Category: Postseason

A League Taken by Surprise

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No one saw it coming. Nine seasons in the league, and exactly one winning record, and that was eight years ago. The beleaguered baseball team from Kingston, Ontario, with the 516-616 record was a team off everyone’s radar. Without a single playoff appearance in the history of the franchise, Kurt Peterson, a.k.a. K.P., was seven years into trying to solve the puzzle. Coming off a year where the team batting average was a paltry .235, where was the offense going to come from?

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Riding High

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It took just six games to win their first Great Lakes Baseball League Championship, but, then again, it took seven years to finally achieve that goal. Perpetually knocking on the door only to come up just short, the Mounties finally negotiated the last hurdle by leaping over the Chicago Architects with their 5-4 win at Lakeside Park.

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Up Against It? Or Right Where They Want Them?

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The Chicago Architects are trying to win their third title but are down 0-2.  History tells us being down in the playoffs means very little to this team.  They have rallied from 0-3 deficits before, so 0-2 probably seems inconsequential, or at least it does not evoke the feeling of doom that some GMs might feel in this position.

Chicago General Manager Al B. had this to say this morning, “Oh, they’re off to a decent start. In their case they won’t have a chance to lose one at home until Game Six, and they may have wrapped it up by then. You gotta like their chances.
But I like mine too. I have no idea who the better team is, but mine has always had a tendency to fall behind and come back.” The small sampling of 4-0 in the regular season points toward Hamilton as the favorite, especially up by two games.

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Quite the Championship Series

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The Duluth Sea Gulls won their first ever USA Championship with an 82-62 record than rallied from 0-2 to finally overtake the back-to-back Great Lakes League Champs, the Chicago Architects, in a tight seven-game series for the rights to represent the USA in the Championship Series. Having scored 563 runs they had offense enough to get the job done, but would the pitching hold up?

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On the Brink

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The Vigilantes have been on postseason fire. They won the final three from the favored Maples, erasing a 1-3 deficit, and they’ve won the first three from the Architects. Henri Picard, who has slugged 114 homers in Windsor, has led the way a 1.182 OPS this postseason.

The Windsor Vigilantes are looking for one more win to claim their first-ever GLBL championship, and they don’t have far to go. The Chicago Architects, reigning GLBL champs, have finally won a game, but they are down 1-3 and have no room for error.

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City of Champs!

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chicago-walk-about-475 The Architects 2018 GLBL Champions

After two second place finishes in 2015 and 2016 (one Championship Series appearance) the Chicago Architects fell to 58-82 in 2017.  It was the third straight year they reduced the payroll ($114M).  Following the mandate of the owner Gregory Boquet they reduced the 2018 payroll even further to $101M.  But, then the team got busy.

Todd Walter was inked to a 2 year extension  (2.52 ERA)

Nathan Ball signed a 5 year deal (35 saves 0.79 ERA)

Ivan Diaz signed a 4 year deal (3-3/3.07 ERA)

Greg Myers 1 year deal (5-0, 1 Saves, 2.25 ERA)

Cyrill Leclerc 2 year deal (.283/.360/.511 w/27 HR’s)

Larry Dares 2 year deal (.278/.345/.438)

Lewis McTeel 3 year deal (7-10, 3.10 ERA)

Chris Dunlap signed in June (4-1, 2 Saves, 1.56 ERA)

Traded for Jean Cheron (3-2, 2.70 ERA for CHI)

With existing stars C Bill Durand, SP Arvin Northeast, SP Carl Cardny, Edward ‘Avenger’ Hudson, the Architects were the ball club with the most wins in the regular season (84) while winning both of their playoff series by  4-1 margins over Milwaukee and then ultimately the Canadian champs Windsor, 4-1.

Congratulations to Al and his Chicago Architects, 2018 Champs!

The 2016 Champs

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eagles_0060B6_FF0000_FFFFFF_0060B6_0060B6_FFFFFF_0060B6_FF0000 shrunk  The Milwaukee Eagles, all time Wins leader in the GLBL, have won the 2016 Championship in a closely fought series with the Hamilton Mounties.  Game 7 Box Score:

mil ham

Henri Francois was the Series MVP as his 1.26 ERA in handcuffing Mountie bats in most situations.  As a matter of fact July 23, 2016,  is the date that he last took an L in a game he pitched notching 9 Wins in a row.

Congrats to Mike T. for his championship season.  Also, to Alex W., who got about as close as you can get to winning it all.

 

Inaugural GLBL 2015 Champs

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caribou-hill     thunder_bay_caribou shrunk

No one talked about it.  No one had it on their radar.  No one saw it coming.

The herd of Caribou in the picture are about as overwhelming as the 2015 version of the  Thunder Bay baseball team who stampeded their way to a pair of 4-0 sweeps over the Mounties of Hamilton and then the Architects of Chicago.

Dan Courcelles and the Thunder Bay Caribou, our 2015 GLBL Championship Team.

The League Championship Series

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USA      eagles_0060B6_FF0000_FFFFFF_0060B6_0060B6_FFFFFF_0060B6_FF0000 shrunk   VS   chi logo shrunk

The Stats:

  • Eagles led the league in Slugging
  • Architects led the league in Homers and Runs
  • Architects steal almost 2x more bases than the Eagles
  • Eagle Catchers are more than 3% more efficient in throwing runners out
  • Eagle pitching yields the least amount of HR’s and total Runs
  • The teams committed an identical amount of errors, 63 to lead their league
  • Team vs Team….Architects hold the  edge 18-10

CAN   hamilton_mounties shrunk  VS   thunder_bay_caribou shrunk

  • Mounties led the league in Runs Scored
  • Caribou led the league in Homers
  • Caribou led the league in Walks
  • Mounties led the league in Runs surrendered (fewest)
  • Caribou led the league in ERA
  • Mounties led the league in fewest errors and largest ZR
  • Caribou Catchers throw out 10% more base runners
  • Team vs Team….Mounties have the 16-12 edge