Thursday, April 17, 2008

And That Happened

Tigers 13, Indians 2: Miguel Cabrera goes 4-6 with 5 RBI, Edgar Renteria drives in five of his own, and suddenly the Tigers and Indians have the same record. Unless you truly believe that the Royals and White Sox are going to keep up their current pace (which I don't), you can pretty much ignore all of the hand-wringing over the Tigers' awful start, because they are back on the prowl. If you wanna worry about something, worry about C.C. Sabathia, who is currently 0-3 with a 13.50 ERA in what has started out as the worst contract year in the history of free agency. I'll have more on CC's dreadful start later this morning.

Yankees 15, Red Sox 9: The starters -- Wang and Buchholz -- combine for 7.2 IP, 17 H, and 15 ER. For the record, this is the fourth night in a row that the Red Sox have been on television here in Central Ohio. Game times for those four games: 4:08, 3:24, 3:40, and 3:55. Quite frankly, if I don't see Kevin Youkilis' beard again for a year it won't be too soon.

Cubs 12, Reds 3: The progression of Josh Fogg's starts this season: (1) 5 IP, 1 ER; (2) 4 IP, 6 ER; (3) 2 IP, 9 ER. If he gets another start I think he'll travel backwards through time somehow. Carlos Zambrano not only goes seven strong innings, but ads in 3-4, 2B, RBI at the plate.

Diamondbacks 4, Giants 1: Brandon Webb can pitch a little bit (8 IP, 3 H, 1 ER). It's painfully early, but right now the Dbacks look like a team primed to run away with a division that most people thought would go down to the wire this year. While there are a lot of guys with worse ERAs than Barry Zito's 4.50, he has only struck out eight guys in 22 IP this year, which has gone a long way towards earning him that 0-4 record.

Astros 2, Phillies 1: Kyle Kendrick was good (7 IP, 2 ER) but Roy Oswalt was just a bit better (7 IP, 1 ER). The difference: a homer from phormer Phillie spark plug Michael Bourn -- late of the Brad Lidge trade -- who hit the difference-making homer off of Kendrick in the 5th. These things happen.

Mets 5, Nats 2: According to the AP recap, the Shea faithful chanted obscenities at Lastings Milledge when he was hit by a pitch in the eighth inning. Classy, New York, classy.

Marlins 6, Braves 5: Atlanta drops their third in a row, and is now 0-7 in one run games.. Given the injuries to Glavine, Hampton, and the bullpen, the Braves really needed more than three innings out of Tim Hudson, and they didn't get it. Chipper Jones is leading the NL in hitting, though, so there's that.

5 comments:

Unknown said...

I can only hope for more Sox games here. Last season was my first time living outside of the Sox TV reach and it hurt to not be able to turn on the tube and catch the game whenever I wanted. The start of the season thus far has been a joy for me.

Anonymous said...

APBA Guy-

Amazing watching the confidence levels of Boston and New York hitters yesterday. Three runs down? No problem. It was like a game in Colorado, pre-humidor.

Out here in the Bay Area, we enjoy the Yankees or Red Sox on national TV for the contrast. 10 runs in one game! Impossible!

SF got 1 run on 3 hits, and Oakland got 2 on 8.

Although, the games do go by quicker...

Anonymous said...

I can't believe how off you are on the whole pitching record thing. Zito is 0-4 because the Giants have scored something like 1.5 runs in support of him!!! I'm not trying to say that he's pitched well this year...but to say that he deserves an 0-4 record with a league-average ERA is simply dumb. I love your wit, humor, and baseball intelligence...but I feel like I should be losing respect for you today. Maybe just for one day.

Craig Calcaterra said...

cobweb: I realize you aren't saying that Zito has pitched well this year. How about acknowledging that I'm not saying he has pitched terribly? Obviously the run support has been putrid -- I'm not denying that. All I'm saying is that his very poor strikeout ratio (not to mention the number of hits he has allowed) hasn't helped him overcome it.

Anonymous said...

Yeah okay...well...fine.