundout, so he was not credited with an RBI. Hino would hit a single in the fourth, breaking up any no-hit bid that might have developed in due time. Neil Reece, in the middle of a cancerous 5-41 slide, had some luck with an infield single in the top 5th which got the inning along, and David Vinson then hit a big 3-run home run. The next time Reece came up, the Stars’ Manny Ramos had just made a terrible throwing error past Mac Woods that put Wedemeyer and O’Morrissey in scoring position with two out. Neil Reece tattooed a 3-run homer of his own, 7-0!! Rivera was dominating the Stars with a 2-hit shutout through six, then suddenly was battered with back-to-back solo home runs by Moromao Hino and Mac Woods in the seventh. Rivera went into the ninth, but was brought in with a 1-out walk to Hino. Miller came in and walked PH Diego Rodriguez, and Cesar Gonzalez was safe when Salazar made a bad throw. Sakutaro Ine then grounded into a double play, game over. 10-2 Furballs. Reece 3-4, HR, 3 RBI; Vinson 3-4, 2 HR, 5 RBI; Rivera 8.1 IP, 4 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 2 BB, 5 K, W (4-0) and 1-4;

Slump over? I sure hope so for Neil Reece. Also, Vinson needs to bat higher in the order. And, after winning nine, losing seven, we have now won six again. I am puzzled. At no point have I fudged up more or less than usual with mismanagement of players.

Also, the Loggers got themselves swept in Richmond, which cut their lead from 4.5 to 1.5 games. At least other teams pull boners, too.

Free agent signing

Once again, we have a lot of outfielders down with injuries in the minors (including Jeff Martin and Joe Lacombe), and we reached out to OF Scott Strong, 32. The Thunder took the left-hander eighth overall in the 1986 draft and he debuted that same September. He was a force with an .800 OPS for his first five full major league seasons, but was lost in translations the last two years, only appearing as backup for the Capitals in 1994 and the Buffaloes in 1995. He batted .172 last season. He was assigned to AAA.

The main reason while I am diving into the outcasts pool is that Stephen Buell is a very bad backup to what we have. You can play either him OR Kinnear, but not both without taking a hit defensively. I am looking for a better backup. I would have called up Joe Lacombe, but he got hurt just in time, and now we have Strong, for whom I tried to trade once, I think, but nothing came of that.

Raccoons (40-23) vs. Crusaders (27-38) – June 13-16, 1996

Little offense, little pitching, with their rotation being of the biggest concern, ranking 11th in the CL. The Crusaders were the cellar children of the CL North for 15 years now, and they would not stop lingering down there. But remember that this is only our second series this year. How did the first 3-game set end? New York swept us.

Projected matchups:
Kisho Saito (8-3, 3.59 ERA) vs. David Ramirez (3-5, 4.06 ERA)
Jason Turner (4-3, 3.45 ERA) vs. Dan Barnes (3-5, 5.03 ERA)
Scott Wade (4-5, 3.44 ERA) vs. Anibal Sandoval (8-5, 4.17 ERA)
Antonio Donis (8-2, 3.95 ERA) vs. David Castillo (0-1, 4.42 ERA)

Those were two left-handers, then two right-handers, giving ample opportunity to rest players. Liam Wedemeyer would rest in game 1, David Brewer would sit out the second game, Royce Green the third, and Neil Reece had already sat out, as well as Kinnear. O-Mo might get a break in game 4.

Game 1
NYC: 2B Lammond – SS R. Rodriguez – C Melendez – CF Diéguez – 3B Wilson – RF P. Jenkins – LF C. Clark – 1B M. Williams – P D. Ramirez
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Green – C Vinson – CF Reece – LF Buell – SS Ingall – 1B Higgins – P Saito

The Crusaders hit four singles off Kisho Saito for two runs in the first inning, so we were reeling right away, but then came back in the bottom 1st to hit David Ramirez for five singles, and three runs! However, the Crusaders had their way with Saito, tying the game in the top 2nd, and this would not be a pretty game for any of the pitchers. Royce Green took to Ramirez with a 2-out, 2-run home run in the bottom 2nd, putting us up 5-3. For the moment, Ramirez had the more horrible day. With two out in the bottom 3rd, the Coons had a pair on, and Saito at the plate. Ramirez got him to 3-2, but then Saito made contact and rushed a single through between Larry Wilson and Raúl Rodriguez. Stephen Buell, in motion from second base, scored easily, 6-3, and Ramirez went for an early shower. Saito went through six with an 8-3 lead, but Haywood Lammond singled to start the seventh and Otero came in to replace Saito. Otero allowed Lammond to score, adding that run to Saito’s ledger, too, and we were up by four. Mallandain and Martinez both put on runners to start the top 9th, but Tzu-jao Ban came in and retired the next three batters. 8-4 Furballs. Brewer 2-4, BB, RBI; Green 3-5, HR, 2 RBI; Buell 3-4, 2 2B;

That’s nine for Kisho and seven in a row for the team. Since the Loggers were off today, we moved to within one game. That game is actually two wins the Loggers have on us, as we both tie with the Miners and Warriors for the least losses.

Game 2
NYC: 3B Wilson – SS R. Rodriguez – RF A. Johnson – LF P. Jenkins – 1B Rigg – CF Cobb – C F. Gonzales – 2B Lammond – P Barnes
POR: LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – CF Reece – C Vinson – SS Salazar – 2B Higgins – P Turner

Like the day before, the Coons were up 3-2 after the first. Steve Cobb had driven in a pair off Turner in the top 1st, but we got three runs back immediately, two driven in by Green and one by Reece. However, Jason Turner had nothing. He loaded the bags again in the top 2nd, including an error by himself, and then surrendered a 2-out grand slam to Pat Jenkins. But Dan Barnes also came apart hard, issuing three walks in a row in the bottom 3rd with Wedemeyer already on base, and Higgins then singled to left. Any runner other than Vinson would have scored from second base, but this way the score was 6-5 Crusaders and the bags full with one out. Turner was hit for with Brewer, who grounded out, but the tying run came in. Three innings down, the score was 6-6 and both starters gone. De La Rosa was put into the game, hoping for three, maybe four innings, and he delivered three shutout innings, striking out four, but looked pretty used up after that. He also was due to lead off the bottom 6th, so was hit for. The score was still 6-6. We didn’t get a lot done against the Crusaders’ pen until Royce Green hit a leadoff double in the bottom 7th. Wedemeyer came up and hit a huge ball that JUST missed the wall for an RBI double and he would score on a 2-out single by Higgins, 8-6. Top 9th. I wanted to stay away from Ban here and with two lefties leading off, Burnett came out, and while he struck out Avery Johnson, he then walked Jenkins. Ban DID come out, got Ed Rigg to 0-2, then hit him. Uh-oh. Mark Berry came out to pinch-hit, but popped out. That brought up Fernando Gonzales. The Crusaders’ catchers hit a huge shot to dead center in a 1-1 count, Reece after it, he’s not gonna get it, he’s not gonna get, HE’S GOT IT!!!!! 8-6 Raccoons!!! O’Morrissey 3-5, 3 2B; Green 3-4, BB, 2 2B, 2 RBI; Higgins 3-3, BB, 2 RBI; De La Rosa 3.0 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 4 K;

Royce Green reached 50 RBI in this game. For the season, that is.

Eight in a row! Who is ever gonna stop us!?

Game 3
NYC: 3B Wilson – CF C. Clark – RF A. Johnson – LF P. Jenkins – C Melendez – 1B Rigg – SS R. Rodriguez – 2B Lammond – P Sandoval
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – 3B O’Morrissey – C Vinson – SS Salazar – RF Newton – P Wade

The Raccoons took an early lead on Wedemeyer’s 16th egg of the year, 2-0, in the first, and were up 3-0 after three. Wade had set down all nine batters he faced. Then the ground opened in the fourth. Starting with an error by Wedemeyer, neither Wade nor the Raccoons did get anything done. Six hits and a Brewer error later, the inning was still not over, but the Crusaders led 5-3. Burnett replaced Wade and got Clement Clark to ground out for the final out. Ugly. That was really ugly. Three runs were earned. Burnett also did the fifth, in the bottom of which Newton led off with a double. Ingall hit for Burnett, but made an out, but the Brewer hit a 1-out triple and we were one base from tying the game. Kinnear singled up the middle, and one again the game was tied and two butchered pitchers had been dragged out on their ankles, leaving puddles of blood on the grass. And a few intestines. We were running out of bullpen here, and needed two innings at least from Daniel Miller. He was going easy, until an error by Salazar put Clark on, and right the next batter, Avery Johnson, homered to right. The Crusaders loaded the bags, before Lammond grounded out to end the inning. With the offense not even getting on base apart from O-Mo reaching on an error in the eighth, this one (and the streak) were getting away. Facing closer Jared Chaney, Newton made the first out in the bottom 9th before Buell drew a walk. Chaney hit Brewer with a 2-2 pitch, and Royce Green pinch-hit for Mallandain in the #2 hole. He flew to deep center, but into an out, bringing up Neil Reece as the last man standing. He connected on the 2-1 pitch, shot a liner over Ed Rigg at first, and the thing fell in and bounced around the corner. Brewer ran the 270 ft dash of his life, came around third and into home, and HE’S SAFE!! NEIL REECE TIES THE GAME!! However, Wedemeyer struck out and thus we went to extra innings with a bullpen full of zombies. Otero was the last remotely fresh guy, with Ban and Martinez tired, and De La Rosa outright unavailable. Otero put down the first two in the 10th, before Neil Reece dropped Lammond fly ball of the harmless sort. Steve Cobb drove home Lammond, and we trailed again. The Crusaders brought in Pedro Mendoza in the bottom 10th, and he started with a walk to O-Mo, and a walk to Vinson. Kondo hit for Salazar for a right-handed bat, but lined out. Newton made an out, before Buell reached with an infield single. Brewer had to do it, but flew out. 8-7 Crusaders. Brewer 3-5, 3B, 2B, RBI; Kinnear 3-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Buell (PH) 1-2, BB; Burnett 1.1 IP, 1 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 2 K; Mallandain 2.0 IP, 0 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 4 K;

FOUR ERRORS!! FOUR ERRORS!! That gives everybody special punishment sessions!!

FOUR ERRORS!! (rages)

By the recent track record they will now lose six more. Best thing is, we will now take a bombed out bullpen into Donis’ start, so this will be fun.

Actually, it wouldn’t be fun. So we made a move over night, and put Stephen Buell and Pancho Padilla on the first planes in the morning, adding a 13th arm to our bullpen just to survive the next few days, while praying for a long outing by Jose Rivera in the series opener in Boston coming up. After that series we would have an off day, finally, after 16 straight games.

Game 4
NYC: 2B Lammond – SS R. Rodriguez – LF A. Johnson – CF Diéguez – 3B Wilson – RF C. Clark – C F. Gonzales – 1B J. Vega – P Castillo
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – SS Salazar – 3B Ingall – P Donis

Donis did not surrender a hit until the fourth inning. By then, the Coons had scored a pair of runs on shy singles by Green and Vinson, respectively, and were up 2-0. Donis himself got on with a double in the bottom 4th, and Kinnear’s 2-out homer doubled the score. Donis was dominant through five, striking out six while allowing only two singles, and then fell apart once again. With a 5-0 lead, he became stuck in the sixth, loaded the bags, walked the first run in, and was removed. Jorge Vega’s infield single against De La Rosa plated another run before pinch-hitter Pat Jenkins hit a pop up to Higgins, having come in in the double switch with De La Rosa, for the final out. A pinch-hit triple by O-Mo in the bottom 7th brought us another run, when Pedro Mendoza, who had saved the game last night, scored him with a wild pitch, 6-2. That was the score into the ninth, which I tried to have pitched by Padilla. Jorge Vega homered, Steve Cobb singled, and Tzu-jao Ban came out of the pen. He quickly got Lammond and Rodriguez out, before Avery Johnson drilled a huge fly ball to deep right. It missed the wall by a few feet, but didn’t miss Royce Green’s glove. 6-2 Raccoons. Brewer 2-5; Kinnear 3-4, BB, HR, 2 RBI; Green 2-5, RBI; Vinson 2-4, RBI; O’Morrissey (PH) 1-1, 3B;

Raccoons (43-24) @ Titans (29-41) – June 17-19, 1996

The Titans ranked 10th in runs scored in the league, but had just rolled over the Indians in a 16-5 game (more below). Their pitchers ranked 9th in runs allowed, starters’ ERA, and bullpen ERA, so the team as a whole didn’t get all that much done apparently. So far we had won all six games against them this season, putting us one game below .500 against them all time.

Projected matchups:
Jose Rivera (4-0, 1.45 ERA) vs. Doug Morrow (6-6, 2.56 ERA)
Kisho Saito (9-3, 3.74 ERA) vs. Jason O’Halloran (5-7, 5.06 ERA)
Jason Turner (4-3, 3.55 ERA) vs. Vicente Navarro (2-6, 3.60 ERA)

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – CF Newton – SS Salazar – P J. Rivera
BOS: SS Silva – RF Thomas – LF J. Martinez – C L. Lopez – 3B Burbidge – 2B Elliott – 1B Mullins – CF C. Garcia – P Morrow

The series opener became the expected pitchers’ duel. Josh Thomas homered in the first, but the Raccoons got the run back in the third inning. The Coons had two on in the sixth with one out but Doug Morrow whiffed both O-Mo and Wedemeyer to get out of the inning. In the bottom 6th the highly annoying Daniel Silva hit a leadoff double and came home to score. Top 7th, Salazar led off with a single to right and was bunted over by Rivera. Brewer struck out, leaving it to Kinnear, who ripped away at Morrow’s first pitch, a line drive to deep left, rising, RISING, GONE!!! Fans scattered for cover as that rocket whizzed horizontally past the foul pole and struck a big, full bucket of popcorn left on a seat, sending the stuff flying everywhere. Morrow was out of steam and surrendered doubles to O-Mo and Wedemeyer for another run, 4-2, before the inning ended. Rivera was removed in the bottom 7th when he put two on, and Burnett got out of the inning. A throwing error by Thomas cost the Titan another run in the top 8th, and they also loaded the bags in the bottom 8th as the overused Raccoons bullpen wobbled mightily, but left them full without scoring. With Ban unavailable, closing the game fell to Juan Martinez today, and after he got the first two batters out, he walked both Bobby Quinn and Daniel Silva, put PH Manny Espinosa fouled out to O-Mo to end the game. 5-2 Raccoons! Kinnear 2-5, HR, 2 RBI; O’Morrissey 3-5, 2 2B; Wedemeyer 2-4, 2B, 2 RBI; Salazar 2-4, RBI; Rivera 6.1 IP, 5 H, 2 R, 2 ER, 1 BB, 3 K, W (5-0) and 1-1, BB;

With this win we got back into a tie for first place with the Loggers, who lost against the Crusaders.

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – LF Kinnear – RF Green – CF Reece – 1B Higgins – SS Ingall – C Kondo – P Saito
BOS: SS Silva – LF Quinn – CF J. Martinez – 1B Burbidge – 3B J. Ramirez – C L. Martin – RF Espinosa – 2B Elliott – P O’Halloran

Kisho Saito vied to become the first pitcher to 10 wins this season in the CL (and only LAP Bastyao Caixinha had 10 in the FL) in this game. We also still had no bullpen to speak of. The Titans slapped nine hits for eight runs off Saito in the first inning. The game was over instantly, which could also be said for Saito’s ERA, which was north of four for good this season. Because there was just no bullpen there to use up, Saito had to go four more innings, in which the Titans hit only two more base knocks, but whiffed five times. 8-2 Titans. Brewer 2-5; Green 2-2, BB; Padilla 3.0 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 0 BB, 6 K;

**** this ****.

Game 3
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – CF Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – 3B O’Morrissey – SS Salazar – P Turner
BOS: SS Silva – RF Thomas – LF J. Martinez – C L. Lopez – 3B Burbidge – 2B Elliott – 1B Quinn – CF C. Garcia – P Navarro

An O-Mo double was the key piece in a 2-run second inning for the Raccoons that put Jason Turner ahead. Turner had struck out the side in the first inning, but started reeling soon enough. In the bottom 5th, still in a 2-0 game, the Titans had runners on first and second with one out, and Navarro at the plate. Navarro laid down a bunt, as expected, and Turner fielded it, throwing wildly past Brewer at first base. The inning would immediately escalate and the Titans plated four runs. The only thing that saved Turner from the gallows was that he went eight in a losing effort. The Raccoons had nothing at all against the Titans past the second inning. 4-2 Titans. Vinson 2-3, BB, 2B; O’Morrissey 2-4, 2B, RBI;

In other news

June 10 – At age 35, LVA SP Rafael Espinoza shows no signs of letting up. He sparkled today in a 2-hit shutout, 8-0, of the Capitals and is 8-3 with a phenomenal 1.87 ERA for the year.
June 13 – TOP OF/1B Dave Reid (.258, 5 HR, 25 RBI) is expected to miss six weeks with a strained oblique.
June 14 – MIL SP Davis Sims (8-5, 3.36 ERA) will miss up to three months with a bad hamstring strain.
June 14 – CIN LF/RF Dan Morris (.348, 7 HR, 40 RBI) is also out. A sprained thumb will keep him out for the rest of the month.
June 14 – Trade in the CL South: the Condors acquire 3B/SS George Waller (.339, 2 HR, 19 RBI) from the Aces for C Andres Manuel (.240, 3 HR, 28 RBI) and a minor leaguer.
June 16 – Titans rookie C Laurent Martin (.282, 5 HR, 18 RBI) has a 5-hit game as the Titans clobber the Indians, 16-5, with TEN of the runs driven in by Martin by ways of a single, two doubles, and two home runs. His last hit in the game is a grand slam off John Snook. Martin ties a record for RBI’s in a single game set by Tom McDonald of the Knights in 1987.
June 16 – Vancouver’s Salvador Mendez (.348, 1 HR, 17 RBI) not only knocks four hits in a 7-6 loss to the Loggers, but also extends his hitting streak to 20 games.
June 17 – An eighth inning single extends the hitting streak of SFW 1B/2B Dave Heffer (.322, 0 HR, 31 RBI) to 20 games, as the Warriors fall 6-4 to the Pacifics, while Mendez’ hitting streak is already over with an 0-3 day in a game against the Indians.
June 18 – The Pacifics stop Dave Heffer’s streak at 20 games, before it really can take off.
June 18 – LVA SP Jou Hara (8-6, 3.27 ERA) tosses a 2-hitter in a 9-0 win over the Falcons.
June 19 – NAS 2B/3B Horace Henry (.291, 8 HR, 38 RBI) will miss three weeks with a concussion.

Complaints and stuff

With regard to Laurent Martin’s 10-RBI game, the Raccoons record stands at nine, put up once each by Daniel Hall (1984, extra inning game), Neil Reece (1990) and Vern Kinnear (1993).

That Haywood Lammond single that knocked Kisho Saito from his start against the Crusaders? The 3,000th base hit that Saito has allowed in his career. You gotta be pretty good to allow 3,000 base hits, I guess. It compares rather favorably, though, to his 3,264.2 innings, 712 walks, and 2,311 strikeouts, plus a career record of 204-148.

And then there was that other start. I am really sick of these innings that just won’t stop and it is like there is one of those in every game now. Not Saito games (although Saito’s BABIP is .314, a chunk higher than that of all other starters). All games. It sucks.

Everything sucks.

[Westheim]

1996 AMATEUR DRAFT

We came in with four picks of the first 90 and a wish list that would not be fulfilled for the most part, mainly since our first pick would not come until #23.

As expected, the Salem Wolves made middle infielder Kurt Metting from Germany the first overall draft pick, almost choking on his $1.9M bonus demand. The Knights picked outfielder Stephen Ware, who was not even on my list, at #2, and SP Dave Crawford, the top starting pitcher on my list, went at #3 to the Blue Sox.

Here is our short shortlist again:

SP Dave Crawford (11/16/12)
SP Jeff Moore (9/18/18)
SP Randy Farley (11/15/14)
SP Cal Holbrook (13/13/12)
SP Tommy Sullivan (12/12/12)
CL Johnny Smith (20/16/14)
MR Juan Diaz (20/10/11)
MR Manuel Martinez (16/17/17)
CL Donald Sims (18/13/12)

SS/2B Kurt Metting (20/20/20)
LF/RF Will Taylor (16/20/20)
1B Brian Nichols (20/6/15)
1B Lawrence Wilson (15/15/14)
LF Lionnel Perri (13/12/13)

Of these, all starting pitchers, as well as Smith, the aforementioned Metting, and Perri were gone by the time we got our first pick. In the end, I liked Manuel Martinez’ makeup the most, and we took him with our first round pick. With our first supplemental round pick up, 1B Lawrence Wilson was still up for grabs, but I forewent him to sign one of the few decent and promising starting pitchers left on the board. The Scorpions took Wilson with the very next pick.

1996 RACCOONS DRAFT CLASS
Round 1 (#23) – MR Manuel Martinez, 18, from Cuautlalpan, Mexico – devastating right-handed changeup, and his sinker is also nothing to make fun about
Supp. Round (#45) – SP Dwight Williams, 22, from Kansas City, MO – righty with three good pitches, maybe not with elite stuff, but he sure looks very promising to make a big league rotation within two to three years
Supp. Round (#61) – INF/RF/LF Carlos Gomes, 21, from Santo Domingo, Dom. Rep. – very decent projection as a hitter across the board, plus the ability to play five positions competently. Also has power.
Round 2 (#90) – 2B/SS Sergio Tirado, 20, from Barinitas, Venezuela – projects to be a strong defensive middle infielder with a good OBP – if he can stop swinging at junk outta the zone. Comes with speed to steal a few bags, too.
Round 3 (#114) – MR Juan Diaz, 21, from Ixtapa, Mexico – left-hander with a killing curve, which he so far is unable to throw for strikes reliably.
Round 4 (#138) – 1B Albert Martin, 19, from San Antonio, TX – left-handed first baseman with an above average bat, including power, and defensive challenges to overcome.
Round 5 (#162) – SP Ralph Warren, 18, from Los Angeles, CA – small (5’8’’) left-hander whom Vince Guerra projects to become elite at painting the corners with his not overwhelming stuff
Round 6 (#186) – INF Manuel Moreno, 20, from West Babylon, NY – falls into that get-on-base-any-way-possible category, with good defense all around the infield, and zero home run power.
Round 7 (#210) – C Powell Henderson, 18, from Phillips, WI – so-so catching, but some offensive capabilities
Round 8 (#234) – MR Ray Morgan, 21, from Mesa, AZ – left-hander with a slider that doesn’t slide a lot, and if it does, it slides right past the catcher
Round 9 (#258) – 1B/C Jorge Defrese, 18, from Barcelona, Venezuela – mixed bag throughout, but the ability to play behind the dish competently could prove valuable if he pans out offensively
Round 10 (#282) – MR Miguel Guerrero, 21, from Vega Baja, Puerto Rico – left-hander with a flat curve
Round 11 (#306) – MR Billy Nichols, 20, from Delray Beach, FL – right-hander with a flat curve
Round 12 (#330) – SP Cliff Walker, 17, from Oakton, VA – throws all kinds of junk with the right hand

All 14 draftees were assigned to the A level team, and we released some older guys still lingering around in the bottom two levels of our minors to make room for everybody.

[Questdog]

deleted for tastelessness.....

[Westheim]

How can anything be tasteless, 40 pages into my scribbles here?

I know I am a spoiled brat, and that there is very little reason to complain, but these crushing defeats … are very crushing. It may be only my fault, but I think I see more 4-run innings than in … oh let’s say 1979, when the Raccoons won all of 55 games.

Time to move forward now and get those Loggers.

Raccoons (44-26) @ Thunder (32-40) – June 21-23, 1996

The Thunder were scoring the third-most runs in the Continental League, but their pitching staff was a burning train wreck, ranking in the bottom three in most important categories in the Continental League. Some high scoring games could be in the books for us.

Projected matchups:
Scott Wade (4-5, 3.60 ERA) vs. Jon Robinson (9-5, 3.21 ERA)
Antonio Donis (9-2, 3.89 ERA) vs. Aaron Anderson (7-7, 3.12 ERA)
Jose Rivera (5-0, 1.63 ERA) vs. Millard Wilson (3-4, 4.48 ERA)

Last in the CL South, the Thunder still posed a threat, and despite an off day before this series and Turner having pitched an 8-inning complete game in the last loss in Boston, I did not send the 13th pitcher away yet. I was also trying to identify a better backup than Stephen Buell, who had certainly fared well in his cup of coffee, but him and Kinnear were very much excluding each other from the lineup. I had thought about Kevin Savary before, but he had come off the DL cold as ice.

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – CF N. Reece – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – SS Ingall – LF Newton – P Wade
OCT: SS J. Sanchez – 1B Shaw – RF Norton – 3B S. Reece – 2B H. Ramirez – LF Browne – CF L. Hernandez – C Guidry – P Robinson

After a perfect first by Wade, the first five Thunder reached base in the second inning, and Jose Sanchez soon enough emptied the bases with a grand slam to dead center. Two innings in, the starter wound up, the game lost. Despearte for length out of Wade, he remained in for the third inning, and was battered to an 8-0 score. Looking for long relief from Pancho Padilla turned out to be no option either, since he was raped for three more runs in the fourth inning. The Raccoons were going down, but the orchestra was playing ‘til the end. 14-2 Thunder. O’Morrissey 2-4, 2 2B; Wedemeyer 2-4, HR, RBI;

Crowning an 8-56 skid with an 0-3 day was Neil Reece. Oh yeah, he also broke a finger, and won’t be back until late July or early August. Talk about going down. We called up Scott Strong, who had gone 6-19 in AAA since arriving there.

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – CF Newton – SS Salazar – P Donis
OCT: SS J. Sanchez – CF L. Hernandez – LF Norton – 3B S. Reece – RF Barnes – 2B Browne – 1B Ikeda – C Guidry – P A. Anderson

The first three Thunder in the game all reached base, and the team batted through the lineup in the first inning, putting three runs on a stuffless Antonio Donis. In the third, Donis hit not one, but two batters, loading the bags with two out, but like in the first inning, pitcher Aaron Anderson grounded out to leave the bags full, and that was about all that held the Raccoons somewhat in the game a third of the way through: Anderson being a terrible batter. Donis was all washed up after five innings, with the Thunder leaving their runners on at will, and with Anderson being a much better pitcher than a hitter, 3-hitting the Raccoons and allowing nobody past first base after five. The Coons finally put a foot on second base when Royce Green circled them after a solo shot in the seventh. Down 3-1, felt like a world away. We actually got the tying run to the plate in the eighth with Brewer on first and one out. Kinnear flew out, O’Morrissey grounded out. Jimmy Morey came out for the ninth. Wedemeyer singled to lead off the frame, and then Royce Green hit an enormous fly ball to deep center, but while it had the height, it lacked the depth, but also was too far away for Lucio Hernandez to catch up and fell in for an RBI double. No outs, and the tying run 180 feet from home, Vinson struck out, Newton walked, and Salazar grounded to short, 6-4-3. 3-2 Thunder. Green 2-4, HR, 2B, 2 RBI;

Game 3
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – 1B Wedemeyer – RF Green – C Vinson – CF Newton – SS Salazar – P J. Rivera
OCT: SS J. Sanchez – 1B Shaw – RF Norton – 3B S. Reece – 2B H. Ramirez – LF Browne – CF L. Hernandez – C Guidry – P Wilson

Rivera had batted to a .188 BABIP this season, so I was well expecting the recent stretch of opposing hitting to continue in full force. Lucio Hernandez got the scoring going in the bottom 2nd with a 2-out RBI single, collecting Sonny Reece. Travis Shaw was hit by a pitch in the third inning, which also quickly escalated. Two on and two out, Rivera threw a wild pitch, and then allowed Ramirez to drive in the runners with a double. Through four, the Raccoons were non-existent at the plate. Luke Newton drew a leadoff walk in the fifth, then ran on Rob Guidry, who had already thrown him out once in the series, but this time Guidry’s throw went into the outfield and Newton went to third. Salazar hit a sac fly, and we were again behind 3-1 and it felt like so much more. But Millard Wilson was in the process of losing it: he walked Rivera, and then Brewer as well. Kinnear got into a 3-ball count and then took a rip, which froze my face. But his liner went over Hector Ramirez and past Hernandez in center for a game-tying 2-run triple! COME ON BOYS!! LET’S DO IT THE KINNEAR WAY!! Kinnear scored on O-Mo’s sac fly, before Wilson struck out Wedemeyer, but we now gave a 4-3 lead to Jose Rivera, who struggled through the fifth, and was pinch-hit for in the top 6th with two on and two out, as the Thunder were bringing in left-hander Mac Henson. Higgins came out and singled up the middle, Green turned third base and was merely safe at the plate. Henson remained in, walked Brewer, loading the bags, and walked Kinnear, forcing home a run. O-Mo then popped out foul, but that dreadful Thunder pitching finally began to show. Between relievers Rick Nicholls and Andy Castle, the Raccoons tacked on five runs in the seventh inning (Castle would still strike out our 4-5-6 batters in the eighth). We also got some amazing and totally unexpected long relief from Tim Mallandain, who almost completed a 4-inning save before running out of breath. 12-3 Raccoons. Kinnear 2-4, BB, 3B, 2B, 6 RBI; Green 3-5, 2B; Salazar 2-3, BB, 2 RBI; Higgins (PH) 1-1, RBI; Mallandain 3.1 IP, 2 H, 0 R, 2 BB, 1 K;

Big innings happen on either side of the line score, that much is fact. But the regularity with which they are coming after our (perceived) top rotation is unpleasant. We lost another game on the Loggers over this weekend series.

Raccoons (45-28) @ Knights (35-40) – June 24-26, 1996

The Knights were struggling to score runs, having only 306 to their credit, barely more than four per game, which ranked 10th in the league (POR: 381, 5.2, 1st). They had a very decent rotation, but their bullpen was 11th overall with an ERA of 4.27. They also had two of their outfielders (Jesus Gonzalez and Freddy Gonzalez) on the DL, which was not improving their chances to score runs. But hey, they were going up against the recently much-torn-up Kisho Saito and Scott Wade, so anything was possible for them.

Projected matchups:
Kisho Saito (9-4, 4.30 ERA) vs. Pat Cherry (5-4, 3.91 ERA)
Jason Turner (4-4, 3.22 ERA) vs. Chet Sloan (1-2, 4.71 ERA)
Scott Wade (4-6, 4.26 ERA) vs. Carlos Asquabal (6-10, 3.14 ERA)

Going into this series, we returned Pancho Padilla to AAA and brought Stephen Buell back up for that extra bat.

Game 1
POR: 2B Brewer – LF Kinnear – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – C Vinson – 3B O’Morrissey – CF Newton – SS Salazar – P Saito
ATL: LF M. Smith – 3B Utting – 2B Nicks – RF Hatch – 1B M. Guzman – SS Tanaka – CF Cooper – C J. Johnson – P Cherry

The Coons scored runs in the first and third innings, while in the latter occasion leaving two in scoring position when both Green and Wedemeyer struck out. Kisho Saito found himself in may 3-ball counts early on (four times in the first 8 PA’s), but allowed only two base runners the first time through the lineup, and we were up 2-0 after three. The second time through, only Connor Cooper reached on a bloop single. Saito appeared to be cruising, having whiffed seven through six frames of 2-hit ball, and nobody reached the next two innings, with only one batter (Sosa Tanaka) making solid contact to the deeper regions of the outfield. The Raccoons had not scored a lot, leading 3-0 through eight, and with Saito just at 100 pitches, would you send him out for the ninth? He came to bat with nobody on and two outs in the top 9th, was sent to bat, and whiffed. Bottom 9th, Saito faced Jose Rojas, Mark Smith, and Jai Utting, with Tzu-jao Ban ready in the pen. Rojas’ leadoff triple was enough to exit Saito. While Ban saved the game by sitting Smith, Utting, and Tom Nicks down in due time, he did not keep Saito’s ledger clean, Rojas scored when Smith grounded out. 3-1 Saito’s Minions. Brewer 2-2, BB, 2B, RBI; Salazar 2-4; Saito 8.0 IP, 3 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 7 K, W (10-4) and 1-3;

Saito is about alternating (near-)shutouts and 8-run blowups by now. I always liked his consistency, so this is a very alien picture… he just turned 36, old age?

His hits, walks, strikeouts, and BABIP are all more or less the same level as in the last few seasons. Well, the BABIP is up a bit (it was roughly .295 for three straight years, but is around .310 this year), and the walks are slowly creeping up. He is surrendering LESS home runs, and still gives up MORE runs. There is but ONE logical explanation: someone put a curse on him.

Game 2
POR: 2B Brewer – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Green – C Vinson – LF Buell – CF Newton – SS Ingall – 1B Higgins – P Turner
ATL: 2B Nicks – C F. Ramirez – RF Hatch – SS Tanaka – 1B M. Guzmán – 3B Utting – CF Cooper – LF M. Smith – P Sloan

The Raccoons scored single runs in each of the first four innings, all cobbled together with small ball tactics, while Turner held the Knights to two hits through five, but those two hits had been back-to-back with two out in the second and had plated a run, so we were up 4-1. Bottom 6th, a bloop, a walk, another bloop, the tying runs were on with no outs. Turner got Sosa Tanaka to fly out to shallow center, holding the runners. Guzmán lined to O-Mo, who made the catch, but took a moment too long to turn a double play on Francisco Ramirez, who was far off second base. Utting grounded out to Ingall. PHEW!! With runners on the corners and no outs in the top 7th, Royce Green brought in our fifth run, but at the cost of an inning-crippling double play. Turner left after seven, and the Knights got a run off De La Rosa in the eighth, and while we didn’t add more offense, Ban pitched a quick ninth to save the game. 5-2 Raccoons. Brewer 4-5, RBI; O’Morrissey 2-4, BB, RBI; Ingall 2-4, RBI; Higgins 2-4, 2B; Turner 7.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 2 BB, 7 K, W (5-4) and 2-3;

Now we need to help Scott Wade a bit. He is falling behind the necessary pace to win ten this year, and you know about his streak. He has only won one of his last 11 starts…

Game 3
POR: LF Kinnear – 3B O’Morrissey – RF Green – 1B Wedemeyer – CF Newton – 2B Higgins – SS Ingall – C Kondo – P Wade
ATL: 2B Nicks – C F. Ramirez – RF Hatch – SS Tanaka – 1B M. Guzmán – 3B Utting – CF Cooper – LF M. Smith – P Asquabal

While Asquabal came in with a 4:1 K/BB ratio, he was wild. Kinnear was plunked to start the game (but soon removed in O-Mo’s 6-4-3 mess), and he loaded the bags with one out in the top 2nd, including two walks. Wade was batting in that situation, whiffed, and so did Kinnear. Scott Wade surrendered some good contact early, but most was plucked from the air by the outfielders, and the Knights failed to score through three. In the top 3rd, Wedemeyer had got us ahead with a solo homer, and in the fourth Nori Kondo hit his first home run as a Raccoons with a 2-run homer to left, 3-0. Both pitchers became better at their game in the middle innings, Asquabal racking up a few K’s and Wade getting those easy groundballs. We ended up facing almost the same situation as in the series opener after eight. Up 3-0, with Wade pitching a 3-hitter, this time just below 100 pitches, but Wade would not bat in the ninth after making the final out in the eighth. We didn’t score in the top 9th, and Wade went out for the bottom 9th, facing Nicks, the pitcher slot, and Hollis Hatch. Burnett and Miller were warm already. And again, the first guy our pitcher faced had a hit, a single, and we made the move to the pen. Since the Knights twitched first and brought left-hander Ramón Corona to pinch-hit, Burnett was thrown in first. Corona singled up the middle. Hatch grounded out, putting the runners in scoring position. Tanaka was a left-hander and popped Burnett’s first pitch to left, where Buell made the play, but Nicks scored. Then Miller came in to face the righty Guzmán. He grounded out to Ingall. 3-1 Coons! Green 2-5, 2B; Wedemeyer 2-4, HR, RBI; Kondo 3-3, BB, HR, 2B, 2 RBI; Wade 8.0 IP, 4 H, 1 R, 1 ER, 1 BB, 4 K, W (5-6);

Nori Kondo was a triple shy of the cycle after flying below the radar for three months. Nice, nice.

In other news

June 24 – MIL SP Rafael Garcia (9-4, 3.88 ERA) is out for the year with a torn flexor tendon in his elbow.
June 24 – The Scorpions acquire 36-year old MR Joaquin Bastos (2-4, 3.04 ERA) from the Indians, sending over RF/LF Alejandro Roldán (.294, 0 HR, 12 RBI), who is 25.

Complaints and stuff

The win in the final game in Oklahoma was #1,600 for the Raccoons franchise. And after walking off with bloodied noses four games in a row, we have now won four in a row again.

I don’t understand this team … at all.

But well. Neil Reece is on the shelf for another month at least, and Luke Newton is not hitting a lot. However, we more than exhausted our budget in the amateur draft and I will not be able to take on any budget in eventual trades. I would not know whom to trade anyway away, to be honest. I feel like I need all the pieces I still have.

[Questdog]

Originally Posted by Westheim

How can anything be tasteless, 40 pages into my scribbles here?

You'll have to take my word for it....

I made a really, really funny joke, but then thought better of it.....

If anyone other than Salazar can field a good shortstop, I'd be tempted to shop him around, since he's probably going free agent anyway and not helping us much with his bat so far this year.