Well things are starting to calm down now. More nights now at home, sort of. I can still fill in the schedule until the end of the week when the Atlantic League season comes to an end. I have no idea how but the Revolution are still alive. Overtaking Sugar Land for the division lead is all but impossible (or so it seems) but they could still make it at least going into the week. It is also doubtful that it would not come at the expense of the Barnstormers for the second straight year as they are sitting pretty to make it. It comes down to whether Somerset or Long Island would win the second half in their division and the Revs needed Somerset to win it. If Long Island wins it the Revs are done. So a big week of baseball for them but with 3 against Somerset at the end this could be a doozy. Of course for me I needed to knock two of the three remaining teams off the list for the year as they come into Baltimore.
Also one hurricane down, another may be on the way. Sunday and Monday gave us quite a bit of rain from what was left of Gordon, as if we haven’t had enough already this summer. Fortunately the only game available on Monday was Washington at Philadelphia. I’ve seen enough of both teams so there was no need to go and it wound up being postponed anyway. It could be a bit of a problem late in the week so we’ll see and it might force some rearranging of the schedule thanks to Florence. The big news over the weekend was that I updated my master beer bottle list and see that I am only 15 away from 3,000. I’ll put a dent into that number over the course of the week and with Florence slated to possibly hit at the end of the week this could have been a big week but it now appears that what is left of Florence will hit early next week.
Game #140 Oakland at Baltimore. Hey, finally got to see Alex Cobb pitch for the Orioles. Haven’t seen this guy all year, don’t know how I managed that but Buck Showalter is notoriously secretive about who he is going to pitch so I really can’t plan too far ahead. He was the big Oriole free agent acquisition over the offseason, wonder if he regrets that now. Mike Fiers started for Oakland, big draw there right? How many Oakland A’s can you name? I admit it was not that many for me but they’re 30 games over .500 so the jokes on me. I’ve never really seen the A’s do well in Baltimore and they are not the only team in that regards, but with the Orioles being historically bad that could very well change this year. I barely recognize the Orioles at this point of the season. The only reason I recognize some of these guys is that I’ve watched them since they were in A ball. Either way this knocks team #28 off the board. 2 to go as I took in the battle of Chris Davis vs. Khris Davis. Cobb started out well with two quick scoreless innings. He has been dealing with a blister and apparently it flared back up and he was pulled (and he was not happy about that). So Mike Wright came in and did Mike Wright things quickly giving up 3 runs. I like him, he tossed me a ball once so being the loyal fellow that I am I am pulling for him. He settled down and that was actually all the A’s got. With previous Oriole teams that would have been enough to win but not this one. Jonathan Villar knocked a solo shot and added an RBI single later but that was it for the vaunted Oriole offense. It’s not that Fiers was that good, it’s that the Orioles are that bad. At least the game was played pretty quick but it was played in front of about 9,100 people, a record for futility in September for them. Sad and one can imagine that record will be bested (worsted?) on Thursday since the Ravens play that night. Oakland wins 3-2. One other observation, Cedric Mullins is tiny. Can we get a picture of him standing next to Aaron Judge?
Game #141 Road Warriors at York. Will the Revs make the playoffs? We will probably know after today. It does not look good. Long Island is sitting pretty to win their division for the second half which opens up only one wild card spot, which Lancaster is all but a lock for. Of course Long Island is playing 6 games down in Sugar Land to finish the season so it may just matter how much Sugar Land wants it. It would take a miracle and with Somerset (the team that needs to win the second half over Long Island who is playing the best team in the league) coming to town next (the Revs need to keep winning after all) it appears that the bubbles will burst. Do you have all of that? To further complicate matters the Revs could still win the second half as they have overtaken Lancaster in the standings and sit only 4.5 games back. I could say that the Germans have outlawed miracles but that’s my dad’s shtick. As a bonus it turned out that Tuesday’s game was rained out so we have a doubleheader and a good opportunity to gain some ground! They’re not dead yet but they have little margin for error.
Stopped in at Gift Horse for another pregame beer. My personal recommendation is a Day at the Races IPA. Robert Carson started for the Revs against Alberto Rodriguez for the Road Warriors. The Road Warriors had no problem hitting Carson, who managed to avoid serious damage in the first two innings thanks to two double plays but his luck ran out in the third. They plated two in the third and then four in the fourth to chase Carson. The Revs bats never got going. They managed to plate one run thanks to some aggressive/dumb baserunning by Henry Castillo who scored on the ensuing fielding error. That was it, they scratched out 3 hits. The Road Warriors win 6-1 and this probably eliminates the Revs from the playoff race. It is not easy to play for the Road Warriors and Rodriguez got a nice ovation when he was pulled in the 7th. Won’t see that with Lancaster! It was not all bad, I got a foul ball in the 3rd on an Anthony Ray foul ball (that sure looked fair to me!). Wellington Castillo tossed it to me in the stands, it helps to go to games when not a lot of people show up. I was actually quite happy that I caught it since I was a bit buzzed from Gift Horse still. There was another highlight, the Revs turned a triple play in the 5th. I saw one a few years ago in Frederick but these are incredibly rare to see.
Game #142 Road Warriors at York. Game 2 of the doubleheader. This game was almost the opposite of the first. Joe Van Meter started for the Revs against Raul Rivera-Alicea for the Road Warriors. The Revs got on the board first with a Henry Castillo 3-run homerun. They continued to pile on him for 3 more runs before he was yanked. Van Meter was going steady until the 5th when he ran into trouble giving up 2 before being pulled but that was it. The Rev bullpen shut down the Road Warriors from there. York wins 6-2. Before the game the Road Warriors received a nice ovation from the crowd. They played one “home game” all year, in fact that was the first in the history of the team. They’ve lived out of motels for the past 6 months which can’t be easy and throw in losing 94 games doesn’t help either. The players stuck it out though, many for the whole season. You have to want to keep playing to do that.
Game #143 Somerset at York. Didn’t head back to Baltimore. There is only so much lousiness I can take. I’ve seen 100 loss teams and most of them barely got to 100 losses. We’re talking like some of the crummy Pirates and Nationals teams of the past 2 decades. I would probably say the 2009 Nationals were the worst team I ever saw, until this year. This year’s Orioles have easily taken that cake. The Phillies teams of recent years were bad and seemingly found new ways to lose nearly every night but they were not this bad (and they had hope on the horizon) nor were they this creative when it came to losing. Hurricane Florence also is projected to miss us so that is a bit of good news here. Granted I could have probably sat wherever I wanted to in Baltimore but it just wasn’t worth it. The Orioles even won and drew over 11,000 fans! On Friday the Revs had a game rained out in Somerset last week so since it needs to be played it’ll get played here with another doubleheader. There no other real option and it’s not like it hasn’t happened to the Revs before so in this case it works out in their favor. Made another stop at Gift Horse for a pregame brew with another around the corner at Liquid Hero.
Logan Williamson started for the Revs against Kyle Davies for the Patriots. Somerset struck first but the Revs responded with 5 in the 3rd. Somerset immediately began chipping away getting two more off of Williamson before chasing him in the 5th and then getting another 2 to tie it off of Jonathan de Marte. Yep, blew a 5-1 lead. In a playoff hunt that is not what a playoff team does. The game went into extras and Somerset won it in the 8th. This was a deflater, not that the Revs really had a good chance to make the playoffs but when you lost like that it is a punch to the gut and I would think that that will eliminate them. Somerset wins 6-5. At least across the Codorus I could hear the PA announcer at Smalls constantly saying touchdown Bearcats as York High was beating New Oxford something like 51-16 at half!
Game #144 Somerset at York. On to Game 2. This could have been an important game. Mitch Atkins started for York against Duane Below for Somerset and this was all Somerset. They jumped on Atkins for 5 in the 2nd and cruised to an easy win. The Revs got a few runs but were never really in the game as Somerset wins 7-4. There was a good crowd at this one, over 4,000 people. Considering that the Fair is still going on and there was a York High football game that closes one of the main stadium lots that was pretty good. Hopefully the team can get two more good attendance games to close the season. I did’t stick around for much of this one, sometimes you just have to say enough is enough.
Game #145 Chicago at Baltimore. Did something I’ve wanted to do for awhile and that is to ride the Light Rail and get off at Woodberry and stop in at both Union and Wavelry brewing for a beer. I’ve been to both of them before, at least at Union’s old location right around the corner from Waverly, but I haven’t been to their new building, which is quite nice. I drove those times which means I didn’t want to imbibe too much so now I could. It’s hard to miss the new building for Union on the JFX, that’s for sure. Picked up an Oriole hoodie at the game. Just what I need as it doesn’t fit me. I have traded these for other giveaways in the past, maybe I can find a taker for it this time or sell it on eBay.
Yefry Ramirez started for the Orioles against former Harrisburg Senator Reynaldo Lopez for the White Sox and now team #29 is in the books. One more to go, I’ll see you Houston at the end of the season. I wonder if Mike Rizzo regrets the trade that sent Lopez, along with Sunday’s starter Lucas Giolito and prospect Dane Dunning to the White Sox for the oft-injured Adam Eaton? As an aside I do wonder at times how he hasn’t gotten fired yet because of his poor choices regarding the manager and the worsening fortunes of the team on the field. This was the kind of game I like, a pitcher’s duel. See it is possible! Both starters were effective, granted no one is going to confuse either lineup with the ’27 Yankees. The White Sox struck first in the 6th chasing Ramirez and Mike Wright came in to pitch. He didn’t pour gasoline on the fire and pitched 2 1/3 of scoreless baseball! The South Siders got another run in the 9th on an Avasail Garcia solo shot. Guess he is the only one left of the 3 Garcias they had in the outfield last year. Lopez pitched 7 scoreless and the Orioles only mounted one serious effort off of him. That was the Lopez I remembered from Harrisburg. I’ve said this before but with other Oriole teams this would have been an easy win but not with these Orioles. Chicago wins 2-0.
Game #146 Somerset at York. Completed my autograph pennant with quite a few new acquisitions, or at least new since I last had it updated. It’ll probably take me half an hour to decipher whose autograph is whose. Baseball players have terrible signatures. Well this is it for the Revs, they were eliminated last after last night’s game. I can’t say I’ll remember this team really fondly but it is hardly the worst team in franchise history. You can’t make the playoffs every year. Anyway until they were eliminated this had the chance of being on of the weirdest games I ever attended. Why? To possibly clinch a playoff berth they would have needed to lose this game. Yeah, figure that one out. Fortunately Long Island made that irrelevant. So Carl Brice, the Revs starter would have been the unlucky guy sent out there to lose. He was opposed by Rick Teasley for Somerset. Brice was not particularly good, he’s a bit overmatched at this level but he only gave up 1 run through 4 innings, though he was helped by 2 runners getting thrown out at home from the outfield. The Revs responded with a 3-run shot from Alonzo Harris that made it onto Arch Street hitting a passing car and that chased Teasley. They added 3 more late to put this out of reach as York wins the season finale 6-1.
On the docket next week (depending on the weather)
September 17 – sit at home, would probably get rained out anyway
September 18 – Sugar Land at Lancaster for some post season baseaball
September 19 – Toronto at Baltimore, got the special ticket for the Oriole WWE bobblehead
September 20 – sit at home
September 21 – New York at Washington for a beer stein
September 22 – New York at Washington
September 23 – sit at home
Also site updates: Pictures from the Battle of Wyoming fought near Scranton have been posted in the Battlefields section. The list of breweries visited have also been updated along with some new pictures.
