Eh. Their was a bunch on Astros twitter calling for Walter to come out for the 8th. It's not exactly a hindsight is 20/20 thing. He was only at 82 pitches, he was cruising, and the bullpen has been taxed lately. It made perfect sense.
My favorite win of the year today. Everything headed south in the 8th and yet we got it. Keep finding a way.
In 8 of the 10 starts for Walter, he's given up 2 runs or fewer. 6 of those 8 starts have been 1 run or fewer. He still has only logged 1 victory.
He already pitched a career high 7 innings. You also don't want him to face the lineup 3rd time around. Take what was given to you by him and use your strong bullpen. At this point, when is the bullpen not taxed?
All the broadcast could talk about was how effective Walter has been the third time through the lineup, like decidedly better. Joe certainly has this info staring him in the face. But Joe thinks he's got a bunch of Abreus in the bullpen. That's not how this works.
He tested it out in the 5th, 6th and 7th innings. Lol Nobody got on base, 8 up, 8 down. 0-8. Not sure why y'all are fighting this. Joe made a moronic move with Sousa pitching in his 4th game in 6 days (for those that keep saying that's the reason Abreu wasn't available today). Point blank, terrible game management. I would have put Abreu in the 8th. But certainly the backup option was Walter to pitch that inning.
The law firm of Gusto Gordon Walter and Alexander are now 12-8. Funny enough the best of the bunch by far, Walter, is only 1-3 despite 8 fantastic starts.
Before today’s game, his numbers 3rd time through the order were great. Only had given up 1 run in 39 plate appearances holding hitters to a .135 average. They only got better after today’s performance. Like you said, he didn’t have any stressful innings and he was still going strong in the 7th.
