And That Happened

All law and no blogs makes Craig a dull boy. Let’s try to remedy that today, shall we?

Nationals 8, Pirates 4: The Laughingstock Series went four games, and nothing was decided. Adam Dunn went 3-for-4 and was a triple short of the cycle. He may as well have been eight unicorns, cold fusion and a perpetual motion machine short, because you were just as likely to see that stuff as an Adam Dunn triple.

Tigers 6, Orioles 5: I’m going to go out on a limb here and guess that not many teams have tagged Justin Verlander for five runs right out the box and have gone on to lose the game. Heck, the Os had five hits in that first frame and only had three the rest of the night. I haven’t seen anyone start so fast and peter out so quickly since Christopher Cross won all those Grammy awards back in ’81.

Padres 4, Braves 2: Can someone explain to me why the Braves had to play the Sunday night game right before flying across the damn country and playing on the west coast without an off day? Twelve teams had friggin’ off days yesterday, but not the team who played the late game and had to fly to California? Sure, that’s fair. And tired or not tired, I couldn’t be more proud of my Bravos here, losing to perhaps the worst team in baseball on a night when they did not even play Adrian Gonzalez.

Brewers 6, Dodgers 5: And lest you think that previous bit is my Braves’ homerism coming out, it stunk that the Dodgers had to fly home and play without a day off too. Totally weak scheduling, here. At least the Dodgers had a chance here. Down 6-2 entering the ninth, the Dodgers came back to within one, loaded the bases and Manny Ramirez came to the plate . . . and flew out, alas.

Diamondbacks 6, Mets 5: The Dbacks teed off on Nelson Figueroa (1.2 IP, 10 H, 6 ER) and could have turned it into a laugher. Instead, New York clawed back, though just not quite enough. You’ll all be shocked to learn that Jeff Francoeur made the third out in the eighth inning with a bouncer to third to end a potential rally. Mark Reynolds took Sunday off, but still finished the series 5-for-12 with four homers and five RBIs.

Cubs 4, Reds 2: Thank goodness for Kevin Gregg’s tired arm, or else Lou might have been tempted to use him in this one. As it stood, Carlos Marmol just didn’t have it in him to cough this one away, instead only allowing one late run. Mike Fontenot’s three-run homer in the second was the big blow here. The Cubs are now 13-5 since the break. Paid attendance: 22,222. This means something. This is important.

Astros 4, Giants 3: You don’t see a ton of complete game losses anymore, but Matt Cain had one (8 IP, 8 H, 4 ER, 5K).

Rays 10, Royals 4: Zack Greinke has his worst start of the year. He hasn’t won since June 28th, though apart from last night he hasn’t pitched too terribly. Eventually you just sort of get dragged down by the folks around you, I guess. More surprising than Greinke getting roughed up — and maybe even more surprising than an Adam Dunn triple would be — was Yunieksy Betancourt hitting a homer. As for the Rays, Willy Aybar hit two homers and Scott Kazmir got his second straight win.

A’s 3, Rangers 2: Just a thought, but if you’re going to use Neftali Feliz out of the pen, maybe you want to think about using him as the closer. Dude pitched two innings, retired all six batters he faced in order, struck out the first four, in fact, with several pitches registering at 100 miles per hour. In the ninth, C.J. Wilson gave up three singles and a pinch hit triple to Rajai Davis, blowing a 2-0 lead.


13 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
MooseinOhio
14 years ago

I am somewhat afraid to make note of this but the scheduling of the baseball season has always made me wonder if the folks creating the schedule have an understanding of factors that will impact: 1) the ability to play the games as scheduled (e.g. opening the season in Cleveland); the nature of rivalries and playing home and home series in September when drama can be heightened (Red Sox and Yanks have only played three games in Sept for the past several years); and 3) travel time and when off days make the most sense (e.g. Craig’s comments).

I am sure that the task of scheduling games is laborous, full of challenges and thankless but it seems to me it could be improved to eliminate some of the aforementioned issues.

Matt in Toledo
14 years ago

The Tigers had a similar situation recently. They played on ESPN (lost as they always do when they’re playing before the boobs announcing for The Network) and then flew off to Texas for a game the next day. They lost and the only good thing was it gave me more reason to complain about the bone-headed scheduling.

Steve
14 years ago

The Braves’ local TV guys have been complaining about the Sunday night game followed by a West Coast swing for a few days now.  They cast ESPN as the villain.  I guess MLB sets the schedule, then ESPN (like Fox on Sat) picks their games to reschedule.

Chipmaker
14 years ago

It was probably Two-Face robbing the box office, during which he insisted that attendance number be posted on the scoreboard.

Time was he only robbed the gate receipts during doubleheaders, but they just cannot be found these days.

During the annual Heroes-Villians softball charity game, he bats second, and plays second base.

Kelly
14 years ago

I expect 2000 words from Plaschke today about how Manny isn’t worth it based on that fly out.

Ben
14 years ago

How’d it go yesterday, Craig?

themarksmith
14 years ago

Why 8 unicorns? Are there 7 others that I don’t know about?

Craig Calcaterra
14 years ago

Ben—hard to say.  Rough case, and the judges gave me a hard time, but I just lost another case that I never would have thought I’d lose, so it’s fair to say that one never knows with these things.

Ben
14 years ago

At least you know they cared about your argument.

APBA Guy
14 years ago

Feliz was completely dominant: the A’s didn’t even get a good foul ball. He has a ++ fastball, and his slider is effective mainly because the fastball is so devastating. He easily went 2 innings, while both Francisco and Wilson showed vulnerability.

Texas can’t afford to lose these games with the way Anaheim (sorry LAA of Anaheim) is playing. But you can’t fault Wash completely: this was Feliz’s first MLB appearance. He caould have blown up as easily as he dominated.

The A’s are playing with much more energy since Coors Creature Matt “Just Visiting” Holliday and Jason Giambi are no longer in the lineup. Giambi is unfortunately set to rejoin the team today, claims to “feel great”, which means Geren will probably be told by Beane to put him in the lineup to provide automatic outs to the opposition.

10,500 last night in the Mausoleum. Attendance has dropped faster than anyone predicted. We got our good performance from Brett Anderson last night, that means the next 6 rookie pitcher outings will be awful.

themarksmith
14 years ago

So, if they had used Wilson earlier, they would have just lost the lead earlier, or were you advocating a 4 inning save? I’m cool with that, and I’m sure Nolan Ryan is all for it, too. Matter of fact, I’m surprised Ryan didn’t run down there and make Feliz go back out for the last few innings and then fire Washington for coddling Feliz.

Grant
14 years ago

Two thoughts:

1. I’m pretty sure that back when Sidney Ponson was merely below-average, rather than atrocious, his specialty was the CGL.

2. Don’t waste Perez by making him a mere three-out, lead-only reliever. Make him a 2-3 inning high-leverage situation super-reliever. Something like what Keith Law is always harping about.

scot
14 years ago

hey, at least frenchy made the d-backs work before he killed that rally. In the 8th inning at bat, he grounded out on the first pitch. Nice.