Well, if you read my last post, you know my opinion of the Silver Sox pitching efforts. Well, I guess it could be worse. I looked at the box scores from the last few days and Yuma has surrendered 70 runs in 3 games. You read that right--70! I thought I was reading football scores:
06/22/08 ST. GEORGE 30 @ YUMA 16
06/23/08 YUMA 19 @ ST. GEORGE 17
06/24/08 YUMA 12 @ ST. GEORGE 21
Well, it appears to be a league wide epidemic. A poster on the Our Sports Central website posted this:
Out of the 101 games played so far, as of June 23rd... 54 of those games had at least one team score 10 or more runs. Of those 101 games as well, there were at least 17 games where at least one team scored at least 15 runs or more. That's a lot of scoring.
So I guess everyone who has voted on the poll on this site for bad pitching are spot on. I am not sure why it is so bad this year. Definitely the worst year yet for pitching in the league. The Sox, unfortunately, lead that pack with a league worst 9.52 ERA. But whatever the reason, I believe it is hurting the GBL's image as a professional league. Granted, I know their metric is how many players they've sent to affiliated ball but I would argue that the average fan won't take the league seriously when you have the winning team score more than 10 runs in over half the contests. I scanned the Northern and American leagues and they are nothing like ours in terms of runs scored. The United, however, is pretty close. So I think we still have a ways to go attendance wise and quality wise (at least statistically speaking) before the GBL becomes a premier indy league. Not saying I'll stop being a fan, just putting it out there.
June 24, 2008 -- Well, the Sox pitching woes continue. Their pitching sent them to a 10-1 defeat to drop to 7-18 and lose their 5th straight game. Jesse Hall left in the 3rd (injury maybe?) giving up 4 runs on 5 hits and surrendering 4 walks with one strike out. Next in the shooting gallery was Chris Fields. First the good news--Fields pitched 3 scoreless innings in relief. Unfortunately, it came after a 6-run fourth inning marked by Fields throwing the ball away multiple times on an intentional walk, a hits batsman, and a run walked in. Scott Schneider was activated and pitched an inning of scoreless relief so that was good. However, it was too little too late as the Sox offense was held to just one run on a solo shot by Ryan Brown.
June 25, 2008 -- Well pitching put the team in a huge hole again but this time they were able to slug their way out of it against a very capable Vipers bullpen so my hat is off to the offense. Our pitching woes came from Kevin Frederick who is yet to get on track this season. Last night he gave up seven earned runs in just 4.1 innings of work. Frustration showed all night as he argued the strikezone with the umpire. By the team he was pulled, Jeff Leonard was ejected as he argued balls and strikes on his behalf. Then Frederick headed to the umpire with nothing to lose to continue the complaining. I feel his frustration since our pitching has been just plain bad. Kevin, as the sole pitcher with Major League experience probably feels the pressure moreso since he is not having a great year either--0-1 with a 9.61 ERA in 6 games. He left on two batters and Mario Guilen came in and allowed the bases to run full before surrendering a grand slam to Travis Drader. Guilen would settle down before yeilding to Reggie Leslie who gave up a run as well. The Sox would rally to take the lead and it actually held up as Eduardo Perez came in and closed the door for the win and his second save of the year.
On the offensive side, the Sox delivered a multi-faceted attack which included a home run from Juan Senreiso (6 on the year), a triple, 3 doubles, 9 singles and 4 stolen bases in front of 1007 fans in Calgary. D.J. Dixon continues to lead the team with a .398 and a .687 slugging percentage. Of course, Ryan Crespi also deserves a shout out since he has a .390 average with 22 more at bats than Dixon. He also is second on the team with 12 stolen bases (Gary Harris has 14).
June 26, 2008 -- More of the same as last night; pitching put the Sox in a hole and they slugged their way out of a loss. Russell gave up 6 runs in six innings; Schneider gave up 1 in 1; Fuda gave up 4 (1 earned) in 1.2; and DelaCruz struck out the only batter he faced to secure his third save on the season. Russell got the win.
Offensively, the Sox knocked out 23 hits and scored at least one run in every inning to batter the Cats in a 13-11 victory. Crespi and Madrid each had a homer while Steven Alexander chipped in with two.
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2 comments:
One reason the score was so high in the 30-18 St. George/Yuma game it was played in Blythe, CA not in Yuma's Desert Sun Stadium. The game was at Alexander Park, which has been described as a bandbox. The Road Runners hitting 10 homers in the game probably confirms that. I've only stopped for gas in Blythe, so I've never seen the field.
Edward Ford
SportsNetUSA.net
(home of the OC Flyers)
Thanks for that insight. I think that explains a lot about those outrageous scores. I looked in the box scores but didn't see that the location was Blythe. Thanks for the info!
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