Thursday, April 3, 2008

And That Happened

The shutout edition . . .

Nats 1, Phillies 0: All spring the Phillies kept calling themselves "the team to beat." So far, the Nats are taking them up on their gracious offer. By the way, this game featured Ryan Zimmerman's second game-winning homer in three contests. I'll be in my bunk.

Mets 13, Marlins 0: David Wright: 3-5, 3RBI, 2b, HR. Rob Neyer will be in his bunk.

Royals 4, Tigers 0: Brian Bannister (7 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 4 K) takes his head out of the spreadsheets for once and plays a damn ballgame, later returns to mother's basement.

Red Sox 5, A's 0: Kevin Youkilis sets record for consecutive games at 1B without an error, as he finished his 194th straight without an E-3. Oakland fans set record for getting shown up in their own home stadium, as the crowd reportedly consists of 75% Sawx fans.

Angels 1, Twins 0: The Angels' two pitchers -- Joe Saunders (8 IP) and F-Rod (1 IP) need only 90 pitches to shutout the Twinkies.

Blue Jays 5, Yankees 2: A-Rod hits a 2-run homer after his team is down by five. How un-clutch can he be?

Indians 7, White Sox 2: Am I the only one who had the feeling all winter that Fausto's Faustian bargain was going to end this year and that he'd start to get shelled this season? Well, it ain't happening yet.

Giants 2, Dodgers 1: I pick on them when they lose, so I need to give them props when they win. Wait, no I don't. They won this game by using Lincecum on both sides of a 1 hour+ rain delay, after jerking him around by deciding at the last minute not to start him (he came out of the pen). He still threw 84 rain-interrupted pitches in four innings. And he had to score the go-ahead run himself. As of now the Giants have still only scored 4 runs in 3 games, putting them on a pace (I know, I know) for 216.

8 comments:

Unknown said...

Is that a Firefly reference I spot? One of my favorite lines in the whole series! Nice one. Very professional.

Craig Calcaterra said...

Yes sir, that would be. I'll say no more, however, lest my inner-geek reveal too much of itself.

Anonymous said...

Lincecum is a freak. He says he had to deal with that stuff all the time in Washington so I bet it didn't take a huge toll on him. Anyway, the Giants won. Their pitching was outstanding. In fact, outside of Zito, their pitching was great the whole series. This is why the Giants can at least put up a good fight everyday. I don't care if they only score a couple of runs. Well yes I do. But, what I mean is that with solid pitching they will at least avoid blowouts. They held a good, offensive Dodgers team in check. Take that Craig-man.

Craig Calcaterra said...

Lincecum and Cain and pray for tons and tons of rain?

OK, that's fine as far as it goes. However, I have this feeling that as the season wears on and their superhuman efforts continue to go unrewarded with decent run support or defense behind them, they will start to lose focus and desire, and there will be a dropoff.

Unknown said...

Aric beat me to it, but I was very excited to see this Firefly reference! And I think it's applicable in this case ;)

Craig Calcaterra said...

Yeah, man crushes are rare for me, but when I get them, they die hard.

(I can't quit you Ryan Z . . .I. can't. Quit. You.)

Anonymous said...

No, actually I'm really excited to see Sanchez get a chance to start. His stuff is above-average. Can he control it? That's why we play the games. Correia could be enjoyable too. So I'm hoping for rain once every five days, that being Zito's day.

Anonymous said...

And I also think you underestimate the drive and character behind Cain and Lincecum. Plus, future paychecks are enough to drive them I'm guessing.