Monthly Archives: May 2010

The Pigs nailed the finale of this series with a 3 to 1 win over the Indians today. Today was also Education Day with a 10:35 am start time. I love education days. Kids are always cheerful and cheer the loudest and strongest on these days. I would have done anything to get out of a day of school to go to a ballgame when I was a kid and with the weather today… it was a perfect day for it!

Great day for baseball and it was nice catching up with some old friends who made it to the park today! OINK!

Good’s
Cody Ransom drove in the Pig’s only 3 runs with a monster (yet wind assisted) home run. The outfielders had a lot of trouble with that wind blowing hard and changing direction constantly.

Indianapolis Left fielder Moss almost made the best catch in CCP history. (Still safe in my eyes TJ Bohn) Paul Hoover ended up with a triple when Moss leaned up against the fence, pulled the ball back from the top of the fence and popped the ball into the air. He reached out with his bare hand, popped it in the air once more only to have it hit his finger tips on his third touch of the ball for it to fall to the ground. As high as that ball was, Hoover was almost on 3rd base when the ball hit the ground and I would say he had a chance at an inside the park HR. Remember, the 1st and only inside the park HR at CCP was hit by Jovan Moran in 2008 in front of an early Education day crowd.

Hoover went 3-3 and was a HR short of the cycle when he came to bat in the 8th. He walked.

Drew Carpenter threw 93 pitches for 58 strikes allowing 3 hits and one run in 6 innings. The Ironpig’s bullpen took over and closed out the game.

Hearing rumors that DeWayne Wise should return to the outfield soon. I’m thinking with tomorrow’s rest day that he returns on Thursday.

Not so Good’s
Andy Tracy again dipped below the .200 mark with an 0-4 performance and left 5 runners on base. Only Brian Bocock is hitting worse… batting .154 stranding 6 on base today.

Tonight’s game was difficult to watch. The crowd wasn’t as large as it had been over the weekend but it was loud and enthusiastic. Unfortunately, the Ironpig bats didn’t hear the roar of the crowd until the 9th when an error allowed one run to cross the plate. The crowd actually let out a collective groan when they learned that Arby’s RBI guy of the game Paul Hoover would not be awarded an RBI (and us a free roast beef sandwich) due to the throwing error that could have ended the game in a double play.

Good’s
Rich Thompson robbed an extra base hit and saved a run in the first inning with a diving catch and followed that up by catching a foul ball over the rolled up infield tarp.

We got to see Bastardo return to the Ironpigs and pitch a scoreless hitless inning.

Brandon Duckworth seems to have transistioned smoothly into a relief role pitching 1.1 innings allowing no hits and striking out three.

Not so Good’s
Joe Savery gave up 3 runs on 8 hits. Ok, the guy seems to be able to get out of jams more often than not but to quote a nearby fan, “He wouldn’t have to get out of jams if he didn’t get into them.”

Cody Ransom collected his 7th error of the season allowing a slow rolling base hit to scoot under his extended glove. Again, I realize he isn’t an outfielder but everyone who has ever played ball knows to put your body in front of the ball, then field it. Ransom went at it lazily and showed himself true when he got into many arguments with the fans behind him. I’m trying really hard to be a fan of his but he’s making it difficult.

Savery and Wasserman both balked a runner to second base when the runner left too soon and they looked like a deer in the headlights falling off the mound. Do AAA players run pickoff drills? Basics! BASICS! In fact, after Wasserman’s balk (the runner got to first with a base on balls) he threw a questionable passed ball to advance the runner to third. He threw gas on the fire when he then nearly hit his third baseman in the head with an errant pickoff throw to allow the runner to score. Wasserman also hit two batters in his .2 innings pitched.

To the dedicated Ironpigs fan, Cody Ransom has become an anomoly. He hits homeruns, he argues with umpires and he leads the team in errors. So, as fans, we can only wonder what is going on in Cody Ransom’s world…

Ransom was drafted by the Cleveland Indians in 1995 but chose instead to attend South Mountain Community College. While at South Mountain, he survived a team van crash that killed two of his teammates. In 1997 he transferred to Mesa State and then to Grand Canyon University in 1998.

In 1998 Ransom was then drafted by the San Fransisco Giants. He made his major league debut in September 2001 against his hometown Arizona Diamondbacks. He spent the next 3 seasons with the AAA Fresno Grizzlies and in 2004 was granted free agency.

In 2005 he played for farm teams for both the Chicago Cubs and Texas Rangers.

Ransom spent 2006/2007 in the Astros organization, mainly with the AAA Round Rock Express.

Then the Yankees signed him to a contract in 2008. He homered in his first two Yankee at bats, being the first Yankee to do so. He started the 2009 season with the big team, as Alex Rodriguez was on the DL. Ransom also made the final out at the old Yankee stadium, fielding a ground ball and stepping on first base to end that era.

So back to my original thought.. how can we, as fans, help Cody Ransom? Well, he seemed to perform well in NY. He hit homeruns and could field a ground ball in NY. This made me think of the movie, “My Cousin Vinny” where Joe Pesci’s character (a lawyer from New York City in a small town in Alabama) can’t sleep because the small town was so quiet. He finally gets a good nights sleep when he is put in jail for the night and the noise there soothes him to sleep. Applying this to Ransom, let’s get the noise level going. Pretend to be a Yankees fan for a moment and let him know you are cheering for him. If he does good, let him know you appreciate it. If he does bad… well, let’s stick to the family environment on this one.. but let him know you didn’t appreciate that. Maybe we could soothe him into better play?

I do recommend you keep it clean, especially those fans in the Bud Light Trough. You may think that high wall protects you but as you can see by the below video clip.. Cody has a pretty high vertical leap!

The Ironpigs mounted a short comeback today but couldn’t quite get that tying run across the plate in front of the second consecutive capacity crowd sellout of 10,000 in CCP today. Even more impressive was the announced 2,500 folks who came out to walk for the MS charity this morning. Thanks go out to the organizers and the Ironpigs Charities who I am sure had a hand in organizing this great event.

We did get a surprise visitor today in former Ironpig Assistant General Manager (current AGM for the Charlotte Knights) Danny Tetzlaff. Danny stopped out to say hi to the Noise Nation and catch the afternoon game. It really exemplifies the family that has formed over the past few years at Coca Cola Park amongst both staff and fans.

Good’s
Rich Thompson went 3-4 with 2 RBI and 2 stolen bases (4 on the season)

Gordon, Zagurski and Mathieson combined for 4 innings of scoreless relief allowing only 1 hit apiece. This is a really good sign!

The Ironpigs pitching staff kept us busy and mowed down 13 batters at the plate.

Not so Good’s
Both John Mayberry and Andy Tracy came up with runners on base and an opportunity to drive in some runs and both failed. These guys need to start eating chicken before every game or something…

Losing pitcher Nate Bump was more like a speed bump today, giving up 5 runs on 7 hits. Nothing spectacular in doing so, but the Indians hit the ball where the Ironpigs weren’t. Not much you can do about it.

The Ironpigs came home to Coca Cola Park with a roar! I stopped in at Pitcher’s Sports Bar & Grill to catch the extended pregame show today and noticed the Sold Out sign already up. I hear tomorrow could be another sellout too (10,000 sellout). The weather was absolutely perfect for baseball tonight and the capacity crowd stayed the entire game to watch another great fireworks show.

Early on in the game it became evident, by home plate umpire Mark Lollo’s tight strike zone, that it would be a hit parade and it was. Pitchers were forced to throw strikes and those strikes found their way onto the neatly manicured CCP outfield.

Good’s
Both John Mayberry and Dane Sardinha homered.

Every position player had a hit tonight, minus one.

Ironpig pitching didn’t perform that great, but they did their job without imploding and blowing the game.

The Pigs kept their streak of win one, lose one going. Hopefully tomorrow will break that streak.

Also, kudos to the little boy who through the Indian’s home run back on to the field. Learning tradition early. He didn’t go home empty handed though.. a member of the Noise Nation replaced his ball from a foul ball obtained earlier.

Not so Good’s
Andy Tracy was the only position player to not get a hit. He went 0 for 4 with a walk.

The Nationals sent Stephen Strassburg to Syracuse. Unfortunately, the Chiefs won’t be back to CCP until July 1st/2nd and then again the last week of August. I don’t expect to see him this summer unless I drive to Philadelphia.

Villarreal gave up 2 runs in 2 innings relief. It’s acceptable when your team is up by 6 runs but need to play hard in the innings when you don’t have to, to be able to come through when you need to.

Cody Ransom took right field tonight and early on extended his team leading error count to 6. I understand he isn’t an outfielder but really.. it’s right field. Another ball he bobbled in the corner gave up an extra base and his throws missed the cutoff man more often than not. Basics and fundamentals seem to escape him. I wonder if it goes in hand with sportsmanship.