League Updates Uncategorized

Les Miserables: Heaney-ous results from the end of May(hem)

Nothing I write about here deserves to be equated with real misery. It’s only baseball.  But it will be about people whom May has left feeling miserable, if only for a little while.

For example, here’s a note I sent Ryan Thursday evening:

So I’m listening to the bottom of the 9th in St. Louis.  The Pirates are up 8 – 5.  I’ve already seen the final score.  I’m listening to the recording of the broadcast to hear how the Pirate announcers handle what’s about to happen.

I knew what was about to happen: the Cardinals were about to lead off with a double. The next batter was going to reach base safely on an error by the third baseman.  Then a walk was going to fill the bases. Then a liner drilled to left was going to score two. Two pitches later Yairo Munoz was going to deposit the ball beyond the center field fence for a 10 – 8 walk-off win… with no one out in the bottom of the ninth.

To their credit, the Pirates’ TV broadcasters (Greg Brown and Bob Walk) were brave about it.  They sensed some trouble right off because the Pirates’ closer was wild and throwing only 96 mph.  The error rattled them, the walk alarmed them, the two-run single filled them with clinical urgency. They kept coming back, calmly but intensely, to the closer’s poor form and the danger it posed.  And when Yairo Munoz launched the game winning bomb, they recognized immediately the game was suddenly over. No unseemly wailing, no recriminations, no sour grapes: just two professionals dejectedly describing a disaster.  Gracious even in a truly miserable defeat.

This is one reason why I tune in the Pittsburgh announcers when I have a choice.  I want to learn from them so I can weather Wolverine woes with more class.

(Note:  the same two announcers complained long and bitterly the other day when Anthony Rizzo went sliding in search of a catcher to upend, even after the New York umpires upheld the “out” call on video review. But then, MLB the next morning ruled that Rizzo’s slide HAD been illegal, so Brown and Walk had justification for their bitterness.)

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EFL Standings for May 31,  2018
Team Wins Losses Pct. GB RS RA
Canberra Kangaroos 33 23 .586 252.7 212.7
Old Detroit Wolverines 33 24 .574 0.6 236.9 204.4
Portland Rosebuds 32 24 .566 1.1 258.8 226.1
Brookland Outs 32 25 .565 1.1 289.7 255.1
Flint Hill Tornadoes 29 28 .516 3.9 238.1 230.1
Cottage Cheese 28 29 .492 5.2 292.6 294.7
Kaline Drive 29 29 .492 5.3 254.2 258.8
Pittsburgh Alleghenys 27 28 .484 5.7 293.7 305.5
Haviland Dragons 28 30 .474 6.3 254.2 267.7
D.C. Balk 24 32 .423 9.1 222.5 259.9
Peshastin Pears 23 33 .409 9.9 235.4 283.5

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Canberra:  W 1, L 1; 7 – 8.  (.167, .250, .167; 5 ip, 1 er.)    The Kangaroos learned yesterday that Rhys Hoskins broke his own jaw by fouling a ball into his face.  He did the deed on Monday, and left the game. No one realized he had broken his jaw, so Tuesday he pinch hit and doubled.  I think I know why  it took four days to diagnose the problem: it barely increased Hoskins’ suffering.  His batting line in May: .161, .253, .299.  Worse than replacement.  As you can see, the entire Kangaroo team did its best yesterday to duplicate Hoskins’ May batting stats. They did pretty well, going 3 for 18 with two walks, except they forgot to collect a couple of extra bases.  Meanwhile, Wade LeBlanc made sure the distracted ‘Roos didn’t fall behind the Wolverines. He saw no reason to redouble Canberran misery.

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Old Detroit: “W”, 5 – 7. (.219, .316, .406; 6 ip, 5 er)  I noticed Thursday morning that my Andrew Heaney was facing the Tigers, including my Jeimer Candelario, the game in the 4th inning. Candelario was about to come to bat, so I quickly got the game video feed up on my computer.  Heaney had already caused enough Woeverine misery, coughing up 5 earned runs in the first, including a Candelario double.  Candelario came to bat in the 4th with the Alleghenys’ Castellanos on first base.

Granted, this situation was packed with peril for the Wolverines. I wanted maybe a little walk, setting up the double play. But Heaney did the worst possible thing: he hit Candelario on the hand.  Jeimer was in serious pain. He had his hand inspected by a trainer, trotted to first, and then was forced out in the ensuing inning-ending double play.

But when the Tigers took the field, Candelario was out of the game. So now I am waiting to find out if my pitcher has sent my third baseman to the DL, and for how long. Candelario’s May line:  17 for 65, 5 doubles, 4 homers, 9 walks, 2 hbp: .262, .386, .523. That .909 OPS leads the club for the month of May. And my pitcher took him out of the lineup.

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Portland: DNP, 2 – 0; (.286, .389, .786;  1 ip, 1 er).  Andrew Heaney was a fount of misery yesterday.  Not only did he torch his ERA (and keep the W’s out of first place today) and injure the W’s best hitter (keeping them out of first place maybe for the rest of the season), he also hit JaCoby Jones with a pitch. This was actually a work of dark art: Jones was in his last day as a Rosebud, and will be a Pear as soon as I get caught up with the paperwork. So Heaney inflicted pain on TWO rivals with one pitch.  Or tried to. JaCoby just shook his HBP off, took his base, and came around to score. So Heaney (and the W’s)  suffered more than Jones did.

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Brookland: DNP, 1 – 0.  (.250, .323, .357; 3.7 ip, 7 er).  The Outs have been producers of misery more than consumers so far this season, humiliating established teams by occupying first place for 7 days in May, and refusing to go back to the basement where expansion teams belong. So I might have been imperfectly empathetic when I noticed how Jake Odorizzi nearly chulked (3.7 ip, 7 er) yesterday. That chulk tumbled the Outs from second place 0.2 games out to fourth place 1.1 games out.  I know this because I forgot to save my stats after entering the Outs’ (and a couple of other teams) so my initial standings update showed what things would look like in an alternate universe in which Odorizzi didn’t pitch yesterday.

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Flint Hill: L,  3 – 7. (.167, .286, .278; 1 ip, 0 er).  It’s not a lot of misery, but still: the Tornados ended May with about 4 replacement plate appearances in the outfield. Jackie Bradley Jr. had four plate appearances yesterday, going 1 for 3 with a walk and a double. Jackie was sent to the minors on May 14. Since then he’s batted .282, .378, .462, for the third best OPS of all the Tornados over that span. I still have a soft spot in my heart for JBJ, the former Wolverine.  If you want to off-load him, Jamie, come see me.

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Cottage: DNP, 1 – 0. (.222, .300, .333; 0 pitching). Cottage fell a long way in May.  On April 30, the Cheese were 18 – 10, in first place, 2.3 games ahead of the Kangaroos.  Today they are 28 – 29, 5.2 games behind the Kangaroos. That’s an 8.5 game swing in a single month. Impressive, in a bad way. The Cheese’s $15,750,000 ace Danny Duffy produced  33 innings pitched, second most on the staff. But he produced them at a 6.00 ERA.  Still, that was better than perfect-game-tossing Sean Manaea, who pitched to a 7.18 ERA across 31.3 innings in May.  But at least that was better than the 31.3 innings at 7.50 ERA produced by replacement pitchers.  But at least THAT was better than the 23.7 innings pitched by Ivan Nova — at a 7.61 ERA. Miseries piled upon miseries, even without the help of Andrew Heaney.

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Kaline:  “W”, 6 – 7. (.357, .500, .500;  5.3 ip, 5 er). Trevor Williams pitched a line like Heaney’s: 5 ip, 5 er.  That undermined some pretty nifty hitting, including Hunter Renfroe’s 2 for 3 with a double and two walks.  Renfroe only appeared in 3 games, but hit .500, .600, .625.  The misery here is in contemplating what might have been… Kaline had a mini-Cheese collapse in May, too, falling from third place at 16 – 13 to 7th place at 29 – 29. Here’s some consolation: the Drive is only 2.8 games further out than they were April 30.  As the Cheese have so effectively demonstrated, teams can easily move 5.3 games in the standings in a single month! If Renfroe keeps this up, you may be all set.

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Pittsburgh: L,  3 – 9. (.216, .310, .270; 1 ip, 1 er).  Nick Castellanos (3 for 5 with a double) was a critical piece in Andrew Heaney’s terrible, no good, very bad day. I suppose Allegheny fans might see this as payback to the cosmos for a miserable month of May.  The A’s had good raw stats (.828 OPS, 3.80 ERA) but had to absorb 28 replacement plate appearances at shortstop, and 30.4 replacement innings, lowering the team OPS to .812 (not bad) and raising the team ERA to 4.38 (worse).  The A’s still had a winning May (15 – 13), but they could have moved at least a couple places closer in the standings to their first place home turf had they avoided these replacements.

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Haviland: W 2, L (-1); 8 – 3. (.321, .367, .643; 9 ip, 2 er).  I don’t suppose we need to look too hard for Dragon misery.  Being pretty much locked into 9th place is probably misery enough for one month for this proud franchise. In fact, with this outstanding performance on the last day of the month, the Dragons actually finished May above .500  — 15 – 14, roughly. Other than 47 replacement innings, Drew Steckenrider’s 10.24 ERA is the only open, oozing sore — and that was only over 9.7 innings.  So all the D’s need is a little more pitching. Hmmm. I wonder if there’s anyone in the EFL with some spare pitching he could trade…

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D.C.: W 1, L 1; 8 – 9. (.258, .281, .387; 8 ip, 3 er). Daniel Mengden pitched well, but it wasn’t enough to cover two games so the Balk’s underlying 4.62 team ERA had to fill in the gap. Dylan Bundy (12 er in 4.3 innings) and Carsom Fulmer (17 er in 7 innings) were the cement shoes the Balk wore into May waters, providing all the suffering needed to keep them from floating up into the middle parts of the EFL. Oh, and Jarlin Garcia’s 19 earned runs in 21 innings didn’t help, either. Scooter Gennett made a lot of people miserable with envy, giving the Balk a .398, .418, .720 line over 97 plate appearances at second base.

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Peshastin: DNP, 0 – (-1). (.263, .364, ;368; 6 ip, 3 er).  May wasn’t a memorable month in Peshastin. The Pears are clearly thinking about 2019 and beyond.  May 31st was their last day with their most valuable hitter, JT Realmuto,  who will report today to the Portland Rosebuds in exchange for young (and indestructible)  JaCoby Jones and next year’s first round rookie draft pick. I imagine other vultures are circling the Pears’ compound, too, looking for plums to pluck… mixed metaphor and all.   The Pears are still within 10 games of first (barely), but even so, being 11th in an 11-team league has to be hard.

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