Sunday, June 26, 2011

Anderson Gives His Best

Game 75, June 25, DBAP
SWB Yankees 2, Durham Bulls 1
Season: 42-33; Home Stand: 3-3
Wrap, Box, Herald-Sun, Indy Week

Leslie Anderson did his level best to win the game for the Bulls yesterday, but it wasn’t enough. In the 3rd inning he had a lead-off double and was sacrificed to third by J.J. Furmaniak. At the end of the inning he was still there. In the 5th inning he had another lead-off double and was again sacrificed to third by Furmaniak. At the end of that inning he was still on third base. In the 7th inning he took things into his own hands and hit a leadoff home run. But that wasn’t enough to carry the game. Valiant try on his part.

The rest of the offensive story was the nine other Bulls who also got left on base during the course of the game.

Meanwhile, Chris Bootcheck is emerging as a terrific starting pitcher for the Bulls. He’s going long into games (starts of 7, 7, and 7 1/3 innings) and with even a modest amount of run support would have won his third in a row last night.

A notable moment was Desmond Jennings’ beautiful catch against the centerfield wall in the 4th. He really is a terrific outfielder. He and Guyer make one heck of a team out there.

Chart of the Day — ERA

Not a lot of surprises here. Young Mr. Buente (currently on the DL) is distorting the chart a bit.
Alex Cobb’s last game was while with the Rays against the Marlins on June 18th. Seems to be yet another example of the Rays calling up a pitcher, breaking him, and sending him back (as with Brandon Gomes). In this case Mr. Cobb is reportedly going to pitch on Monday after recovering from flu-like symptoms.

The other day’s disastrous outing by Brian Baker and Ryan Reid are pushing them out. R. J. Swindle’s ERA is falling nicely, but with his extremely short appearances, it wouldn’t take much to push it back up.

Obviously the starters as a group (the Bulls have had 13 different ones) need to do better.


click on image for larger view


Cranky Old Geezer Alert!

Am I the only one who gets blown out of his seat by the noise when they crank up the PA volume for a large crowd? We sit right under one of the corner speakers and that may be it. They may be trying to get their noise out to the Diamond View seats.

I just don’t understand why it’s necessary to try to make 10,000 folks sound even louder than they already do. Am I just of a generation too old to have had his hearing destroyed at rock concerts? Am I alone in wanting to have a conversation with my friends between innings?

10 comments:

  1. Agree about the speakers; last night's crowd was not a loud one. There was no need to have the volume so high. And I'm that same generation b/4 self-caused deafness.

    Dave

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  2. Actually, I do have a slight deafness. It was not caused, however, by rock and roll. Instead I'm sure it was the result of my fondness for riding around in helicopters with my colleagues and our love of blowing things up.

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  3. Agree 100% about the speakers, I hope someone from the Bulls Org is reading this.

    Sometimes I like to arrive early to the ballpark, right about the time the grounds crew is laying down the lines. I find it incredibly annoying that they feel it necessary at that time to blare the nastiest crap out of the speakers, awful

    I would also add the other game where the Bulls were blitzed and I left at the third inning they had a Jimi Hendrix cover band playing before the
    game outside by Pit BBQ on the patio. Those guys were great.

    My suggestion would be to do more of that and kill that canned crap blaring through the speakers

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  4. On the subject of the decibel level (which I agree tends to be high at the DBAP), you might find this article illuminating, if not consolatory:

    http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/07/sports/basketball/stoking-fans-excitement-arenas-pump-up-the-volume.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=mavericks%20arena%20noise&st=cse

    I also have noticed that, because the DBAP's PA System is slightly outdated, sound distribution is uneven. There are parts of the seating area that are much louder than others, i.e. the parts onto which the speakers bear down. For what it's worth, it seems to me that your seats are in a particularly loud zone.

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  5. Thanks for the link, Adam. A quote from it (only slightly out of context) says a lot about some mindsets on this issue:

    "It’s never too loud."

    Speaking just for myself, my best game at the DBAP was a couple of years ago when the system failed entirely. We all sang the National Anthem together and we paid attention to the game (and not the between innings folderol). I'd bet that that when we cheered, the Bulls knew we were cheering their play, and not cheering just because we'd been given a cue (same for the umps when we gave them a hard time). It was a great game and we left without headaches.

    Also agree that our seats are in a bad place.

    My worry is that if they "improve" the sound system they'll just make it more pervasive/invasive (read "louder").

    Sigh. Guess I'll put some earplugs in my game bag.

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  6. Yes: a generally less busy ballpark soundtrack would encourage more baseball-attentive fandom. The Bulls FO knows, though, that relatively few people follow the team closely (like the WDBB community does), and so the game experience is geared toward fans who are there more for the non-baseball entertainment.

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  7. You're probably right. But sure would like to see them try it someday. Who knows folks might respond. Could be a "Field of Dreams" moment. At least in the movie folks weren't coming to Iowa to watch the bugs in the trousers moments, or to take Captain America's salute...

    I do like Wool E., tho' ...

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  8. A few years back they had an inning called "sounds of the game" where they'd have nothing on the PA for an inning. Thought that was neat, but it quickly went away.

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  9. BTW, note from tonight's game. Desmond Jennings didn't play and a friend says he was not seen on the bench. The countdown to Jennings clock shows 2 hours remaining until he's past the Super 2 rule. Coincidence? Maybe....

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  10. I was going to join the speculation, but this mornings (27 June) Herald-Sun says Jennings had a sore wrist. Not sure we should believe that, but that's what he said.

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