Notes from around the league

Vancouver and Hoboken battled it out with Vancouver edging the Cutters 11-10 in 10 innings. Both teams got on the board early and often, leading to a 9-7 Vancouver lead after 4 innings. The Cutters clawed back and eventually tied it up on a two-run home run by Adam Dunn. The Iron Fist scored what would be the winning run off a Michael Cuddyer single in the 10th. Ronald Belisario finished the game off for his 12th save. Cuddyer ended the game 4-6 with a triple and 4 RBIs and Brad Hawpe was 4-4 with 2 doubles for the Cutters.

Jon Lester held the Falcons in check, limiting them to 3 hits over 7.1 innings, while striking out 11. Matt Kemp was 3-4 with 2 homers and 5 RBIs for Amityville in the 9-1 win.

New Jersey extended their winning streak to 6 with a 6-5 win over Hillsborough. Everyone in the Buddah lineup got one hit except Seth Smith, who had 2 hits.

Bridgewater won an important victory against the Rat Pack, ending their 3-game losing skid. Rookie Tommy Hanson held the Rats to only 4 hits in 7 innings to earn his 5th win of the year. Hanson struck out 9.

Aramis Ramirez was 5-5 with 2 homers and 3 RBIs to lead the Mudcats to an 11-6 win over the Mighty Men. The Mighty Men lost ground to both Las Vegas and Newark, who won 6-5 over Philadelphia. The Mighty Men's lead shrunk to 4 games over second-place Newark. Vegas is one game behind the Sugar Bears.

Greinke's unreal season continues against Hoboken

Zack Greinke was at it again last night, holding the Cutters to just 1 hit and 1 run in a complete game, 4-1 victory. Greinke struck out 10 in the game (his 100th of the season), improving to 10-0 on the season (and 10 apparently being the magic number of the night, Joe Thatcher saved his 10th game of the season as well). Greinke's ERA falls to a league-leading, microscopic 1.87 and is now tied for most complete games in the league (3). Vancouver extended their division lead to 3 games with the victory.

Those slugging Buddahs continued their offensive showing with a 13-3 drubbing of Hillsborough. Vlad Guerrero was 3-4 with a homer and 4 runs scored and Franklin Gutierrez continued his hot streak with a 3-5 night. The Buddahs have now won 5 in a row.

Another hot cellar-dweller is Arkansas who won their 3rd straight with a 5-3 slaying of Amityville. Cliff Lee, who had been struggling this season, pitched a solid 7 innings, giving up only 1 earned run and lowering his ERA to 7.30.

Philly survived a bigtime comeback from Newark yesterday to escape with a 7-6 win. The Animals had a 3-0 lead in the 8th, but Newark scored 2 in the bottom of the inning to bring them within one. The Animals knew they'd need some insurance so they scored 4 runs in the 9th to open up a 7-2 lead, but the Sugar Bears clawed back, capped by Adrian Beltre's 3-run homer that brought Newark to within one. Unfortunately for them, Asdrubal Cabrera popped out to center with two runners on base.

Sardine City scored 9 runs in the final two innings to stage a successful comeback against Blue Ridge and win 11-9. The Bombers were up 7-2, but Sardine City rallied to tie the game up at 7. Blue Ridge scored two more runs to retake the lead, but the Sardines kept rolling. James Loney started it off with a solo homer with one out, then Blue Ridge fell apart, giving up a 3-run homer to Willie Harris. Mike Wuertz struck out 3 of the 4 batters he faced to earn his 13th save.

Gutierrez, Bay bash their way to victory

Carolina, who's been in a bit of a freefall since being in first earlier this season, scored an important win over first place Vancouver. Barry Zito held the Iron Fist to 6 hits and no runs in 7 innings and struck out 9 en route to a 2-0 victory. Mat Latos pitched an impressive game for the losing end, giving up only 1 earned run on 3 hits in 7 innings, but it wasn't enough. The win was just the 3rd in the last 10 for Carolina.

Jason Bay's 2 home runs propelled the Mighty Men to a 7-5 win over Hoboken. Alberto Callaspo was also 3-4 in the game for the Mighty Men, who preserved their 5 game lead in the Hanover Division. The Mighty Men have dealt with injuries to their outfield, but have continued to play top shelf ball, currently riding a 3 game winning streak.

The Mallers slump continued as they were mercilessly shelled by the Sugar Bears 13-3. Jorge Posada was 4-5 with 3 RBIs and Mike Cameron had 5 RBIs for Newark. Brad Bergesen held the Mallers to just 5 hits. The Mallers have now fallen into 4th place in the Morris Division. Last week the Mallers lost 7 in a row to fall out of first place and hope that these last two games aren't an indication of a new streak.

Franklin Gutierrez hit 3 home runs - but drove in only 4 - to lead Team Buddah to a 7-5 win over Amityville. The Buddahs' offense has apparently awoken in the last few games, as the 7 runs was the lowest total in their last 5 games. The Buddahs have won the last 4 games, scoring 8 runs twice and 16 once. Buddah also score 8 runs in their last loss to Hoboken. They've got a long way to go, however, sitting 16 1/2 games out of first and 11 1/2 out of a playoff spot.

Remember when Alex Rodriguez was struggling for the Rat Pack shortly after being acquired from Amityville? Well that seems like a long time ago now with A-Rod tearing the cover off the ball. A-Rod is now hitting .284/.357/.670 since joining the Rat Pack with 11 homers and 22 RBIs. Yesterday, A-Rod again led the offense with 2 homers and 5 RBIs, but the Rats dropped a 9-7 decision to Sardine City.

Morales mops up the competition

Yeah it was no contest this week for the JR Cigars Smokin' Batter of the Week. Blue Ridge's Kendry Morales blew away all competition with his stellar week. Morales hit .556 (20-36) this week with a .568 OBP and 1.194 slugging, hit 5 doubles, 6 home runs, scored 13 runs and drove in a whopping 20! We're going to send Kendry two boxes of smokes this week.

Some notable runners up: Bridgewater's Brian McCann (.458/.462/1.125, 4 HR, 12 RBI), Hillsborough's Carlos Gonzalez (.480/.500/.880, 2 3Bs, 7 R), Vancouver's Ryan Ludwick (.375/.423/.833, 3 HR, 7 R, 8 RBI), and New Jersey's Seth Smith (.379/.419/.966, 4 HR, 10 R, 14 RBI).

This week's Laugh Man Pitcher of the Week Award goes to Newark's Marc Rzepczynski. Rzepczynski was 1-0 with a 2.25 ERA and 1.08 WHIP, holding his opponents to only 5 hits in 12 innings of work.

Other top pitchers: Blue Ridge's Gavin Floyd was 1-0 with a 3.07 ERA and 1.09 WHIP and struck out 21 batters in 14.2 innings, Vancouver's Kevin Millwood (2-0, 2.45), Philadelphia's Jered Weaver (1-1, 2.93, 13 K), Las Vegas' Rich Harden (2-0, 3.09, 17 K), and Carolina's Burke Badenhop (8 IP of relief, 0.88 WHIP, 6 K).

Troubling news from Diamond Mind Baseball?

For those of you who don't follow this stuff -- OK, just about everybody on the planet -- Diamond Mind Baseball was purchased a couple years ago by a company called Imagine Sports. (Diamond Mind Baseball isn't just the name of our league; it's the name of the company that makes the software that Yaro uses to simulate our seasons.)

Ever since it was purchased, people have been concerned that they would stop supporting the software and just switch to an online-only model. That hasn't happened yet, but on Thursday, the owner of Imagine Sports made the following announcement:

It’s no secret that Imagine Sports acquired Diamond Mind for strategic reasons connected to its online games, not because we wanted to own a pc sports game business. The online games have been and always will be our priority, and, yes, Tom knew that when he sold the company. Nonetheless, we always thought that we could keep the PC game business going for you all, as we figured it could at least cover its costs. To demonstrate that and as a show of good faith, we tried to change very little (at first), and we put out version 9c, for which you had been waiting for awhile before we were around. We continued the season disks every year, on time and with the same quality you’d come to expect (or at least we hope we did).

After getting 9c done, however, we were not really sure where to go with game. I think it showed in our communication, and our indecision led to mistakes. To be clear, however, there was never any attempt to mislead you, nor was any product offering ever held back for any reason other than it not being complete (despite some claims here to the contrary,) including version 10.

It’s also clear that I have never been able to relate well to this community, nor have I communicated effectively with it. I’m sorry about that. Rest assured, however, that I do appreciate your passion for the game, and it’s the primary reason we’ve kept it alive. It’s also clear, however, that it will not thrive again under the management of Imagine Sports, given our online focus. Therefore, we started exploring strategic alternatives for the PC game over a year ago, including licensing, development and marketing partnerships, and even an outright sale of the PC game business. We had significant discussions with at least three parties interested in the PC game. None of those discussions came to fruition, unfortunately. However, we will now make a renewed effort to work out some sort of arrangement with the hope of finding someone or some company who wants to make this game its priority. Any of your suggestions or ideas to that end are welcome, and I’ll schedule a chat to discuss those ideas after v10 is released.

Until we do find that other party to take over, we will continue selling the game and disks via the new store, and we intend to produce the 2010 season disk as usual (and, to be clear, Luke’s contract with the Red Sox carves out time in the fall for him to do it).

So what does this mean for DMBL?

Yaro can continue sim'ing the game with or without Version 10... that really won't make any difference. Version 9c works just fine. The problem is the 2010 season disk (and season disks beyond that). In the last paragraph, the owner says "we intend to produce the 2010 season disk as usual" -- well, intend is always a troubling word in PR speak, isn't it? So we'll see.

If DMB doesn't release a 2010 season disk, we can always hope that someone releases a "homebrew" version... Stephen Drake has done a number of previous seasons, maybe he'll step up again. If worse comes to worse, maybe we can start over in 1991. I have a feeling Cecil Fielder won't be the first pick this time. ;)

Greinke dominates Animals

Zack Greinke improved to 9-0 on the season with a masterful performance against Philadelphia yesterday. Greinke held the Animals to 2-hits in a complete game shutout, walking one and striking out 14. Greinke lowered his ERA to a league-leading 1.94 and extended his strikeout league. Greinke now has 90 Ks on the season. Meanwhile, Vancouver poured on the offense, scoring 8 runs. Every starter got a hit except slumping Chase Utley.

Hillsborough held off a late rally by Bridgewater and won 7-5, retaining control of the Morris Division by 1/2 a game. Wandy Rodriguez gave the Hitmen 6.1 innings of shutout ball, holding the Mallers to 5 hits and striking out 7, but the bullpen almost gave it all up for him. It looked like the final inning would be no problem as the Hitmen retired 2 of the first 3 batters, but soon Hillsborough got into trouble. With runners on first and second Felipe Lopez lined a single that scored Erick Aybar, then Derrek Lee followed up with a 2-run double. After intentionally walking Carlos Beltran, George Sherrill finally got Jose Lopez to pop up and end the game.

Well Hoboken's Edwin Jackson gambit didn't pay off, at least not right away. Jackson was hammered for 5 runs in 4.1 innings against the Sardines, but the Cutters escaped with a 7-6 victory anyway. The Cutters, who were down 5-0 at one point, clawed their way back, until in the 9th inning, they were trailing 6-5. Jose Bautista, who had entered the game earlier when Michael Young left with an injury, hit a two-run walkoff homer to win the game.

Meanwhile, Newark, who grabbed Blue Ridge's other castoff Chris Iannetta, also got a victory despite not getting anything from their new merchandise. Iannetta was 0-3, but was hit by a pitch and scored in his Newark debut.

And of course there's Blue Ridge, who did the casting off, who got pummeled by Amityville 9-2. Matt Kemp was 4-5 with 3 RBIs and Nelson Cruz hit 2 homers and also drove in 3 runs for the Ant Slayers. Jon Garland, who replaced Jackson, was hit for 6 runs in 6.1 innings, giving up 10 hits and 2 walks, while striking out only one.

Mr. Popularity

Blue Ridge, trying to shake things up Tuesday, released pitcher Edwin Jackson and catcher Chris Ianetta. Ianetta was just the backup catcher, though it seemed he was doing an adequate job (.241/.313/.552, 3 HRs in 29 ABs). But Jackson...Jackson was a solid part of the Bombers rotation. Jackson was 4-2 with a 4.21 ERA so it was a bit surprising to see him let go. Well as soon as he hit the waiver wire, his agent was getting calls left and right. Four teams had a filed a waiver claim with the commissioner's office for Jackson. Hoboken happened to be in the right place at the right time, as far as the standings go, and were awarded the claim for Jackson. Jackson will replace Anibal Sanchez in the rotation.

Jackson first appeared on the DMBL scene back in 2004 when Harrison drafted him in the 4th round. Jackson stayed in the minors all year but was no protected for the 2005 draft. Harrison must have seen something in the young hurler, so they drafted him again in 2005, this time with their 7th round pick. This time Jackson did not last with the club and was released in May. Would the Rats take him again in 2006? This time it was Vancouver who took a flyer on the pitcher in the late stages of the Supplemental Rounds, but he didn't even make it to Opening Day. By 2007, after being draft three times as an ineligible player, teams had begun to give up on Jackson. No one signed him in '07 but in 2008, Marietta took a chance with their 15th round pick. Jackson would finally see some action in 2008, getting into 5 games, but no starts. Jackson ended up 0-2 with a 4.82 ERA and 2.14 WHIP in 9.1 innings. Marietta was unimpressed and left him unprotected. Blue Ridge drafted Jackson in 2009 in the 8th round and he was protected for the first time for the 2010 draft. So Jackson now signs for the 6th time in his short career and tries to find a home. Will it be Hoboken?