Mavericks’ murderer’s row all about depth

By Sean Rooney on July 25, 2018.

srooney@medicinehatnews.com @MHNRooney

They win big, like Sunday’s 16-4 demolition of the Brooks Bombers.

They win small, like Tuesday’s 4-2 squeaker over the Lethbridge Bulls.

However they’ve done it this summer, the bats in the Medicine Hat Mavericks’ lineup are a veritable murderer’s row —dangerous no matter who’s at the dish.

“If you just take a look at our numbers, one through nine no matter who comes in the game, they can drive the baseball, put it out of the park, they can bunt, run, we can do everything,” said first baseman Zack Gray prior to Tuesday’s game at Athletic Park. “I think that’s pretty indicative of our record.”

Now 34-7, the numbers look mighty good. As a team the Mavs’ batting average is .316. They’ve scored 362 runs — 75 more than anybody else in the Western Major Baseball League.

Gray went 2-for-3 against the Bulls, batting fifth and raising his average to .320. That’s good for seventh on the team. Only four players are below the esteemed .300 mark and two of them — Louie Canjura (32 RBI) and David Vilches (26 RBI) are among the team leaders in RBI.

Jordan Dray, who hit eighth in the lineup against Lethbridge, has a .329 average and his four home runs are tied for second on the team. He knew good hitters when he saw them upon arriving in late May, but had no idea it would translate into this sort of production.

“You can’t be pitching around the whole lineup,” said the UBC Thunderbird. “You have to come at guys. We get pitches down the middle more often, it works out well.”

The term murderer’s row dates back to the New York Yankees, mainly the 1927 team that had Babe Ruth hitting 60 home runs and Lou Gehrig adding 47. Gray figures if anyone can be termed this team’s Babe Ruth, it’s catcher Colton Wright, who’s only got six home runs.

Really, this is a death by a thousand cuts-type of roster, not one that bashes everything it sees.

It starts with David Salgueiro, who Gray outrageously claims is faster than Usain Bolt. The centre-fielder’s 24 stolen bases is second in the WMBL.

Carson Johnson (.353) is more of a Derek Jeter-like shortstop, then Wright (.359) is followed by Sal Rodriguez (.342) one of three players with four homers. After Gray, hometown product Nolan Rattai (.313) had a clutch, two-out RBI double in the eighth for the home side Tuesday that helped Jumpei Akanuma to his league-leading sixth win (he went 8 innings, giving up six hits). Canjura (.265) hit seventh, Dray eighth and Jaxson Hooge (.287) ninth.

Even the guys off the bench hit. Backup catcher Reed Odland is hitting .340 but he’s seen the fewest at-bats because Wright is the de-facto leader, both on and off the field.

“It works out well for our lineup,” said Dray. “We have a crazy bottom of the order, which is wild.

“Some games we do everything, some games we don’t have to do anything.”

They’re back at it tonight, finishing up a rain-suspended game from Edmonton last week before a second game against the Prospects, who like Lethbridge could be a first-round playoff opponent. The first game will start at 5 p.m. with Medicine Hat the away team, leading 3-1 in the fourth inning. The second game — the last at Athletic Park before playofffs — is slated to start at 7:05 p.m.

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