And That Happened

Bonus Holiday Edition!

I'm not gonna be blogging today. There are parades to attend, meat products to grill, fireworks to watch, and alcohol to consume. And my afternoon is pretty packed too.

But I do feel obligated to recap last night's action as it's The American Thing To Do.

Diamondbacks 6, Brewers 5: Milwaukee led 5-0 entering the bottom of the ninth. This should be easy work! Single. Walk. Single. Double. Single. Double. Single. Ballgame. The best part: you know that given the score half the people left the park before the inning started.

Phillies 4, Braves 1: The Braves are now seven back of Philadelphia. They have lost eight of nine to the Phillies this year. You do the math.

Dodgers 5, Astros 2: According to the game story, Chad Billingsley said he threw only three offspeed pitches through the first four innings and didn't start throwing breaking balls until the fifth."I was getting the fastball in for strikes on the first pitch and I was able to get ahead in the count," Billingsley said. "I was just sticking with the fastball." In other words, the Astros were only able to muster two runs against batting practice.

Reds 5, Nationals 3: I watched most of this game from Chez Shyster. This was fun: top of the fourth inning, Former Red Dimitri Young at the plate. Reds' announcers George Grande and Chris Welsh are talking about the good old days:

Grande: Young always produced when he was with the Reds. In his four years here, he was at .310, .300, .303, and .302.

Welsh: Are you talking about his weight?

Giants 8, Cubs 3: Tim Lincecum (6 IP, 7 H, 3 ER, 8K) sat down on his legs, relaxed his shoulders, got his left side on target, and picked up the frickin' dollar.

Red Sox 7, Yankees 0: Jon Lester shuts out the Yankees. I don't mean to shortchange his effort, but making New York miss wasn't that hard given that lately Yankee players are more concerned with trying to avoid process servers than they are about playing baseball.

Royals 10, Orioles 7: Tony Pena hit a home run. That was his fourth career home run in 726 at bats. If there is any justice in the world Garrett Olson -- the man who gave up that home run -- is, as we speak, being forced to buy the drinks for each and every person on the Orioles active roster.

A's 3, White Sox 2: Quite a duel between Vazquez (CG, 4 H, 3 ER, 10K) and Duchscherer (7 IP, 5 H, 2 ER), but the guy with the 1.96 ERA won it behind blasts from Jack Cust and Donnie Murphy.

Mets 11, Cardinals 1: Mitchell Boggs had given up nine runs through three innings, but La Russa didn't pull him. Why? The Cards had used six pitchers in Wednesday night's win, and dammit, the bullpen needed rest. This was Boggs' turn to wear it, and wear it he did, throwing his 100+ pitches, giving up his ten hits, eleven runs, and six walks, and taking one for the team in every sense of the word. We rightfully celebrate outstanding performances and understandably boo poor ones, but I have always found there to be an admirable nobility in a pitcher wearing one like Boggs did. It would probably be unseemly in front of the hometown fans and on television for his teammates to high five him after such an ugly loss, but I hope that the Cardinals players gave Boggs some modest fist bumps and respectful nods back in the clubhouse.

Tigers 8, Mariners 4: This could be fun: "During his pregame session with reporters, Tigers manager Jim Leyland said 'it's a possibility' when asked if Joel Zumaya could be a starter next season."

Rockies 6, Marlins 5: Due to a postgame fireworks show, over 48,000 people showed up at Coors Field. I'm guessing that was pretty unsettling for the Marlins.