2010 DIVISION SERIES HIGHLIGHTS

For Immediate Release
October 04, 2010

 

Elyria vs. Chicago – Written by Chicago Mobsters – John “Stray” Corrado – Games played face to face on September 3rd, 2010

Game #1 – Adam Wainwright vs. Felix Hernandez

A pitcher’s duel headed into the bottom of the seventh when Todd Helton hangs a close-line deep to give the Mobsters a 1-0 lead. Two outs later a span double, puts a runner at second base. With first base open the Indians elect to pitch to Mobster pinch-hitter Alex Avila. Avila promptly lines a 3-2 pitch deep to right center for a two run Home Run. That was all the Mobsters needed. King Felix went 7 innings, allowed 2 hits, struck out 9. Mobsters lead the series 1 game to 0.

Game #2 – John Lester vs. C.C. Sabathia

The Mobsters got on the board in the 1st inning on a Polonco single, Helton walk, followed by a Chipper Jones RBI Single. In the 2nd, after Rios singled and was moved to second on a ground out by Ivan Rodriguez. Derek Jeter RBI single sent Rios home to make it 2-0 Chicago. A Drew Stubbs home run cut it to 2-1 in the 4th. A Sandoval single, was followed up by a Raburn, triple – but Raburn thought he was Rickey Henderson but was thrown out at home plate by Denard Span. Score now tied at 2-2. Bottom of the 7th, Alex Avila pinch hits, and promptly hooked a fair ball down the line in right for a 3-2 Mobsters lead headed to the 9th. In the bottom of the 9th, Jacob Ellsbury draws a walk, steals second. Valverde comes on to try and close the door. Drew Stubbs answers the call with a single to left, Ellsbury scores to knot it up at three. Sandoval is walked to put runners at 1st and 2nd with one out. Rauburn drives one down the line in right, Stubbs scores, but Sandoval is thrown out at the plate. Score now 4-3 Indians. Chicago fails to score in the 9th, so the series is now tied at 1-1.

Game #3 – Josh Beckett vs. Jair Jurrjens

A 4 run fourth inning for the Indians on RBI’s by Ellsbury, Asdrubal Cabrerea, & two by Pablo Sandoval put the pressure on the Mobsters. A solo shot in the 9th inning lead to a final score for 4-1 for the Indians. Series now 2-1 Indians.

Game #4 – Felix Hernandez vs. Adam Wainwright

A rematch of game #1, as both starters come back on three day’s rest. A Ryan Hanigan solo shot put the Indians ahead 1-0 in the 3rd. After a Stubbs double, Asdrubal Cabrera lines a single in the hole between Jeter and Jones, Indians 2 – Mobsters 0 after three innings of play. After a Span single, Chipper Jones hits his 2nd Home Run of the series. Score knotted at two apiece. In the 7th Andy LaRoche doubles, and Alexi Casila comes in to pinch run for him. Luis Durango pinch hits for Jeff Francoeur, and singles up the middle, Casilla rounds 3rd, and heads home and puts the Indians up 3-2. Josh Outman and Daivd Aardsma pitch the 9th and shuts down the Mobsters. Final score 3-2 Indians, who now lead the series 3 games to 1.

Game #5 – C. C Sabathia vs. John Lester

This was the John Lester show. He shut out the Mobsters for eight innings. A leadoff walk to Ryan Raburn, comes back to haunt C.C. Sabathia as Raburn is moved to second on a ground out by Cabrera, followed by a Hanigan single – which scores Raburn for the only run of the game. Indians hold on to the one run lead headed to the 9th, when Aardsma comes in to try and close the door. Mobster’s manager Corrado could be seen yelling at Rajai Davis with two outs, no one on in the 9th, saying “If you don’t hit a Home Run to tie this up – you will be the first player I trade this off-season. Rajai Davis promptly defies the manager and doesn’t even take his bat off his shoulders, and looks at a called 3rd strike to end the game, the series & the season for the Mobsters. Final score 1-0 Indians. Indians take the series 4 games to 1.

 

Coconut Creek vs. Tijuana

Tijuana kicks off its 1st playoff appearance in 5 years by sending out C. Carpenter to face the visiting Crushers and K. Correia in game 1 of this A.L. Divisional Series. The Crushers line-up might be categorized as feast or famine, plenty of power but contact can be an issue as they led all of MWBL in strikeouts. If they are on though, watch out. With this in mind, J. Damon starts the game off with a gap double which causes me to “gulp”. Carpenter shrugs it off and gets the next 3, stranding Damon on 3rd. That would be the 1st and last hit Carp would allow in his 7+ innings. B. Butler breaks a scoreless tie in the 3rd with a 2-run jack to put the home team up. A sac fly from C. Beltran in that inning makes it 3-0. The Bottle Rockets add 2 more in the 4th and 1 in the 5th to run away with this one by the score of 6-0.

Feeling a bit relieved after taking the opener (We can’t be swept now) Z. Greinke gets the call in game 2. He’ll be opposed by 17 game winner during the regular season R. Dempster. H. Ramirez starts things out right for The Bottle Rockets with a 1st inning lead-off homer. Back to back homers by Young and Zobrist in the 3rd put us up 4-0. The Crushers quickly strike back however, as M. Reynolds gets into the long ball act with a 3-run shot, bringing the Crushers within 1. Unfortunately for the visitors this is as close as they would get. Tijuana turns it on and launches a couple more homers and pulls away taking it by the score of 8-3. Greinke picks up the win, his only mistake being the homer to Reynolds. For the Crushers R. Dempster was Cito’ed. He was allowed to serve up 5 homers and 8 earned runs before finally getting the hook.

Bronson Arroyo-CCC vs Javier Vazquez-TIJ

Tijuana breaks out in the first on a solo homer by Carlos Beltran … followed by a solo homer by Prince Fielder … followed by a solo homer by Ben Zobrist. 3-0 TIJ after one.
CCC gets one back in the bottom of the 2nd on a solo homer by Mark Reynolds. 3-1 TIJ after two.
Arroyo struggles with his command in the top of the 3rd issuing 2 walks including one that forces in a run. 4-1 TIJ after three.
After retiring the first 2 batters in the 5th, Arroyo gives up 3 consecutive hits resulting in 2 more runs for Tijuana. Arroyo is yanked and Volquez comes in to try and stop the punishment. He K’s Michael Young to end it. 6-1 TIJ after five.
In the bottom of the 6th the Crushers get back-to-back-to-back doubles to plate two. 6-3 TIJ after 6.
Both bullpens take over and completely shut down the hitters the rest of the way.
Final score: Tijuana-6 Coconut Creek-3

W-Vazquez
L- Arroyo
S-Choate

Ted Lilly-TIJ vs Rich Harden-CCC

Tijuana gets to Harden in the 3rd. A walk, double and anotehr walk and the bases are loaded with no outs. Naturally some guy named Mauer is up next. He rips a single to RF driving in a run. Jermaine Dye is guilty of impersonating a RF and kicks the ball around allowing another run to score. Beltran promptly hits a double off the wall driving in 2 more runs. Another walk and a single and finally their half-inning is over. A brief spark of life from CCC in the bottom half as Raul Ibanez pops a 2-run homer.
TIJ-5 CCC-2 after three.
Tijuana gets a cheap run on a throwing error by Reynolds to extend their lead. TIJ-6 CCC-2 after five.
The game then gets completely away from CCC as Tijuana’s offense breaks out the whipping sticks. TIJ-11 CCC-3 after six.
The string is played out to a final series end.
Final score: Tijuana-13 Coconut Creek-5
W-Lilly
L-Harden

The Crushers do very little crushing as we get swept. Only Mark Reynolds played up to form with 2 doubles, 3 homers and 5 RBI in 4 games. Congrats to Tijuana and my condolences to Elyria and then the NL representative.

Iron City vs. West Coast –

In their first playoff appearance, the Yinzers win the division series 4-1.

Game 1: Iron City 7, West Coast 4

The West Coast Swing took a quick 2-0 lead on Michael Cuddyer’s two-run home run off of Tim Lincecum. Kendry Morales cut the lead in half with a solo shot off of Josh Johnson in the second. Chase Utley’s solo shot in the third made it a 3-1 ballgame. Iron City would tie it in the fourth when Morales led off with a triple. It looked like Johnson would get out of it with two outs, but David Murphy knocked one off the foul pole to knot the game at three. Johnson issued a two-out walk to Mike Lowell and paid for it when Carlos Gonzalez hit a two-run homer in the sixth inning. West Coast pulled to within one in the bottom of the inning, but the Yinzers put it away with two in the eighth. Tim Lincecum got the win after giving up four runs over six innings. Josh Johnson gave up five runs over seven frames to get saddled with the loss. Jason Frasor got the save.

Game 2:

Taking a 1-0 lead in the series at West Coast, the Yinzers were looking to take a commanding 2-0 lead back to Iron City. They jumped out of the gate with a run in the top of the first on a Nolan Reimold RBI single.
The Swing tied it up quickly when Juan Pierre tripled and scored on a double play. Victor Martinez broke it open in the third with a two-run shot off of Wandy Rodriguez. The Swing pulled to within a run in the third, but Iron City scored two in the fifth and two more in the seventh on homers from Kendry Morales and another long ball from Martinez. The catcher ends the night 3-for-4 with four RBIs. Tommy Hanson goes seven strong, allowing two runs for the win and Iron City goes home with a 2-0 series lead.

Game 3:

Back in Iron City, the Yinzers send Randy Wolf to the hill and he brought his ‘A’ game to the home mound. Wolf went eight shutout innings, yielding five hits and striking out six. Iron City got all the runs they needed in the second inning when Mike Lowell hit a two-run shot against Scott Baker. The Yinzers added one in the fifth and one in the seventh, including a solo shot from Victor Martinez, to close out the scoring.
Iron City fans lined up overnight to buy NLCS tickets with their team holding a commanding 3-0 lead.

Game 4:

The Swing said, “Not just yet.” West Coast scored four times in the second inning against Yinzer starter Jeff Niemann. West Coast starter Kevin Millwood was at the center of much of the offense, driving in a pair of runs with a double, then scoring on a trick double-steal play.
The Yinzers scored two in the ninth on a Kendry Morales solo homer and a CarGo RBI triple, but couldn’t get any closer. Millwood gets the win thanks to his seven shutout innings.

Game 5:

What proved to be the series finale was wrought with the tension of an outstanding pitchers’ duel. Tim Lincecum and Josh Johnson, who met in Game 1, matched zeroes through the first five innings. West Coast, got on the board first, scoring a run on Michael Cuddyer’s solo homer in the top of the sixth. Before the Swing could start really dreaming of a comeback, the Yinzers tied it in the bottom of that inning. With two outs Brian Roberts singled, his sixth hit of the series. Victor Martinez, an NLDS MVP candidate, doubled in Roberts to knot the score at one. Martinez hit .368 for the series. It would stay 1-1 until the bottom of the seventh. Carlos Gonzalez led off with a single and moved to third on David Murphy’s two-base hit. Up came the light-hitting Elvis Andrus, who remained in the game to hit for himself. Andrus hit a fly ball to Shane Victorino in center. CarGo was tagging all the way and scored just under the tag for the go-ahead run. The bullpen took it from there, with Kiko Calero and Jason Frasor each tossing perfect frames to preserve Lincecum’s victory. The Cy Young Award candidate went seven innings, allowed just the one run on three hits, walked four and struck out 11.

 

Brooklyn Ave. vs. Sacramento –

Brooklyn began the series with a bang, taking the first two games on the road and scoring 12 runs in their first 10 innings. Relying primarily on its pitching and VERY few clutch hits, Sacramento came back to take the next three games in Brooklyn and Game 6 at home. Sacramento wins the Division Series against Brooklyn 4-2.

Games 3 and 4 were the turning point for the Series. Brooklyn carried its hopes into Game 3, starting off the first 3 innings with 6 hits … but 2 OF assists at the plate and a bases-loaded strikeout left Brooklyn scoreless after three. The Capitals were on a roll from that point forward, taking a No-Hitter into the 9th behind Happ in Game 4, and holding Brooklyn to 1 run in each of games 4, 5 and 6. Needless to say, it was a very close, tense, series.

The Capitals outscores Brooklyn 23-17 for the Series, and ended with a .185 team BA and a 2.50 team ERA. Brooklyn finished the series batting .187 with a 3.57 team ERA.

Scores for the Series
Game 1 – 8-3 BRK
Game 2 – 4-3 BRK
Game 3 – 5-2 SAC
Game 4 – 8-1 SAC
Game 5 – 2-1 SAC
Game 6 – 2-1 SAC

No doubt, this gives Sacramento’s next opponent a good deal of hope in next week’s NLCS.

Verlander is Pitcher-of-the-Series, going 2-0 with a 1.38 ERA in 13 IP.
Bay is Player-of-the-Series, batting .238 with 5 H (1 2B, 1 3B, and 3 HR), 5 R, and 5 RBI

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