Baseball Journal September 3-4, 2017

9-3-17

With little on TV today (like the NASCAR Southern 500 at Darlington which NBC put on cable, but I’m not bitter or anything), I almost forgot that the Rangers were playing the hated Angels this afternoon.  I joined the game in the second with the miserable Halos already up 2-0.  The Rangers got one in the bottom, but left the bases loaded.  In the third, Elvis Andrus homered to tie it.  Carlos Gomez struck out in the inning.  He then argued and tossed his bat and was ejected.  He’d apparently had other problems with the umps this series.  In the fourth, Robinson Chirinos hit a two-run homer and Delino Deshields followed that with a solo shot, 5-2. 

In the fifth, some loser named Al got an RBI for the crappy Angels.  (I don’t like this fellow in an increasingly unprofessional manner.)  Conversationally during the game, Eric Nadel was excited that he’d to be doing the Spanish broadcast for an inning this week.  The team’s Spanish broadcaster would be doing the English.  Eric also talked about the about the new ballpark that’s about to be built.  He was already visualizing the orientation of the field and where the sunlight would be coming in.  It was a hot, humid day in Arlington.  The guys are really looking forward to an air-conditioned, indoor facility.

In the sixth, Joey Gallo had an error at third, his third in three games with Adrian Beltre out.  Will Middlebrooks at first made a great play to end the inning.  I didn’t know he was with the team.  It turned out was his first game with the Rangers, his favorite team.  In the bottom, Elvis hit another homer, a 434’ line shot for two runs.  Eric and Matt Hicks were in awe, 7-3.  In the seventh, Gallo made a great diving catch.  He’s apparently made a great play around every error lately.

The ninth got hairy.  The bad news Angels got runners on second and third with no outs.  Al made the first on an infield fly rule.  Ha, ha.  Then Andrelton Simmons doubled, 7-5.  Runners were again on second and third with one out.  An intentional walk loaded the bases.  An unintentional walk forced in another run, 7-6.  Finally, Gallo fielded a grounder and threw out a runner at second for the nervous 7-6 win. 

Martin Perez went over 100 pitches for the win.  Tony Barnett got the shaky save.  He was the second pitcher used the ninth, and I think they said he’d worked three days in a row.  The Rangers won two of three from the horrid Angels, but their bullpen got shelled in the process.  Robinson Chirinos was the post-game guest.  He’d caught all three games in the series.  (Where’s Brett Nicholas?)  And the games dragged for like over 12 hours total.  He was cool with it.  Whatever it took to win.  Robinson just wanted to play and contribute.  If this turns out to be my last Rangers’ game on the weekend, it at least was a good one, in spite of the wretched Angels.

6:00 pm was the baseball game I was waiting for between the Chihuahuas and the Rivercats.  The pups could clinch it with a win today.  Tim Hagerty was back.  He had been attending a friend’s wedding yesterday.  The guest voice was Tim Roye, voice of the Golden State Warriors and obviously a friend of the Chihuahuas’. 

None of this came up in the first inning though.  Tim was too busy calling three straight Chihuahuas getting on base to start the game and Hunter Renfroe hitting a grand slam to bring them in.  He didn’t even have time to go over Renfroe’s bases loaded hitting stats before the ball went out.  Nick Buss kept it going with a single.  The next batter finally made the first out of the game, drawing a sarcastic cheer from the Sacramento crowd.  Tony Cruz then came up and hit a two-run homer.  After that, there was a double and the second error of the inning before the third out.  That was a six-run inning and it took about 16 minutes to play out. 

Renfroe made the highlight reel again in the second inning by throwing out a runner trying to stretch a single into a double.  There wasn’t much else to talk about until later in the game.  Tim started to talk about playoff ticket information.  He’s been doing this for a couple of weeks, but had to say that he wasn’t jinxing anything.  They have to offer the tickets beforehand.  He told the story about the Red Sox putting a World Series logo on their field before they actually got in one year (the Aaron “Bleeping” Boone series with the Yankees).  “I’ll let you in on a secret,” he said, “Every team does that.  They have to be prepared before the event.”  He also noticed a couple of Chihuahuas’ hats and a Diablos’ shirt being worn in the crowd.

Jose Rondon, back off the IR again, doubled in a run to make it 7-0.  Tim Melville, El Paso’s pitcher, let on two batters in the seventh and was taken out.  (He was also one of the outs in the first inning on a strikeout.  It was like his third professional at bat.)  Adam Cimber came in and unfortunately gave up a three-run homer to make it 7-3.   That was all the scoring.  In the eighth, Tim talked about when the clubhouse attendants should start putting up plastic sheets on the lockers.  A strikeout ended the game and began the Chihuahuas next run into the playoffs. 

They were eight games out halfway through the season.  The Salt Lake City Bees looked to run away with the division.  I don’t follow the team or their parent club, the suckwad Angels, but perhaps the big league team’s Wild Card run sapped the Bees’ roster.  With the Padres not contending, they had no problem with sending Hunter Renfroe down so he could hit over .500 with the Chihuahuas and help put them over the hump.  Before the game, manager Rod Barajas got a hold of the league offices to make sure that if they won, they were in.  You can never be too careful in making sure you don’t celebrate prematurely.

9-4-17 Labor Day

Comet TV had a Godzilla film festival on, but I found myself flipping stations.  The new Stadium network was showing the Pony League World Series.  It was Covina, California versus Seoul, South Korea.  Korea was up 1-0 for most of the game.  Their manager got ejected for arguing balls and strikes.  He nearly took his team with him.  In the seventh and final inning, Korea got the third out, but the tying run scored before that on the same play.  Their pitcher was ejected for arguing.  Covina won it in extras in the eighth on a two-run homer off a light pole, 3-1 US wins.  James Jimenez was the hero, going seven innings of one-run pitching and hitting the winning home run. 

Today was the last day of the PCL regular season.  The Chihuahuas played the Rivercats in the afternoon.  Several Chihuahuas were out of the lineup to rest for the playoffs.  Franchy Cordero led off with a home run, 1-0 Chihuahuas.  Franchy scored again on a sacrifice in the third, 2-0.  In the fourth, Dusty Coleman hit a home run that bounced off the top of the wall, 3-0.  In the bottom, the Rivercats got back-to-back homers to bring it to 3-2.  The crowd in Sacramento got into it.  They sounded like a large, enthusiastic group.  The game was halfway through in an hour.  Tim spent much of that talking about the playoffs and the post-game celebration. 

Hunter Renfroe got a pinch hit double in seventh.  Franchy singled in a run and Renfroe scored on a Carlos Rondon single.  Coleman singled after a pitching change, and then Ryan Schimpf doubled in three runs with the bases loaded.  When the dust settled it was 9-2.  Things were looking good.  Christian Bethancourt came in and gave up three walks in the eighth and two runs came in on a single, 9-4.  Jason Jester came in to finish the inning. 

Then came the ninth.  Jester gave up three home runs in a row without getting an out, 9-7.  The crowd was going nuts.  Jester was out after another hit.  Eric Yardley came in and did no better.  He gave up a two-run homer to tie it, 9 all.  Yardley hit for himself in the tenth.  Diego Goris had wanted to pitch today and was warming up.  The Chihuahuas apparently didn’t want use any more pitchers.  Yardley did go back out.  With two outs in the bottom of the tenth, a walkoff homer ended it.  10-9 Rivercats was our shock ending to the game.  We’re all going to hopefully forget this game ever happened and look forward to the playoffs on Wednesday.

Somebody was happy about the game.  You can tell if hasn't been a good season for the Giants when the Triple-A team winning the meaningless last game of the season makes their main fansite.  Still, from that perspective, it was a tremendous game.

The Rangers/Braves game coverage started on time thanks to a bottom of the hour starting time.  Elvis Andrus got it started in the first with a home run off RA Dickey.  Rangers’ pitcher, Andrew Cashner, helped himself out in the second.  With the bases loaded he sacrificed in a run.  Another scored on a passed ball, 3-0 Rangers.  Should Kurt Suzuki really have been charged with that given that he was catching a knuckleballer?  In the third, Matt Hicks commented on the height of the pressbox at new Suntrust Field in Atlanta.  It’s not quite as bad as Nationals Park, where you can wave “Hi” the blimp pilots as they fly by, but it’s still an aerial view of the game.  Joey Gallo tripled in a run and Roughned Odor sacrificed one in, 5-0 Rangers. 

Then there’s an unintelligible sentence on my notes.  I need to learn how to write.  Matt Adams, who had been playing an amusing left field in the game, got some revenge with a two-run homer in the fourth, 5-2.  In the sixth, Normar Mazara homered, 6-2.  Former Chihuahua, Ender Inciarte almost got it as it passed over a low point on the outfield wall.  Carlos Gomez tripled, as Matt Adams fumbled it in the outfield.  Ruggie drove him and himself in with a homer, 8-2 Rangers.

At this point I lost my local station with the sun going down.  Ah, but how could the Rangers lose at this point?  It’s in the bag.  Some kind of huge collapse couldn’t happen twice in one day, could it?  Actually, by the time I could pick up another affiliate, it was the ninth and the score was unchanged thankfully.  As the game was about to end, Eric Nadel noted they were just under three hours, “If we were playing the Angels, we’d be in the sixth inning.”  Earlier, the slimy Angels had set an American League record for pitchers used in a game at 12.  It was an 11-inning game and the previous record had included much longer games.  The craptacular Angels won the game in a tidy four plus hours.  Anyway, the Rangers beat the Braves tonight, 8-2.  Back to the Godzilla film festival.