Macro Paz, Catcher: There weren’t many great expectations out of Paz, last season’s backup catcher who played sparingly and fared abysmally against big-league pitching when he did. But after a terrible spring that led most to believe he would spend another long season incubating on the bench, Paz exploded out of the gate in April, hitting a scorching .339-.383-.607, and didn’t let up, batting for .346-.398-.533 over the first half and gaining the primary catching role. As hot as his first half was, Paz began to wither as the season went on – his second half stats were just .237-0.305-.372, dialing down his overall numbers to a respectable .295-.351-.457. Nonetheless, the 18-year-old Paz made a remarkable leap in his 2^nd season.

Tina “Experimental Error” Quach, Backup Catcher: Just one year after finally assuming the full-time catcher role, Quach appears as though she’s lost her major-league touch already. While her drop-off last year was attributed to growing pains in adjusting to the rigors of the full-time role, Quach continued her regression. Though her batting average bumped slightly from .286 to .296 (mostly on the strength of severely cutting down her strikeout rate, from 6.50% of plate appearances to 3.17%), Quach continued to struggle with picking up on walks (her 10.62% walk rate last year dipped down to 8.97%) and hitting for power (1.329 bases per hit in 2006 to 1.218 this year). With the more-rapid-than-expected-development of Paz, Quach was quickly relegated to backup catcher position and utility infielder, where she mainly substituted for the inconsistent Joanna Maung.

Derek Lew, First Baseman: Following up his stellar comeback and Batter of the Year season in 2006, Lew proved again his worth as the Montis’ roundhouse power hitter and dependable franchise star. He hit a solid .291-.343-.559 on the season, and demonstrated an improvement in his patience at the plate, setting a new career high with 55 walks, while striking out just 13 times in 735 plate appearances. He also bested the doubles record he set last season by 1, setting 78 as the new high water mark.

Henry Nghe, Shortstop: After his all-star season as a rookie in 2005, the aging Nghe produced little in his 3^rd season, struggling along to just a .270-.330-.424 line, before a torn hamstring in early September ultimately knocked him out for the season. It will be a long road to recovery for the declining Nghe in the offseason, as he’ll face stern competition from the upstart middle infielder Wissmath and his 2005 Rookie of the Year season now seems a distant memory.

Cristian Ortiz, Second Baseman: While Ortiz set himself up last year for universal renown as the stolen base champion with 91 steals, the speedy second baseman elevated his game to a whole new level in 2007, evolving himself from simply one of the best leadoff men in the league to one of the best all-around players, period. Ortiz set new personal bests for power (.560 SLG, 34 homeruns, 42 doubles), on-base ability (.311 AVG, .393 OBP, 84 walks, and a 5.41% K-rate), and even bested himself in speed (a record-shattering 112 stolen bases, and a personal-best 13 triples as well). And it appeared he was only getting warmed up – Ortiz hit a scorching .325-.377-.692 in September, and achieved the rare feat of a 30-RBI, 30-Run month, one of the only such months recorded in history. Altogether, Ortiz batted .311-.393-.560 with 213 hits ,34 homers, 139 RBI, 160 Runs, and 151.46 Runs Created, an all-around display of hitting and durability that hasn’t been seen since the inaugural 2003-2004 seasons (the last time anyone had >140 Runs Created, or > 260 RBIs+Runs.

Joanna Maung, Saung-gah-basewoman: Like many longtime fan favorites, saung-gah-basewoman Maung is long on memories and stories but in the new age of statistical scrutiny, increasingly coming up short in real production. While she continued to play admirably in close/late situations (.344-400-.438) and put up clutch plate appearances for the ages (who could forget the opening game of the Divisional Series!), Maung’s regular season body of work was simply another middling year at the plate (.289-.355-.360). While she played in about half of the games at third, she found herself displaced often by Quach and the upstart rookie Wissmath.

Salgu Wissmath, Utility Infielder: After destroying minor-league pitching in the Berkeley Independent League, the rookie free agent pickup got her chance to shine in the bigs, and she hasn’t disappointed for a rookie, batting .318-.387-.420 and stealing 24 bases whilst filling in as part of the 3B platoon for the lackluster Maung, and in September as the primary SS replacement for the injured Nghe.  For a rookie, she demonstrated great bat control and picked up walks at a nice clip, resulting int he 4th-best OBP on the team. With the left side of the infield continually in flux, the versatile Swissmath looks like she’ll play a major role in that mix next year.

Ted Kwong, Leftfielder: Rumored as the next prodigy before he even stepped into training camp, Kwong carried with him not quite huge expectations (the Montis, winners of 4 straight Universal Series and stocked with star talent, were probably the team in least need of the next superstar hitter to help carry their offense) but intrigue.  While the SWL had had the other-worldly Gates Skywalker for 3 years running, no one had achieved an other-worldly season (an OPS over 1.100) since the Daly City slugging duo of Tienturier and Ho retired in 2004. The rookie leftfielder stepped onto the scene and hit like few ever have at such an age, and in ways the Montis haven’t seen since Kwong’s legendary predecessor at leftfield, Norman Ho… if that.  In just his first year, Kwong set nearly unheard of marks: a godly .445 OBP (2^nd in Montis history to the .467 in Ho’s 2003 season); an all-time Monti record .704 SLG (only Jason Liu in his barely-qualifying 2004 season came particular close, when he slugged .702. Ho’s 2003 had the 3^rd highest mark in team history, at just .663); and 48 homers, a Monti rookie record and just 1 short of Ho’s 2004 record.

Concerningly, Kwong has also been bitten by the injury bug several times at the end of the season – he dealt with an inflamed back that forced him out for a week in September, then in the middle of the Montis playoff run, tore a calf muscle that set him out for the rest of the postseason.

Tiffany Ho, Centerfielder: Entering the season as the most experienced contestant of the centerfield platoon(145 starts there in 2006), Ho surprisingly found herself as the odd girl out – she logged just 20 starts at center, and instead found her spots in relief at left field, right field, and even shortstop for a spell (12 starts). Despite all of the defensive shuffling and the lack of a consistent starting spot, Ho’s performance hardly seemed to suffer – she improved her rate stats across the board, hitting .315-.354-.429, for the first time bringing her on-base rate above league-average levels.

Jessica Kuo, Centerfielder: Expected to be the defensive wizard and lightest-hitting of the centerfield candidates, Kuo ultimately emerged as the primary centerfielder candidate for 2007. She flashed better-than-expected on-base ability (.382, built mostly upon a .346 average), and simply slapped singles for most of the season (out of her 182 hits, just 22 went for extra bases). Aside from getting onto base, Kuo’s signature value proposition was simple: pure and unrefined SPEED.  Though the record-holder (and eventual record-breaker) Ortiz stole the headlines for most of the season, Kuo was able to match him nearly steal-for-steal  after spotting him a huge head start (she stole just 3 bases in sparse play when she first started in April, compared to 22 for Ortiz). From May through September she stole 86 bases to Ortiz’s 90, while being caught only 14 times (86%) to Ortiz’s 19 (82.6%), and was partially responsible for many of his steals, allowing the leadoff hitter to piggy-back off her double-steals after getting on-base from the 9-spot.  If she can maintain her on-base ability and playing time, 2008 could shape up to be a stolen base race for the ages.

Francis Chen, Rightfielder: Ever since he stepped onto the scene in 2004, blasting 13 homers in just 162 part-time at bats, Chen has attracted intense interest as a player who flashed all the tools to be a star in the league and was only in want of the consistency to put it all together. The next step was the 46 walks in just 304 plate appearances in 2005 (15.13% walk rate), enough to raise his appalling .179 batting average to an acceptable .307 on-base-percentage. Despite the paltry overall numbers (Chen was just .179-.307-.417 that season), the potential there was enough for the Montis to make a commitment, and again, Chen was almost there, putting together a decent 2006 season that mixed flashes of appallingly bad flailing at the plate with locked-in power surges.

Finally, 2007 was that season that Francis Chen the Legend arrived. Racking up 83 walks and 14 steals, Chen put stacked himself up to a .354 OBP, and put on a prodigious power display, becoming the first Montis player ever to achieve a 50-homerun season. He hit 53 out of the park, slugged .604, and led the team with 144 RBIs. Sure, he hit only .237 and was still inconsistent, failing for weeks at a time with months like a .176-.341-.412 May and a .184-.316-.378 September, but when Chen was locked in, nearly no hitter was better, such as in the month of June when Chen hit a simply unbelievable .338-436-.925 with 14 homers in just 80 at bats. In total, Chen went .237-.354-.604 for a .958 OPS, 6.62 RC/27, and an absurd 2.552 bases per hit.

Jonathan “The Cheet” Chee, Designated Hitter: The Cheet saw his role increasingly squeezed out in 2007 as fresh faces, especially ones with better defensive prowess, emerged. After playing 1,235+2/3 abysmal innings left field in 2006, Chee barely logged any defensive innings in 2007, just 72 innings over 10 games at catcher and third. Instead, Chee found himself in a DH role, and a part time one at that, given the steep drop off in Chee’s huge drop offs in his signature hit-by-pitches (just 18 this year, surpassed by 4 other players in the league, the first time in 3 years in which Chee did not lead the league), and power, where Chee dropped off to a meek .324 slugging percentage, the lowest mark on the team and 2^nd-lowest of any Montis season with at least 250 plate appearances.

Skyler Reid, Designated Hitter: The power third of the centerfield platoon, the defensively challenge Reid soon found himself in the designated hitter’s spot after Kuo’s speed and defense proved to be a winning combination in center, and The Cheet’s further declining power hitting opened up the DH spot. Offensively, Reid posted an extremely solid offensive output, hitting .327-.379-.506, giving the third-highest RC/27 (7.10) if he had made enough appearances to qualify.

Nathan Yan, #1 Starting Pitcher: What a year it’s been for Yan, who has delivered what must be considered the most dominant pitching season the league has ever seen. Pitching on a slightly aggressive schedule that saw him throw 34 starts in a 6-man rotation, Yan posted career highs in almost all his counting stats, including a 33-1 record, 296 innings (that’s 8.76 innings per start!), and obliterating the strikeout record by becoming the first ever pitcher to record 600 K’s in a season (after having already become the first, and still only, pitcher to record 400 and 500 K’s). Though his ERA (0.91) didn’t quite reach the lofty depths of last year’s 0.79, he did continue to improve his peripherals however so slightly, walking just 0.7 batters per 9 innings (down from 1.0), and bumping his strikeout rate to 18.3 K’s per 9. After a formula-breaking -0.01 DIPS ERA last year, Yan’s 2007 season completely busts it with a -0.12 DIPS mark. In a season such as this one, it would be impossible not to add to Yan’s lore of legendary games, and his highlights this season built up even more than the last, including a 22-strikeout PERFECT GAME on May 23rd against the Apple Septic Tanks (just the 5^th in league history, and the first in his career), a game in which he also recorded his 2000^th career strikeout. He followed this up just a few months later on August 5^th with the SIXTH PERFECT GAME in league history, a 17-strikeout beauty against the Europe Cricketeers.

Whitney Anne Esguerra, #2 Starting Pitcher: After a stellar but at times trying rookie season in which she pitched well but rarely found the run support to win games, Esguerra left it all on the table in her sophomore season, pitching in such a dominant fashion that she needed hardly needed any run support at all – 1.88 ERA, 0.83 WHIP, an opponent OPS of just 0.496, 289 K’s in 235 innings (11.1 K/9), en-route to a 24-1 record in 30 starts, setting numerous team records for Daly City starters not named Yan, and finishing second in the league in almost every major statistical category. She especially dominated the last month of the season, throwing 53 K’s in 46 innings, with an 0.59 WHIP, 0.59 ERA, and 4 CG’s and 3 shutouts in 5 starts.

Samantha Chin, #3 Starting Pitcher: A 2^nd straight year of improvement for Chin, who is as steady as they come – for the 3^rd straight year she’s improved in just about every category, settling down her control (2.0 walks per 9 innings, down from 2.8) and allowing far fewer flyballs to go yard – she allowed just 7 this year compared to 14 in about as many innings last year. Her ERA, CERA, and DIPS ERA continue to decrease, and if the 1:1 correlation between her CERA and subsequent year’s ERA continues, her 2007 CERA (2.12) may indicate a Pitcher-of-the-Year caliber performance coming soon.

Terrence Zhao, #4 Starting Pitcher: A second straight good, yet disappointing season for Zhao, who seems to have regressed and inverse-plateau’d following his breakout 2005 season. The year Zhao put up, with 188 innings, a 3.06 ERA, 1.17 WHIP, and 203 K’s (9.7 per 9), can hardly be distinguished from the previous season, and Zhao continued to exhibit a worrying drop in control (allowing a .292 OBP, highest since his rookie year). While great from a production standpoint (he went 18-4 on the season in 27 starts, averaging 6.96 innings each), it feels like a missed opportunity for Zhao, once the #2 starter who has now been surpassed by Esguerra and Chin to fall to the #4 slot.

Alfred Vong, #5 Starting Pitcher: In his season-long audition for a permanent role in the starting rotation, Vong shined for the first four months of the season, but seemed to simply run out of steam down the stretch – after that 7-2, 2.83 ERA, 0.94 WHIP, 101+2/3 inning start through July, Vong was an abysmal 2-4, 5.86 ERA, and 1.41 WHIP in nine August+September starts, once again casting a long shadow of doubt over whether Vong can make it as a starter, or is better suited to a life in long relief. Overall however, Vong fared decently in his first year as a starter, finishing with a 9-6 record, 3.90 ERA, and 1.11 WHIP in 157 innings over 21 starts and 2 relief appearances.

Sean Wade, #6 Staring Pitcher: And the regression continues for the one-time rock-steady rookie, who has been anything but in his two seasons since.  Entering the season haven been just barely edged out by Vong for the #5 slot, Wade couldn’t establish himself as anything but the 6^th-best starter on the team, throwing only 21 starts and recording an 8-5 record, 5.08 ERA, and 1.38 WHIP over 122+1/3 innings in that span, the worst season by ERA of anyone with even 50 innings, much less 122 and a third. While he did better in some peripherals, upping his K’s to 8.0 per 9 innings and lowering his homeruns allowed to 1.3 per 9, the hits (10.2/9IP) and walks (2.3/9IP) just kept coming against Wade.

Alvina Chu, Setup Reliever: Though sidelined  at the end of August with a ruptured tricep tendon that put her out for all of September, Chu made it back just in time for the postseason, playing an integral part in the bullpen effort (5 innings, 4 K’s, 0.80 WHIP and no runs allowed) to deliver Daly City their 5^th consecutive postseason title. Despite being cut a month short from her last season with the team, Chu still managed to set record highs in games (55), innings (67+2/3), strikeouts (63, for 8.38 K’s per 9). She retires having established herself as Daly City’s primary setup reliever (having served that role for her last 4 seasons) and one of its most accomplished bullpen leaders, with 145 relief appearances (1^st), a 27-7 record (1^st among relievers), 6 saves (5^th), 32 holds (1^st), 221+2/3 relief innings pitched (2^nd, 3+2/3 short of Angel Poon’s mark), a 2.80 ERA (2^nd among relievers with 100 innings), 3.45 DIPS (2^nd), and 1.06 WHIP (2^nd).

Kelley Cox, Long Reliever: Taking the role vacated by converted starter Alfred Vong, the rookie reliever impressed with her stamina, throwing 76 innings over 38 games, and posting solid if unspectacular stats of 3.43 ERA, 1.26 WHIP, and 3.76 DIPS ERA, exactly the workhorse-like performance you need from your long reliever. Cox even tried her hand in a starting role, attempting her first career start in May against the Caribbean Pirates, although it turned out disastrous (she lasted just 3+2/3 innings while allowing 9 hits+walks and 5 runs). She’d get a second chance, however, on the big stage, starting Game 6 of the Universal Series and going toe-to-toe with Parisian Kenneth Price through 8 innings, giving up 5 hits+walks and allowing just 1 run before handing off the 1-1 tie game to closer Josiah Leong.

Bernadette Dugtong, Middle Reliever: The rookie middle reliever, thrust into the primary relief role after the 2006 bullpen retirements, struggled late in the season, allowing an ugly 13 runs (9 earned) in 9 September innings, giving her a 9.00 ERA and 2.56 WHIP for the month. That brought her overall numbers down into decidedly league-average territory – only Wade posted a higher ERA or bOBP. Though her strikeout rate wasn’t impressive, Dugtong showed a remarkable resistance against giving up the big hit, allowing just 1.24 bases per hit and only allowing a single homer over 61 innings.

Josiah Leong, Closer: Leong ushered in an era of consistency to the closer role by becoming the first Daly City closer to serve consecutive seasons as the team’s closer. At this point one of the team’s most experienced relievers, Leong seems to have settled into the closer role – though he had far fewer opportunities for saves this season with the Monti’s prolific offensive production, Leong managed to gather 24 saves and emerged with a 9-2 record after being inserted into high-pressure situations throughout the season. Compared to his previous season’s 9 blown saves in 46 chances (19.6%), Leong blew just 3 in 26 save opportunities (11.6%). Overall Leong allowed fewer base runners and fewer big hits than last season, reducing his opponent’s AVG to a miniscule .176, and SLG to a tiny .300. Nonetheless he still ended up allowing about the same number of runners, having lost some control to allow a staggering 4.7 walks per 9 innings.

And the 2007 Team Award Winners…

Team Defensive Player of the Year: Whitney Esguerra

It’s a bit strange, giving your defensive award to a pitcher who logged just 235 defensive innings. But Esguerra was a dominant presence covering the center of the diamond, putting away 55 batters on the field (20 putouts + 35 assists), an impressive number for a pitcher who placed second in the league in strikeouts (11.07 K/9). All told, Esguerra relied on 408 fielding outs (subtracting strikeouts), for which she accounted for 13.48%.

Rookie of the Year: Ted Kwong

It wasn’t much of a contest this year; having established himself as undoubtedly the league’s rookie of the year, and with others clamoring for Batter of the Year honors to be bestowed, Kwong ran away with the RotY award, even against one of the strongest fields Daly City has had in years. In a season in which CF/DH Reid established himself as a solid lineup presence, CF Kuo gave Ortiz a run for his stolen base title while playing stellar defense, and relievers Cox and Dugtong both proved serviceable in the bullpen, no one set the team on fire as much as Kwong, who put up one of the best Daly City hitting seasons ever, batting .357-.445-.704, generating 10.79 Runs Created per 27 outs, and posting up 48 homeruns, 135 RBI, and 142 Runs in an injury-shortened 146 Games.

Comeback Player of the Year: Alvina Chu

It wasn’t a strong comeback year for any player in particular – on the whole the players who had been improving continued to improve, and the players who were regressing continued to regress. Chu bunked that trend just a little – while she didn’t return to the lofty heights of her 2005 season, Chu did improve a bit on last year’s regression, setting a career high in innings while shouldering the load as Daly City’s setup reliever.

Breakout Player of the Year: Whitney Esguerra

There were breakout performances a plenty for the Daly City Montis this year. From Ortiz, the speedy leadoff hitter who bulked up in the offseason and put on a power display that catapulted him into the echelon of top-flight all-around players; to Chen, who 3 years after his part-time debut finally took on the reins of a full season and put on a power display for the ages. But no player exceeded their history more than the sophomore starter Esguerra, who put on a season for the ages. In fact, measured by a whole slew of metrics – K’s, Quality Starts, CERA, DIPS ERA, bOBP, bSLG, K:BB – she put on the best season by a starter not named Yan, and overall her body of work shines more impressively than even the legendary 2004 Willis Fong’s or Zhao’s breakout 2005. And only Yan and Leong have bested the impressive 11.07 K’s per 9 mark she put up. In just two short years

Performance of the Year: Yan’s Twin Perfect Games

Everyone expected that at some point in his career, Yan would do it – post up the rare Perfect Game, flawlessly gathering 27 outs with nary a hit or walk or hit by pitch or even fielder’s error. In league history it’s only been done 4 times before, and none since Jack Seemann in 1938. Yan finally achieved this feat in 2007, blanking the not-anemic Apple Septic Tanks (they did finish 3rd of 8 in the UL in Runs) with a jaw-dropping 22 strikeouts, pulling the hat trick on 6 of 9 Apple batters (only the great SS Kenobi escaped without being struck out). Not even three months later, Yan astonished the world by dropping his SECOND Perfect Game on the Europe Cricketeers, a feat which prior-to occurred once every 13 YEARS.

In Need of Relief

The Montis are rounding the final corner into September, and on paper they’re looking the strongest they’ve been in years.  They’re 109-26 (.807) and with a 33 game lead over the 2nd place Microsoft Longhorns (76-59, .563, second-best in baseball), they’ve already clinched the division.  They’re on pace to blow away their records the past two seasons (125-37, .772 in 2005 and 119-43, .735 in 2006), and they’ve even got a fair shot of beating out their second-best 131-31 (.809) record from their inaugural 2003 season.

But the Montis have hit a roadbump that threatens to derail their season – while staying virtually injury free all season (save for a broken rib injury that allowed Tina Quach to play in only 17 games between July and August), the Montis lost two critical players right at the end of August – on the 30th, setup reliever Alvina Chu suffered a devastating ruptured tricep tendon that will leave her out for 4-5 weeks, likely leaving her out for at least the first round of the playoffs.  The very next day, star leftfielder Ted Kwong injured his back running the bases on a double, and is out 1-2 weeks.  While a condensed 3-man rotation of Yan-Esguerra-Chin (a combined 64-5 over 609 innings with 1.88 ERA, 0.78 WHIP and 918 K’s (13.57 K’s/9) will likely be able to hold for the playoffs without too much bullpen support, the offensive machine will need Kwong to come back at full strength if it expects to continue humming at its league-leading 6.81 runs per game pace.

The rest of the league is starting to shape up as well – the Microsoft Longhorns seem to have a firm grip on 2nd place as they’ve done all season, backed by their murderer’s trio of  sluggers (Jango Fett – .376-.455-.669, Boba Fett – .346-.411-.612, Jabba Desilijic Ture – .251.396-.609), and the Caribbean Pirates have reversed their 2006 last-place fortunes by staking themselves to a 66-69 (.489) record and 7 game lead atop the UL Terran Division.

The race in the SWL is a bit more interesting – while Pentax (led by .349-.438-.971 Skywalker and no one else) and Nikon seem to have secured playoff spots for the Photomaker division, the World Cities division will come down to the wire, with Las Vegas, Tokyo, and Paris all within 3 games of each other.

The Lineup

Tina “Experimental Error” Quach, Catcher/Third Basewoman: Quach hasn’t done much at all the past couple months, playing in just 17 games since July after breaking several ribs in a collision at the plate.  As such, her numbers haven’t changed much – Quach went an unremarkable .274-.338-.306 and hasn’t been all that impressive since her outstanding April.

Marco Paz, Catcher: After a blistering first-half performance, Paz has regressed mightily, hitting a terrible .214-.290-.325 in July-August, and with Quach healthy and spot starting behind the plate (albeit not hitting all that well either), Paz will need to fight to maintain his current position.  Paz has worked much better on his defense, however – he’s thrown out 10 of 22 runners since the season’s midpoint, finally fulfilling the potential of his cannon arm.

Derek Lew, First Baseman: Derek Lew is nothing but consistent, and while other hitters have had flashed terrific parts of seasons, Lew has been content to continue plugging along near his career averages – so far he’s put up a .288-.342-.559 line on the year.  Lew won’t have any earth-shattering developments this year – he’s on pace to put up 74 doubles, 12 triples, 27 homers, 144 RBIs, 136 runs (great but no career bests) – but one area of encouraging improvement is Lew’s improved walk rate – he’s already set a career best for walks with 47, and his walk rate of 7.7% is a vast improvement over the 4.6% rate he put up last season.

Cristian Ortiz, Second Baseman: Ortiz has continued his torrid June pace into the blistering Indian Summer,  propelling Ortiz to career bests in almost every category, with a full month left to go.  Ortiz has already set a career high in homeruns (26), doubles (36), RBIs (106), Runs (130), walks (74), and has already broken last year’s stolen base record with 95 so far this season.  He’s batting .309-.396-.532, all career highs, and should have no problem achieving the lofty goal of 100 steals on the season (he’s on pace for 113).

Henry “Mr.” Nghe, Shortstop: The oldest player on the Daly City team may finally be showing his age – at 30 years old, Nghe is putting up career lows in almost all categories, with a replacement-level .263-.324-.404 line.  While attributed to poor luck early on, Nghe hasn’t been able to get good contact on the ball at all – his BABiP has plummeted from  to .425 to .457 to .304 this season, which has been terrible news for a player who built his on-base and slugging rates on good batting averages.

Joanna Maung, Saung-gah-basewoman: Written off in the first half of the season after compiling worse than replacement level .250-.320-.288 batting, Maung has finally begun to heat up, hitting .308-.390-.385 and .385-.417-.477 in July and August.  She’s even refound her clutch intangibles, hitting .563-.611-.750 in close/late situations.

Salgu “Swissmath” Wissmath, Utility Infielder: Swissmath has gone through significant growing pains as a rookie, but she’s done fairly well for a #9 hitter, raking .420-.474-.620 in July and raising her line up to .302-.371-.413 on the season, and even stealing 21 bases to boot (on just 315 plate appearances). With the continued struggles of Nghe at shortstop, and Maung only now finding her stroke, Swissmath has a decent shot at playing herself into a solid infield starting position by the time the postseason rolls around.

Ted Kwong, Leftfielder: If the slight cool-down heading into the all-star break cast any doubts on the young rookie’s skills, Kwong answered them authoratatively in July and August, hitting a monstrous .393-.480-.749, with 20 homeruns, 52 RBIs, 53 runs, and 34 walks in that span. He’s vaulted himself into the leading position for the Batter of the Year award, with a .364-449-.713 line, 43 homeruns, 123 RBIs, and 130 runs on the season.  His 1.162 OPS, .713 slugging, 13.1 RC/27, and 130 Runs lead the field of candidates, and opposing managers have come to fear him, intentionally walking him a UL-leading 17 times (just one behind Pentax uber-slugger Skywalker).

Jessica Kuo, Centerfielder: The fleet-footed Kuo didn’t blaze the basepaths quite as fast in August – she nabbed just 11 bags after pacing the league (including league-leader Ortiz) every month from May through July.  With Ortiz’s increased power pushing him back to the #2 slot in the lineup, Kuo has taken most of the starts at leadoff, where she’s produced mixed results – her speed has been impressive, but she’s gotten on base at a league-average rate of just .340.

Francis Chen, Rightfielder: After his monstrous June performance won him an All-Star nod for the very first time, Chen’s BABiP regressed back to normal as he saw his batting average plummet to .235 over July-August.  Still, between walks and hit-by-pitches (12th and 6th in the league, respectively) Chen has pulled things together enough to make him serviceable at the plate (a .362 OBP for the season), which has given him enough chances this season to develop and display his prodigious power – and oh what power!  Chen is slugging .656 on the season, and ranks second in the league behind Microsoft’s Desilijic Ture in homeruns.  He’s already tied Norman Ho’s record of 49 homers, and has still got a month to go!  Needing only another 11 homers (which he’s already done in 3 of 5 months this season), Chen even stands a fair shot of becoming only the second player to hit 60 homers since the 2005 league reboot.

Tiffany Ho, Utility Outfielder: Perhaps the most consistent of all the young centerfielders, Ho still lags behind both Kuo and Reid in starts but has demonstrated her versatility by playing at least twenty games in all three outfield positions. While she’s still learning to take a walk (just 14 walks in 305 plate appearances – fewest on the team by far), she’s smacking the ball at a much better rate (.330 batting average), and putting a little more power on it as well (she’s raised her bases per hit from 1.32 to 1.40).  It’ll be interesting to see how the rest of the season plays out, as all three players will be competing fiercely to gain a foothold on the starting job for the postseason, and 2008.

Skyler Reid, Designated Hitter: After leading the field of standout rookie centerfielders, the rookie Reid has been finding success in patches.  Reid stumbled out of the gate in the second half, batting an abysmal .065-.121.-065 in July, but then followed up with a fantastic .373-.431-.644 August.  With better defenders Kuo (or occassionally Ho) establishing themselves in the centerfield position, Reid has mostly been delegated to designated hitter duties, but he’s performed well enough there to carve out a sizable majority of starts.

Jonathan “The Cheet” Chee, Designated Hitter/Emergency Catcher: Chee isn’t quite sure what position he plays these days – he’s started just 8 of 58 games in the field, none of them in the outfield where he has most experience. In fact, the lack of positional flexibility and his defensive liability in the outfield has probably hamstrung Chee the most in his search for consistent playing time to establish himself this season.  Nonetheless, while Chee continues to struggle with an abysmal slugging percentage (just .322 – set to be the second-lowest on record of any Daly City season with at least 250 plate appearances), he’s refound some of his ability in his area of strength: walks and hit-by-pitches and on-base percentage.  Since July Chee has reached base at a .439 pace, behind only LF Kwong in that span.

Nathan Yan, #1 Starter: The second half of 2007 has been marred with inconsistency for Yan, who has put together 10 complete games, 7 without earned runs, in 12 starts over July and August, yet came away with a solid but not awe-inspiring 0.95 ERA to show for it. Despite a dominating stretch (complete games in 17 of his past 19 starts, including his second PERFECT GAME of the season), he’s also been hit hard, giving up his first non-quality start of the season – 4 runs over 7 innings against the United States Patriots, and the brilliant control he demonstrated in the first half of the season seems to have regressed (he walked 9 batters in July alone, after walking just 8 in the three preceding months).  Nonetheless, Yan’s peripherals remain strong, and with his aggressive start schedule he could break several records – he can make up to 6 more starts in September, which currently projects to give him new career highs (and league records) in innings (294 IP), strikeouts (595), complete games (28), and shutouts (16).

Whitney Esguerra, #2 Starter: Esguerra has truly evolved into a lights-out phenom in just her second year, and has shown no signs of letting up – behind Yan, she’s second in baseball in nearly ever pitching statistic, from ERA (2.19) to Wins (20) to Quality Starts (23) to K’s per 9 (11.2).  For the year she’s 20-1 in 25 starts, and has been immensely consistent in her dominance – she hasn’t gone a single month with an ERA above 3.00 or a WHIP above 1.00.  If she can maintain the same level through September, Esguerra has a chance to set several Daly city marks – with 4 more wins she’ll have put up the best Wins mark of any pitcher not named Yan or Fong, and her current K-rate would put her at 283 K’s and 11.2 K’s/9 – both non-Yan Daly City records for a starter.

Samantha Chin, #3 Starter: While Esguerra has captured all the headlines and imagination with her potential, Daly City’s other young phenom starter has quietly continued her steady season-on-season improvement.  While none of her numbers jump off the graphs, she’s set to put up career bests in almost all categories, and put together a dominating July stretch in which she pitched shutouts into the 9th inning in four straight starts, completing two of them.  Chin had a forgettable August however, giving up a 4.24 ERA and managing less than 7 innings per start.

Terrence Zhao, #4 Starter: While the dominance of the 2005 Zhao may be long gone, he’s quietly turned around his abysmal first half with solid performances in the second half, winning all eight starts with a 2.10 ERA and 1.07 WHIP, and even finishing out August with a pair of complete game shutouts.  With a 3-man rotation a strong possibility going into the playoffs, Zhao will have to reach back for some of that 2005 magic to displace Chin for that #3 slot.

Alfred Vong, #5 Starter: Vong entered the season with high expectations for himself, and for four months it looked like he was destined become another lights-out ace in the loaded Daly City rotation.  Through the end of July, Vong had compiled a 7-2 record in 12 starts, with a 2.83 ERA and 0.94 WHIP.  Things came crashing down for Alfred in August, however, as he put up ugly starts and a 5.97 ERA en route to a 1-3 record in 5 starts.  Vong’s lone gem in that span was a complete game, 1-run win.  For now the bullpen convert will struggle through some consistency issues, and with the knockout of setup reliever Chu, may find himself resuming his old relief duties for the month of September.

Sean Wade, #6 Starter: Bad has turned worse for Wade, whose pitches have looked like homing missiles for bats this season.  With a 5.23 ERA and 1.43 WHIP, Wade is having one of the worst seasons on record for a regular starting pitcher in Daly City – no one who has thrown more than 50 innings has ever fared worse (and Wade has been given 105!).

Kelley Cox, Long Reliever: Cox has struggled of late, although her problems are partially due to rust – solid starts by the Daly City rotation in July meant almost no work for Cox, who made just two appearances and pitched 1+1/3 innings that month.

Bernadette Dugtong, Middle Reliever: Dugtong hasn’t been flashy (her numbers are 3.46 ERA, 1.21 WHIP, and 5 holds against 1 blown save), but she’s been adequate and durable stopgap in middle relief.

Alvina Chu, Setup Reliever: Chu’s farewell tour ended early as she ruptured her tricep tendon at the end of August, leaving Daly City’s most experienced reliever out for the rest of the regular season, and possibly into the playoffs as well. Up to that point, Chu had been putting together a solid second half – she sported a 3.04 ERA and 0.98 WHIP through 26+2/3 innings of work.  Her loss means an already thin bullpen (down to just three relievers, including closer Leong) will have to work overtime over the last month.

Josiah Leong, Closer: After months of dull perfect innings and few save opportunities, Leong was back to his thrill-seeking ways in July and August, going 4-1 with a 3.27 ERA and both blowing and saving critical leads. On the whole, however, Leong is having his best season yet as a closer – he’s blown just 2 save opportunties (21 for 23 – 91.7%, tops among relievers with at least 20 save opportunities) and has dominated with a 2.12 ERA, though he hasn’t had many opportunities to protect close leads for the overpowering Daly City offense.

More than most seasons in recent memory, the Daly City lineup is an embarrassment of riches.  While some of the veterans have put up lackluster numbers, almost every reserve and newcomer has panned out in a big way, batting their way into the lineup.  As the Monti manager joked – it’s an 11-man lineup squeezing into 9 spots.  As a result, no player has fewer than 137 plate appearances at the midpoint of the season, as the competition for playing time has forced nearly everyone out at some point for the next hot-hitting player.

The Lineup

Tina “Experimental Error” Quach, Catcher/Third Basewoman: Quach (.310-.376-.381) has put up a great batting average, but not too much else out of the ordinary so far this season, as her OBP and SLG numbers have fallen roughly in line with her career numbers.  After a strong start, she was merely pedestrian in May and June, and with the continued mashing on display by fellow catcher Marco Paz, has been forced into exile at the third base position.

Marco Paz, Catcher: After exploding onto the scene early in the year, Paz has shown that he’s here to stay, raking his way to a .346-.398-.533 line while displacing Quach as the primary catcher.  His potent power has faded somewhat (he’s slugged just .511 after belting 4 homers in 56 at-bats for a .607 slugging in April), but Paz has proved his resilience by continuing to pour on the hits, actually improving his average from the .339 he hit in April.  Paz does need to work on his fielding, however – he’s thrown out just 8 of 34 runners this year, ranking just 18th out of 21 of catchers with 20 or more baserunner attempts.

Derek Lew, First Baseman: After what looked like an MVP start to the season in April, Lew has struggled at the plate as of late, producing a line of .290-.345-.541, good for just the 6th-best OPS on the team (and just the 8th-best Runs Created/27 outs at 6.15 RC/27).  One area that Lew continues to improve in, however, is his walk rate, where his 30 bases-on-balls so far is on pace to shatter his career high of 43, achieved in his rookie year.

Cristian Ortiz, Second Baseman: The slick-fielding Ortiz is having a career season as he’s setting career highs in almost all categories, and becoming a bonafide force in the leadoff spot by adding on-base ability (.404 OBP) and power (17 homers, .519 SLG) to his arsenal of speed (60 stolen bases so far).  As it stands, Ortiz is on pace to shatter two records this season: he’s on pace for 120 steals and a staggering 170 runs, which would shatter his own record (set just last year) of 91 steals, and Kenton McClinton’s 166 runs from his hallowed 1942 season.

Henry “Mr.” Nghe, Shortstop: Dismissed as an early season fluke, Daly City is in full-on worry mode for Nghe, who so far has hit at a glacial .250-.305-.403 clip.  At this point the only thing allowing Nghe to start a staggering 58 of 81 games is the lack of any suitable backup to play the shortstop position.

Joanna Maung, Saung-gah-basewoman: The incumbent third basewoman has looked terrible at the plate, with a .250-.320-.288 line with no discernible pop (her isolated power is just 1.15 total bases per hit), and she’s done even worse in the clutch hitting situations she’s known for, batting .182-.250-.182 in close/late situations and just .128-.271-.179 with runners in scoring position.  With a multitude of hitters banging on the third base door to get a spot in the lineup, she may be relegated back to her bench/pinch-hitting role for the rest of the season.

Salgu Wissmath, Utility Infielder: Daly City has had to lean heavily on the green Wissmath, who was originally brought in to back up the middle infield.  She’s played about as well as you might expect from a rookie bench player, putting up an adequate .275-.350-.350 line that would be great for spot duty, but hasn’t been quite enough to warrant the substantial number of starts she’s received (42 total) in place of the struggling Nghe and Maung.  She’s also looked shaky on defense, committing 9 errors so far playing 2nd, 3rd, and shortstop (her fielding percentage is .932).  But for better or worse, the young Wissmath has been thrown into the starting infield fire, until the incumbents can re-establish themselves or some other candidate can clearly separate themselves from the pack.

Ted Kwong, Leftfielder: While Kwong has cooled down just slightly from his April pace, he’s continued to rake through the summer months and now sits near the top of the UL leaderboard in almost every category (he ranks in the top 5 in OBP, SLG, Runs Created, RC/27, RBIs, and Runs).  For the season, his line stands at .344-.430-.687, which if, he holds pace, would rank as the 8th-5th-2nd best in team history, and would set a new Montis record with 11.88 RC/27 and 181.2 Runs Created total (shattering the previous records of 10.95 RC/27 and 165.53 total RC set by Norman Ho in 2003).

Jessica Kuo, Centerfielder: After competitively pushing for centerfield playing time with outstanding play in April, the speedy Kuo has done nothing but pick up speed – literally.  After disappointing with just 3 steals against 4 times caught in April (despite reaching base 20 times in 47 plate appearances), Kuo turned on the afterburners, swiping 23 bags in May and 19 in June, outpacing team and league leader Ortiz both months, despite having just 205 plate appearances to his 253 and 79 on-base chances to his 104.  She’s been playing in both the #1 and #9 spots as a leadoff hitter, and has set the table nicely with a .393 on-base percentage.  On account of her stellar defense, Kuo seems to have gotten the majority of starts at centerfield so far, squeezing fellow outfielders Tiffany Ho and Skyler Reid into other positions on the field.  Kuo had one of the most exciting stretches in baseball for a while from mid-April to mid-May, when she put together a 22-game hitting streak that looked like it might challenge the 27-game record set by 3B Joey Wong in 2004.  During the streak she hit .414 (41 for 99).

Skyler Reid, Centerfielder/Designated Hitter: The rookie Reid has been tearing it up at the plate beyond everyone’s expectations so far.  Projected to be a low percentage batter with some pop, Reid has hit to a tune of .356-.400-.531, ranking 1st-3rd-5th on the team, and with the 3rd-best RC/27 (8.84, behind only Kwong and RF Francis Chen).  Mostly, the results have rested on a stellar ability, and a bit of luck in making good contact – Reid’s BABiP is an absurd .459, which unfortunately isn’t likely to last into the second half of the season.  But for now, Reid has worked himself into a large portion of starts between the centerfield and designated hitter spots.

Francis Chen, Rightfielder: After three years of patient waiting, the season of reckoning has finally arrived for Francis Chen, who at long last has developed the power stroke and consistency to deliver the MVP-type season he has only hinted at in flashes.  It’s only halfway through the season, but Chen is already close to setting career highs in HR’s (29) and RBIs (74), and leads the team in those categories as well.  After posting a solid performance in April, Chen seemed to lose himself once again in May when he put up a .176-.341-.412 line, before a monstrous .338-.436-.925, 14 HR, 32 RBI June vaulted him into the discussion as one of the best sluggers in the game.  Unless he falls apart completely, Chen should easily find himself among the elite 40HR club (only two others have achieved this in team history, and none since 2004), and has a very good shot at becoming the first Daly City player to hit 50, and maybe even 60 homers.

Tiffany Ho, Utility Outfielder: Ho seems to be making marked strides after her full-season stint at center last season, but has had the unfortunate luck of competing against two breakout rookies in her centerfield spot.  As a result, Ho has been the odd woman out, making just 30 starts compared to 59 for Reid and 52 for Kuo.  Nonetheless, Ho is hitting solidly – .326-.365-.488 – in limited duty, and she’s still shown her ever-enthusiastic spirit by even trying out the infield (3 starts at shortstop) as a way to find starts.

Jonathan “The Cheet” Chee, Utility Outfielder/Designated Hitter: It hasn’t been a kind season for Chee, who has maintained his on-base ability (.376 OBP) but has fallen off the map in just about every other area – he’s batting .244 and slugging a measly .291.  He’s made 36 starts, all but four of them at designated hitter, a year after contributing 137 starts in leftfielder.  Without any ability besides a simply adequate production of weak singles and walks, and lacking the defensive skills to play any of the demand positions, The Cheet finds himself without a clear role or future going into the second half of the season.

The Rotation

Nathan Yan, #1 Starting Pitcher: After appearing simply human in April, Yan has re-established his dominant form and is well on his way to another solid season, statistically in line with his past two.  It doesn’t look as though he’ll achieve the counting stats he did in record-breaking 2006 (when he pitched 284 innings, got 568 K’s, and finished with a 30-1 record; Yan is on pace for 276 innings, 546 K’s, and a 30-2 record), but he’s again putting up astronomical rate stats – he’s lowered both his hits and walk rate for a astounding 3.8 runners per 9 innings (compared to 4.4 in 2006), although he’s given up slightly more extra-base hits compared to last season (a .196 HR/9 vs. .127).  For the season, he’s putting up an ERA of 0.98, a WHIP of 0.40, and he’s on pace to tie career highs with 13 complete games and 7 shutouts, and pitched an amazing PERFECT GAME on May 23rd – a 22-K gem – just the fifth ever in league history, and the first since Jack Seeman’s perfect game for Seattle in 1938.

Whitney Esguerra, #2 Starting Pitcher: Big things were expected from Esguerra this season, but no one could have predicted she could put up such a dominant streak of performance – she’s 12-0 so far, with a 1.93 ERA and 0.89 WHIP, and she’s striking out batters at 11.1 K’s per 9, for a second-best league mark of 138 K’s.  While she’s improved in just about every area, the key to her success seems to be her complete shutdown of opposing sluggers – she’s given up just 4 homers all season for a rate of 0.3 HR/9 – the 2nd best mark in the league and far below the 1.1 mark last season.  As of now, she’s the leading candidate for 2nd place in the Pitcher of the Year award – no small feat consider she’s just 18 and in her second year in the league!

Samantha Chin, #3 Starting Pitcher: It’s been an up-and-down ride for Chin, who started the season slowly, had a brilliant May (4-0, 2.14 ERA, 0.89 WHIP), and has returned to average levels in June (2-2, 3.06 ERA, 1.08 WHIP).  She’s improved slightly overall, by lowering her walk rate and homerun rate, but her K’s have dropped by a significant amount – she’s hitting just 8.0 K’s/9 after flirting with the 9.0 mark the past two seasons.  Nonetheless, she seems to be making strides, and has already moved up to the #3 position in the rotation as the most consistent starter after Yan and Esguerra.

Terrence Zhao, #4 Starting Pitcher: At this point Zhao is still delivering solid performance, but he’s looked nothing like the dominant form he displayed in his runner-up Pitcher-of-the-Year in 2005.  His ERA is at 4.13, his WHIP is at 1.35, and he’s completed just 9 quality starts (64.3%), 2 CG’s and 1 shutout so far this season – all numbers that would put him on pace for the lowest since his rookie season.  He’s giving up a few more hits and walks and striking out batters less, but perhaps most alarming is that he’s giving up homeruns at more than twice the rate of previous seasons.  Zhao’s been demoted to the #4 spot for the meantime, and though it looks like his position is safe for now, even former spot starter Alfred Vong is chomping at his heels with a solid mid-summer performance.

Alfred Vong, #5 Starting Pitcher: Vong has flip-flopped between the #6 and #5 slots all season, and only recently has he secured the #5 spot for good.  As a result, he’s had the fewest opportunities of all starters (just 9 starts, compared to 12 for Wade and 16 for Yan).  Nonetheless, he’s made the most of it – he’s 6-2 so far with a 3.09 ERA and 1.00 WHIP, and turned in a solid June with a 1.82 ERA, 0.73 WHIP, and 2-1 record in 3 starts, including pitching his first-ever shutout against the Caribbean Pirates.  Vong is mostly doing it via solid control – he’s reduced his walk rate and homer rate significantly compared to last season, though with conditioning himself for the starter role, he seems to have lost a bit of zip (just 6.8 K’s/9 after 7.2 last season).

Sean Wade, #6 Starting Pitcher: Wade has simply imploded after a decent start to the season, putting up an ugly 1-2 record and 5.89 ERA in 8 starts.  Despite his abysmal performance, it’s hard to tell what’s wrong with Wade – his rate stats are not too far removed from last season, and he’s even improved a  bit in the HRs allowed and strikeouts department.  Perhaps at the end of the season, a regression to the mean may make his line respectable, but for now he’s just been sent down to 6th starter purgatory, where he’ll find even less starts than usual given the more aggressive start schedule Yan is slated for.

The Bullpen

Kelley Cox, Long Reliever: Aside from a lone ill-advised spot start she made in May, Cox has continued to be lights-out.  Filling in for Vong in a spot start, Cox gave up 5 runs in 3+2/3 innings.  Take that away, and she’s a brilliant 5-2 with 1 save,  2.41 ERA with a 1.07 WHIP in 44+2/3 of solid relief work.  She’s been absolutely vital to eating up the innings or sometimes even securing the wins after some of the early-game meltdowns by Daly City’s starters – she’s thrown at least 3 innings in 9 of her 18 appearances, and she’s on pace for nearly 90 innings of relief work, and will get close to Sarah Jimenez’s record of 90 relief innings set in 2003.

Bernadette Dugtong, Middle Reliever: After a rough introduction to the league in April, Dugtong seems to have settled down to become a solid reliever – she’s currently sitting at a 3.55 ERA and 1.24 WHIP, and amazingly hasn’t given up a homerun in 33 innings.  Despite great movement numbers, she isn’t blowing it by hitters (just 5.5 K’s/9), but is keeping good control with just 1.4 walks/9.

Alvina Chu, Setup Reliever: Chu had a dreadful two months to start the season, with a 5.33 ERA and 1.50 WHIP by the end of May.  Since then, she’s been absolutely lights out, holding on for three wins and an 0.57 ERA and 0.51 WHIP in 15+2/3 June innings.  In what is likely to be the 4-year veteran’s farewell season, her career could go out either way if she continues her June domination or reverts to the unsteady form that lost two games and blew three saves at critical moments in the beginning of the season.

Josiah Leong, Closer: Josiah has dominated in somewhat of a wasted performance so far this season – he’s given up just four runs and is on pace for career bests with a 1.24 ERA and 1.10 WHIP.  He’s allowed a miniscule 0.3 HR/9, and maintained a beefy 12.7 K’s per 9 with his high-velocity fastball, and hasn’t blown a save so far (after blowing 9 in a shaky 2006).  Despite all this, there have been barely any save opportunities at all – he’s converted all ten he’s been given this season, and picked up an extra 3-inning save, but aside from this has hardly found any opportunities to pitch – his 29 innings lag all relievers in the Daly City bullpen.

It’s been a topsy-turvy first month for the Daly City Montis, with flashes of brilliance mixed in with puzzling losses.  The Montis sit atop the Galactica Division at 21-7 (.750), the top record in the majors and 3 games ahead of the second-place Microsoft Longhorns.

Daly City dominates in almost all statistical categories – the team is 1st in offense (201 runs scored, vs. Nikon’s 188), leading in all rate categories save for batting avergae, and is 1st by a huge margin in pitching (an ERA of 2.90 – next best in a high offensive year is 4.08 by Mozilla).  Compared to a year ago at this point, Daly City seems to be in fantastic shape, and faces significantly weaker competition in the division (last year’s 3rd place, the .568 squad Apple Septic Tanks, carry a lowly 9-19 record (.321)).

The Lineup

Tina “Experimental Error” Quach, Catcher: After spending last season as the team’s primary catcher, Quach has been all over the field in her super-utility role this season, thanks to the sudden emergence of the power-hitting (and better defensive) backup catcher Marco Paz.  Despite taking starts in the catcher, third base, and designated hitter roles, Quach has flourished thus far this season – she’s hitting .363-.431-.461, raking in the hits.  Hitting at the top of the order, her high OBP rate thus far, she’s also one of the team’s primary run scorers, with 23 runs so far in the season.

Marco Paz, Backup Catcher: After putting up the most terrible hitting season in Montis history in 2006, Paz roared into the picture as backup catcher in his first spot start, hitting a homer in his first at bat, and continuing to rake the homeruns and RBIs after that, even from the #7 and #8 slots.  With a .339-.383-.607 batting line, Paz has hit himself into the catcher mix, making half of the team’s starts at the position and forcing Quach to find playing time at the expense of other positions.  How long Paz can keep this up remains to be seen, but for now he’s fully supplanted Quach at the catcher spot, even with the career season she’s been having so far.

Derek Lew, First Baseman: After his career MVP season in 2006, Lew picked up right where he left off, going .339-.397-.627 and having an outstanding month overall.  Most notably, Lew seems to be on a prodigious doubles pace, raking in 17 so far, and putting him on pace for 98, which would shatter his record of 77 set last year.  Lew also seems to be judging the strike zone better, which has significantly boosted production – he has walked in 8.4% of plate appearances, compared to just 4.6% last season, and his now-serviceable OBP makes him much less of a liability in the middle of the order.

Cristian Ortiz, Second Baseman: The speedy Ortiz is off to a solid start, averaging what would be career highs in all rate stats (.294-.391-.471) and taking advantage of his high OBP rate thus far to absolutely blaze the basepaths to the tune of 22 steals against just twice caught stealing (a 91.7%).  He’s on pace for an absolutely incredible 127 stolen bags, but that will be highly contingent on keeping up his career-best OBP and retaining his spot at the top of the order, which has seen some stuff competition in recent weeks.

Henry “Mr.” Nghe, Shortstop: Nghe has looked completely lost at the plate, hitting a terrible .245-.305-.396, and eating up 118 plate appearances while doing it.  His batting average on balls in play (BABiP) is a low .279, compared to the .390 he’s averaged for his career prior to 2007.  Nghe should get back on track, and with only a single backup (new utility infielder Wissmath) who hasn’t exactly lit it up so far, the former #3 hitter will need to in order to get Daly City’s offense fulling humming again.

Joanna Maung, Saung-gah-basewoman: Maung’s numbers so far eerily mimic her slightly disappointing 2006 – she’s batting .281 (same as the .281 last year), getting on-base at a .352 clip (compared to .351), but her power has been almost nonexistent – Maung has slugged just .297, with a single double accounting for the extra total base above her hits count.  As such, she’s lost a good chunk of starts to super-utility player Quach, who herlf has been pushed out of the catcher spot by the emergent Marco Paz.  Maung’s trademark clutch hitting has been nowhere to be found as well – she’s hitting a terrible .133-.235-.133 with runners in scoring position.  She’ll need to pick up the pace soon, or might find herself relegated to a backup role permanently.

Salgu “Swissmath” Wissmath, Backup Utility Infielder: The rookie Wissmath hasn’t been faring well at the plate at all – she’s hit a miserable .194-.268-.333, despite a hot start (she went .333-.429-.556 in her first five games).  This is bads news for the Montis, who came into the season depending on a good chunk of production from the role, and now desperately need it with the struggles of SS Nghe and 3B Maung.

Ted Kwong, Leftfielder: Just 132 plate appearances into his young career, Kwong looks like a star already, winning batter of the month honors for April and raking his way at a .387-.485-.730 pace, with 10 homeruns, 26 RBIs, and getting on-base nearly half the time in front of a power combination of 1B Lew, C Paz, and RF Chen, scoring a league-leading 30 runs.  His 14.9 runs created per 27 outs is simply astronomical – it would exceed the 10.95 set in Norman Ho’s 2003 season by 36%.  Kwong has solidified his cleanup spot at the heart of Daly City’s batting lineup, and at the moment looks like the brightest star in the class of 2007 newcomers.

Skyler Reid, Centerfielder: At the beginning of the season, the three-way competition at centerfield looked to be fierce, and the candidates so far have done everything they can to ensure it be a highly competitive battle.  Given a slight edge (and the opening day start) on day one, Reid has flourished, hitting .357-.424-.486, while hitting all over the order from the #7 backend to the #2 tablesetting position. Establishing his consistency early on, Reid has won a plurality of starts at centerfield, with 13 games compared to 10 for Kuo and 5 for Ho.

Jessica Kuo, Centerfielder: The speedy and light-hitting Kuo didn’t get many opportunities at the start of the month (she had just 1 start through the first 10 games, but has hit just as well as anyone else (.386-.426-455)  in the fierce centerfield competition.

Tiffany Ho, Centerfielder: With two new hot competitors at her old position, Ho has found the plate appearances hard to come by – though her .386-426-.455 line is on par with the rest, she’s found space for just 5 starts at CF, with the rest of her games coming in spot relief at rightfield.  Given her versatility, she may find herself the odd-one-out at centerfield if the others continue to play well, and may have to apply her defensive skills at one of the infield positions if the incumbents and backups there continue to struggle.

Francis Chen, Rightfielder: After seasons upon seasons of futility, could this finally be the year for Francis Chen?  Chen is on pace for career-high numbers, with a .253-.383-.695 line, 11 HR’s and 31 RBI’s that rank among the top in the league.  He leads the team in homeruns and RBIs, and is second in slugging, although his swing for the fences style has also resulted in nearly a 25% strikeout rate.  As always with Chen, things could take a nosedive at any moment, but he’s off to his most promising start yet this season.

Jonathan Chee, Designated Hitter: It’s been an abysmal month for Chee, who just doesn’t seem to be able to put it together after he set career highs in 2005.  His numbers this month have fallen even further to .234-375-.281 – even more abysmal power numbers than usual, and with only a serviceable on-base percentage saving him.  With the designated hitter spot open to all hitters, and with such a logjam at the outfield and catcher positions, Chee may have a hard time finding playing time without returning to form in a hurry.

The Pitching Staff

Nathan Yan, #1 Starting Pitcher: Yan started off the season with a 2-hit, 15-K gem of a shutout, but hasn’t been able to find the magic consistently in starts since – he’s now 5-1 in 6 starts with a 1.26 ERA and a still-league-leading 15.7 K’s per 9, but those numbers include a terrible 3-run, 7-inning loss.  He’s also averaging just 8+1/3 innings per start, far off his career pace of 8.7 innings per start.  While still a historic, pitcher-of-the-year type season, Yan will need to step it up a notch to match his lights-out performances in past years.

Whitney Esguerra, #2 Starting Pitcher: The hard-luck rookie is now doing quite well for herself in her second year out – she’s dominating to the tune of a 4-0 record and 1.46 ERA in 5 starts, and hasn’t given up a single homerun yet after serving up 25 taters last year.  After getting beaten up to a 13-11 record due to poor run support and bullpen meltdowns last year, Esguerra is now enjoying a healthy record thanks to her league-high 9.7 run support per game.  The sky appears to be the limit for Esguerra – she’s second only to Yan in ERA, K’s, and OBP, and looks to be headed towards one of the best non-Yan pitching seasons not just in Daly City history, but league history as well.

Terrence Zhao, #3 Starting Pitcher: While last season just seemed like a string of bad luck, Zhao has continued to struggle into 2007, and his plunging peripherals seem like a cause for concern – he’s striking out just 7.6 batters per nine, after striking out 10.4 the previous season, and has given up 5 homers already after giving up 6 in both 2006 and 2005.

Samantha Chin, #4 Starting Pitcher: Everyone expected huge things from Chin in 2007, but they haven’t happened yet.  Though she did throw a 2-hit, 1-walk, 8-K gem in her second start, she’s been absolutely horrendous at other times, giving up 5 runs in 4+1/3 innings in her third start and 5 runs in 5 innings in her fifth start.  Despite this, Chin seems to characteristically inspire her fellow teammates – she’s among the tops in the league once again in run support per game (9.3 runs), and sits with a 3-0 record, receiving no decisions in both her shellings.  In order to take the next big step most expect from her, however, she’ll need to up her consistency and avoid the mistakes that have led to big innings.

Sean Wade, #5 Starting Pitcher: Aside from one bad, 4-run in 4+2/3 inning start, Wade seems to have found more consistency early in the season, achieving a 3.16 ERA and a 3-1 record in four starts.  However his peripherals haven’t looked overly promising so far – his WHIP is a somewhat high 1.25, and his strikeout, walk, and hit numbers are about the same as last year.  At this point Wade has simply evened out his brilliant and horrid performances for more consistency, and with a healthy 6.1 runs scored per game, it may be all he needs to consistently win games.

Alfred Vong, #6 Starting Pitcher: Vong has split duties between #6 spot starts and long relief in the bullpen, and unlike his great series of starts last season, hasn’t found himself particularly effective in either; he’s sporting a 4.15 ERA in relief and a 3.86 ERA in starts, for a 2-1 record and 3.90 overall ERA.

Kelley Cox, Long Reliever: Cox has been the lone star in the remade bullpen, but she’s been a brilliant one.  After getting drilled for 3 runs in 3 innings in her first appearance, Cox has locked down, throwing 17+2/3 innings at a 2.04 ERA clip, and logging a win, a save, and a loss in the process.  She doesn’t have overpowering stuff – just 5.1 K’s per 9, but is getting the job done, especially in the long relief situations when the bullpen need is greatest.

Bernadette Dugtong, Middle Reliever: Dugtong is still ironing out the rookie kinks, and has been spotty in relief so far, giving up runs in four of her eight appearances for a 5.40 overall ERA.  She’s been allowing a high 1.50 WHIP, and is failing to fool anyone with her curve – she’s gotten just 2.7 K’s per 9.  Fortunately, the starters have been pitching relatively deep, and Vong and Cox have been available to pick up the slack.  For the moment, however, Dugtong seems like she’ll be relegated to mopup relief until she’s fully major-league ready.

Alvina Chu, Setup Reliever: Chu’s 0-1 record, 6.00 ERA and 1.67 WHIP look terrible so far, but they don’t tell the whole story.  Chu appears to have been still working out the rust at the start of the month, giving up 7 runs (6 earned) on 10 hits in her first two appearances, but since then has bunkered down to her dominant self – she’s given up no runs and has allowed just four baserunners in the 5+1/3 innings she’s pitched since (for an 0.00 ERA and 0.75 WHIP).

Josiah Leong, Closer: It’s a hard life for a closer on a team as successful as the Montis – they’ve had blowout wins of four runs or more in all but four games (one of which was a complete shutout by Yan), and to his credit Leong has closed out all three save opportunities.  He’s pitched dominantly so far (1.50 ERA, 0.67 WHIP, 9 K’s per 9, no homeruns) so far, but he’ll need closer games to get more work in beyond the scant 6 innings and 4 appearances he’s made so far.

Another year, another championship, and another year of impending doom for the Daly City Montis. The championship this year, as in the past, was handily won, in a clean 4-0 sweep of the Pentax Shake Reducers. Daly City had another sweep of the postseason awards, with Yan winning his fourth-straight Pitcher of the Year, and Derek Lew winning his first Batter of the Year, and rookie Whitney Esguerra narrowly missing by placing 2^nd in the Rookie of the Year balloting.

But amid another year of success, the 2007 season dawns upon fair Verona Daly City, and the shadows of free agency loom. When the original roster signed in 2003, all of the contracts were for four years, at $1 a year – through the 2006 season. Now the remaining 8 of those 4-year players – Terrence Zhao, Nathan Yan, Josiah Leong, Derek Lew, Cristian Ortiz, Jonathan Chee, Angel Poon, and Joanna Maung – are bound for free agency, unless the team can resign them. On the free market, however, each of those players could command 7-figure, if not 8-figure, multi-year salaries. Despite the team’s prodigious growth, their stadium situation, the 5,000 seat Panorama Park, has hindered them since their inception, and their net profit from 2006 was a mere $4.3 million, and their cash reserves leftover from 2006 were a mere $340,000. On top of this, each of the other players currently on roster enter into their arbitration years, and could also figure to command exorbitant sums, most notably stars Samantha Chin, Whitney Esguerra, Henry Nghe, and Rudy Puzon. The outcome doesn’t seem to have a clear resolution now, but it appears that if Daly City wants to retain their players, their era of small-town baseball may be over.

But 2007 is 2007. Without further ado, the 2006 recap:

Tina “Experimental Error” Quach, Catcher: Finally emerging from under the shadows of long-time catcher Sam Lau, Quach got her first chance at a starting role this season. Having done incredibly well the past two seasons in a part-time role (accumulating about a half-season’s worth of plate appearances in 2003 and 2004), Quach projected as a light-hitting, good OBP catcher, with decent defense behind the plate but a poor arm overall. Quach pretty much lived up to just that, going .286-.363-.380, which was off from her half-season numbers, but still fit into her player profile and was above-average on the Daly City team. Behind the plate, Tina’s runners thrown out percentage was a mere 30.8%, a far cry from the 50% numbers Lau used to achieve annually, but still good enough to rank 7^th out of 16 teams. Overall, about what was to be expected from Quach, if not a little disappointing on the development of hitting. Perhaps with another year adapted to the rigors of a full season, Quach will pick up with the .300-.380-430 numbers she showed in a part-time role.

Marco Paz, Backup Catcher: Paz secured his place in history with undoubtedly the worst season by a Daly City hitter, ever. Rushed to the majors as a backup catcher after Lau’s retirement to AA, Paz, who put up a decent .250-.317-.515 in AA, and only .167-.163-.310 in AAA, never quite got the ball rolling, hitting .139-.160-.228 in 106 plate appearances, for a cumulative .388 OPS and 0.98 RC/27, by far the lowest in the league of any player with as many plate appearances as Paz did. Nonetheless, Paz was excellent behind the plate, committing no errors in 173 defensive innings and throwing out 4 of 7 would-be baserunners, and showed some signs of life once he got to the postseason, hitting .316-.350-.474.

Derek Lew, First Baseman: Talk about a comeback season for D.L. Lew. After a poor 2006 campaign marred by injury, Lew came back bashing in 2006, returning to his career average AVG and OBP numbers, and setting a new career record for SLG. No one on the team was more consistent than Lew, either, as he hit an .850 OPS every month except September, and ravaged pitchers with the best run production in the league, driving in 164 RBIs (a career high, and league lead), on the strength of a career-high 77 doubles (league record), career-high 16 triples, and 408 total bases (UL lead). Lew even won the Batter of the Month award for his monstrous August performance, where he hit .398-.419-.771 with 9 HR and a staggering 39 RBIs. To top off this year’s comeback story, Lew won (highly contentiously) the 2006 Batter of the Year award, maintaining Daly City’s 4-year stranglehold on the trophy.

Rudy Puzon, Designated Hitter: Although Lew may have the defense and the flashier 2B, HR, and RBI numbers, when it comes down to it pure production, no one, not even Lew, helped drive in more runs than Puzon did. He was 1^st in AVG and OBP, and 3^rdin SLG, and led the team with a .950 OPS and 8.72 RC/27. Far from a sophomore slump, Puzon improved in just about every single hitting category, and this year formed part of Daly City’s 3-4-5 core, batting in the 3^rd position and scoring 129 runs (6^th in the league). After only two years in the league, Puzon has solidified himself as one of the game’s best, and perhaps the best run-producer in the Daly City lineup.

Cristan Ortiz, Second Baseman: It was a whirlwind year for Ortiz, coming off of his first full-time breakin to the majors, and trying to live up to a .284-.342-.460 season in which he hit 23 homers and stole 58 bases, exceeding what his talent ratings indicated. Ortiz quietly put up a .279-.349-.435 line in 2006 – slightly worse AVG, slightly better OBP, and a prodigious power dropoff. However, Ortiz became one of only three players on the team, and a select few elite in the league, to drive in 100 RBIs and score 100 Runs, with 104 RBIs and 128 Runs on the season. The story of the year, however, was Ortiz’s season-long race against Apple’s Ben Kenobi in an attempt for the Stolen Base title, and eventually, Aubrey Cubilo’s year-old SB record of 77. Ortiz trailed Kenobi for much of the season, and at the end of August had accumulated 53 steals – on pace for a career-high and possibly even the record, but still lagging behind Ben Kenobi’s 59 at the time. From then on, however, Ortiz put on the afterburners, and helped along with a .356 OBP in August and .377 OBP in September, swiped 38 more bags (19 in each month), leaving Ben Kenobi’s 13 combined steals in the dust. Ortiz finished with 91 steals to Kenobi’s 72, obliterating Cubilo’s record and setting a mark that no one but himself stands to approach anytime soon.

Henry “Mr.” Nghe, Shorstop: Where’s the magic gone for last year’s rookie of the year? Hitting from the #5 spot – the cleaning up the cleanup spot – Nghe had a phenomenal year behind the plate – yet missed all expectations. While nobody expected him to go .362-.408-.545 like he did his rookie year, and many skeptic figured he’d do much worse, Nghe put up a very respectable .305 AVG and .386 OBP… yet fell flat with a .429 SLG. Nghe played great throughout most of the season, consistently hitting for a good average and getting on base, yet never managed to find the pop he had in 2005 – aside from very good months at the beginning (.336-.430-.536 in April) and the end (.375-.449-.558 in September), Nghe hovered in the .280-.360-.370 range all season.Nonetheless, Nghe was good on the field and on the basepaths, going 34 for 41, 83%, against last year’s 19 for 28, 68%, and the flashes of his rookie brilliance he showed in April and September.

Joanna Maung, Saung-gah-basewoman: After 3 years in the shadow of Joey Wong, Maung finally got her chance starting a full season at 3B. Long a pinch hitter and bit-role player (averaging 160 AB’s per year), Maung was perhaps the least experienced of the four year players. How did she do? Well, the worst that could have been expected – a .281-.351-.379 line that was far below her career numbers, and a scarily declining rate of walks and increase in strikeouts. Given the transition into full-time starter, most of this was to be expected, and Maung can only look to improve upon her numbers in 2007.

Jonathan “The Cheet” Chee, Leftfielder: After one heck of a comeback campaign in 2005, it was perhaps Chee’s turn to fall flat once again. Jonathan played extremely well in the first half, especially with a huge .347-.436-.545 month in May, but began showing a rapid decline in skills – his 1^st half/2^nd half splits were .318-.416-.449/.204-.360-.282. Nonetheless, Chee still led the league in hit-by-pitches – 46 to Jabba Desilijic-Ture’s 30 and Francis Chen’s 26, and demonstrated an improved batting eye – his OBP-AVG (OBP minus AVG) difference was .099 in the first half, and a staggering .156 in the second half. Chee performed well in the playoffs, with a .327-.469-.490 line, and maintained his ~1.4 SLG/AVG ratio in the second half, so it seems only a matter of making good contact with the ball again. Whether Chee can still catch up to major league pitching, however, is a big question indeed heading into 2007.

Tiffany Ho, Centerfielder: From bit-role player to full-fledged starter, perhaps no one made a big a leap as Tiffany Ho did this year, diving head-first into the most demanding defensive position in baseball – centerfield. After a fairly ordinary rookie season, most weren’t expecting much from the light-hitting native rightfielder. Nonetheless, Ho made improvements at the plate, going .290-.323-.382, along with solid, though not gold glove caliber defense. Tiffany, however, became a whole new player in the postseason, becoming one of the unlikely spark plugs of the Daly City engine by going .431-.477-.569 in the postseason, leading the team in both AVG and OBP. Ho’s base-running was quite a concern this year, though, as she set a career high of 22 steals… in 37 attempts (that’s a 59.5% success rate).

Francis Chen, Rightfielder: Another year of the Francis Chen experiment, and another round of… well, it’s hard to tell these days. Chen got the chance to play nearly the whole season this year, starting 128 games and accumulating 546 plate appearances. He went .212-.336-.480, setting a career high for OBP, and improved upon his AVG and SLG from the previous year, yet still remained highly unsatisfactory, with only average OBP and SLG numbers to go with his typically abysmal AVG. Yet as always, Chen showed glimmers of hope, with a few months of good OBP and SLG (his September .256-.369-.610 is a particular standout) – just not quite consistently good enough and not improving fast enough for fans and management. Chen did improve on his base-stealing, however, swiping 26 bags in 30 attempts – good for #3 on the team and extraordinary considering Chen’s low OBP.

Jason Liu, Rightfielder: Once with a future so bright, hard days have fallen on Jason Liu. Poised to finally inherit the RF starting position, the spot once again returned to the fan-favorite Francis Chen, leaving the powerful Liu, a career .311-.390-.643 in two seasons, on the bench. Perhaps the lack of opportunities got to him this year, as Liu declined once again, and was hampered by a very slow first four months when he couldn’t seem to find a groove anywhere – his April numbers of .171-.189-.429 in 35 at bats set the tone for the rest of the year. Liu showed signs of returning to life at the end of the year however, when he batted .314-.386-.665 in August-September

Nathan Yan, #1 Starter: It was a career season upon career seasons for Yan, who came in knowing he would dominate once again in 2006, and still blew away everyone’s expectations. His WHIP remained roughly the same at 0.47, but his ERA plummeted to 0.79, his ERC down to 0.06, and most amazingly, his Ks per 9 innings skyrocketed to a blistering 18 K’s per 9 inning. While Yan jokingly referred to going after the 500-K mark, no one imagined he could actually approach it, until he started piling up the strikeouts with monstrous games, including four 19-K games, five 20-K games, four 21-K games. His season was highlighted by two consecutive starts in June-July, where he threw a 21-K no-hitter, and followed it up the next start with an 11-inning, 1-hit, 25-K shutout. He topped 100 K’s in May, July, and September, and ended the season with a staggering 568 strikeouts, obliterating the league record of 469 he set last year. What’s next on the list for Yan – 700? The sports writers will be careful what they predict next year – the limits of Yan’s ability these days is virtually limitless.

Whitney Esguerra, #2 Starter: It was a rough-and-tumble year for the rookie starter, who jumped in the #2 role after an insane 2005 at AAA – there she racked up a staggering 27-0 record in 29 starts, with a 2.01 ERA, 0.77 WHIP, and 341 K’s in 246 innings (that’s 12.5 K/9!). Everyone expected big things, and Esguerra didn’t disappoint – she threw 214 innings in 30 starts, with a 3.15 ERA and 1.12 WHIP, and was second in the league (by a wide margin) with a 10.8 K’s per 9 innings, resulting in 256 strikeouts – 2^nd on the team and #5 in the league. Esguerra was plagued, however, by an inability to finish out long games (due mostly to her rather low 72 endurance) and bad luck with offensive support – Daly City scored only 4.3 runs per game for her, abysmally below the team’s average (6.0 runs per game) and ranking 9^th-worst in the league – and embarrassing number for baseball’s #1 offense. The result was a team-worst 13 wins and team-worst 11 losses, the latter actually setting a team record for most losses in a season. With hopefully another year of experience, and some endurance training, Esguerra can evolve into a full-fledged ace, though she’s already one of the game’s best (5^th best ERA, 8^th best CERA, 7^th best WHIP).

Terrence Zhao, #3 Starter: After the stunning evolution of Zhao in 2005 (1.74 ERA, 1.74 CERA, 1.01 WHIP, 9.3 K/9), Zhao regressed a bit in 2006, putting up a 14-7 record (far off from last year’s 23-4) and only a 3.03 ERA and 1.16 WHIP in 205 innings in 30 starts. Zhao did improve on K’s per 9 innnings, however, with a 10.4 mark that ranked 3^rd in the league, and he was 2^nd on the team in complete games with 9. Zhao started off slow, with a combined 2-4, 3.92 ERA, 1.32 WHIP April-May, but ended strongly and had a good playoff run before getting knocked out with a pulled bicep tendon in Round 2.

Samantha Chin, #4 Starter: Daly City could have yet another new ace on its hands. Showing some flair for the daring, a lot of luck, and inconsistency in her rookie season, Chin showed all signs that she was beginning to put things together in her sophomore year. In a Zhao-esque like development, Chin jumped from a 13-1, 4.06 ERA, 1.11 WHIP, 3.23 CERA to a 19-4, 3.20 ERA, 1.07 WHIP, 2.61 CERA season, and improving her 14/26, 53.8% Quality Start rate to a #2 on the team and #3 in the league 24/29, 82.8% rate. The way she improved this 2^nd year, 2007 could be a season of even bigger things to come.

Sean Wade, #5 Starter: From glory boy to washed-up prodigy, things fell apart for the sophomore starter, who experienced a slump for the ages in 2006. After nearly winning the Rookie of the Year award in 2005, Sean fell way back from his 2005 numbers, putting up a 13-8 record, 4.09 ERA, 1.16 WHIP, 3.63 CERA, and for the rookie named Mr. Consistency, a horrendous 54.2% quality start rate. Nobody’s quite sure what’s happened to Wade, who was on and off all season, pitching 3 shutouts to rank #2 on the team, yet throwing SEVEN games in which he gave up 6 runs or more, a truly horrendous number. Have opposing hitters finally figured out Wade’s impossible knuckleball, or has the boy wonder still got a few more tricks up his sleeve? Wade did put up another spectacular postseason run, with 2 wins in 3 games, and a 1.82 ERA and 0.65 WHIP, so there’s hope yet for a 2007 comeback.

Miguel Pardo, #6 Starter: Poor Pardo, forever at the whim of luck. It was another fast start year for Pardo, who began 3-2 with a 3.07 ERA in 44 innings over 6 starts. From there, however, things went downhill for Pardo, and never looked up again – he put up decent 4-ERA months in June and July, but by August Pardo was in full free-fall with an 11.32 ERA in 3 starts, before he was (perhaps mercifully) knocked out for the season after tearing his rotator cuff muscle, also knocking him out for the playoffs.After a 2005 season of such progress and high hopes, 2006 was a disaster for Pardo, who will known enter into an uncertain offseason filled with surgery and the prospect of free agency.

Alfred Vong, #6 Starter: It was a mixed season of sorts for Vong, who was expected to make significant strides in his second season. Instead, Vong performed abysmally out of the gate – at the end of July, his ERA was a gaudy 5.66 and his WHIP 1.38! With Pardo’s injury, however, Vong got his chance to start again in the #6 role, and from there on out he performed brilliantly. In four starts he was 3-0 with a 2.70 ERA and 0.72 WHIP, lasting at least 7 innings in each start and throwing 2 complete games. Despite 2/3 of a season spent figuring things out, with Vong’s recent development Daly City will be hard-pressed to keep him out of the rotation for much longer.

Helen Yamamoto, Mopup Reliever: In 2005, Yamamoto set records as the worst pitcher in the history of Daly City baseball. Her 9.35 ERA, 2.54 WHIP, 12.05 CERA, all set records, besting former mopup reliever Katie Clayton. In 2006 Yamamoto was better, but still not quite good enough – she improved her numbers to 6.00 ERA, 1.96 WHIP, and 7.14 CERA, once again worst on the team. Yamamoto did show signs of improvement during the season, however – through the month of June she had put together a spectacular stretch which chiseled her ERA down just under the 3.00 mark. From there, Yamamoto suffered perhaps one of the worst meltdowns in history, putting up ERA marks of 7.36, 11.57, and 11.25 in the following months, before a 1-appearance, 13.51 ERA, 6.00 WHIP performance in the playoffs.

Zubeda Khan, Middle Reliever: In a bad year for the bullpen, the downgraded former closer didn’t fare too well, leading off with a horrendous 6.43 ERA, 1.43 WHIP April and ending the season on a sour 6.48 ERA, 1.56 WHIP note. In between, Khan put together one of the best 4-month stretches of any reliever, with a 2.73 ERA and 0.81 WHIP. Despite a fairly inflated 4.00 ERA, Khan led the bullpen in WHIP with a 1.04 mark and CERA at 2.69.

Angel Poon, Middle Reliever: For Daly City’s veteran reliever, things seem to have stagnated over the past two years. Once looking up with a 2.88 ERA season in 2004, Poon has faced declining appearances, innings, and ERA numbers ever since. This season she threw only 44 innings, the lowest out of Daly City’s five primary relievers, and was bogged down all season by a slow start in the first two months of the season, where she accumulated a 6.61 ERA. Things fared better for Poon in the middle of the season, where in the 3-month summer stretch from May-August, she put up a 2.00 ERA and 0.72 WHIP. Perhaps she’s still got more left in the tank, but as Daly City’s longest tenured reliever, the first to break the 200-inning career relief innings mark (which she reached this season), the 18-year old reliever may be past her prime and on the decline already.

Alvina Chu, Setup Reliever: Though she was the best of any reliever, Chu disappointed this year when she set career lows for ERA (3.63) and WHIP (1.23), and maintaining one of the worst inherited runners scored records on the team, allowing 8 out of 22 (36.4%) to score this season. Nonetheless, Chu seemed to improve in several key areas, notably reducing her blown saves drastically from 7 out of 19 to just 1 out of 9. Once again, Chu also led the league in reliever wins, setting her own career mark with a 10-2 record.

Josiah Leong, Closer: 2006 was a year of big changes and great anticipation for Leong. The inconsistent starter-turned-closer-turned-starter, after a tumultuous 2005 season wracked with nail-biting starts, took to the bullpen once again, where he pitched in an even more nail-biting 2004 season as the team’s closer. Two seasons ago, Leong put up a 3.70 ERA, 1.20 WHIP in 58 1/3 innings while saving 40 games, and the Montis hoped that another two years of experience and maturity would help him gain more consistency, or at least improve upon the mediocre 5 blown saves rookie Zubeda Khan had in 2005. Still, since the inception of the team in 2003, Leong had been hands-down the most inconsistent pitcher on the staff, and mixing that in with high-stakes save situations was treading a fine line between brilliance or disaster. The result was just that – a mix of brilliance and disaster, and perhaps the most mercurial performance by any pitcher, anywhere, to date. A workhorse of the staff, Leong threw 71 innings, by far the most of any reliever this year, and second to Sarah Jimenez’s 90 innings in 2003. Leong even managed career bests in ERA (3.68), WHIP (1.14), and CERA (3.04), not to mention K/9 (12.8). Leong started the year leerily, with a near-disastrous first four appearances in which he earned 1 save, blew three, and won 2 and lost 1 of the games he blew. His ERA was at 8.10, his WHIP at 1.95, and things were looking to go downhill, fast. From there, Leong somehow caught fire, going on an incredible April-July stretch run spanning 35 1/3 innings in which he put together an 0.51 ERA

And the team awards for the 2006 season…

Team Defensive Player of the Year: Derek Lew
In a bounce-back year from an injury-plagued 2005, first baseman Derek Lew brought nothing short of amazing consistency to first base. Starting all 162 games, Lew led the league in starts and defensive innings. However, it was Lew’s stellar consistency that earned him the award – over 1467 2/3 innings and 1504 total chances, Lew made only 4 errors for a league-leading .997 fielding percentage.

Rookie of the Year: Whitney Esguerra
There weren’t many rookies on the team this year, but rookie #2 starter Whitney Esguerra would be a clear lock in any season. The rookie finished in 2^nd place for Rookie of the Year voting, but despite being just 17 years old, ate up innings to the tune of 214 innings over 30 starts. A string of bad luck resulted in a meager 13-11 record that masks a team-worst 4.3 run support per game. Over those 30 starts she threw 6 complete games and 2 shutouts with 23 quality starts, while losing complete game 0-1 decisions twice. With a 3.15 ERA, 3.01 CERA, 1.12 WHIP, and an astounding 10.8 K’s per 9 innings, Esguerra might have the brightest future of any starter to join the team since the inaugural season in 2003.

Comeback Player of the Year: Derek Lew
After a disastrous season in 2005, Lew came back roaring in 2006, reassuming his role as the team’s #1 power hitter. Lew set new career highs in slugging percentage (.593), OPS (.931), stolen bases (13), RBI’s (164), and triples (16), in addition to setting a new league record with 77 doubles in only 688 at bats (that’s a double every 8.94 at bats, shattering his previous best of 10.19).

Breakout Player of the Year: Samantha Chin
Coming off a promising rookie season and strong finish in 2005, big things were expected from Chin, and boy did she deliver – over 29 starts Chin pitched 202 2/3 innings and won 19 games while throwing 199 strikeouts. She averaged a 3.20 ERA (6^th), 1.07 WHIP (3^rd), and 2.61 CERA (5^th) over the season, earning her 5^th place Pitcher of the Year voting. Her performance strongly paralleled Terrence Zhao’s 2004 campaign – an average 4 ERA season before breaking out with a ~3 ERA campaign. If that’s the case, opponents in the Galactica Division – and Daly City depth chart – should watch out: Zhao’s very next season was his jaw-dropping 23-4, 245 K, 1.74 ERA runner up Pitcher of the Year season, and Chin has all the same tools to follow in his footsteps.

It’s Wednesday, September 9^th, 2006, and with only 27 games to go, the league is coming down to the wire as usual.  Except for the Galactica Division, no division leader leads by more than 4 games, and the wildcard slots are tight in all four divisions.

Compared to their 29-game lead at the conclusion of the 2005 season, the Daly City Montis are hanging onto a history-worst, yet still-sizable 16-game lead going into September.  With a 12-game magic number, another division title for Daly City seems secure, and all eyes turn towards individual recording-breaking opportunities and preparation for the playoffs.

In the two months since the All-Star break, Daly City has gone 38-16, .704, off of some absolutely dominating star performances.  They’ve been even more dominant in pitching, and are now solidly back at the top in terms of batting, leading by a large margin in OBP and total runs.

But before we get there, let’s have a quick look at the rest of the league:

Things were lopsided in 2005 in the Universe League, when Daly City and Apple placed 1-2 in the division, and the Microsoft Longhorns, 94-68 and a full 17 games ahead of sub-.500 Terran division winner Europe, failed to make the playoffs.  This year, the Universe League and especially the Galactica Division seem more stacked than ever – while Daly City still leads the pack, Microsoft and Apple follow up 2-3 not only in the division, but in all of baseball.  The fourth best team in baseball, the Canon Image Stabilizers, are four games behind Apple, and within the Universe League, even the last-place Mozilla Firefoxes, 66-71, .474 and 33 games out of first place, lead Terran division leader Asia by 6 games!  Sadly, with the current playoff structure, Daly City and one of Microsoft or Apple look to head into the playoffs against two sub-.500 teams from the Terran Division.

The headlines in the Universe League have been dominated once again by the epic Microsoft-Apple struggle.  The most dramatic change for both teams has been a huge beef-up in hitting – Apple, who went .262-.312-.435 in 2005, are now .286-.341-.465, riding almost purely on the shoulders of their two superstars, SS Ben Kenobi and RF Chewie Gonzales.  Microsoft, meanwhile, has developed into an offensive juggernaut, from .262-.330-.444 to .274-.337-.488, on the strength of a slew of power hitters – SIX out of their nine starters are slugging over .500.  On the pitching front, their aces have been dueling it out all season long, with Apple’s Kyle Katarn 18-8, with a 2.31 ERA, 0.95 WHIP, and 240 K’s in 249 1/3 innings (8.7 K’s/9) and Microsoft’s Kernel Tyranus at 21-5, with a 2.03 ERA, 1.02 WHIP, and 189 K’s in 217 2/3 innings (7.8 K’s/9).  So far in the season, Microsoft is leading by two games, and Tyranus is 2-0 in 2 starts against Apple, with a 1.13 ERA and 0.75 WHIP, while Katarn is 1-2 in 3 starts against the M-Dollar, with a 3.38 ERA and 1.13 WHIP.

Over in the Shinto-World League, the league is dominated by a smattering of mediocrity, save for Canon’s Gates Skywalker’s single-handed march to the record books.  At the young age of 24, Skywalker appears headed straight for his second straight Batter of the Year Award, hitting .354-.442-.907 with already 67 HR through only 5 months, putting on pace for 80.  If Skywalker continues his amazing August run, however, in which he hit 23 homers, he may very well challenge Kenton McClinton’s 66-year old HR record of 88.  With 157 RBIs already, he may be on his way towards the RBI record as well.

But despite Skywalker’s individual achievement, his Canon Image Stabilizers are only 75-60, .556, hanging onto a tenuous 4 game lead over the Nikon Vibration Reducers.

Tina “Experimental Error” Quach, Catcher: The Daly City catcher hit a bit of a cold streak after the end of the all-star break, going .238-.313-.298 in July, but like the rest of the lineup, heated up n August, where she posted a .307-.402-.426 line.  Quach has seen a noticeable uptick in walks – she’s drawn 25 in July and August, compared to only 24 in April-June combined.

Marco Paz, Backup Catcher: Things haven’t gone well this rookie season for Paz.  After posting some of the worst numbers in the league, Paz hasn’t seen much of any opportunity, seeing a total of only 31 plate appearances since June, in which he’s gone .138-.194-.172.  Among players with 100 plate appearances, Paz is by far the last in the league in almost every single hitting category.  On the bright side, Paz’s fielding has been flawless – he’s the proud owner of a perfect fielding percentage, and has thrown out 3 of 6 baserunners.

Derek Lew, 1^st Baseman: What a comeback season it’s been for Derek Lew!  While Lew was consistently good throughout the first half of the season, he has simply exploded in the second half – he posted a .312-.342-.615 line in July, and he followed that up with an even bigger .398-.419-.771 August in which he drove in a staggering 39 RBIs and scored 25 runs.  He’s now leading the league by a large margin with 143 RBIs, and with a line of .318-.350-.609, is poised to set career highs in all the batting categories, not to mention shatter his career high of 160 RBIs he set in his rookie year and the league-record 74 doubles he hit in 2004 – all this in likely 100 less at bats than he had in 2003-2004.  He’s 7^th in the UL in batting average, 3^rd in hits, 1^st in doubles, 3^rd in triples, 1^st in RBI, 2^nd in SLG, and looks to be in strong contention for the Batter of the Year award, especially if he can keep up his August hot streak through September.

Rudy Puzon, Designated Hitter: As big of a season as it’s been for Lew, Daly City’s designated hitter Puzon, batting in the third slot ahead of Lew, has been every bit as critical to the team’s success.  Like Lew, Puzon seems to have turned on the burners since the All-Star Break, since which he’s posted consecutive .400+ OBP months (.453 in July and .427 in August), which has been key to Lew’s prodigious RBI totals.  Puzon has built on his rookie success, and has been an OBP machine all year – he currently leads the team with a .407 OBP (4^th in the league), and is 4^th in the league in Runs Created as well, and his 108 runs are 2^nd in the league.

Cristian Ortiz, Second Base: While it’s been up and down for Ortiz, the one thing he can say is that he’s never been abysmally bad.  He appeared to be in a prolonged July slump but still pulled out a .250-.317-.407 month out of it, and rebounded back with a .293-.356-.455 August.  Throughout all this, he’s been as quick as ever on the basepaths, stealing 11 more bases in July and 19 in more in August, when he finally eclipsed Ben Kenobi for the lead league in steals.  For the season, he’s just reached 72 steals, and looks just about ready to break Aubrey Cubilo’s freshly-set steals record of 77.

Joanna Maung, Saung-gah-basewoman:  Despite everyone else’s breakout second-half performances, Maung has been a sore lack of production so far, barely even reaching  the .300 OBP plateau.  Her power has seen a noticeable increase of late – her total bases per hit has gone up to 1.45, compared to 1.23 in the second half.  If she can get her batting average back up, which might be tough considering the number of strikeouts she’s accumulating.

Henry “Mr.” Nghe, Shortstop: The story’s stayed the same for Nghe, who’s been combining solid hitting all year long with a complete and utter power outage.  So far in the second half, Nghe’s added another weapon to his arsenal – walking power, drawing 10 in July and 19 in August, to post OBP’s of .360 and .380.  He’s also increased his speed prodigiously, swiping 7 bags in July and 9 stolen bases in August, to put him at 30 steals for the year.  Despite all this improvement, Nghe still can’t seem to hit the ball much further than the infield – he’s slugged .363 and .383 the past two months, and still isn’t showing any signs of improvement.

Jonathan “The Cheet” Chee, Leftfielder: After a solid first half of 2006, Chee hasn’t been anywhere close to the mark since the All-Star break.  While he’s maintained a high OBP through walks and hit-by-pitches (including a combined 29 walks and HBP in August), he’s his .239 and .198 in July and August, and slugged only .337 and .271 in those months.  Nonetheless, Chee’s consistent OBP has still kept him in the #2 slot, where he’s managed to score 93 runs so far in front of sluggers Puzon and Lew, and is on pace to record his first-ever 100 run season.

Tiffany Ho, Centerfielder: The young spunky outfielder continues to provide life to this team, as Ho continued her success through the second half.  She had a monstrous .340-.384-.437 July, in which she also stole 13 bases, and she’s also been steadily increasing her walks every month.  For the year so far she’s .294-.332-.382, demonstrating dramatic improvements across the board, along with some star contact ability and stellar defense.

Francis Chen, Rightfielder: Where has the long road known as the 2006 season led for Francis Chen?  While he appeared to be off to a blistering start, Chen fell long and hard in June, and only continued that through July, with a .182-.289-.364 line, playing only 18 games.  Things got slightly better in August, where Chen went .177-.311-.435, but Francis is still far off from his April-May marks in which he appeared to show his true potential.  With just a month to go, and with a batting average barely above the Mendoza line (it sits at .203) it looks sadly like another wasted season for Chen.

Jason Liu, Rightfielder: Speaking of wasted seasons, Jason Liu and his enormous power potential has sat on the bench for much of the season, being placated by the more popular Chen.  As a result, Liu’s performance seemed to suffer with the inconsistent playing time.  Liu finally appeared to get it together in August, however, where he played 15 games and accumulated 55 at bats, going .309-.345-673 with 6 homers.

Nathan Yan, #1 Starter: Yan’s continued his dominance so far in the season, although he accumulated his first loss and had a fairly ugly 1.90 ERA August.  Regardless, Yan appears on pace to shatter all records (and personal career highs), including the hallowed 500-K mark (he’s up to 462 K’s, on 18.0 K’s/9).  Since August he’s had a number of phenomenal performances, including perhaps his best start yet, an 11-inning 1-hitter, in which he struck out 25 batters (and had K’d 21 through 9 innings).

Whitney Esguerra, #2 Starter: It’s been a long, hard season of bad luck for Esguerra, who can’t seem to get a break anywhere.  Despite her 3.26 ERA, ranked #6 in the league, Esguerra has been the victim of the 12^th worst run support in baseball, garnering only 4.2 runs per game on a team that scores 5.9.  Despite being perhaps the best pitcher on the team in August, where she pitched 38 1/3 innings with a 1.88 ERA, 0.97 WHIP, and a shutout, she was only 2-3, and overall is 10-10 with a 3.26 ERA, 1.15 WHIP, and 19 quality starts (76%), which is ranked 5^th in the league.

Terrence Zhao, #3 Starter: While his numbers may now show it, Zhao has been one of the most dominant in the second half – seven of his last 11 starts have been complete games, and 8 of those 11 have been 1-run starts.  Zhao seems to have a habit for getting bombed, however, which is where the worst of his numbers come from – despite all this he’s been a healthy 6-2 in July-August, and his 1.67 ERA, 0.80 WHIP, and 13.14 K’s/9 in August show that the lights-out 2005 Terrence is still buried in there somewhere.

Samantha Chin, #4 Starter: Chin’s break out season continues, as the sophomore starter was nothing but brilliant in July and August.  She went 6-0, with a 2.41 ERA and 0.90 WHIP, and has been just a couple runs of support and a few shaky bullpen appearances short of being a perfect 10-0 so far this second half.  4^th in the league in ERA, 3^rd in WHIP, 5^th in wins, 7^th in K’s per 9, Chin appears well on her way to becoming a superstar in who is surely this year’s breakout player for Daly City.

Sean Wade, #5 Starter: After an abysmal first half, Sean seems to have righted himself back on track, with sub-1.00 WHIPs in both months so far, and an especially dominant 0.75 ERA in July.  While Wade isn’t going to come anywhere close to his rookie season numbers, a seemingly strong finish to the 2006 season is a positive sign that Wade will be able to begin 2007 with a fresh start.

Miguel Pardo, #6 Starter: Pardo suffered a tragic end to his season, tearing his rotator cuff muscle clean off in his 3^rd August start.  He’s now shelved for the end of the season, and perhaps not a moment too soon – his July ERA hit a high 4.38 with 1.38 WHIP, and his three starts in August seemed to show a regression to the Miguel of old, with only 10 1/3 innings in 3 starts, with an 11.32 ERA and 1.84 WHIP.  A somber end to another season of hope and heartbreak for Pardo – one wonders whether he’ll ever break through to become anything more than a #6 starter, especially in Daly City’s stacked rotation.

Helen Yamamoto, Mopup Reliever: After a blistering first half, in which Yamamoto brought her ERA all the way under 3, she’s regressed significantly to her 2005 form – so far in the second half she has a 9.00 ERA and 2.33 WHIP, mostly in non-consequential games.  She still stands at a decent 4.95 ERA and 1.70 WHIP in the season, although if she were to retire right now (as she’s expected to be sent down to the farm at the end of 2006), her 7.30 ERA and 2.17 WHIP career numbers would go down as the worst in Daly City history – a little bit of September effort, and she might manage to get her numbers down lower than Clayton’s 7.28 ERA and 1.67 WHIP

Angel Poon, Middle Reliever: After her shaky start, Poon has been nothing but sheer brilliance since June, with 18 innings of work and a 2.00 ERA and 0.72 WHIP.  While her ERA from 2006’s early months still weigh  her numbers up at 4.19 ERA (right now, a career-worst), her WHIP is a career-best and league-#4 1.02.  On another note, despite another year of declining appearances and innings, Poon has just broken the 200-inning mark, a first for a Daly City reliever.

Alfred Vong, Long Reliever: It hasn’t been a good year for the sophomore reliever, who was expected to make great strides on the mound, but has instead regressed in every way.  Vong was abysmal in July, where he accumulated a 7.27 ERA and 1.73 WHIP.  With Pardo’s season-ending injury, Vong gets a reluctant chance to prove himself, although with the way he’s pitched this year, he hardly seems ready to become a starter.  In two semi-starts so far, however, Vong seems to have risen to the occasion – he filled in for 5 1/3 innings the game that Pardo was injured, giving up only 1 run and earning the win.  The next game, Vong’s first start this season, Alfred pitched a complete game, allowing 2 runs and striking out 8, and accomplishing it in only 109 pitches, no less.  Perhaps this is Vong’s big break – he’s got a whole September (2 or 3 starts) to show his stuff, and all eyes will be watching perhaps Vong’s first and last big chance to make the rotation permanently.

Zubeda Khan, Middle Reliever: The former closer has quietly put together a season of steady improvement – while her ERA at 3.44 isn’t much better than last year’s at 3.47, and she’s blown 3 saves as a middle reliever, her WHIP has dropped dramatically to 0.93 (good for 2^nd in the league, if she was an inning qualifier).  Perhaps more tellingly, her Component ERA has dropped from last year’s solid 3.28 to a gaudy 2.27.  She’s been the one steady part of a tumultuous season in the bullpen, and who knows… she may well see herself back in the closer’s role next year.

Alvina Chu, Setup Reliever: It’s been a season of ups and downs for Chu, who seems to have put it all together in the last three months after a dreadful April and May.  She’s 4-0 with a 0.93 ERA in 19 1/3 innings since June.  However, her WHIP remains at a high 1.27 (including a scary 1.67 August WHIP), and her CERA is a pedestrian 3.24.  She has, however, only blown 1 save in 8 opportunities this season, although she’s allowed 41.2% of her inherited runners to score.  On another note, her 7 wins this year puts her in the all-time lead for reliever wins with 27, toppling Sarah Jimenez’s old record.

Josiah Leong, Closer: What looked so right has gone horribly wrong this second half for Leong.  The player who led the league in saves and had a sub-2.00 ERA at the end of the first half has been hammered all second-half, posting a 9.95 ERA and 1.84 WHIP. He’s also blown a staggering 9 saves so far this season, far more than any Daly City closer in history, and 2^nd in the league.  Despite all this he’s still 2^nd in the league with 31 saves , is #1 with 12.8 K’s per 9, and could conceivably become the 1^st reliever in Daly City history to strike out 100 batters in a season.

It’s the midseason, July 1^st, 2006, in the land of Monti Bizarro Baseball. After a somewhat disastrous start to May, the Daly City Montis have rebuilt themselves into dominant form. Fresh off a 15-game winning streak (and 21-4 overall June), the Montis are now 59-22, .728, and leading the 2^nd place Apple Septic Tanks by 9 games. The team is once again in dominant form, with a league-first 3.23 ERA, and 2^nd-place 468 runs scored (trailing the Canon Image Stabilizers’ 497 runs).

Daly City seems to have regained its form, and appears to be cruising to another Division Championship, although their 9-game lead is more tenuous than in any year past. What’s more, for the first time the Montis are looking at some formidable competition all around in the league. While they top the league in almost all pitching statistics, as expected this year, the offensive machine has been more mortal, though still good. They’re 2^nd in runs, but whether that’s sustainable is a legitimate question – they top the league in OBP, but lag behind a lot in SLG, with only .439 (which ranks 5^th out of 16 teams). Most importantly, the rival top-team Canon Image Stabilizers of the Shinto-World league, who faced Daly City in the finals last year, has far and away the top offense in the league, although their pitching doesn’t hold a candle to Daly City’s.

It’s been an exciting half so far, and with three months to go, anything can happen.

On the Daly City homefront, the pitching staff has settled into a strange mellowness – the staff as a whole has been performing fine, but no one, outside of Yan, of course, has shown much signs of dominance. The bullpen has been in taters all year, except for one surprise standout. On the offensive front, things have gone pretty much as expected, with the lineup barely hanging on together and eking out just enough offense to get those wins.

Tina “Experimental Error” Quach, Catcher: After a slow start in April, Quach has come around to her usual production levels, hitting a combined .317-.379-.411 over May and June, filling in nicely in the OBP department, with a surprisingly high AVG as well. What Quach is lacking, however, is true run production – she has 27 RBI and 39 Runs, mostly due to a poor .269-.354-.299 line with runners in scoring position, which thus far has kept her in the bottom of the order, besides otherwise decent stats.
Stats:

Marco Paz, Backup Catcher: The power-hitting prospect has been off to an abysmal start so far in the season. His meager .250-.317-.515 numbers in AA last year might have indicated he wasn’t yet ready for the big leagues, and so far at least, those projections have born out. In 71 plate appearances he’s .132-.141-.206, not really finding any kind of groove. As a result, he hasn’t seen that much time behind the plate, either, logging only 111 defensive innings. Hopefully his power numbers come along as the season progresses, as Paz is one of the few power-hitting prospects the Montis have got.

Derek Lew, First Baseman: After a promising April, Lew has been bashing away at a steady clip and seems to be demonstrating a full comeback from his injury-riddled 2005 (he also hasn’t missed a game). He knocked in a tremendous 36 RBIs in May, and is, like before, hitting towards record doubles numbers – he’s hit at least ten every month, and is on pace for 74, which would tie his 2004 record (although in less at bats). He also has 10 triples, which leads the league and already breaks his previous career high of 6 in 2005 and 2003) With a .552 slugging percentage, he’s by far the best hitter on the team, and the only one to remain consistently good all throughout the first half.

Rudy Puzon, Designated Hitter: Puzon got off to a blazing hot start, and didn’t let up at all in May, going .330-.403-.563. Puzon dipped significantly just before the all-star break, however, with a disappointing .247-.330-.443 start. Puzon nonetheless leads the team in OPS, and is second in OBP, SLG, and AVG, and hitting from the #3 spot, has the highest RBI+Run total of any player on the team. While his June cool-off seems to be temporary, Puzon seems to have solidified himself as the real deal in 1 ½ seasons of playing time.

Cristian Ortiz, Second Baseman: Ortiz has been hot and average this season – after starting the season off with a mediocre .265-.312-.393 April, Ortiz hit .318-.381-.482 in May, and then dipped down to .258-.348-.340 in June. His numbers are in line with his 2005 season, except that his ability to hit for power seems to have disappeared . While his numbers have been fluctuating, his patience at the plate seems to be improving – he’s increased his walks drawn every month, and the one constant for Ortiz has always been speed – this season he’s faster than ever, with 42 steals that seems set to obliterate not only his previous career high (58 in 2005), but Cubilo’s league record as well.

Joanna Maung, Saung-gah-basewoman: After three seasons under the shadow of former superstar Joey Wong, Maung has proven herself, well, sufficient at third base. After she started out with a hot April that somewhat concealed an alarming lack of power (.333 AVG, but only 2 extra base hits for a .354 SLG), Maung had a rough May (.247-.319-.329), before bouncing back to the kind of solid, consistent numbers that she’s showed the previous three years: .293-.375-.424. If she can continue hitting at that level, she’ll have played out the team’s most optimistic expectations from Maung’s first full year. Defensively, Maung hasn’t fared so well at third base – her fielding percentage of .935 is disappointing, especially compared to the rest of the infield (Nghe, .963, Ortiz, .979, Lew, .999).

Henry “Mr.” Nghe, Shortstop: Perhaps the fairy-tale story for the sophomore shortstop is over. After surprising everyone by winning the rookie of the year award in 2005, Nghe picked up right where he left off with a sizzling April, quieting many critics who said he was overrated. In the two months since, however, Nghe has fallen back to Earth, hard. While he hasn’t been bad, Nghe’s numbers have been very average – .278-.346-.364, most shocking of all being his complete power outage (last year he had a SLG of .545)., fueling many of those same critics who have said all along that Nghe has outperformed his ability.

Jonathan “The Cheet” Chee, Leftfielder: Following up on last year’s breakout season, Chee is once again having an awesome season – he’s batting .318-.413-.449, about in line with last year’s numbers. In fact, Chee leads the team in both AVG and OBP, and has been a run machine at the top of the order. A trivially alarming sign, however, is Chee’s low hit-by-pitch rate – he’s got 20 this year, compared to his record-shattering 49 from 2005. While he still leads the league, #2 Jabba Desilijic Ture has 19 HBP, trailing Chee by only one.

Tiffany Ho, Centerfielder: After a typical first two months, Ho seems to be showing signs of blossoming into a strong contact hitter – in June she hit .337-.378-.446, and overall is .294-.323-.391, already improving on her rookie season, with half the year still to go. She seems to love the home crowd, where she has a .327-.361-.442 home split against .263-.285-.342 on the road. Defensively, Ho’s been showing great improvement – Ho’s zone rating of 1.96 dwarfs that of the other outfielders (1.40 for Chee in leftfield and 1.58 for Chen in right), although she still can’t cover quite the same range that Cubilo did (2.35 in 2005). Nonetheless, Ho seems to have grown into a very capable replacement at centerfield, a slightly better hitter and slightly worse fielder than her predecessor.

Francis Chen, Rightfielder: Just when you thought Chen was back, it turns out he’s… not. Chen followed up his huge April with another flashy, although not quite as spectacular, May, going .195-.340-.524, hitting another 7 homeruns and winding up with the league lead. Chen faltered in June, however, putting up the ugly .212-.303-364 numbers of the Francis of old. Interestingly, like Ho Chen has a noticeably home-road split. At home he’s hitting like the all-star Francis Chen – .264-.391-.568, but on the road he’s an abysmal .162-.289-.385. This actually somewhat mirrors his 2005 splits – hm… maybe a platoon is in order?

Jason Liu, Backup Outfielder: Things just haven’t been bright for poor Jason Liu. After being “swiftly” ousted from his starting job by old-fashioned politics, Liu struggled out of the gate, while his rival Francis Chen had a monster season, further eliminating any hope of Liu regaining his starting role. Since then, Liu doesn’t seem to have found his groove anywhere – he had a good .275-.351-.549 May, but hasn’t really found a groove anywhere else otherwise – so far he’s .226-.273-.481 on the season, although his 9 HR is actually not that far off of the mark.

Nathan Yan, #1 Starting Pitcher: In a season that hasn’t gone so well for the pitching staff, everything is going right for Yan, who seems to be on an extended fire streak – in three months he hasn’t registered an ERA over 1.00, or a WHIP over 0.60. In addition, Yan’s maintained his amazing 18 K’s per 9 innings rate and is all set on actually breaking the 500-K mark (right now he’s projected for 572 K’s!) Since his two 20-K performances in April, he’s hit that mark another three times, hasn’t struck out less than 14 batters, and on June 24^th, threw a 21-K NO-HITTER. Things look better than ever for Yan, who just may have reached god status with his now 0.08 CERA.

Whitney Anne Esguerra, #2 Starting Pitcher: It’s been a weird, trying season for Esguerra. After an extremely promising April, she’s now had an abysmal May, highlighted by a 4 2/3 inning, 11 run (8 earned) start. She seemed to come into her own in June, however, going 2-0 in five games with a 2.84 ERA and 0.92 WHIP, garnering her first shutout. She’s also second on the team in K’s, 2^nd in ERA, and 3^rd in WHIP.

Terrence Zhao, #3 Starting Pitcher: Zhao has been perplexingly average all season this year, and has only a 66.7% quality start rate, compared to his 87.1% last year. His complete games (2), and shutouts (1) also indicate that Zhao is far from the dominating form he’s had the past two years. His CERA, however, still indicates a dominating 2.69 (despite his 3.44 actual ERA).

Samantha Chin, #4 Starting Pitcher: Chin has followed her spectacular start to the season with an equally impressive May – she went 4-0 yet again in 5 games, with an even lower 2.68 ERA and 1.03 WHIP, and seemed to be well on her way to becoming one of the game’s elite. She somehow got derailed in June, however, with a 5.40 ERA, although a somewhat more forgiving 1.20 WHIP. Perhaps the best indicator is that her CERA, at 2.93, is third best on the team and 8^th best in the league. All in all, Chin seems well on her way to developing into one of the best pitchers on the team, and yet another cornerstone of the Daly City rotation.

Sean Wade, #5 Starting Pitcher: Wade’s fall from grace continues to spiral. While Wade hasn’t been as bad as in April, he hasn’t done much to turn his season around – his May and June ERA was 4.39, with even worse WHIP numbers (1.50 and 1.35 in May and June), along with a rapidly disappearing ability to strike batters out (5.96 K’s per 9 in May, 5.40 in June, off from 7.3 in 2005). With a 5.18 ERA and a 4.92 CERA that doesn’t give much cause for hope, the season only looks to drag on for Sean Wade.

Miguel Pardo, #6 Starting Pitcher: What can be said about Miguel Pardo? The sporadically brilliant pitcher is once again on his good side, and so far this season, he’s achieving – dare I say it? – consistency. After a good April, Pardo has gone 3-1 in five starts (including a shutout), achieving a decent 3.85 ERA and 1.23 WHIP. So far in the season, Pardo’s 3.47 overall ERA ranks fourth on the team, and were he to have enough qualifying innings, 11^th in the league.

Alfred Vong, Long Reliever: It hasn’t been a good sophomore follow-up for Vong. While he’s pitched a lot of innings (39, putting him on pace for 78), he hasn’t been particularly effective. His K’s per 9, ERA, WHIP – almost everything is worse than his first season. He’s blown two out of two save opportunities (last year he blew none in 7 chances) and has allowed 4 out of 9 inherited runners to score (compared to 3 of 17 in 2005). What’s happening to Vong? Is it mechanics? Tiredness? No one seems to know, but at this point he’s got to be thanking Wade for providing those mopup long relief situations to pitch in.

Helen Yamamoto, Mopup Reliever: Color this a surprise. After an abysmal 9+ ERA 2005, and coming back to start the season with a 7.72 April ERA, Yamamoto has somehow transformed herself into the second best reliever on the team with a 0.96 ERA since May and 3.21 ERA overall. Her WHIP, however, is still a scary 1.43, so the mopup reliever’s newfound brilliance may not last for long.

Angel Poon, Middle Reliever: After a nasty April, Poon didn’t seem to improve a whole bunch in May, when she threw a nasty 10 innings of 5.40 ERA ball. She’s begun to show signs of life in June, however, when she had a 1.69 ERA and 0.56 WHIP over 5 1/3 innings. Perhaps Poon is back to form? Despite a high ERA, her 1.15 WHIP is back to her career average, and actually lower than last season.

Zubeda Khan, Middle Reliever: Talk about lights-out brilliance. Like the rest of the bullpen, Khan came out with an abysmal April start, but has flourished in the time since then. While none of the other relievers really were, Khan proved to be a rock of consistency in May, throwing 7 1/3 innings with a 3.68 ERA and 1.09 WHIP. Since then, however, Khan has just been other-worldly brilliant – she’s currently on an 8-inning shutout streak, during which she’s also carrying an 0.25 WHIP. Maybe removing her from the closer’s role was a bit premature… or maybe it was just the ticket she needed to rebuild her confidence.

Alvina Chu, Setup Reliever: Chu pitched and struggled again in May, with a 4.82 ERA and 1.61 WHIP over 9 1/3 forced innings. With June has come some glimmer of improvement – her 1.50 ERA and 1.00 WHIP harkens back to the Alvina of old, although her season numbers are still at an ugly 4.50 ERA and 1.27 WHIP. Chu does, however, have six reliever wins, leading the league and setting her on pace for a career-high twelve.

Josiah Leong, Closer: From the category of sheer brilliance comes Josiah Leong, who after struggling a bit with a white-knuckle April, has settled into one of the most dominant closers in the league. Leong saved 5 games with a 1.00 ERA and 1.11 WHIP in May, and then vaulted into the leaderboard with 10 saves, a 0.47 ERA, and 0.88 WHIP in June. He’s striking out batters at an amazing 12.9 K’s per 9 innings, and he seems to have been particularly thorough with right-handers, who have a .069-.213-.069 line against Leong. With 23 saves, Leong leads the league by two, and has 1.71 ERA ranks 4^th best, and best in the Universe League.

It’s a month into the season, and already big changes are evident in the dying Spring air of the 2006 season.

At the conclusion of April, Daly City stands at 19-9 (.679), tied with the Canon Image Stabilizers in the Shinto-World League for the best record in the majors.  However, the Monti’s 19-9 mark is not only their lowest starting mark ever, but leaves little margin for error as the all super-.500 Galactica Division hotly tails the team, with the Apple Septic Tanks two games back, the Mozilla Firefoxes 3 games back, and the Microsoft Longhorns 4 games back.

Despite standing atop the standings, Daly City is far from being the dominant team it used to be.  It’s ranked 2^nd in runs scored, and with a 3.79 team ERA, a full run over 2005’s ERA, ranked 3^rd in pitching.  What’s been plaguing the team?  Everyone knew the team would be worse hitting-wise, losing a huge chunk of production in Batter of the Year Joey Wong and all-star catcher Sam Lau.  Compared to 2005’s .304-.369-.484 average line, the team is down to .283-.357-.436 – a similar on-base ability, but a huge power outage (OBP in fact ranks 1^st in the league, while SLG is 5^th out of 8 teams).  The problem seems to have stemmed from a lack of any midrange whatsoever.  Several players (Derek Lew, Rudy Puzon, Henry Nghe, and surprisingly, Francis Chen) have all performed fairly well, each slugging in the .521-.546 range.  After this, however, there is a significant dropoff to Jason Liu, who slugs .429, Jonathan Chee, who slugs .404, and then 3 ¼ more sub-.400 sluggers after that.  Lacking a 1-9 slot of consistent slugging power, and lacking a single supreme slugging force (like Wong, or the Lew of years past), Daly City seems to be struggling a lot more with scoring runs.

On the pitching side, there seems to be a heavy contrast between the rotation and the bullpen.  The rotation’s ERA is a fairly low 3.15, which is still a bit higher than usual.  However, the bullpen ERA is at a hideous 5.93, driven by several abysmal performances among nearly every single member of the bullpen (save Josiah Leong, ironically).

Despite the struggles, Daly City is still winning, although these days there seems to be more haphazard duck-taping of the leaks rather than smooth sailing.

Tina “Experimental ErRR” Quach, catcher: After finally inheriting the catcher position after two seasons waiting in the wings of Sam Lau, Quach began the season behind the plate… only to fall flat when stepping up to it.  She’s played in 23 games out of 28 so far, but has done so with an abysmal .228-.287-.304 line.  Defensively she’s getting her bearings straight, and despite a weak arm has thrown out 3 out of 9 would-be base stealers.  One of the biggest drop-offs so far from 2005 production, Tina definitely needs to turn it around for the team to return back to form.

Marco Paz, backup catcher: The rookie hasn’t seen too many chances so far he’s had 7 starts to play, and in 30 plate appearances, a .143-.167-.250 line to show for it.  Given time, Paz looks to come around, although at this time there really isn’t much to see.

Derek Lew, first baseman: After a bit of an agonizing 2005 season, Lew looks to be back to form so far in 2006.  He’s hitting .277-.346-.546, and while his contact numbers are a little off, he’s slugging every bit as well as he used to, and is currently Daly City’s top power hitter in terms of slugging.  A surprisingly new aspect of Lew’s game is his newfound penchant for walks – after only 14 in all of 2005, Lew already has 11 so far in 2006, a .083 BB/PA that far exceed’s 2005’s .027 BB/PA.  With Wong gone, Lew emerges as the veteran and leader of this team, and so far he’s done a superb job returning to form and leading what’s left of the hit parade.

Rudy Puzon, designated hitter: There’s no sophomore slump for this rookie hitter, who burst right out of the gate to hit .333-.412-.541 in 27 games, averaging well over his 2005 numbers in each category.  Part of Daly City’s new 3-4-5 core of Puzon, Lew, and Nghe, Puzon has so far been instrumental in keeping the team afloat, and his continued hitting is vital to the run production of the team, especially in his dual role of run-driver for the 1-2 hitters and place-setter for RBI leaders Lew and Nghe.

Cristian Ortiz, second baseman: Hounded by critics all offseason, Ortiz appeared to silence most of them as he raised his batting average to well over .300 in late April, only to see a slump that would bring it all the way back down to a meager .265-.312-.393 line.  While a single month isn’t very telling, the beginning of the season has been a bad sign for Ortiz, whose critics have lamented that he performed far pass his actual skill level in 2005.  On the bright side, Ortiz has 13 steals in April, putting him on pace for 78, which would just barely top Cubilo’s record.

Henry “Mr.” Nghe, shortstop: The rookie of the year returns in 2006 to slightly less flashy numbers but overall better performance.  While his batting average of .333 is off his league-leading .362 mark, a newfound ability to walk and new penchant for extra base hits has left his OBP at .430, higher than 2005’s .408, and his .536 slugging not far behind 2005’s .545.  Hitting at the backend of the 3-4-5 core, Nghe is tied for the league in RBI, and perhaps due to his high OBP, also leads the team with 21 runs, despite having only the 6-7-8 hitters to drive him in.

Joanna Maung, saung-gah-basewoman: Coming in with the need to fill big shoes, and at the same time with no expectation to do so, Maung in her first full starting role has adapted beautifully.  Both her AVG and OBP at .333-437 are career highs, yet at the same time her SLG of .354 is a career low.  Despite cranking out the hits and walks at a dizzying pace, Maung has only 2 doubles, leaving her with 31 singles out of 31 hits for a shocking .939 1B%.  While the team will take what it can get – solid on-base production – from a good tablesetter, there’s some luster missing from a Joanna Maung who no longer hits those clutch pinch-hit homers.  When or if those start to come around, Maung looks, surprisingly, to join the echelon of elite hitters on the team, at least based on her performance so far.

Jonathan “The Cheet” Chee, leftfielder: After making a big name for himself in 2005, Chee returned again to a permanent starting role in LF.  He’s been doing well so far, with a .314-.392-.404 line that isn’t too far off from his 2005 numbers, although he’s scored only 16 runs despite hitting well at the #2 spot in front of the 3-4-5 core.  HBP-wise, Chee’s monthly total of 4 is a far ways off from his 2005 total of 49, so he’ll need to start leaning in towards those beanings if he wants to duplicate his 2005 success in that regard.

Tiffany Ho, centerfielder: After a meager half-season with not much in the way of noteworthy statistics, Ho plowed into the 2006 season as the starting centerfielder.  While her fielding has been decent, her batting abilities are clearly still developing.  With a .292-.309-.349 line, she’s been building up her average, although her OBP and SLG numbers aren’t really going anywhere for now.  Time will tell, but until then Ho slaves away at the bottom-of-the-order 7-8-9 slots.

Francis Chen, rightfielder: Guess who’s back to form?  Surprise!  It’s Francis Chen, who was set to become a bench player in favor of Jason Liu, only to be brought back by grassroots activism.  It turns out that all 2005 postseason indicators (where Francis went .244-.404-.805) were correct – so far this season Francis has batted .234-368-.521 and leads the team with 7 HR, right around where most optimists estimated his performance, and setting the stage for potentially greater development in the coming months.  It’s always a roller coaster ride with Francis Chen, so stay tuned to see what happens in the coming two months.

Jason Liu, backup outfielder: Once slated in the offseason to become the opening day rightfielder for the first time, Liu surprisingly found himself back on the bench, despite arguably being Daly City’s best hiter in 2005.  Maybe it’s frustration and discouragement, but Liu hasn’t been hitting well at all so far, with a mere .171-.189-.429 line (check out that AVG to SLG ratio though!).  As long as Francis Chen keeps slamming away and The Cheet keeps getting on-base, the plate appearances may be hard to come by for Liu, especially if he keeps hitting like this.

Nathan Yan, #1 Starting Pitcher: It’s been a rough month for Yan, who somehow still comes out better than his 2005 average.  In his first start Yan got slammed for a career-high 10 hits in only 8 innings, allowing 4 runs (only 1 earned).  He was, however, still set to win that game, when he handed off the ball to Josiah Leong for the save.  Instead, Leong BLOWS THE FIRST SAVE OPPORTUNITY OF THE SEASON and renders Yan with his first ever career No Decision, breaking the streak.  Since that first game, Yan has bunkered down, throwing four complete games but only one shutout.  Nonetheless, his 0.82 ERA is fairly below 2005’s 0.98 ERA, and Yan’s K per 9 rate has skyrocketed to a godly 18.2, over last year’s already-record 15.3.  Yan also threw a 20-K game in his 2^ndstart, and tied that record again in his 5^th start.

Whitney Anne Esguerra, #2 Starting Pitcher: The rookie starter has had four great starts and one bad one thus far, and has emerged with a 1-2 record to show for it (including a complete game 1-run loss), which isn’t too surprising given her team-low 2.9 runs per game.  She’s currently pitching at a 2.83 ERA, 1.06 WHIP level, which just may be the best performance from a rookie pitcher in years.  So far, she’s shown every bit of the potential that put her into the #2 slot, and it’s just a matter of time (and some offensive support) before the wins start rolling in.

Terrence Zhao, #3 Starting Pitcher: Another victim of poor and inconsistent offensive production, Zhao, like Esguerra, has thrown four good starts and one bad one, including a 9 2/3 inning, 1 run performance that went far into extra innings and resulted in a no decision.  Zhao’s ERA stands at 3.77 and his WHIP at 1.29 with a 1-1 record, but the real culprit has been his low 5.2 runs per game offensive support.  On the plus side, Zhao seems to be gaining a little bite on pitches, striking out 9.9 K’s per 9 innings and fast approaching the magical 10-K mark.

Sean Wade, #4 Starting Pitcher: The steadfast rookie, who has built his reputation on consistency in his rookie year, has been anything but so far this season.  In four out of five starts Wade has given up 6 runs or more, and yet the fifth start was a complete game shutout.  This all combines together for a 6.35 ERA and 1.24 WHIP, which may easily be Wade’s worst month ever.  However, with a team-high 9 runs per game offensive support, Wade’s record stands at 2-1.  So early into the season it’s hard to make any judgements, but Wade’s performance thus far has been most disappointing, to say the least.

Samantha Chin, #5 Starting Pitcher: Going through her rookie year brimming with potential, Chin seems to have achieved that sooner rather than later.  So far through April, she’s 4-0 with 2.92 ERA and a 1.11 WHIP, although she’s thrown with a more consistent style rather than sheer dominance (no shutouts or complete games, but four out of five quality starts).

Miguel Pardo, #6 Starting Pitcher: For yet another year, the enigmatic Pardo starts out the season blazing, defying all analysts’ predictions.  In three starts this year (all quality starts), he’s 2-1 with a 2.86 ERA, including a beautiful 2-run complete game, despite a high-ish 1.32 WHIP.  As always with Miguel, it’s a game of roulette every time he takes the mound, but for now it seems as if luck is on his side once again.

Helen Yamamoto, Mopup Reliever: I guess the one thing that can be said about Yamamoto is that she has improved.  Where her ERA used to be 9.35, she’s now down to 7.72, her WHIP down from 2.54 to 1.93.  She’s given up an earned run in every appearance she’s made, although she’s not actually the worst of the bullpen woes…

Angel Poon, Middle Reliever: What’s happened to the steady Poon?  Once humming along steadily as one of the team’s better relievers, Poon seems to have hit a very rocky spot.  Her ERA has ballooned to a team-high 8.53, with her WHIP at 1.58.  Could this be the beginning of the end for Daly City’s longest-tenured reliever?

Zubeda Khan, Middle Reliever: Khan seems to have taken her fall from the closer’s role hard, as she gets slammed for a 6.43 ERA and 1.43 WHIP in her first month as a middle reliever.  More than anything, she seems to be particularly affected by big hits, having given up 3 HR and 3 doubles in only 7 innings of work (her SLG of .688 is far higher than 2005’s .408).  Like the rest of Daly City’s ailing bullpen, things need to turn around quick for Khan before the efforts of the rotation and feeble offense are squandered away.

Alfred Vong, Long Reliever: Things have gone from bad to worse for Vong, and no one is quite sure why.  His ERA has risen all the way to 5.89.  In his share of close games, Vong has stepped in to throw 4, 4, and 6 inning outings, which may be stretching things  a bit for the young reliever (he’s on pace to throw 110 innings, after having only thrown 63 2/3 in 2005).  Surprisingly, his other performance metrics aren’t all that bad, with his WHIP at 1.15 and both AVG and OBP numbers lower than last year’s. Maybe a bit of luck is all Vong needs, and the team is hoping the bullpen, and most especially Vong (who’s thrown 30.2% of bullpen innings), finds it soon.

Alvina Chu, Setup Reliever: The leader of the Daly City bullpen, it’s perhaps most shocking of all to see the troubles of Chu, who owns a 5.91 ERA from two very bad relief outings.  Her 1.13 WHIP still offers hope, however, although it is a far cry from her 0.91 2005 WHIP.  At the very least, Chu is no longer vultering those starter wins into no-decisions…

Josiah Leong, Closer: When the team announced that Josiah Leong would be returning to the closer role in 2006, everyone braced themselves for one hell of a ride.  Leong has delivered, to say the least.  In his first four appearances Leong blew three saves (and in the process three wins, including Yan’s first no-decision), going into extra innings in both of them to win two for himself and lose the other.  Outside of those three blown saves, however, Leong has been flawless, and since his last blown save has gone six shutout innings with only 2 hits and 2 walks, and seven consecutive saves.  In fact, with 8 saves, Leong currently leads the league!  With a return to the bullpen, Leong is also throwing at a 3.95 ERA, 1.24 WHIP clip, slightly below his career averages, and throwing out his three blown saves, has got a 0 ERA and .60 WHIP.  More rough spots can be expected along the way, but perhaps this current shutout streak is a sign that Leong may have finally put it all together as a dominant reliever.

The morning shines again on the Daly City Empire.  Of course, these days the sun never really sets.  On yet another sunny April in the Gateway to the Peninsula, spring training abounds yet again with the same enthusiasm, determination, and fresh faces.

Coming off yet another World Championship, last year’s team nonetheless fell short with their first sub-.800 season in history, finishing at 125-37, .772.  The falloff was somewhat expected, given the mass departures of team stalwarts such as 3-4 hitters Ho and Tienturier, a .951 OBP SS Mok, and a full ½ of the pitching staff.  If 2005 was any indicator of how Daly City could carry on without many of its star players, 2006 might see even further decline.  The 2005-2006 offseason saw the departures of all-star catcher Sam Lau, Batter of the Year Joey Wong, speedy CF Aubrey Cubilo, and reliever Katie Clayton.  The trio of batters accounted for 337.4 out of the team’s 1083.7 runs created, or 31.1%, and so far none of their replacements seem completely capable of approaching their production levels.

There are new faces, and new roles, however.  Last season’s crop of promising rookies return, and this year sees two new rookies in starting pitcher Whitney Esguerra, who looks to take role of #2 starting pitcher, and catcher Marco Paz, who will likely fill into the backup catcher position.  In the wake of the latest round of retirements, longtime backup catcher/utility outfielder Tina Quach finally gets her chance at the starting catcher position, while longtime benchwarmer Joanna Maung steps into the big shoes left by Joey Wong at third base.  The centerfield position is the biggest question – Tina Quach, having the best CF defensive ability, used to fill in here (21 games in CF in 2005), but with her new role as catcher, Tiffany Ho seems the best candidate (67 out of 100 defensive rating), although her hitting skills are still a bit underdeveloped and her defense is better at the corner outfield positions.  Jason Liu, with a 55 out of 100 CF rating, also seems capable, although again his defensive skills seem much better suited for the corner positions.  On the pitching side, the departure of Clayton has opened up a spot in the bullpen, which no other than 2005’s closer, Zubeda Khan, steps in to fill.  After a tumultuous season filled with blown saves, the closer position for 2006 goes back to a known commodity in Josiah Leong, who despite shaky stats managed a bottom line of 40 saves and only 3 blown saves in 2004.

More than ever, the team seems to rest on the strength of the pitching staff – though still quite formidable, the lineup has taken yet another strong punch this year, and would be hard-pressed to repeat last year’s league high 1085 runs.

Without further ado, the hardened sophomores, old stalwarts, and new faces of Daly City’s 2006 team.

Tina “Experimental Error” Quach, Catcher: After two years as an understudy to retired all-star catcher Sam Lau, Quach finally moves up to take the reins of the catcher position.  Playing in two partial seasons, Quach has shown signs that she can be a capable on-base hitter, with her .381 career OBP, but this season will be a test of how well she can sustain that level of production over the course of an entire season, in addition to handling her defensive responsibilities as catcher and her management of the pitching staff.

Marco Paz, Backup Catcher: Straight from AA ball, Paz is a new recruit who spent part of 2005 in the minor leagues, beginning in AAA where he struggled and then moving onto AA, where he batted .250-.317-.515 in 20 games. While still a bit underdeveloped, the retirement of Lau and the lack of any other viable catcher meant that Paz was needed up with the major league club to serve as a backup.  The 17 year old is projected as a below-average defender, although he has a cannon arm.  His hitting skills are in the below-average range, but as indicated by his short time in AA last year, he projects out to be an average hitter with decent slugging skills.  He’ll be watched closely as the season winds along, making sure he isn’t impossibly challenged at the major league level, in which case someone else, such as emergency catcher Jonathan Chee, would have to fill in.

Derek Lew, First Baseman: After a vigorous offseason of training, Lew bursted into spring training like a vicious Vladimir Guerrero-type swinger.  So far he looks like he’s been more aggressive free-swinging with the bat, meaning even less walks and a bit more strikeouts, but he’s also been doing it with much greater contact and power than last season.  With last year’s disastrous campaign, Lew is looking to come back, and in a big way.  With Joey Wong gone, Lew remains the last of the “Big Four” of hitters of the inaugural 2003 team, and more than ever, the offensive production will rest squarely on his shoulders.

Rudy Puzon, Designated Hitter: Puzon looks to follow up his explosive rookie season with further development, although it might even be fair to say that he had already began hitting like what many hitters projected he would do after he reached his prime. After a solid all-around performance, with no clear weaknesses in his game, nobody knows what to really expect in terms of development for Puzon.

Cristian Ortiz, Second Baseman: The defensive wizard surprised everyone last year as he turned in a strong statistical season, most especially on the basepaths.  Despite being deemed Daly City’s “breakout” player of the year, many of the league’s scouts still rate Ortiz as simply average in almost all categories, and put strong doubt on whether Ortiz can replicate his 2005 numbers.  2006 will be the year Ortiz proves that his ‘breakout’ performance was no fluke.

Joanna Maung, Saung-gah Basewoman: After three years coming in from the bench, Daly City’s most prolific pinch hitter steps into her first starting role.  With only limited playing time over three seasons, Maung has shown decent OBP ability and virtually no power skills, although it’s anyone’s guess what kind of hitter Maung will actually be in her 4^th year and 1^st full season.  On the defensive side, Maung has been training hard, and has built herself up to a very respectable 61 defensive rating at 3B. She certainly won’t be an MVP Joey Wong (or will she?) but in terms of sheer love for the game and enthusiasm at finally getting the coveted starting third basewoman role, she may yet turn out to be the Wiggin to the now-retired Wong’s Bean.

Henry “Mr.” Nghe, Shortstop: Reigning Rookie of the Year and oldest player at the same time, Henry Nghe returns for his sophomore campaign hoping to continue on his first-year success.  Surprisingly, like Ortiz many scouts still have doubts over Nghe’s ability, believing he far exceeded performance expectations last year.  Without a dedicated middle infield backup in Kelvin Chang (since retired back to AAA), both Nghe and Ortiz will test their endurance and look to gut out all 162 games on their own out in the middle this year.

Jonathan “The Cheet” Chee, Leftfielder: Daly City’s “comeback” player of the year, Chee looks to continue his tremendous success into 2006, this time going the distance to play in a whole season (last year, he played in only 119 games and had 446 at bats).  Chee’s slated to be in either of the 1-2 leadoff positions, where he’ll set the table for the more powerful hitters with his team-high career .392 OBP.  Having come ever so close to the 50 hit by pitch mark (he had 49 HBP last year), Chee looks to make another run, this time possibly getting there with a full season.

Tiffany Ho, Centerfielder: Taking over the reins from longtime incumbent Aubrey Cubilo, the rookie Tiffany Ho, who had an unremarkable rookie year (.279-.305-.361), is one of the biggest question marks.  While she’s still one of the more promising hitters in terms of skill, she hasn’t demonstrated the ability to hit well yet.  Although originally a corner outfielder, with Quach at catcher, Ho is the best fielder left at the center position, although her 67 CF rating lags behind her 77 rating at the LF and RF positions.  Nonetheless, she’ll be thrown out of the frying pan and into the fryer, starting centerfield on opening day in baseball’s biggest small-town stage.

Francis Chen, Rightfielder: The enigma Francis Chen returneth once again.  Afer enduring a horrendous 2005, Francis was dropped from a starting role, replaced by slugger Jason Liu, and at times, utility player Tina Quach.  After toiling away all during the regular season, however, Chen seemed to catch on fire in the postseason, batting .244-.404-.805 in 41 at bats.  Despite all this, he was about to be dumped back to the bench, or even back to the minors for more conditioning, before the Daly City fans emerged.  All winter long they picketed and protested the stadium and front office with a grass-roots “Bring Francis Back” campaign, ultimately succeeding when management gave in to demand.  So by popular demand, the oft-inconsistent and fleetingly brilliant Chen is back to his role in RF, ready to take a backseat manage whenever Yan is on the mound, albeit with a tighter hook than ever.  He’ll have to jump out of the April gates full blast if he hopes to establish any security at the RF position.

Jason Liu, Backup outfielder: For the third straight year, Jason Liu finds himself starting the season on the bench, despite consistently demonstrating his skills at the plate, and in the field.  After a breakout rookie campaign in 2004 and a strong 2005 followup, Liu was all set to become the starting rightfielder, before the “Bring Francis Back” campaign derailed the club’s plans.  For now, Liu remains on the bench, his pure strength and raw power ready to pounce the second Chen begins inevitably slipping at rightfield.

The Pitching Staff

Nathan Yan, #1 Starter: After a record-shattering 2005 campaign, in which he went 30-2 yet again, with a 0.98 ERA and 0.48 WHIP, the staff ace and three-time reigning Pitcher of the Year returns with his overpowering arsenal of stuff.  Virtually unrivaled anywhere in the league, at this point it’s pretty much just a guess of what record highs he’ll accomplish next.  Zero-loss season?  A 500-K campaign?  30 complete games?  In any case, Yan is on track to surpass 1000 career innings, 1500 K’s, and 100 wins, and 100 complete games and 50 shutouts is not out of the question either.

Whitney Esguerra, #2 Starter: After a year of demonstrating her skills in the minors, rookie Whitney Esguerra makes her way to the big leagues in a surprise move, taking over Josiah Leong’s spot in the rotation.  The young right-hander comes in fully polished already, with a 93-96mph fastball, good control and movement pitches, and dominating stuff.  Her Stuff-Control-Movement rating is 101-77-70, with a talent potential of 124-78-96.  Spending nearly a full season in the minors in 2005, Esguerra pitched 29 games, dominating with a 27-0 record, 2.01 ERA, 0.77 WHIP, and 341 K’s in 246 innings (that’s 12.48 K’s per 9, and 8.48 innings per start!

Terrence Zhao, #3 Starter: Daly City’s unexpected staff ace continues to flourish.  A year after a breakout 2004 campaign, Zhao found himself with yet another breakout beyond all expectations.  There doesn’t seem any stopping Zhao, who worked hard to improve his control, his one point of slight weakness, this offseason.  Zhao looks to continue his winning ways and dominating stuff, although he once again finds himself sitting pat behind the #2 spot for the second straight year.

Sean Wade, #4 Starter: Daly City’s other star rookie is back for a sophomore season.  Wade was a breakout success in his rookie year, and despite not having spectacular stuff, cruised by on sheer consistency to earn himself a 3.00 ERA and 1.00 WHIP.  All signs point to Wade repeating his rookie success, although his second-half dropoff in performance could be some cause for reservation.

Samantha Chin, #5 Starter: Chin finds herself in the not-so-enviable role of being the best #5 pitcher in the league, by a far margin.  With at times dominating stuff, Chin floundered with a bit of inconsistency in 2005, with a 4.06 ERA.  Her 3.23 CERA, however, indicates that she can do a lot better, and much like Zhao breaking out in 2004, after a shaky 2003 that was brimming with potential, many scouts believe Chin will break out into one of the league’s most dominating pitchers this seasons.

Miguel Pardo, #6 Starter: Daly City’s #6 returns to round out the DC6, the only rotation in the majors consisting of 6-man rotation.  Pardo has improved in some aspects – his 2005 season certainly saw significant improvement over his past seasons, although the second-half Pardo looked much more like Miguel at his worst.  It’s perhaps time to see if Pardo can work his fleeting magic once again, and it might be his last chance to do so, with new rookie Alfred Vong breathing down his neck for the #6 slot.

Alfred Vong, long reliever: The oft-forgotten rookie pitcher, Vong spent much of 2005 as the long reliever, a role in which he was, in a word, inconsistent.  While clearly displaying good all-around talent, consistency has been a bit of a problem, which is why Vong once again finds himself back in the bullpen.  With a little more time to develop, however, Vong looks to become a solid pitcher, and could look to dislodge Pardo from his coveted #6 starting spot soon.

Helen Yamamoto, mopup reliever: After the worst season in recorded history, Yamamoto returns in 2006 with her 2005 numbers not leaving much to hope for: 9.35 ERA and 2.54 WHIP, and an opponent’s line of .379-.475-.672.  The upcoming season will probably be make-or-break for Yamamoto, as the reliever, especially the mopup kind, seems to be a dying breed in the Daly City system.

Angel Poon, middle reliever: Once again, Poon finds herself in the middle relief role, although the increasingly better pitching staff and increasingly closer games may mean even fewer innings than ever.  While her ERA has been erratic – 4.15, 2.88 3.75, Poon has shown consistency in her WHIP (1.14, 1.14, 1.19), and she looks to fill in a few, although likely not many innings, in middle relief.

Zubeda Khan, middle reliever: Once the team’s great hope at closer, a season marred by blown saves and stretches of downright atrocity have left her out of the running, despite averaging out to a decent 3.47 ERA and 1.14 WHIP in 2005.  She joins the regular bullpen, although like Poon she doesn’t expect to see many innings this year, especially with the development of Vong at long relief, the introduction of Esguerra, and the movement of starter Leon to the closer role.

Alvina Chu, setup reliever: Perhaps the most maddening member of the bullpen in 2005, Chu put it down with one of the league’s best 1.70 ERA and 0.91 WHIP, yet at the same time blew wins and saves like no other.  Still, over the past two years (102 innings, 2.03 ERA, 0.96 WHIP, 95 K’s), she’s been Daly City’s most dominant reliever by far, and she once again earns her spot as the team’s setup woman.  Forever the bridesmaid, never the bride, I guess….

Josiah Leong, closer: After an unsuccessful try at turning rookie Zubeda Khan into closer material, it was an offseason back to the drawing board, and at this point, the best Daly City has turns out to be none other than their 2004 closer, Josiah Leong. Partly driven by his prior experience, and partly by his abysmal track record as a starter, 2006 will bring Leong back to the bullpen, where he pitched 58 1/3 innings with a 3.70 ERA, 1.27 WHIP, and 40 saves in 2004.  All signs point to things being more of the same for Leong, who still hasn’t quite gotten a handle on his control issues, but many still hold out hope for a Gagne-like conversion (without the Gagne-like injury flameout)

On a closing note, everyone’s contract ends after the 2006 season, so it’s time to rework those $1/year salaries.  That’s right: Contract year for everyone.