Monday, May 15, 2006

More of the same

The Rainiers had been shut out once all year coming into yesterday's game. Now they've been shut out twice in a row. Hey, maybe the low minors picked 'em up, though, right? Um, no. Not really. I can tell you this: the Mariners *did not lose* today, as they flew up north to Oakland.

Tacoma lost 1-0 to a phenomenal performance from Albuquerque's quirky-named Nic Ungs, who went all 9, giving up 4H, no walks and 4Ks. He spoiled a great team effort from Tacoma's Cesar Jimenez, who went 6IP 1R 7H 1BB 5Ks. Bobby Livingston reacquainted himself to the PCL by going 3 scoreless innings, giving up 2H, no walks and 3Ks. Welcome back, Bobby.

San Antonio's offense was blitzkrieged by Texas' farm-team Frisco, as John Danks and two relievers combined to rack up *17 Ks* against our valiant Missions. Wlad Balentien, as you might suspect, led the parade with a Golden sombrero. But Bryan Lahair had a hat-trick for his 0-4, and Justin Ruchti matched that in only three ABs.

Wisconsin was swept in a double-header (nobody did anything), including another shut-out, so we're down to the offensive insanity that is the Cal League to bail out a rather anemic system today... well, it's still going on, and the Sixty-Sixers are tied at 5. Yung-Chi Chen keeps hitting... seriously, why is he still down there? SA has a number of middle-infielders? Then have him play third, or SS. And hey, there's a certain brother of a famous MLB SS/1B who's unaccountably taken over the starting 2b job in Tacoma....

Tomorrow: Felix the Cat goes up against Joe Blanton the Fat at 7pm. You should watch, because Felix is really quite good, and the A's offense, save for Moneyballer Nick Swisher, has been terrible. Couple that with a lot of foul territory, a great IF defense and this is probably your best chance to see a no-hitter until....well, until Felix pitches again.

3 Comments:

At 5/15/2006 9:49 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Curto said on the broadcast that they didn't know whether Livingston would be going back to the rotation, or just used out of the bullpen from now on.

I'm still high on him, though his ML time seemed like it was from some bizarro alternate universe (wildness? From Livingston????). Where do you think he'll end up - rotation or pen - and why?

Gotta love the Tacoma crowd that gets on the visiting players for foul language. One particularly chivalrous fan yelled at them that there were women and children in attendance before the bucket hat-wearing fun squad guy came to break it all up. Can't get that kind of action at the Safe!

 
At 5/16/2006 10:07 AM, Blogger marc w. said...

I think he'll end up in the rotation. He's just not a shut-down bullpen guy, so he'd basically become a latter-day John Halama in mop-up duty.
On the other hand, he could develop into a half-decent 3 starter, and that's a very valuable thing to have. I'd be shocked if the team wasn't grooming him for that. It didn't look like it in his call-up, but of course it didn't look much like anything (take a week off, rookie!), and they may have wanted him to get a taste of MLB hitting so he knows what he has to work on.

I heard about some fan yelling at Tom Wilson and the ump and fun-squaders breaking it up. Ah, MiLB. Still, I never thought I'd see the day when my fellow Tacomans are concerned about foul language. What next? Tacomans chiding fellow spectators for drinking?

I'll be at the game this morning... you coming up?

 
At 5/16/2006 10:37 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Yeah, I'm coming up. Swapped my regular CWW off day (yesterday) for today.

Bringing a retired state employee with me, and then another slacker (taking the day off) and his son are going to come and sit in the front row seats by us, because I know those people won't show up. I know you like to sit behind home, but feel free to come crash our party if you like. We could all learn stuff from you.

Those fans were really ticked off about the language - that's why they were booing not only Wilson (who initially threw the tantrum) but Andino as well (who said something to the effect of 'leave him the f*** alone' to the fans). I thought it was sort of quaint in a totally Tacoma way.

 

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