Hillsborough loses ground on shaky playoff spot

Philadelphia broke their recent hex and came out on top of Las Vegas yesterday with a 12-10 win. The Animals jumped out to an early 7-2 lead but the Rat Pack came back and led 10-7 by the end of the 6th. Albert Pujols tied up the game at 10 in the 8th inning with a 2-run homer, then Jorge Posada hit a 2-run homer in the following inning to give the Animals the win. The Animals desparately needed the win after dropping into double-digit games behind Morris Division-leading Vancouver.

Newark extended their winning streak to 11 games after a 5-3 defeat of the Hitmen. The Hitmen made a noble effort to come back in the later stages of the game, but fell short. Jack Cust hit his 40th homer of the season for Newark and Chien Ming Wang improved to 12-5 on the season. Hillsborough lost ground in the playoff race as both Sardine City and Tampa Bay won their respective games. The Plunkers are now only one game behind Hillsborough, while Sardine City trails by 3 games.

Arkansas and Carolina keep falling deeper and deeper into irrelevance, as far as the playoff race is concerned. The Falcons dropped their 6th straight game, a 5-3 loss to the aforementioned Straphangers. Meanwhile Carolina lost to the Cutters 5-3 making it 4 in a row for the Mudcats.

Two DL moves were made yesterday. Las Vegas once again turns to Jason Hirsh to patch up their rotation. Tim Lincecum, who replaced injured Erik Bedard in the rotation, was placed on the DL to make room. Hirsh was 0-2 with a 3.71 ERA and 1.46 WHIP in 4 starts during his last tour of duty with the team. Meanwhile, Sardine City picked up journeyman catcher Yorvit Torrealba to fill in while Miguel Olivo recuperates. Torrealba had previously played for Arkansas where he briefly replaced Olivo as well.