Sharks take a bite out of Vancouver's playoff hopes

Hoboken finally lost, 8-0 to South Boston. Dontrelle Willis hurled 7 shutout innings, giving up only four hits and two walks. Vladimir Guerrero hit two homers and drove in four runs to give the Gang enough offense for the victory. The Cutters fell back into a fifth place tie.

Honolulu completed their sweep of Vancouver with a 12-7 smackdown yesterday. Ben Sheets was crushed for seven runs in two innings and Adrian Gonzalez went 3-5 with a homer and three RBIs. The Sharks moved into fourth place, while Vancouver's playoff hopes seem to be disappearing by the day.

Hillsborough defeated Las Vegas 4-1 to remain the top outsider, only 1/2 game back of sixth. D.C. was idle and remains tied with Hoboken for fifth. Justin Verlander pitched a complete game 3-hitter, surrendering only one unearned run to improve to 14-8 on the season.

Arkansas and Carolina remain somewhat alive in the playoff chase, both shutting out their opponents yesterday. Arkansas blanked Marietta for the second straight day, 4-0 behind Curt Schilling. Schilling allowed 10 hits but struck out 10 Mighty Men. Carolina meanwhile had an unlikely shutout from Jason Jennings, who had been getting smacked around this year. You may remember him giving up 20 runs to the Sugar Bears back on April 2nd and 13 runs on July 2nd to D.C. (maybe he shouldn't pitch on the second day of the month?). Jennings held the Sardines to four hits over nine innings.

Marietta, by the way, has now lost three in a row and is not sitting as comfortably at the top wild card seat. Luckily for them there is a lot of shuffling going on in the lower ranks. With Vancouver, Hillsborough, and Newark coming up next on their schedule, the Mighty Men will have to prove that they belong.

Day of Blowouts

D.C. pounded the snot out of Carolina yesterday, 15-8. Esteban German, filling in for the injured Luis Castillo, was 5-6 with three doubles and four runs scored. Lyle Overbay was 4-5 with 6 RBIs and Alfonso Soriano went 3-6 with 4 RBIs. Altogether, D.C. slapped out 20 hits and walked 10 times. Carolina starter Jason Jennings, no stranger to getting bitchslapped (bushslapped?), surrendered 13 runs and 14 hits in 4.1 innings.

Meanwhile in Hillsborough, the Hired Hitmen scored early and often against the South Boston Gang, taking the contest 12-4. Jason Bartlett was 3-3 with 2 stolen bases and Brad Hawpe hit a pinch-hit grand slam in the sixth. With the win, Hillsborough evened up their record at 53-53.

Finally in Vancouver, the Iron Fist were once again shellacked, this time by Arkansas, 16-4. It looked like a close contest in the beginning. Starter Ben Sheets had given up five runs, but Vancouver climbed back to make it a one run game after a 4-run fourth. Then in the eighth all hell broke loose. You knew it was going to be a bad inning when Wes Littleton hit Barry Bonds with the first pitch. Both benches cleared, but it was mostly just a lot of screaming. Bonds was forced to leave the game. Littleton was able to get two outs, though he allowed two more to score, then the two-out rally began. Brian Sweeney was called in to stop the bleeding, but instead cut the wound deeper. Seven runs crossed the plate that inning and four more in the ninth. Orlando Cabrera was 5-5 in the game with 4 runs and 4 RBIs and Brandon Phillips also drove in four.

Meanwhile, in a return to sanity, Las Vegas and Sardine City's starters duelled but Vegas prevailed 2-1 in the end. Cole Hamels pitched well for the Sardines (7 IP, 2 ER, 6 H, 7 K), but it was not enough against Oliver Perez's brilliant outing. A rare sight this year (Perez is 5-14 with an 8.87 ERA on the season), Perez pitched 8 innings, surrendering only one run and seven hits, while striking out seven.

Newark rallied to beat Team Buddah yesterday. The Buddahs were clinging to a 3-2 lead late in the contest, when Bobby Abreu hit a two run shot off Todd Jones, giving the Sugar Bears the lead back. Both starters pitched brilliantly but were not factors in the decision. Tom Gorzelanny limited the mighty Sugar Bear offense to three hits and one run in six innings, while Javier Vazquez struck out 12 Buddahs in 6.1 innings for the Sugar Bears.

Wagner blows

Well by now everyone knows that Alex Rodriguez's consecutive games streak is over at 1054 games. The streak started back in 2000, lasted through four ownership changes, a position change from shortstop to third base, and several playoff appearances. Honolulu's Miguel Tejada now holds the longest current streak at 930 games. Nick Punto will replace A-Rod for now, unless another replacement is signed off the waiver wire.

Billy Wagner had his 50th career blown save and sixth of the season. Wagner inherited a 6-3 lead in the ninth inning, but Wagner was wild. Wagner walked the first two batters he faced, then hit Reed Johnson, then threw a wild pitch. Wagner allowed three runs to score, all without a single base hit and left the bases loaded. Chris Britton was brought in and got Vernon Wells to line out, but the winning run scored on the sacrifice.

Perhaps in the most unlikely pitchers duel of the season, Carolina's Jason Jennings and South Boston's Dontrelle Willis battled it out for eight innings before Ramon Hernandez broke the tie with an RBI-single. Jennings lowered his ERA to 7.69 and Willis to 8.55.

Pitching Breakdown

Honolulu kept their string alive by crushing New Jersey 9-2 yesterday. Jered Weaver improved to 4-1 on the year. The first overall selection in this year's draft also has a 2.30 ERA (4th), 45 Ks (tied for 3rd) and 8.6 R/9 (1st). Weaver is not only justifying his lofty draft status, but is also making a case for the Listach Award. Honolulu will next face the struggling Mudcats today in Carolina.

Two pitchers went down yesterday. The first was a crushing blow for the Marietta Mighty Men. Rookie starter Francisco Liriano - he of the hot spring and great start to the season - will be lost for most of this month. Marietta will replace him with Gil Meche, formerly of Vancouver. That's not the only rotation turnover in Marietta though. The Mighty Men have given up on their home/away platoon and have tossed both Brett Tomko and Mark Hendrickson overboard. They will be replaced by Jeff Suppan.

The other pitcher lost to injury was New Jersey's Jake Westbrook. Westbrook had pitched in only his second game since returning from a prior injury before succumbing to his latest ailment. Westbrook will once again be replaced by Livan Hernandez, who was awful in his brief tryout before (0-2, 11.20 ERA). Westbrook will miss around two weeks.

By the way, did you see Jason Jennings breathe a huge sigh of relief when he realized that he wasn't facing the Sugar Bears this week? In fact Jennings pitched 7.1 innings against South Boston without allowing any runs and lowering his ERA to a still high, but at least single digit, 9.37.

Crunch with Punch KOs Jennings

Wow, anyone catch that football game in Newark last night? The Sugar Bears pounded the crap out of Carolina, especially starter Jason Jennings. Jennings got into trouble right off the bat and in fact, the Sugar Bears batted around once before Jennings retired a batter. Jennings walked leadoff hitter Bobby Abreu, in a sign of things to come, and proceeded to walk 11 more batters in the inning! Wow. Jennings also gave up 10 hits in the first. The Sugar Bears were already up 8-0 when Jim Edmonds smashed a grand slam over the head of Rocco Baldelli. Later in the inning, Nick Johnson hit a triple to run the score to 19-0, setting a new record for most runs in an inning. The Sugar Bears batted around twice in the inning. In the second, Jennings only surrendered a solo homer to Gregg Zaun, setting a new record for most earned runs allowed by one pitcher in a game with 20. Jennings ended up with the following atrocious stat line: 2 IP, 12 hits, 20 earned runs, 11 walks and 3 strikeouts. I bet those three feel like chumps.

And on the complete opposite end of the spectrum... D.C.'s Kelvim Escobar and Philly's Erik Bedard and their bullpens battled through a 0-0 game into extra innings until Reed Johnson finally broke the tie in the bottom of the tenth with a walk-off double that scored Scott Rolen. Escobar pitched six innings and allowed only two hits and four walks, while Bedard pitched seven and allowed only five hits and one walk. Both struck out five hitters each.

Vancouver's David Ortiz continues his home run tear, swatting two off Hillsborough starter Jeremy Bonderman. Ortiz now has 11 on the year to lead the league.

If you didn't catch it, there's a new Zane Smith article up on the site.