Any C’s fan who was hoping for a return to V-Town for recently promoted pitchers Mighty Joe Scott and Mike Mitchell, could be waiting for a while.

Last night, the Cougars went on a home run spree, and almost all the runs were scored by 2004 Vancouver Canadians players, while the Scott/Mitchell tag team combined to keep the Wisconsin Timber Rattlers well and truly out of a game won 8-3 by the Coug’s. Javier Herrera and Myron Leslie (pictured left) cracked two of the three long bombs on the night, which has become the norm for both players, who earned Midwest League All-Star selections just a few weeks ago.

Leslie, who hit a solo shot, has racked up 11 long shots so far this season (he only hit 1 home run in 2004), and a .290 average (up from .245 last year), while Herrera, last year’s NWL MVP, hit a three-run shot. Last season, Herrera destroyed the NWL, hitting 12 dingers and a .331 average, and so far this season he has managed a reasonable tally of 8 homers and a .265 average (though he was hitting .417 over 5 games in an emergency promotion to AAA earlier this season).

Mighty Joe Scott (who we’re really missing in Vancouver right now), gave up 3 earned runs in his 5th inning of 4 hit, 5 walk ball, so though he got himself out of a few jams along the way, he’s not exactly in premium form, but Mitchell gave up just one hit and a walk in three innings of middle relief, keeping the Timber Rattlers rattled when it counted.

But the star of the show was Ryan Ruiz (seen right), last year’s Vancouver Canadians king of clutch (who can forget the game-winning walk-off grand slam that Ruiz hit on the road last year, on his first at-bat after a several week lay-off with injury?). Ruiz went 0-1, which doesn’t help his average much, but the 3 walks and 3 runs he managed over the course of the game surely grabbed the attention of coaches. In the 7th, after drawing a walk to get aboard, Ruiz stole 2nd, then scooted to 3rd on a wild pitch, and made it home after a second pitch escaped the catcher, manufacturing a run out of absolutely nothing in three pitches. Ruiz has had a rough time of it in pro ball in terms of getting serious playing time, and when 1st round draftee Cliff Pennington came to Kane County to play shortstop, it shifted everyone else in the infield back a step.

Ruiz, playing behind the higher-rated Kevin Melillo in the pecking order for most of last season, found himself in the same spot for most of this year, until Melillo was sent up to High-A Stockton.

Unfortunately, that happened not long after Pennington took over at short, which shifted defensive marvel Gregorio Petit along to second base, and Ruiz once more sat and waited for his chance.

In my opinion, if the A’s are smart (and they are), they’ll either give Ruiz an extended run at 2nd base for Kane County, or (and this seems all the more possible if Travis Buck goes up) they’ll shift him back to Vancouver for the season, where his defense and offense would fill the hole currently occupied by the patchy pairing of Wilber Perez and Isaac Omura, and his calm head and patience would benefit everyone else in the C’s line-up by giving them a #2 man who can draw a walk, steal a base, or go yard, depending on the need.

I’m sure Ruiz wouldn’t be asking for any such ‘demotion’, but if that’s what’s required to let the Ry-Guy show that he has what it takes to hold a regular spot in the line-up, then I think it would be a smart move for all concerned. He’d never say as much, but Ryan Ruiz is just too good a player to warm the bench.