Week Eight: Summary of Series

Sass win again!
Lead held after relaxing weekend
By Beth Sass / hereforthesass.blogspot.com

The Here for the Sass team reported that they won their second series in a row, this time with a score of 8-4. This also put the Sass up to 14th place out of 18 teams. Because of this, cake and wine (non-alcoholic for the children) were served in the dugout, as well as an order of balloons from Ghetto Cub.

“We’re moving up! This is so totally awesome. Winning is FUN!” Beth said.

Although earlier this week the Sass held a greater lead, they were just pleased to hang on for the win.

“I know we were doing much better earlier in the week, but it was our usual weekend problem. And our pitching melt-down issue,” Beth explained.

Pitching melt-down seems the trouble spot of the Sass. While they are all perfectly capable of putting on a fine pitching performance, once one pitcher has a bad outing, all the other pitchers follow in sympathy.

“Kristin is our reliable guy, but he started out this week with a craptastic performance, and finished the week with a slightly better, but still not even close to stellar, performance,” Dawn said.

The batters finished the week with a sweep, taking all six categories, while the pitchers could only manage two of six. The scores were: runs (26-20), home runs (9-4), RBI (31-20), stolen bases (2-1), walks (21-12), batting average (.290-.279), wins (1-3), saves (0-1), strike-outs (36-40), holds (4-0), ERA (5.62-5.48), and WHIP (1.53-1.62).

“Wow. We hit--and walked--really well,” Adam Dunn said. “Winning two weeks in a row is a bit heady. I know we have a tough competition this coming week, but I hope we can bring out our best game--both sides of the game--and pick up another victory. Because it’s fun to see Beth and Dawn smiling.”

Jermaine Dye was given the Hitter Award of the week, as he had the most runs (5), home runs (3), and walks (8), while tied with Carlos Guillen for the most stolen bases (1). Juan Encarnacion had the most RBI’s, at 7, while Michael Cuddyer had the highest batting average (.316). Among the bench players, Emil Brown led the way with 3 RBIs, while Doug Mientkiewicz had 2 runs, and Mark Grudzielanek had a batting average of .500. Little Nicky Punto did not have an opportunity to play as he spent most of the week putting together the weekend package for Dawn.

“I’m honored to have the Weekly Hitter Award,” JEn said, smiling. “I know I had some pretty poor weeks earlier this year that frustrated Beth and Dawn a lot, so I’m glad I’ve finally come out of that funk. I’m really grateful that Beth and Dawn didn’t give up on me. It would’ve been easy to do. I was ready to give up on myself too many times, but they were always there, giving me another chance.”

The pitchers, on the other hand, made Beth and Dawn cringe--again.

Among the starters, the Weekly Starter Award went to Aaron Harang, who led the starters in every category--except wins, saves, and holds, which no Sassian starter had any. Aaron H. had 8 strike-outs, an ERA of 2.57, and his WHIP was 1.29.

“A whole week without a single win? That’s pretty sad,” Aaron H. said. “We really have to go out this week and get back on track. It’s completely unfair to our batters.”

The relievers did slightly better, with Brandon Medders getting the lone Sass win; Julio Mateo and Matt Guerrier both picking up 5 strike-outs, Matt, Ambiorix Burgos, Carlos Silva, and Julio all picking up holds; Brandon and Julio both had ERAs of 0.00; and Julio’s WHIP was .25.

“Whoa. Those are some good numbers we threw up there,” Brandon said, with a touch of awe in his voice. “If we can keep this stuff up, it will take a lot of pressure off of our starters. If they trust us, they can have more confidence in the games, and they’ll pitch better.”

Beth agreed, “They are doing well. I’m quite impressed with the Sassian relievers. We know we have issues not having a real closer, but it’s quite impressive the Hold Machine they’re turning into. I’m quite pleased with this, and I hope they continue.”

This week the Sass face the Tygers, who are currently in 11th place.

"Let's try for another win," Beth said. "The Tygers like to take weekends off, too, so let's see if we can actually continue to compete through a weekend!"