Sim 11 review
For the second week running in June the Sluggers notched four wins and finished the week over .500. Carlos Rivera opened the week with a rare start and couldn’t complete the sweep at California. Louisville returned home for a homestand with the Genius’s new team, Wichita, and also Montreal. Having been swept in Wichita Louisville were keen to show him that they had moved on. He received a warm welcome in the opening game of a four-game set but he got no love on the field with two runs in the sixth enough for a 5-4 win. The second game saw the sixth innings decide it again, this time four from the Aviators was the catalyst for a 6-3 win. 7-4 & 5-3 wins wrapped up the series and levelled the season’s tally at 4-4, the sides won’t meet again until mid-September in Wichita. Montreal were down and out in their series opener as the Sluggers were 12-1 up after six innings. In an error strewn game Louisville gave five of the backup players a few AB’s from the sixth onwards but the Blazers could only take advantage of that to pull back to 12-6. The last game saw Montreal gain some measure of revenge, they scored seven without reply in the first two innings and as both sides kept their starting line-ups on the field only one more run was scored as Sluggers went down 7-1.
Clough has 2,952 career hits, 16th all time in the BBA
Gabriel Talamante continued his hot bat, hitting .409 for the week with one homer and four RBI. That was one of the only three homers that Sluggers managed in a powerless week, Shag Hopkins hit the other two. Despite that 56 other hits and a league leading 33 walks helped the team to four wins. The lack of current power is a bit worrying, only three have double-digit homers and only three more have five or more, some of the big hitters need to find their form if Sluggers are to make any waves in the new JL Southeast division. Rookie Pedro Saldana though hit three triples in the week which contributed to his five RBI while fellow new boy Vince Osborn had four doubles in his seven hits. Brian Clough, chasing that 3,000 hit mark, was walked nine times during the week but still managed to add six more hits to his tally; he now needs just 48 more to reach that magic number.
At the back end of the bullpen both Lando Klomp and Carlos Rosa are growing into their roles, Klomp hasn’t given up a run in June so far and has only allowed two hits while Rosa has given up one run in his last outing, the first run in five appearances on the mound. Even so it is still the pitching that is looking the weak spot at the moment, nobody is looking confident and if you look past Kevin Morales and Pepe Jaramillo there are a lot of .500 pitchers.
In the minors Wilson Padilla is 1-0 with a 0.84 ERA in his first two Double-A starts and promising outfielder John Dundee is heading for his first taste of Double-A after CF Alberto Delgardo headed for a brief DL stint. The 2035 Amateur Draft class is heading in as the Rookie ball and Short-A seasons prepare to start up next week. Negotiations are well under way with the Sluggers top picks and the front office anticipate no problems in tying them down.