TV GAME OFFERS A NEW PESPECTIVE

I didn’t go to the Rock Cats game against the Connecticut Defenders in Norwich tonight. Hey, even sports writers deserve a day off now and then.

The wife and I did some wine tasting up in Litchfield at Haight Vineyards, bought some plants at White Flower Farm and did some gardening, but I couldn’t stay away from baseball an entire day. The game was televised on the Comcast Cable channel, CN8, so naturally I tuned in.

No matter how many games you watch from a press box behind home plate, you get a much different perspective watching on TV, particularly from the camera stationed in center field that allows you to watch the pitches break. You also get the expert commentary of announcers like former Red Sox catcher and color broadcaster Bob Montgomery, which is equally as valuable.

The unique perspective allowed me to make some observations that are hard to make from the press box.

The Rock Cats fell behind early with the Defenders taking it to starter Brad Baker.

Baker, the Red Sox’ first-round draft pick in 1999 when Dan Duquette was calling the shots, is struggling, and it’s easy to see why. His fastball is none too fast and has little movement. He has a terrific changeup that breaks sharply away from left-handed hitters, but Connecticut hitters were aggressive to the fastball and doing serious damage.

Montgomery pointed out that Baker’s delivery allows hitters a long look at his pitches, which doesn’t bode well for a pitcher either. Baker reaches back with his pitches and holds it there for a split second before following through.

Baker’s stats belie his problems. Going into Saturday’s game, he had given up 37 earned runs in 65 1/3 innings (5.10 ERA). He had also walked 20, which in addition to his 69 hits allowed, indicates that far too many hitters are reaching base.

Montgomery and CN8 play-by-play man Dave Popkin did a revealing in-game interview with Monty’s former Boston teammate – Connecticut pitching coach Bob “Steamer” Stanley. Stanley’s spot starter Brooks McNiven had New Britain hitters in the palm of his hand by spotting his pitches beautifully in just his third start.

Stanley talked about the Giants’ minor league pipeline, which is funneling plenty of prospects the Defenders’ way. Connecticut is mired in last place in the EL North but the way things are going, they’ll catch the beleaguered Rock Cats before long.

After falling behind 4-0, Baker began spotting his changeup and curveball extremely well and he settled down. The strikeouts began piling up and he retired a bunch of Defenders in a row. But the way McNiven is throwing, four runs may be enough to send New Britain to its 12th loss in the last 13 games.

There’s another reason why it’s fun for a beat writer to watch his team play on the tube.

Eugenio Velez, Connecticut’s flashy young second baseman, laid down a bunt. As he made his way toward first, he made contact with the ball and home plate umpire John Tumpane called him out.

Defenders veteran manager Dave Machemer came out to argue. Tumpane huddled with his two colleagues. They determined that the bunt was foul. Rock Cats manager Riccardo Ingram, who hasn’t caught a break since the Twins named him Double-A manager in the winter of 2005-06, voiced his protest, but of course to no avail.

As the umpires went back to their positions, a voice rang out very clearly.

“You called it right the first time. That’s boolsheet.”

Montgomery and Popkin probably didn’t hear it. Even if they did, they wouldn’t have known who it was, but beat writers get to know the voices of the people on their teams.

It’s always good to hear Rock Cats hitting coach Floyd “Sugar Bear” Rayford expressing his opinion.

ROCK CATS HAVE RILED BASEBALL GODS

It’s easy to pass judgment on Rock Cats manager Riccardo Ingram, facets of the team’s game or individual players during a time when losses are piling up.

As the Rock Cats were dropping 10 of their last 11 games, Ingram will be the first to tell you that he made mistakes. The players’ mistakes, of course, are magnified. Those who don’t actually witness them first hand hear about them on the radio or read about them in the newspaper. People make mistakes. Ballplayers and managers are people. They’re entitled.

Mistakes have undoubtedly played a role in the Rock Cats’ nose-dive, but what has been incredibly apparent to those who watch the team daily is they just cannot catch a break.

Whenever Ingram sends a runner home from second on a hard-hit single and challenges the outfielder to make a perfect throw, he’s been making it.

In the second game of Wednesday’s doubleheader, New Hampshire has two outs and nobody on in the top of the ninth inning of a 1-1 game. Aaron Mathews pokes a single. Chip Cannon doubles into the right-field corner.

As right fielder Matt Allegra comes up with the ball, Fisher Cats manager Bill Masse sends Mathews. Prevailing wisdom questions how in the world he can make such a decision. Mathews is going to be out by 15 feet. Not when second baseman Felix Molina drops Allegra’s relay throw.

It goes down in the book as simply an RBI double and the box score analyst has no idea.

Thursday night, New Britain trails 1-0 in the seventh inning. The Cats bats have been resilient all season, though, and fans sniff a rally when Dave Winfree belts a leadoff single.

With one out, Kyle Geiger launches a long fly ball to the deepest part of the park. Center fielder Dustin Majewski angles back and twist nearly 360 degrees to compensate for the brisk tailwind. Just when it looks like the wind is going to carry the ball beyond his reach, Majewski makes a remarkable catch that would have made Jim Edmonds proud.

But the Rock Cats get a reprieve. Brandon Roberts’ Baltimore chop is coming down to second baseman Ryan Klosterman just as Winfree is running by. All Klosterman has to do is catch the ball and make the tag, but he drops it.

Ingram figures that stroke of luck will change the Rock Cats’ fate, but somebody in that New Britain dugout must have done something pretty distasteful to bring the wrath of the baseball gods down this hard on the team. Rashad Eldridge hits an absolute rope that seems destined to split the outfielders and bang off the wall.

Mathews races over from left field, goes horizontal and snares a sure double in his glove.

If Ingram didn’t keep his head shaved, he would have been yanking out hair by the handful. Of the seven losses he’s endured in the last eight games, six were by one run. How’s that for splitting hairs?

Explain the losing streak? All he can say is, “That’s baseball.” He can only wait for those capricious baseball deities to quietly rise from the opponents’ dugout and meander back into the Rock Cats’ good graces. The hard part is that has to happen during a 12-game road trip or any dreams of postseason play can be in serious jeopardy by the Fourth of July.

June swoon haunts Ingram again

Sincerity shines from Rock Cats manager Riccardo Ingram as he contemplates the reasons for his team’s recent inability to win.

Seven consecutive defeats, the last four by one run, have him gripping the lifeline with determination, but determination is a quality that he can’t realistically transfer to the 24 men who go out and play the game. The wear-and-tear of the fruitless stretch has him searching for answers and absorbing the self-punishment that such experiences bring.

The answers are manifested in clichés that thousands of managers before him have uttered.

“Somebody in the bullpen has got to step up.”

“They’re coming out of the bullpen with fresh arms. They’ve got to throw strikes.”

“We’re just not getting the clutch hits when we get the chance.”

“We’ve got to do the little things.”

Last year in his first crack as a Double-A manager, the kindness and authenticity that characterize his nature were not enough to reverse the losing pattern. He was unable to use the traits that come naturally to him to motivate players who had more powerful negative forces at work.

He nearly willed a talented but flawed 2006 team back to .500 by June 4, only to go on a road trip to Akron, Harrisburg and Binghamton and watch it lose in every conceivable way. Eight straight losses. Even the return home couldn’t make it any better than 11 setbacks in 12 games.
Ingram’s Double-A debut had drifted into oblivion.

This year would be different. Perhaps he would be a little tougher. He would toss a bucket of cold water on any smoldering, selfish resentment about players being underappreciated and held captive at a level beneath what they deserve.

The chemistry is much better. Every position player is contributing. The team hits with consistency. It never gives up until the last out is recorded. But can history be repeating itself?
The Rock Cats battled their way to the loftiest record they’d had since teenaged wunderkind Joe Mauer arrived from Class A Fort Myers in June, 2003, and shouldered the hopes of a winning season in the hearts of the ever-growing band of New Britain faithful. A playoff berth was the result.

The extended homestand of early June didn’t provide the benefits that Ingram would have preferred (7-6), but nonetheless, the Rock Cats were embarking on a foreboding six-game Southern Division tour at 31-26.

Seven defeats later, including Monday night’s homecoming calamity, are the 2007 Rock Cats destined to stagger down the same meandering downhill path that their predecessors tread?
Although Ingram covers it up adeptly with the broad smile and genuine expression that are his trademarks, a proud manager with a winning tradition seems to be allowing losses to burrow deeper into his heart and mind. He isn’t the first. He won’t be the last.

The mid-June changes that brought us Mauer and Matt Garza in years past have begun. One veteran reliever plagued by inconsistency is gone. Others are likely to end up down or out before the week ends.

The question that looms as the final four games of this crucial series with New Hampshire unfolds is whether Ingram can prevent another June swoon from writing another painful epitaph.