2008 Planetary Extreme Championship Recap: Game 6

[John]

For the millions of us who have fallen in love with baseball – that simultaneously languid and breathtaking melding of skill, science and lazy summer days – October is a holy month. It is the one moment in time when our heroes can transcend and rise into legend. October doesn’t play favorites. It doesn’t matter if you were a heretofore unknown: One moment on one cool, crisp fall night is enough to enshrine you in hearts and minds forever.

Young Desi James knows this already. Unknown to the nation and an afterthought in his own home town, it took James just one pitch to pass into legend three nights ago. One ball softly deposited into the front half of New Frontier Park’s outfield put James’ name on the lips of people the world over and elevated him to sainthood in the city of New Orleans.

Last night, October admitted one more player into the Hall of Baseball Legend. But we’re getting ahead of ourselves.

Just over 30,000 fans – eight over, to be exact – filed into Gnat Field on Friday. Despite facing elimination, there as an overwhelming sense of calm. When your team has won an unheard-of 127 games (playoffs included), confidence is to be expected. That confidence would be put to an early test when the Trendsetters struck for two runs in the top of the 2nd on the strength of just one hit. José Cruz led off the inning with a walk of Ernest “Sourface” Conard and compounded his predicament by grazing Dominic Gagné with a first-pitch curveball.

The one hit in the inning came two batters later off the bat of Cooper Scott, who took over the starting RF role from Todd Hansen in game 5. Scott’s single dropped into left field and Shunso Kichida’s throw wasn’t able to beat Sourface to the plate. Both runners advanced a base on the throw home. That hustle paid off when Cruz uncorked a pitch to Leonard Martin that bounced all the way to the backstop and allowed Gagné to score.

The Trendsetters were up 2-0, a lead that would be almost instantly halved when Manny López crushed a pitch from Edward Coleman 428’ to right field in the bottom of the 2nd. Perhaps sensing the crowd’s surging confidence and realizing momentum threatened to turn against them, New Orleans refused to let up off the gas pedal. Jeff Cline saw López’s homer and raised him one. His two-run shot in the 3rd inning just cleared the wall in left-center and staked the Trendsetters to a 4-1 lead. For the first time all season, one could sense the confidence of Gnats fans wavering.

Determined to single-handedly buoy the fans and carry his team to the Promised Land, López once again struck in Crystal Lake’s half of the 4th. His liner over the left field wall wasn’t as impressive as the towering 2nd inning moon shot, but it was just as effective. The Gnats were outhitting the Trendsetters 4-3 and out-homering them 2-1, yet they still found themselves down two runs.

After seemingly finding his groove while striking out the side in the 5th, Cruz instead once again found trouble in the 6th. Gagné and Augusto Valdéz connected on back-to-back one-out singles. Cruz, who needed 115 pitches to make it through 6.1 innings, then uncorked his second wild pitch of the night. With the runners now at second and third base, Crystal Lake manager Wayne Kedsch ordered Scott intentionally walked to set up the force at each bag. Cruz was able to retire Martin on an infield pop fly, though. López then demonstrated that he was more than just a solo home run producer, robbing Floyd Gates of potential extra bases with a leaping catch of his liner that seemed ticketed into the right field corner.

Cruz was finally lifted after Dave Lewis singled with one out in the 7th inning. Righty Hoyt Howard entered the game, his fourth appearance of the series. Perhaps feeling the fatigue, Howard immediately surrendered a Cline double that allowed Lewis to score an important insurance run. New Orleans now held a 5-2 advantage over Crystal Lake, and the hour was growing late. 1-2-3 innings in the 7th and 8th had the Gnats with their backs against the wall and the Trendsetters dreaming of hoisting the Cup. By the time New Orleans closer Dave Phelps came on to start the 9th, confidence had turned to grim pre-determined fate for Gnats fans. Little more than a murmur came from the crowd, and more than a few fans were seen heading for the exits.

Baseball does not reward those lacking in patience, however, and Crystal Lake had not exhausted its bullets. P.J. Thomas led off the inning with a grounder easily fielded by Valdéz and flipped over to the covering Phelps for out number one. Exhibiting his “never say die” attitude, Mark Frazier followed with a liner to right for a base hit. Next up was Héctor Castillo, who dropped a fly ball into center for another base hit. Frazier came perilously close to becoming the goat when he decided to try to reach third base on the play despite his run meaning absolutely nothing. He managed to slide in just before the tag, and Castillo alertly took second on the play.

Now New Orleans manager David Parks was faced with an unenviable choice. Manny López – already in possession of two home runs on the night – was striding up to bat representing the tying run. First base was open, but walking López meant the winning run would now be at the plate in the form of Rex Groves. Groves had hit 7 home runs since joining the Gnats on August 1st but had crushed 19 long balls while playing with the Guadalupe Frijoles de Dios of the Alianza Béisbol Al Sur de la Frontera. On the other hand, he was homerless in 44 playoffs at-bats. If you pitch to López and he ties the game with his third home run of the night, you’re an imbecile. If you walk the winning run to the plate and he comes around to score, your personal safety is now in jeopardy. What would you do?

Parks choice was particularly bold: not only would he issue the free pass to López; he would remove his closer Phelps – who had successfully converted 38 of his 44 save opportunities on the year – and bring in righty Joaquín Hernández to face Groves. The two players have a history dating back to Groves’ time with the West Virginia Coal Sox. Groves had one hit in two at-bats against Hernández. That one hit? A home run.

It was this fact that Coal Sox GM Tyler Babcock loudly informed all within earshot of as he drunkenly burst into the home dugout of Gnat Field. Babcock, who had earlier in the evening been spotted at a local establishment consuming alcoholic beverages with Kentucky Thoroughbreds Assistant GM (and acknowledged drunken, debauched lout) William “Bill” Shatner, apparently had decided to cast his lot in with Crystal Lake because of Groves’ presence on the team. After shouting advice at a clearly nonplussed Kedsch, Babcock was removed from the dugout and expelled from the ballpark by security. But not before he had made a complete jackass of himself.


October affords the unheralded to stand tall, the meek to inherit the Earth. A name that once was barely recalled suddenly becomes canonical. Rex Groves name was not that name – not on this night, anyway – but his mammoth blast to straightaway centerfield on a 1-2 94 MPH Hernández fastball was about to christen PEBA’s newest legend. Jorge Ruíz leapt off with the crack of the bat and raced with his head down towards the centerfield wall. Jorge Ruíz, a 25-year-old all-speed, no-stick outfielder who had hit a lowly .249 in 156 career PEBA games. Jorge Ruíz, whom Palm Springs could only find 296 at-bats for over the course of his one-and-a-half year tenure there and whom they were eager to dump on New Orleans at the trade deadline for nothing for than the cost of his salary (just over a million dollars).

That same unheralded Jorge Ruíz utilized every ounce of his one above-average tool, raced towards the outfield wall and dove with his back completely facing the infield. With glove-hand extended, Groves’ blast came to rest gently for a half-second in Ruíz’s mitt before gravity took its due and sent Ruíz crashing to the warning track and rolling up against the wall. Castillo was standing close enough to Frazier to touch him and López was a few steps away from making it a Gnats get-together at third base. Like every fan who had stayed to watch this amazing spectacle, they were waiting to see what happened next.

Ruíz lifted his mitt. From within the dark brown leather webbing, white cowhide and red cotton stitches was visible.

While Castillo and López raced back to their bases, Frazier was able to tag and score from third base. The run was an afterthought, though; by now it was clear which side was favored by the baseball gods. When pinch hitter Jeffery Graham struck out swinging to end the game and the Trendsetters poured out of the dugout, they didn’t charge the mound as you would expect to see. Each and every one of them raced towards centerfield to shower their joy upon a 25-year-old from Norwalk, Conn. whom no one had really paid attention to. Until now. Now Jorge Ruíz’s name is legend, and now…

The New Orleans Trendsetters are your 2008 Rodriguez Cup Winners

[Tyler]