Game 69: Cubs 5 – Rangers 4

Cubs 32-37
Rangers 26-44

POTG: RP Carlos Marmol (3 IP, 5 K, 0 R, 0 H, 0 BB, W [2/7])
Runner Up: Ryan Dempster (IP, 3 K, S [16/75]), CF Felix Pie (3B, 2 RBI), 1B D Lee (2 H, 2B, RBI), 2B Mike Fontenot (2 H, 2 R, BB), DH Uncle Cliffy (2B, BB, R)
Nice To Know Ya: C Michael Barrett (2 H, R)

Now that this is completely dated and mostly worthless, let me just quickly point out that Marmol as 7th (and 6th and 5th!) inning guy is looking like genius, Marshall was due for a bad start, and Sammy looked bad on all 4 Ks.

Instead of writing three paragraphs more about a game I really had a hard time getting into on tape delay, how about I talk about the Midwest League All Star Game I went to Tuesday night? Yea, well, I don’t think I’m going out of my way to go to an All Star game again.

If you’re someone who likes getting autographs, stashing them for five years, and seeing which of those Sharpee scrawls turn out to be slightly valuable, you might have enjoyed this event. They were selling $1 programs with everyone’s picture in it perfect for this event (as well as balls, and I saw a few people trying to get uniforms, bats and cards signed), and all the players were available on the field before the game for about half hour of free autograph signing. I’m not an autograph person (and my program got snatched away when I stepped away to get some food), but it was a nice job of providing access.

The presentation of the game really wasn’t up to that level. During the regular season, the Cougars had moved their stats from a two line electronic marquee to showing up on their video board. For the first time, you actually got info about who was at the plate, and that’s the sort of thing you need when you have 60 some players from 14 teams participating. For this game, they didn’t put names up on the video board, and they didn’t put up on the marquee board – the PA guy just said the name, and one was expected to race thru the program to find the name. The programs didn’t have uniform numbers, and the uniforms didn’t have names on them – really, you had little idea who was who unless they were on the team you normally followed, you’re a huge fan of the league, or you made your own cheat sheet and brought it. Who’s going to do that?

(and yea, I did, but I forget to bring the sheet)

I didn’t score the game, because it’s a freaking all star game and I’m smartened up enough to know they never announce defensive changes or pinch hitters (which isn’t as big a deal as you’d think in a DH league but still kills me.) I’m almost sure the umpire didn’t actually know about the changes, but occasionally looked over to see that the tall black first baseman was all the sudden white and short. Both teams had bloated rosters to protect themselves in case of promotions and injuries. Neither much happened, and the managers just had to get everyone in the game, so it turned into a plodding and boring affair. If you don’t know who’s who (and who’s going to be someone you’ll care about in a few years), games stretching past 10 on a Tuesday night aren’t so good.

The highlight of the game might have been Darren Bragg, first base coach, the people encouraging Darren Bragg to teach each runner on 1st how to steal “just like you used to!”…and those people stealing and Bragg triumphantly taking credit.

Midwest League is a two umpire league. I think they might have had 4 for the playoffs last year, but honestly I don’t remember. Somehow, we got all six for this game. (And the worst at first, but that’s another story.)

This game will get replayed locally on Comcast 100 – that’s the near public access channel with the high school Game of the Week that used to be (may still be) way higher on cable system – this Saturday at some point and it’s available onDemand. Five people will watch it. I was actually going to, I have no idea why but it sounded like a good idea, but it’s like every other channel seems to be lately with digital static/buffering problems.

(personal drama which probably would be more interesting to write about than this post, but I’m bored with now: people who no-showed on me, buying $10 sun glasses for the express purpose of not caring if I lost them and then spending a couple hours fuming over losing them, walking around the parking lot for 20 minutes trying to find my car which was actually in the adjacent lot)