Link Correction

Oops. I made a mistake on the league stats link. Here is the correct one.

Americans Impact the Reds

I'll keep this post a short one. Mark Perea arrived last week to join us on the Reds team. Mark is the nephew of Walter Perea, my long time catcher in New Mexico. I'll get to Mark in a minute.

Walter played pro ball with the Brewers and Phillies organizations and was one of the highest rated defensive catchers during his time in the minors. Unfortunately for me, Walter threw the ball back harder to me than I threw it to him! And don't piss him off because he would throw it back even harder! I equate Walter to a nice warm blanket on a cold winter day. I could throw a curve ball 10 feet short of the plate and somehow, we would still come up with it or block it perfectly. Now that's comfort when you are on the mound!

So you get the idea of Walter. Now imagine him 14 years ago and you get Mark. He looks like him, talks like him and acts like him. Even has that stupid grin all the time! Mark played with us on the New Mexico Mets too and is an awesome catcher and hitter. This is the boys' first time out of the states so I'm sure it will be an eye opening experience for him. He's already had a run in with the check out girl at a local electronics store. She started yelling at him in German and he just froze up. Welcome to Germany!

Well the Americans made an impact this weekend as the Reds beat first place Karlsruhe 5-3. Yours truly pitched a complete game for the win and Mark caught, threw out the tying run (at the time) on second base as he was trying to steal and went 4-5 with 2 doubles and a triple and 4 RBI. Getting back to the guy he threw out on second; the guy laid a perfect bunt down that only went about 4 feet and stopped one inch from the third base foul line. After I grabbed the ball, the guy was already on first. Mark said "Damn that guy is fast". We knew he was going to steal, but I wasn't worried. I had a catcher with a cannon behind home plate and he wasn't afraid to use it. Sure enough, the runner goes on the first pitch and I get the ball to Mark as fast as possible. "SSSSSSSSSSSSSSS" I hear as the ball wizzes by my ankles. Perfect throw from his knees and he got him out by 2 steps. That was huge!

I did ok too. Only allowed 1 earned run and no runs at all after the first inning. It was truly an exciting game and one you had to be at to feel. Oh yeah, I also hit a double in the gap to score the tying run.

Here is the link to see the league stats on Marc and I. I don't think Mark is in the league leaders yet because he doesn't have enough at bats, but he will shortly. You can click on our team name "Stuttgart Reds" to see his team stats. I'm in the League Leaders for ERA right now. Should be first, but some score keeper pegged me with an extra earned run!

Also another article on our team site.