Link Report for Games of Saturday, August 26th

[hsvstarsfan]

THE FULL NELSON

Stars now lead by two games

What's a game here without humidity? It would be nice to finish the season with a little drier weather, but it didn't happen on this 89° evening. I can't remember a summer consistently as hot and humid as this one........ The 2007 magnet schedules were issued at the park tonight. If you didn't get one, there's still plenty more and no doubt, they'll be given out when the Stars open the 2007 at home, April 5 against the Mississippi Braves....... The Stars will spend July 4 at home against the Tennessee Smokies and finish the season at Hoover Met against the Barons. The home season ends with the West Tennessee Diamond Jaxx, August 25-29...... The Stars will have 10 home dates in April, 19 in May, 11 in June, 14 in July, and 16 in August.

Before the game, the Stars beefed up their bullpen after placing catcher Carlos Lee on the disabled list........ Getting a morning call in Florida, lefty Joe Thatcher received the good news that he was coming to Huntsville to join in on the fun of a playoff race, and 3 hours after arriving at Huntsville International Airport, he was warming up in the pen to pitch to two lefties, Mike Rozema and Matt Young....... The Brewers had picked up Thatcher last July 20 from the independent River City Bandits of the Frontier League and assigned him to West Virginia (1-3, 2.43)....... After 26 appearances there, he moved up to Brevard County, where he had a murderous 0.29 ERA --- that's no misprint, either Stars fans, in 16 appearances........ In the 9th, the 6'2" Indianapolis native struck out both hitters swinging on seven pitches, his 6th -- a ball to Young....... Joe Valentine then was waved in, striking out righty hitter Eddie Perez, the major league vet who homered to left off starter Steve Hammond in the 1st to give the Braves an early 2-0 lead.

The 7-6 victory was the 19th win in the month for the Stars........ Only three times in the Stars' long 22-year history have they won 20 games in a month, and never more than that. They have nine games remaining on the schedule....... For a comeback like this, Don Money should be a breeze as the Southern League manager-of-the-year, but the ballots were mailed in early August. Between that time and the August 21st deadline, the Stars were still in 2nd place, not taking over 1st place until the day after the deadline, but they were 12-5 in that stretch, so we'll have to see what happens.

After Friday's 14-inning game, hopes were on Hammond to have a strong outing to give the pen a little rest, but instead, it was his briefest of his 12 starts with Huntsville, and the first time he had pitched less than 5 innings....... Hammond had two quick innings, retiring six hitters over the 2nd and 3rd innings, getting a double-play from his defense in the 3rd, but by the end of the 4th, he had thrown 68 pitches, and after throwing 10 pitches in a walk to Perez in the 4th, then walking Yunil Escobar on four pitches to load the bases with nobody out, he was done.

Fortunately by this time, the Stars had a 6-2 lead, and that came from a power surge, the deficiency of which the Stars can partially blame for such a dreadful 1st half........ The Stars hit just 25 home runs in the 1st half. In games they didn't hit a home run, they were 13-36! When they did, they were 11-9....... In the 2nd half, they have hit 43 home runs, and in those games, they are now 23-12..... What a difference! (For the record, they're 13-13 when they're homerless in the 2nd half).

For the first time this season, the Stars got two HRs from one hitter, and three in one game...... The first of three came on the very first pitch to Steve Moss in the 1st inning, going over the StarMarket sign to the left of the scoreboard and below the large star-shaped ad sign....... In the 2nd, Brad Nelson tied the game up, 2-2, on a 3-1 pitch with a shot that cleared the third wall in left that I would guess went easily over 400'........ Brad then capped off a 4-run 3rd inning with a 3-run blast to right this time, once again clearing the fences....... Mississippi starter Eric Schmitt set the inning up by walking the bases full at the top of the order. Brendan Katin then grounded Schmitt's first pitch slowly down the third base line. Josh Arteaga came in and made a fine defensive play, picking the ball up with his throwing hand and whipping the ball to first to get the out on Katin, moving the runners up and scoring Moss........ Nelson then hit a 1-1 pitch out to make it 7-3, and that made a loser out of Schmitt, whose record is now 0-4....... Schmitt spent six years in the Yankee organization before being released last December 19. This was just his 2nd start of the year after 26 relief apperances. In two previous appearances against the Stars this season, he gave up 3 runs on 8 hits over 4 innings in games the Braves ended up winning.

Gerrit Simpson, reliable as ever, came in to clean up for Hammond, who left the bases full in the 5th. He got Josh Burrus to hit into a 5-3 double play, Ryan Braun tagging out Eddie Perez going to third, then going to first. Simpson then struck out Mike Rosamond swinging on three pitches........ Simpson then struck out the side in the 6th on 16 pitches, 9 of them on Arteaga, who fouled off a few before looking at strike three........ Fans did a good job of warding off the mortar rounds that were going into the seats this night. There were a lot of them, and some nice catches were made........ Simpson tired out after three innings, giving up Burrus's single to center in the 8th before Michael Rosamond hit his team-leading 15th home run on a 3-0 pitch to left to make it 7-6, close to where Steve Moss hit his in the 1st......... Chris Mabeus finished the inning for Simpson and retired the side on 12 pitches, 9 for strikes. Ignore his 6.87 ERA. Mabeus now has a 3.46 mark since July over 13 innings in 13 relief appearances as a set-up/middle reliever after giving up 9 runs in his first three appearances with the Stars.

Sunday night, Yovani Gallardo (4-2, 1.63) will face Chris Waters (7-13, 5.01)....... Waters has given up a league-leading 23 home runs on the season. Moss homered off him on July 13th in a 3-1 victory for the Stars and Ron Acuna and Jeff Eure targeted him in the 2nd game of a double-header on August 10th in another loss for Waters..... He also leads the league in losses.

At a post-game awards celebration put on by the Booster Club for the Stars, Callix Crabbe was awarded this year's Rocky award, the Boosters' budget equivalent of the Emmys. The Rocky has been given out every year since 1992 when it was awarded to Eric Fox. It honors the player whose spirit, desire, hustle, and love of the game manifests itself on the playing field, and believe me, after watching Callix's major-league caliber defense, and lately, his offense, he richly deserves it......... Callix is the all-time club leader in sacrifice hits (36), breaking Jared Mathis's record last June 27th. This month, he's outshined the sluggers on this team, leading the club with a .388 average this month on 38 hits, the most by a Stars infielder since Jeff Pickler in 2001...... Callix also picked up his 100th career run as a Star last night...... He's close to cracking the Stars' all-time top 20 in games played, at-bats, and hits, and is already 10th on the list in walks (131), passing Tony Gwynn, Jr. and tied for 12th with the player I compare his defense most to, Gary Jones, in stolen bases (50)....... The Eagle, named in honor of Bob Bennett, was given to Corey Thurman. Bennett, who pitched for the Stars from 1995-97, was a full--blooded Lakota Sioux Native American whose Indian name was "One Eagle". Bennett was very popular in the community, so the award is mostly a popularity award, but the award is also handed out to the pitcher who characterizes fortitude and resiliency in face of long odds. It fits for Corey, whose ERA never dropped below 3.06, despite 9 losses and almost a constant lack of runs behind him.

Brad Nelson continues to have the hottest month of his four years as a Huntsville Star, hitting .359 with 15 RBIs and 3 HRs. He became the first Huntsville Star this season to hit two out in one game. That now gives him 31, ranking him 7th all-time, one behind another Nelson -- Rob -- and Ben Grieve........ Brad, dubiously if I must say, is now one of five players to have played in over 300 games for the Stars, and ranks at this moment 4th in at-bats (1,087), tied for 5th in hits with Jeff Pickler (278) , 12th in runs scored, tied for 2nd in doubles with Terry Steinbach (64), 4th in RBIs, 5th in total bases, tied for 4th in sac flies, and 6th in walks...... On the negative side, Brad broke the Stars all-time strikeout record once held by Steve Howard when he struck out four times in last Thursday's game. Nelson, now with 281 strikeouts in 303 games, broke the single-season record in 2004 with 146. That record had held up since 1987 when Howard struck out 142 times.

If you haven't seen it, go to the standings page and see, in numbers, how the Stars made their miracle climb to the top in the Southern League..

www.starsboxscore.com/standing.htm

Edit: Added link...