One what turned into (at the last moment) an incredible night for baseball, 2371 Canadians fans turned up at The Nat (many of them donning mullet wigs in honour of a Canadian Cancer Society fundraiser that brought in about $500) to welcome the C’s home from a conquering tour of Yakima, eager for more of the same hot form that has seen the C’s stand at equal 1st place in the NWL West.

And for a while, that’s exactly what they got. But only for a while.

The lineups:

VANCOUVER CANADIANS:
Michael ‘Runway’ Richard DH
JD ‘Beanball’ Pruitt LF
Sean ‘Doc’ Doolittle 1B
‘Amblin’ Danny Hamblin 3B [seen left]
‘Uptown’ Corey Brown CF
‘Excellentic’ Matt Sulentic RF
Walter ‘Missing kid on Lost’ Correa SS
Julio ‘Hoop’ Rivera C
Carlos ‘Peachy’ Arrieche 2B
Jose ‘The Goose’ Guzman RHP 

SALEM-KEIZER WITCH-KINGS:
Shane ‘Crossing’ Jordan CF
Matthew ‘Syndrome’ Downs 2B
Garret ‘Shakin’ Baker LF
Mike ‘Hogwart’ Ambort C
Chad ‘250lbs in your freakin’ dreams, kid’ Rothford 1B
Sean ‘Clogs’ Van Elderen RF
Andrew ‘Mavis’ Davis 3B
‘Terrible’ Tyler LaTorre DH
Jose ‘Ballbooter’ Flores SS
Ryan Mop-Up’ McGrath RHP 

And it went a little somethin’ like this:

Salem-Keizer, who are joint leaders in the West Division with the C’s, opened with a whimper against Jose Guzman’s pitching, going down with two K’s and a groundout to first. This was the perfect warmup to Vancouver’s patented Ivan Drago "I must break you" routine, in which they take an opposing pitcher and brutalize him like me in a locked room with Paris Hilton and a sock full of quarters.

JD Pruitt opened the carnage by singling up the middle. A wild pitch moved him along so that He Who Talks To The Animals could move him to 3rd on a groundout. This would usually be where you look for a sac fly, but none was required as Mop-Up McGrath balked on a pitch, allowing Pruitt to slowly wander home like Rob McGowan after a hard night of testing beer temperature in the bleachers.

A Danny Hamblin double off into opposite field kept the fun going, but Uptown Corey Brown went swinging at something that was a little too downtown, and thus ended the inning with a K.

Salem-Keizer notched a couple of singles in the top of the 2nd, but they might as well have all struck out, because The Goose wasn’t in a mood to allow runs to score, and thus runs stayed away. Not so much for Vancouver, however, as a Matt Sulentic double to left led off the bottom of the frame, and a Walt Correa bunt left Mop-Up McGrath not just flailing after the ball, sprawled out on the turf, but it bamboozled him such that you could almost hear Tom’n'Jerry music playing in the background.

With McGrath’s comedy stylings out of the way, he got down to the serious business of striking out Juan Rivera, and then walking Peachy Arrieche, before The BallBooter, Jose Flores, threw away an attempt to gun down Sulentic at home plate, hitting the backstop and allowing Correa to come home too.

Feeling plucky, and knowing he’s one of the faster players in the minors, Michael Richard did his best impression of a Cessna hurtling down a runway (something he’s most familiar with, having made seven stopovers to get to Vancouver from Louisiana after signing his deal), stealing 2nd in a heartbeat. JD Pruitt then grounded out, scoring another runner, and the C’s led by an imposing 4-0.

Sadly, it all went horribly wrong for the C’s from that point, as Guzman started to wobble, conceding a run to a single, two walks, and a hit batter in the 3rd, and with the C’s pitching coach not looking to warm anyone up so early, he conceded five runs in an eville 4th in which singles, walks, wild pitches set the table, before an error to Arrieche tipped the scales to "ugh".

I don’t know if Arrieche hasn’t played much second base, but one thing is certain, if you’re fielding the ball running away from first, most infielders would know to plant and throw to get the runner at first… not ‘keep running and flip the ball to the shortstop, hoping he knows what you’re about to do and won’t be made to look foolish’.

That was the end for the Goose, as Flyin’ Bryan Collins entered the fray for the ‘Couv, just in time to see the trees shake fro what was to come.

With the Volcanoes having fought back to 4-3 with two outs and two on, the towering mass of man meat that is Chad Rothford emerged from the cavernous, foul-smelling, Salem-Keizer dugout. I believed several orcs followed him out.

For the uninitiated, Chad Rothford is the kind of guy that you can just tell shoved his fair share of Chess Club members into lockers during his high school years. He’s 6′5", about the same wide, and every limb he possesses has the thickness of your average 50-year-old oak tree. He’s Larry Kubiak all over again (Parker Lewis Can’t Lose references rule!). He’s Mongo. He’s the beast that swung maple and took out Tokyo.

And he doubled hard – a line drive hit so firmly that it kept going up all the way to the Sportsaction ad on the right center field wall – a solid 360 feet away – hitting it about 38 feet up, just shy of a home run.

In the end, it didn’t matter, as he scored the runners and gave the Lava-Lifers a one-run lead, 5-4.

Ah, but that the onslaught were over – alas, it had a few more runs to notch. In the top of the 5th, as the clock hit two hours of game time (Seriously Goose, how do you stay warm out there when you take 4 minutes between pitches?) Matt Downs, AKA Syndrome, singled home two runners to leave the C’s flailing in their wake.

And then came the Old Man Rivera show. Not content with having ended the top of the 5th by throwing out a steal attempt at 2nd, Julio Rivera drilled a triple to the corner in right field (that most in the press box were convinced was actually a fielding error, but hey, let’s pad the home stats out whenever possible), that allowed him to score on an ensuing wild pitch.

That brought in Easy Earl Oakes, who needs a big time outing or two to shift him upstairs before any roster cutting starts going on, and to his credit, the man with a list of people he’s done wrong, who he’s now going to do right in order to get great karma… pitched pretty darn well. I’m not going to sat he didn’t let anyone on base – in fact, he let runners find the bases in each of his four innings – but he got himself out of jams with aplomb, kept his head on, and by the end of his extended outing, he looked like a man who had turned a corner. In fact, with a line of 4IP, 0R, 2H, 2BB, 2K’s, he looked like a guy who was ready to start.

The C’s battled back hard, with Correa bringing Hamblin home in the 7th on a sac fly, and in the 8th, JD Pruitt singled, stole, and came home on Doolittle’s RBI shot to left field, bringing the Canadians to a 1-run deficit.

Unfortunately, Salem-Keizer closer Daniel ‘The Terror’ Ortero chewed through Brown, Sulentic and Correa in quick order, and the C’s couldn’t muster the juice to take back the game.

June 29, 2007
	Final    1   2   3   4   5   6   7   8   9      R   H   E   Salem-Keizer   0   0   1   5   2   0   0   0   0      8   12   1   Vancouver   1   3   0   0   1   0   1   1   0      7   9   1  box | log W: C. De La Rosa (1-0, 4.15); L: J. Guzman (1-1, 2.87); SV: D. Otero (4) HR: None.