SIM COMPLETE - 1984 - Regular Season 19

[Andrew]

Next Sim: Thursday

Please double check the trades and make sure I got everything in. Also double check the traded draft picks thread.

There is another round of interleague play during Sunday's sim so IL teams make sure to check your DH lineups.

[Sully]

Two All Star caliber players on contending teams had their season end tonight. Ouch.

[Whale]

After sweeping first place Maine, and splitting 4 games with WC leader Pitt, the Whalers take 2 of 3 from both first place Dallas and first place Sin City...making us 16 of the last 21. This puts us back above .500 for the first time this season.

[Pat]

The Washington Bats lose their closer Dave Beard for 10-11 months.

Fuck.

[Andrew]

I'm going to test out elprez's theory about players performing better at certain positions this next sim. Neto Bermeo has been filling in for Sanchez at SS all year and is hitting like absolute shit. I'm going to try moving him back to 2B and see what happens.

[spot]

So...

The "big" trade goes through on 7/30 and I place Boladeres in the bullpen to get a feel for the guy.

On 7/31 I get a message from the same Boladeres saying he doesn't appreciate pitching out of the pen because "he is a starter".

On 8/1 he takes the ball to start off the 6th inning, relieving fellow trade-mate Maroales. He throws 9 pitches to 3 batters recording exactly 1 out and then ruptures a disk in his back: out for a month.

Did I mention that I was only kidding about the Van Slyke trade???




On a better note we went 4-2 and remain 5 back of WC. We opened a can on Washington (You can take your broom back...) and were still unable to take a series from Virginia. Virginia has more wins and a better winning % against Los Alamos than any other team in the BLB.

Onward I guess...

[Lintyfresh85]

3-3 sim after a 4-2 sim. It would have been too much to ask for back to back winning sims.

Hopefully we can keep playing average ball. Three more wins and we've got more than last year. Yippee.

[Delandis]

In two games so far in Baltimore:

Ghaniy: 1-1, 1.76 ERA, 7 SO, .170 OAVG.....pretty nice.

I think we've got a nice little lineup to compete down the stretch. Now Latham has lost his bat, though. Probably because he's tired. How much does a player need to get back to 100%?

[Spectre]

Puerias agreed to the extension, thank goodness. He's getting paid well but less than what he would have gotten in FA. His contract value decreases as the contract goes along as well.

[Pat]

2-4 road sim. After being swept 0-3 to Los Alamos, Washington bounced back to take 2 of 3 against Philadelphia.

The Good:
-SP Joe Chavarraga is the best SP in the BLB. The #1 VORP SP in the league raised the bar this sim when facing another one of the leagues best, Philadelphia's Joe Aurillo. Chav pitched his 2nd CG of the season, giving up just 1 ER, off 5 H, 0 BB, and 9 Ks. He is now on pace to finish the season 18-4, 1.90 ERA, 251.2 IP, 280 Ks, .89 WHIP.
-Catcher Jerry Fortin had his best month of the season in July, and so far in August he has a 1.154 OPS through four games.

The Bad
-LF Steve Bing has completely lost it. Three straight seasons of .820+ OPS, still just 29, in a contract year, he is completely shitting the bed. He is now hitting .240, with a .705 OPS. In the month of July he went 10/72 for a .139 average.
-SP Romano Gonzalez is in a total funk. Three straight seasons of sub 2.90 ERA, a career season in 1983, he is on pace to finish the year 6-16 with a 4.10 ERA.

The Ugly
-Closer Dave Beard is lost for 11 months. I started the year with Lambarria as my closer. He had a major summer meltdown, so I gave the ball to Beard. He respondsby converting seven of eight save opportunities over two months. Then he gets hurt. I guess it is time for closer #3 on the year, likely recently acquired Merlin Thompson. I have now lost my closer/best RP for 11 months, after losing my best overall player (1B Joe Sierra) for 12 months. The luck of the draw...

Playoff Outlook
-The Bats have been playing poorly, but so has Morgantown and Wilmington. It is amazing, Virginia is now only 11 games back. My pyt. record suggests that I should cruise into the post-season, but I'm not sure of what to expect when I get there. I am 2nd in the IL in runs, and 2nd in the IL in runs given up, but I don't know if I can beat the better teams in the league. If Chav continues to pitch like he has all year, and I can get him two starts a series, I guess anything is possible.

Next Week
-Here is a real test. Three-game series versus Davenport, then a three-game series versus Baltimore, both legit playoff contenders. If I can win each series, I will feel really good about my squad. The following week the Bats travel to Hartford to face the red-hot Whalers, and then the DL-best Maine Guides. Two weeks of tough games.

[Matt]

3-3...not too bad, didn't move much on the Co-Commish Cup.

Our stud new FA 3rd baseman Bob Kett is batting a cool .100 in his first 6 games. He was released by Cal so maybe he will turn things around like his brother in arms CF Carl Kingsbury.

In 28 games Kingsbury is batting .360/.450/.610 with 5 HR and 14 RBI's.

Also in 34 games LF Malcolm Hanson, who I got off waivers, is batting .276/.280/.528 with 7 HR's and 18 RBI's.

Finally P Hernandez Mejla, another waiver wire steal, is 4-2 with a 2.36 ERA

[mahoney2]

This was a quality sim for Pawtucket. After dropping the first two games to Miss. we took the next four including a sweep of Syracuse.

#3 overall pick Hector Gonzalez is absolutely killing the ball in Single A. Hitting .340 and putting up an OPS of over .900 since he was drafted. As I said in the Baseball America thread, 1984 15th Round Pick Raul Salas after only getting 1 at bat has had two ratings increases and is now the #63 overall prospect in the BLB.

[Clay]

Another .500 SIM for the Colonials...

1-2 @ Batavia -- These Muckdogs just play us tough. We had to scratch out a late inning win to steal one in the series.

2-1 v Los Alamos -- Played the Bandits tough. They hammered "The Skull" in our only loss in the series. Touched him up early and chased him after just one inning.

Notes:

- Wilton Harcourt hits two more bombs to reach 27 and extend his lead in the HR race.

- Joe Negron has been a welcome addition to the pen making 3 more appearances this week for a total of 7 in Colonial's Uni. Because, I believe a reliever's ERA never tells the full story.... I'll just mention that his WHIP is sitting at 0.84 and his BABIP is sitting at .148. Call it a bad trade, but I know my team needs pen help.

- Fan interest crashed with the loss of Jorge Taracena. No shocker.

- Joshua Poling made his BLB debut on Thursday going 0 for 5 with 3K's in his first game against Batavia. After getting those first game jitters out of the way, he played the entire Los Alamos series going 4/10 with 2 RBI, 2 BB and 0 K. Stay Tuned.

STOUT UPDATE

I know it seems small... but we take small victories in Virginia.

For the second straight month, the Colonials were the only team in the Stout with an above .500 record for the month.

Virginia
Record in June 14-12, .538 PCT
Record in July 13-12, .520 PCT

Washington
Record in June 13-13, .500 PCT
Record in July 12-13, .480 PCT

Morgantown
Record in June 11-15, .423 PCT
Record in July 9-17, .346 PCT

Wilmington
Record in June 11-15, .423 PCT
Record in July 8-17, .320 PCT

In the past two months, Virginia has gained 2 games on the Bats, 7 games on the Mohawks and 8 games on the Wildcats.

Again, small victories... but you have to start somewhere.

[Plastic]

A sweet 1-5 sim. We are losing our new team shine, having struggled the last two months. All in all still sitting better than I thought we would be at this time in the season.

[Clay]

A sweet 1-5 sim. We are losing our new team shine, having struggled the last two months. All in all still sitting better than I thought we would be at this time in the season.

Water finds its level