SERIES #3 vs TORONTO REDCOATS - Stouts Finally Win a Game. Pedro Injured.

The Stouts head home to the confines of Memorial Stadium after a HORRENDOUS opening road-trip which saw them lose all six games to open up the season.  In comes Thomas and  the Toronto Redcoats, who bring a 3-3 record into town.  Hopefully the home field will prove to be the elixer the Stouts need to get back on track.  Let's head to the action and see how it all shakes out.



Game 1
Memorial Stadium

April 8, 2014

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9		R	H	E
Toronto Redcoats (3-4)	0	1	1	0	0	0	1	3	0		6	14	0
Baltimore Stouts (1-6)	5	4	2	0	1	0	0	0	X		12	13	0
	W: S. Estes (1-0)   L: K. Rogers (0-2)

Ding dong, ding dong.  The bells have rung.  Baltimore is in the winning column for the first time, getting their first Millennium League victory in convincing fashion with a 12-6 drubbing of the visiting Redcoats.  This game was never in question as the Stouts scored five in the 1st inning and never looked back.  As a matter of fact, they were up 11-2 after three innings of play.  Toronto starter Kenny Rogers failed to record a single out in the ballgame, giving up three hits and a walk before injuring himself and having to leave the game.  Garrett Anderson one of the hitting stars, going 3-5 with a homer and five RBI.  Stouts starter Shawn Estes into the history books, picking up the inaugural win by throwing 7.2 serviceable innings.  Carlos Beltran goes 4-5 with four RBI in a losing cause for the Coats.

Game 2
Memorial Stadium

April 9, 2014

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9		R	H	E
Toronto Redcoats (3-5)	0	0	2	0	0	0	0	1	4		7	12	0
Baltimore Stouts (2-6)	5	4	0	2	0	3	1	2	X		17	23	0
	W: T. Stottlemyre (1-1)   L: J. Suppan (0-2)

SS Ricky Gutierrez launching his
second HR of the game

It's apparent that Baltimore likes the home confines as the Stouts once again get the bats rolling early and often, scoring five in the 1st for the second consecutive game and cruising to an easy 17-7 victory.  Another game that was never in doubt as the Stouts led 9-0 after two.  The hit parade ended with a tally of 23 hits for the victors, including unlikely power from SS Rickey Gutierrez who launched a pair of homers, going 3-5 overall with a walk and five RBI.  Starting pitcher Todd Stottlemyre got into the offensive action as well, launching a 418 foot HR blast of his own in the bottom of the 7th.  All told, the Stouts smacked four homers in the game, going 7-16 with runners in scoring position.  All eight starters had at least two hits in the contest.  That's 29 runs in two games following their shutout to end the road-trip.  Up next though is Pedro Martinez so the hit parade is likely to end.

Game 3
Memorial Stadium

April 10, 2014

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9		R	H	E
Toronto Redcoats (4-5)	0	2	3	0	0	0	0	0	0		5	3	2
Baltimore Stouts (2-7)	0	0	0	0	1	0	0	2	1		4	9	1
	W: P. Martinez (3-0)   L: K. Appier (0-1) SV: D. Veres (2)

The Redcoats salvage the last game of the series to avoid the sweep.  Starter Pedro Martinez leads the way, picking up his third victory of the short season.  Toronto jumped out to a 5-0 lead before the Stouts mounted a late comeback.  The Coats actually won this game despite only registering three hits in the contest.  Baltimore starter Kevin Appier actually retired the first five batters he faced.  But after walking Melvin Mora with two out in the 2nd, catcher Todd Pratt launched a 423 HR blast to get the scoring started.  Then with two out in the 3rd, Appier walked a pair before surrendering back-to-back hits.  The Stouts bullpen actually pitched well in this one, as four relievers tossed the final six innings without surrendering a single hit.

Pedro Martinez injured.
Will miss two weeks of action.

Game got interesting late as Pedro began to tire.  A pinch-hit single in the 5th by Eric Owens plated Ricky Gutierrez to get Baltimore on the board.  The Stouts scored two more in the 8th to cut the lead to 5-3.  Pedro opened the 9th with a strikeout of Lance Berkman, but back-to-back-to-back singles by Garrett Anderson, Rondell White and Gutierrez plated a run and put the game-tying runner in scoring position.  Martinez then struck out Charlie Hayes for the second out of the inning, but he was injured in the process and team doctors later revealed he will miss two weeks of action.  Thankfully for the Coats, reliever Dave Veras came in and got Fernando Vina to fly lazily to right to end the game, securing the save for Veras in the process.

Pick 5.11 - 107th Overall

Garret Anderson - ANA OF
http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/a/anderga01.shtml


And the hits just keep on a coming, this time in the form of Garret Anderson.  Thought I was gonna luck into Carlos Beltran, who I've had my eye on since the 2nd round, but he went a few picks ahead of me.  In the end, it may be a blessing.  Anderson matches up perfectly for me with Lance Berkman.  Both can play both LF and CF.  When Fat Elvis moves to CF in a couple years, I can just slot Anderson over to LF no problem.

Anderson is one of the more underrated hitters, in my estimation, in recent MLB history.  And 2000 marks the beginning of the best stretch of his career.  His four highest HR totals come between 2000 and 2003.  His only four seasons with over 100 RBI were the 2000-2003 seasons, years where he only missed 11 games combined.  He received MVP votes three times in his career - the 2001, 2002 and 2003 seasons.  Anderson led the AL in doubles in 2002 with 56.  He followed that up by leading the league in that category again in 2003 with 49.  He also won Silver Slugger awards in those two seasons.  Needless to say, this guy was raking at the beginning of the decade.  It always seemed the Angels were constantly trying to replace him.  Not sure why?  All this guy ever did for them was hit.

So my OF is set now with Berkman, Anderson and Green.  Add them to I-Rod and Helton and the lineup is shaping up to be monstrous.  Good thing because I've completely ignored pitching up to this point while everyone else has at least 2/3 of their rotation in place.  Gonna continue rolling with this strategy though as no SP knocks my socks off.  Gonna fill out the rotation with one year guys probably.