Week Six: Summary of Series

Taking the weekend off
Good start completely foiled by weekend off
By Beth Sass / hereforthesass.blogspot.com

MINNEAPOLIS - The Here for the Sass team played very well and were very competitive versus Team Neut last week, but a weekend of poor performances by most Sass players meant a poor overall finish. The final score was 3-8.

It was reported that a couple of players were confused by the schedule, and seemed to think that this weekend was just exhibition games. SBGF had released an official announcement saying that the weekend was for exhibition. He later retracted the statement, but the retraction did not reach all members of the Sass before the weekend games commenced.

The Sass managed to win in RBIs (25-21), walks (22-15), and batting average (.266-.262), while tying in wins (4). Their losses came in runs (26-30), home runs (4-6), stolen bases (1-4), saves (1-4), strike-outs (37-42), holds (0-2), ERA (5.19-2.96), and WHIP (1.55-1.41).

“Really, we remained strong all week. We just barely lost a couple of those categories. The guys did well. I’ll admit there was some poor managing on my part,” Beth said.

Injuries also played a role in this past week’s performances, with Justin Duchscherererer going on the DL, and a couple other Sass players being a little worse for the wear, but narrowly avoiding the DL. Because of this, Beth and Dawn were unable to get them in the line-ups.

“Although,” Dawn said, “The Royals sweep of the Indians did help our team immensely.”

The team leaders for hitting were as follows: runs, Michael Cuddyer (6); home runs, A.J. Pierzynski, Adam Dunn, Edwin Encarnacion, and Jermaine Dye (1); RBI, Carlos Guillen, and Jermaine Dye (4); stolen bases, Adam (1); walks, Adam (4); and average, Little Nicky Punto (.667, with limited at-bats), and Mark Grudzielanek (.429, with significant at-bats).

“Jermaine and A.J. are a little upset with their performance, to tell you the truth. They’re glad they helped the team, but they managed to get multiple hits against Twins pitchers this week, and that invokes the ‘No Cookies’ law. Since they both hit home runs against Carlos Silva, they were both banned for a period of one week,” Beth said.

A.J. and Jermaine both sent apologies to Silva, but the damage was done. Mrs. Guillen, wife of Carlos G., fully supports the ruling.

Adam was the most amused by his stats for the week. “I feel kinda powerful, to tell you the truth. My batting average for the week was a paltry .091, and I still walked 4 times. That’s saying something about their fear of my bat!”

The Sass pitchers, on the other hand, would have done well to fear opposing players’ bats. The performances this week only earned them a tie.

The team leaders among the starters were: wins, Kristin Benson, Aaron Cook, and Carlos Silva (1); strike-outs, Aaron Cook (6); ERA and WHIP, Kristin (1.29 and 0.71). Among the relievers, the leaders were: wins and saves, Ambiorix Burgos (1 and 1); strikes-outs, Ambiorix and Brandon Medders (5); ERA, Matt Guerrier and Brandon (0.00); and WHIP, Matt (0.86).

“The consistency we see from Kristin is so nice. He’s a guy we throw out there every week and he’s on top of the game. Like all starters, he’ll have a bad outing here and there, but we always know he’ll keep us in the game,” Beth said. She paused and then said, thoughtfully, “I hope that doesn’t jinx him.”

The Sass are looking forward to some increases performances in pitching this week, although they’re just not quite sure how they’re going to manage with four pitchers on the DL. There is hope that Julio Mateo will return this week. The doctors and trainers in Nice have indicated that he’s been able to throw without pain, but they still have not cleared him to return to the Sass. In the meantime, they have added Chan Ho Park to their roster.

In other news, Carlos S. has been removed from his starting pitching duties. He will spend some time with the Sass doing relief appearances, when needed, and will spend the remainder of the time with pitching coach Bronson Arroyo, both working on pitching and doing back-up vocals on Bronson and Matt’s first collaborative album.

“He will also be required to clean the hot tub morning. We coddle our lads on the DL, but we don’t coddle our players in the big leagues. Clearly, just dragging the field was not enough motivation for Carlos,” Beth said.

Dawn reported that Kyle Lohse will be mowing the outfield at Sass stadium Tuesday, as the Sass team will be away on a road series.