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The Houston Babies

Without the time open to do this series on a daily full-report basis, a simulated APBA Baseball World Series between our Houston Babies has now been played and is reported here in summary form. If you were a player, I hoe you did well. If you are a vintage ball fan, we hope you enjoy, regardless of the outcome and your preference for one team over the other. Because of the home town bias going around here, the results of the Houston Babies players are reported post-series in greater specificity.

The series is a First Four Wins in Seven scheduled games contest. Red Sox games are played in Boston under American League rules. Babies home game are played in a pasture at the George Ranch near Houston. Terry Francona is the manager of the 2007 Red Sox. Bob Dorrill is the playing manager of the 2014 Houston Babies. Time Travel technology is provided by Wormholes, Inc.  Tickets for the games are available to the general public, but no persons without a visionary and respectful imagination need waste their time in the press box ticket lines. You cannot get to these games without a winged spirit and a sublime level of wishful thinking going to town hard inside of you.

The Houston Babies versus the 2007 Boston Red Sox Series by Game Report

GAME ONE: BABIES @ RED SOX, Tuesday, October 23, 2007

 Mike Vance (L, 0-1) of the Babies and Josh Beckett (W, 1-0) of the Red Sox each went the distance. The difference in Game One was provided by Manny Rameriz’s 2-run double in the bottom of a 3-run Red Sox third. Vance struck out 11 and walked 2 on the night. Beckett fanned 7 and walked 3. Jimmy Disch (2/3) paced Babies hitters with a double, a run scored, and one RBI.

Red Sox Lead the Best of Seven Series, 1 Game to 0.

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GAME TWO: BABIES @ RED SOX, , Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Larry Hajduk (W, 1-0) of the Babies went 7.1 innings, striking out 11 to match Mike Vance’s effort in Game One. He gave up 7 scattered hits , walking only one. Mark Rejmaniak (1.0 ip) and Mike McCroskey (0.2 ip) closed Boston down from there. Curt Schilling went 7.0 innings for Boston and took the loss. Okajima Hideki shut the Babies down after taking over for Schilling in the 8^th with runs in and no one out.

Larry Joe Miggins and Zach Hajduk each went 3 for 4 to pace the Babies on the day, and Phil Holland went 2 for 5.

The Babies and Red Sox are now tied at one win each in the Best of Seven Series as the contest now moves to Houston, following a travel day.

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 GAME THREE: RED SOX @ BABIES, Friday, October 26, 2007

With the series shifting to Houston’s nearby George Ranch pasture, old Babies pro Bob Blair (W, 1-0) finally got a start as he recovered from the serious head cold he caught in a Boston pub . Blair was able to hang in there for the 5.0 minimum innings he needed to take due credit for the 7-3 win that the Babies piled up over the first 4 frames. Knuckler Tim Wakefield (L, 0-1) pitched the first 4.1 innings to take the loss for the Red Sox. Julian Tavarez shut out the Babies over the last 3.2 innings, Patrick Lopez, Tony Cavender, Mark Rejmaniak, and Ira Liebman each pitched an inning from the 6^th through the 9^th to nail things down. Against the four Babies relievers, Boston managed only one-run in the 8^th off Rejmaniak.

Trailing 7-2 at the start of the top of the 8^th, Manny Ramirez of the Sox scored the last run of the game by blasting a long home run over the highway for the only Boston long ball of the series.

Marc Hudec (3/4) and Deacon Jones (3/5) paced the 16-hit Babies Game 3 attack with Alex Schmelter (2/3), Robby Martin (2/4), (Robert Pena (2/5), and Ken Burns (2/5) checking in as the other four of six batters who celebrated a multiple hits day. Zach Hajduk got in the game long enough to get a pitch hit single, driving his series BA to a stratospheric .833.

The Babies take the series lead over the 2007 Red Sox, 2 games to 1.

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GAME FOUR: RED SOX @ BABIES, Saturday, October 27, 2007

The Houston Babies broke a 2-2 tie in the bottom of the 8^th by plating both the Hajduk boys. Then they made it stand through the top of the 9^th behind reliever Ira Liebman (W, 1-0). The Babies now sit only a win-away from the series title. Starter Daisuke Matsuzaka (L, 0-1) went the distance to take the loss in Game Four.

Red Mahoney started for the Babies, going 5.0 innings and giving up both Boston runs. Tony Cavender followed, giving up no runs and 1-hit in the 6^th and 7^th. Ira Liebman then duplicated those stats for the 8^th and 9^th to claim the victory.

Robbie Martin (3/5), Phil Holland (2/4), and Jimmy Disch (2/4) paced all hitters among the Babies.

The Houston Babies now lead the Boston Red Sox in the Series, 3 games to 1.

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GAME FIVE: RED SOX @ BABIES, Sunday, October 28, 2007

The Houston Babies defeated the 2007 Boston Red Sox in five games today, saving their best, most dramatic playing for the 9^th inning of the final game. Mike Vance (W, 1-1) took the win that disposed of the Red Sox, pitching all but the last important pitch of the game. Red Sox starter Josh Beckett (L, 1-1) went all the way for the loss. And Patrick Lopez earned one of the most importantly economical saves (Sv, 1) in the history of this thing we call ball.

The Babies took an early 2-0 lead with single tallies on bunched hits in the bottom of the 2^nd and 4^th. Boston came back to tie the game at 2-2 in the top of the 5^th, setting up two moments of drama that would finish both the game and the series in a Texas cow pasture near Houston.

Alex Hajduk led off the bottom of the 6^th by blasting the second pitch he saw on a high, deep, and gone forever rainbow arching track over the fence and over the highway. The ball literally disappeared in the glaring sky like a constantly shrinking grain of Imperial sugar. Alex Hajduk’s second homer of the series would hold, but not before the Babies fought a dramatic threat in the 9^th.

Nursing that 3-2 lead, Mike Vance got Coco Crisp on a slow bounding grounder to start the top of the 9^th, but Julio Lugo of the Sox quickly countered with a double over Robby Martin’s head in right center.

The tying run now lived within serious reach of a dramatic 9^th inning tie. Manager Bob Dorrill came out from his catching position to confer with Vance as he also motioned for Patrick Lopez to start throwing in the pen. A butt-pat later, Dorrill left Vance in the game to face Josh Beckett – or whomever Sox manager Terry Francona picked to hit for him.

Big mystery, my eye. David Ortiz would be the pinch hitter., a luxury choice produced by the fact that the series was playing by NL rules in Houston and only using the DH for the AL rules games in Boston.

Glub! Glub! Who pitches to Big Pappy in this situation? You got it. Nobody in their right mind.

Mike Vance then issued a pitch-around-him four-pitch walk as manager Dorrill issued a hand-waving motion to the pen on his return trot to the mound. Vance was through for the day on two-runs (so far), 6 hits, 5 walks, and 4 strikeouts.

Patrick Lopez walked in from the bullpen with all the style of a shorter Clint Eastwood. He would be facing Dustin Pedroia. With the tying and leading runs on base., there was little margin for error.

Before he threw a single pitch, Lopez pulled out a small piece of paper from his pocket and stared at in until the umpire cautioned him to get on with the business at hand.. He folded the paper again and returned t to his back pocket. Then he looked in at playing manager-catcher Bob Dorrill for a sign as Pedroia stepped in.

Before anything further could happen, Boston manager Francona pulled Big Pappy for Jacoby Ellsbury as the runner at first.

Lopez shook off the fact that he was now pitching with dangerous speed at 1^st and 2^nd. He stared in for sign from Dorrill, almost taking as much time as he had used on his scrap meditation a few minutes earlier.

The pitch was a sweeping curve that was breaking down and away from the right-handed Pedroia. He caught it near the end of his bat and slashed a fast-moving, ground-hugging ball to Deacon Jones at first. Jones picked it up quickly and winged it to Jimmy Disch at second in time to get Ellsbury. Disch then hustled it back to Jones at first for the bam-bam out on Pedroia coming down the line.

 Game over. Series over. Babies beat the 2007 Red Sox, 4 games to 1.

Pandemonium broke out, George Ranch style. The Babies and Red Sox went off to the big ranch house to eat some good old Texas barbeque and talk some baseball history.

When asked about the piece of paper that drew so much of his attention before his one-pitch miracle save, Lopez smiled. “It’s a sketch of a painting I’m going to do someday. It will be called “Buffalo Watching,” but that’s at story for another day. I will settle for our little miracle win over the Red Sox this afternoon as the fan that fires our Houston hearts.

The Houston Babies have defeated the 2007 Boston Red Sox in their series by a final tally of four games to one.

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POST SERIES HITTING CHART FOR HOUSTON BABIES,

PLUS TEAM TOTAL COMPARISON, BABIES & 2007 RED SOX

Julio Lugo led the Red Sox with a .412 BA (7/17) that included 3 doubles and J.D. Drew batted .278 (5/18), also with 3 doubles. Mannie Ramirez hit only .158 (3/19), but he did hit the only Red Sox Series homer. David “Big Papai” Ortiz went 1/10 for a .100 BA that included only 1 double, but 5 strikeouts.

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 PITCHING

Josh Beckett led all Red Sox pitchers with a 1-1 record and a 2.12 ERA over 17 innings of work.

The four Babies starters were outstanding: Mike Vance went 1-1, with a 3.31 ERA for 16.1 innings, with a series leading strikeout total of 15. Bob Blair was 1-0 with a 1.89 ERA over 5 innings, with 7 “K”s. Larry Hajduk was 1-0 with a 2.45 ERA for 7.1 innings and 11 strikeouts; and Marie “Red: Mahoney had no record, but a 3.00 ERA for 5 injury-shortened injuries in her only start. She did have 3 strikeouts.

Closer Ira Liebman (1-0, 0.00 in 2.0 innings of work), who also serves as the radio broadcast voice of the Houston Babies, set a baseball record because of his double-duty obligations when became the only reliever in history to shut another team down while describing his own actions over the air.

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STAY TUNED …

The Houston Babies will be taking on other great historical clubs in future simulated series action. One of these days, our club will catch up with the 1927 New York Yankees. Then we’ll get to see who the real “Murderers’ Row” really is.

Tags: a simulated baseball series

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