It's Award Season

The Miners can taste an ABL Championship coming down the stretch. Mat-Su needs a win plus a Bucs loss tonight to clinch to title outright. But even in the midst of the race some individuals are getting some recognition.

At the team banquet last weekend, GM Pete Christopher gave out the teams awards as voted on by the coaches and the Mat-Su Miners executive board:

Best Position Player: Jonathan Johnson, Loyola Marymount (2B)- .323 avg., 9 RBI, 5 2B, 2 3B, 20 BB, .444 OBA

Best Pitcher: Justin Kraft, Centenary- 3-1, 6 GS, 1.14 ERA, 47.1 IP, 32 K, .186 Opp Avg.

Team MVP: James Ramsey, Florida St.- .323 avg., 1 HR, 23 RBI, 12 2B, 33 BB, .460 SLG

Stan Zaborac (Overall team spirit): Will Musson, Eastern Connecticut St.

Meanwhile, the league all-star team was announced before the game today. 3 of the 4 Miners listed above are also representatives there: Johnson, Ramsey and Kraft were honored on the team. Johnson picked up the ABL Gold Glove Award as well and Head Coach Russell Raley was named ABL Coach of the Year. Here's the rest of the team:

C- Austin Barnes, Bucs

1B- Ben Minard, AIA

2B- Jonathan Johnson, Miners AND Gunner Glad, Pilots

SS- Justin Schafer, Goldpanners

3B- Jason Martinson, Bucs

OF- James Ramsey, Miners AND Drew Heid, Pilots AND Brian Bello, Bucs

DH- Andrew Pollack, Goldpanners

SP- Justin Kraft, Miners AND Logan Darnell, Pilots AND Ryan Carpenter, Pilots AND Ryan Millard, AIA AND Cody Kendall, Oilers

RP- Kevin Jacob, Bucs AND Kyle Brule, Goldpanners AND DJ Mauldin, Pilots

Player of the Year- Drew Heid, Pilots

Top Prospect- Kevin Jacob, Bucs

Gold Glove- Jonathan Johnson, Miners

Silver Slugger- Drew Heid, Pilots

Coach of the Year- Russell Raley, Miners

We'll have more reaction to this in the coming days and on tonight's broadcast, which you can hear starting at 5:50 AK time.

7/25 Miners vs. Bucs Canceled

As you may have guessed by the of a game on the web tonight, tonight's game was called because of the rain. We're still waiting on the official word on tomorrow's game(s) but we do know a little info that we can pass along.

The schedules down the stretch for both the Miners and Bucs doesn't really coincide with any off days until the end of the MLB Showcase. Either way, we'll be having a doubleheader tomorrow starting at 2 p.m.:

Miners vs. Pilots (as scheduled) at 2 p.m.
Miners vs. Bucs (makeup) shortly after.

The length of the games (innings) is still to be determined.

We'll let you know when we know more about the situation.

Miners Ride Momentum from Kenai

The Miners won 4 of 5 down in Kenai to improve to 14-4 on the road so far this summer. Their problem has been playing at home.

They dropped the first home game back from Kenai against the Oilers. They just could not find a key hit in order to pull out a win. David Stilley had the best peformance of his career going 9 innings and only giving up 1 unearned run. This was the 2nd time this season a Miners pitcher has gone 9 without giving up an earned run and both time the Miners lost and both times it was to the Oilers.

Luckily they found the bats for the next 2 games. They took advantage of 9 walks from the Fire pitchers in order to blow them away to keep up their winning streak against the AIA. They then had a game for sole posession of first place the next day against the Bucs. The Miners first 5 guys in the order started the game by only failing to reach base once in each of their first 2 plate appearances. That helped them score 3 runs in each of the first 2 innings and ride that 6 run lead to the W. The Bucs tried to post a comeback but fell short 9-5.

So the Miners are a game ahead of the Bucs for first but finish out the year with 6 of their last 8 games against the two other contenders, the Bucs & Pilots. They head down to Anchorage for 3 straight games down there. A lot will be decided in the ABL race after those three games.

Mat-Su Pulls Out a Nail Biter From Behind

The Miners got behind early but showed off some late clutch 2 out hits to pull out a victory against the fire 7-6.  This win kept them 4-4 in the last 8 and kept them from losing back-to-back games for the first time all summer.  

The Fire showed off hot bats early putting up 5 runs in the first three innings. But as soon as their bats cooled off, the Miners' bats caught on.  Trevor Costin (Long Beach City) stepped into his first at bat with the Miners and doubled to lead off the 3rd inning and eventually scored the team's first run. The bats really got going in the 4th with Brown, Cisneros & Marshall all reaching with singles to start things off followed by Jacobs walk.  Alleman then stepped in and hit a great sac fly to center. to make it 5-3.  Costin got back on base with a walk to make it bases loaded.  Cox then had a great at bat and picked up the RBI walk to bring it to 5-4.  

It sat at 5-4 for a while giving the feeling that the Miners' bats had cooled off.  Then in the 7th, the Miners got things going again.  Arthur led off the inning with a single followed by Ramsey's walk and Brown's sac bunt to make it runners on 2nd and 3rd.  Cisneros then walked and Marshall flew out to make it bases loaded and 2 outs for Jacobs.  Boy did he deliver.  A blooper single that scored 2 and gave the Miners their first lead.

The fire tied it at 6-6 in the top of the 8th and in the bottom it was 2 outs and only Cox on first for James Ramsey.  Another clutch 2 out hit to the gap in right-center field ended up scoring Cox all the way from 1st after good base running and a better slide.  that ended up being the game winner before Atkins got in for his 4th save of the summer.

Only the 2nd come from behind win for the Miners all summer and it couldn't have come at a better time after a disappointing loss yesterday.  They definitely know how to rebound.

Recap of the past few days

Certainly has been a while since the blog was last updated, but here we are back home again for the time being.    Down the stretch we’ll probably update in this fashion; it’s a bit irregular, but all the bases will be covered in each and every post.

After a tough July 4^th loss and then the rest of Independence Day on a bus back to Palmer, the Miners took a much-needed day off to recoup for the final month of the season.  Heading into the unofficial halfway point (season ends August 3, but the Miners have more than half the games left to be played) the Miners were sitting pretty atop the ABL by 2 games.

Monday’s first game back brought the first meeting with the Kenai Peninsula Oilers, who lead the ABL in pitching but are dead last in batting average.  One of those held up in the first game of the series, as the Oilers scattered 5 hits throughout the ballgame.  The Miners crushed Kenai in the first one, 12-2.  R.L. Eisenbach struck out 8 in his 3^rd win of the season.  At the plate, Jonathan Cisneros went 3-4, scored twice and drove in 3 more.  James Ramsey and Nick Cox (in his first game back from a finger injury) also had multi hit efforts.

Tuesday was all about the pitchers.  Justing Kraft started for the Miners and had the best outing of any Miner this summer.  He threw 9 scoreless innings, striking out 5.  Unfortunately, Oilers starter Crosby Slaught was just a good, throwing 8 scoreless.  The game went into extras as neither team scored in the first 9 frames.  After loading the bases in the top of the 11^th, a tight strike zone caused Jeremy Atkins to walk in the go-ahead and eventual game-winning run.  Estevan Uriegas got credit for the loss after giving up 2 straight hits to start the inning.  Kenai took the 2^nd game 2-0.  After the loss, the Miners fell to only 2 games up (Monday’s win put the team up 3), as both the Bucs and Pilots won.

The AIA Fire (last in the ABL) come to Palmer Wednesday for a one-game set then another day off.  David Stilley makes another appearance for the Miners tonight on the mound.  Game time at 7 p.m, Miners pregame starts at 6:45 right here.

Longest Game from Start to Finish & 1st Game to Extras

For the 2nd straight day, the Miners get two W's. They made up the 9th inning of the game started 2 days earlier because it was postponed due to rain. Jeremy Atkins came in and made quick work of the Fire lineup only allowing 1 base runner to solidify the 5-4 victory in that one.

Little did the Miners know that another close one was coming. The Miners broke open the scorebook as they so often do with a DJ Gentile 2 run homer in the 4th inning. The day before a questionable call by the ump took back one of his homers, but there was no question about this one. You could tell as soon as the ball hit the bat that it was gone.

But the Miners continued to struggle putting up runs in the late innings and allowing the Fire to tie up the ballgame with 2 runs in the 6th. The Fire got a 1 out double and then a wild pitch to get a runner on third. The next batter grounded one to JJ at second and he threw home to try to prevent the run and his throw was off the mark. Another well placed ground out scored a runner from third later that inning to bring it to the 2-2 mark.

The Miners had to go into extra innings as the tie held up through 9. The Miners were quiet in the top half of the 10th with only David Alleman reaching base on a hit by pitch. The Fire posed a little more of a threat in the 10th with the lead off hitter reaching on an error from Shane Brown and getting over to 2nd with a one out walk to the batter.

So the scene was set with runners on 1st & 2nd and only 1 out for the Fire's 2-hole hitter Brian Kolb. Kolb struck a hard ball into deep center field, but Nick Cox made an amazing diving catch and got it to 2nd base for the double play because the runner did not tag. This was a web gem if I ever saw one with how far Cox had to go just to get to the ball and a great full extension dive to get the out. If that ball would have dropped the runner from 2nd would have easily scored and ended the ball game. Instead, the Miners got out of the jam.

You got the feeling that after that catch the Miners were going to win it. And they made quick work of Fire reliever Bradley Kidd in the top of the 11th. Cisneros started the inning off with a lead off walk and had Ryan Cole pinch run for him. Chad Marshall then laid down a great bunt that hit the dirt in front of the plate and just stopped. The pitcher was not able to get there in time to make the throw as Marshall reached on the bunt single. Bobby Jacobs then stepped up and laid down another good bunt. Kidd got their in time but made a bad throw to 3rd that ended up in the outfield and allowed Cole to score from 3rd and advance the runners to 2nd and 3rd. The Miners still had no outs and followed up the series of nice bunts with 2 well placed sac flies by Newalu and Cox to the deep parts of the outfield to score 2 more runs.

The 3 runs off of only 1 hit won it for the Miners as Atkins stepped in to get his 2nd save of the day in the bottom of the 11th. The first extra inning ball game was as close as it gets to going down as an L but a grat play in the field and heads up bunting and base running gave the Miners the 4 game sweep of the Fire.

Next game for the Miners is against a Goldpanners squad that has been playing much better recently and is climbing up the ABL standings.

Miners Sweep DH, hope for 2 on Tuesday

To say that Monday was an interesting day is a bit of an understatement here in Fairbanks.  First of all, since it's been a while, let's catch up on what exactly happened since we got here.

Clayton Ehlert started the first game of the series Sunday night.  He got through 5 innings without so much as a hiccup.  Heading into the 6th the Miners led 5-0 behind RBI efforts by each of the 3-4-5-6 hitters and Nick Croce.  James Ramsey had a solo homer in the 4th and was 2-3 on the game.  DJ Gentile and Jonathan Cisneros also had 2 hits and Shane Brown had 1.

Ehlert lasted through 2 outs in the 6th after giving up 3 runs to the Fire, and AIA got one more in the 7th.  That's when the rain started.  Both teams got through the 8th inning scoreless, but after one pitch in the 9th, the umps called the game.  At the time we thought it was official.

League rules, though, stipulate that each game be finished.  And because of another rule saying each team can only play at most 2 games per day, we were forced to hold off on the 9th inning until Tuesday.

MEANWHILE, the Miners had 2 more dominant efforts Monday in both games of the doubleheader.  They were 7 inning games.  In the early matchup, the Miners used 7 walks from Fire starter Cameron Heath to build a 7 run lead after 3 innings with only 3 hits.  The game didn't get much closer and a Shane Brown homerun in the 7th put the Miners in front 13-4 and the game ended 13-7.  RL Eisenbach improved to 3-0 with the Miners and still has a miniscule sub-2.5 ERA.

The nightcap took a little longer to get going offensively.  Both teams were scoreless through 5 innings.  Will Musson made his first start of the summer for the Miners and threw 5, striking out 3.  Chad Marshall picked up the game's first RBI, followed by a 2 RBI 2B by Nick Cox that turned into another run (Cox scored on the same play after advancing to 3rd on the throw home and scoring on an error).  That'd be all the Miners needed, but Jonathan Cisneros blasted a 2-run homer in the 7th inning.  Mat-Su won 6-1 to sweep both games.

With the wins, the Miners moved into first place by 1.5 games over the Bucs, with a half game still up for grabs if the 9th inning stays as is.  The teams will finish the game at 6:30, followed directly after by the originally scheduled game.  Justin Kraft starts the 9-inning affair and you can hear it all here.

As promised, the picture above is of Growden Memorial Field, home to the Fire and Panners.  The Miners are here until July 4.